Tip # 19 Get Comfortable With Being Wrong
May. 31st, 2015 11:41 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wingedbeastRemember last tip. This is not a battle, a game, or even a formal debate. This is a conversation where you share and explore ideas. Without knowing you, I can say one thing, for certain, about you. Some of your ideas are wrong.
I did not just insult you. I did not just make an assumption about your level of education, your amount of available information, or any other element about you. All I did was state that you share something in common with every single human being ever to exist. You may claim one human being as an exception, but that human being would not be yourself.
That understood, take a moment and a breath. Repeat these words. "I am wrong about many things. I am wrong about some important things." Get really comfortable with that reality. You'll never be without factual error. You can, however, achieve a state of being less wrong than previously.
Now, the next time you are contradicted on a statement of fact or on the validity of a certain argument, stop and ask yourself a question. Does your faith need you to be right about this? Chances are that the answer is "no".
Do your research to confirm that you were, actually, wrong on this claim, sure. But, denying that you are wrong or, worse, ignoring the correction just so you can go on repeating the same corrected misinformation, only keeps you from becoming less wrong.
At bare minimum, finding out that you are wrong should result in your alteration of your arguments to fit the new information. Some may have to be rethought. Others may have to be dropped entirely. You don't have to stop arguing, just adjust to reality.
Additionally, acknowledging the correction would show a little class.
But, a refusal to acknowledge error doesn't refuse to cede ground. Remember last tip, here, this is not a game. You won't earn points by repeating already corrected misinformation or arguments that rely upon same.
Refusal to acknowledge error only tells us, the nonbelievers, that you lack for honesty and that your faith lacks for the ability cope with contact with reality.
I did not just insult you. I did not just make an assumption about your level of education, your amount of available information, or any other element about you. All I did was state that you share something in common with every single human being ever to exist. You may claim one human being as an exception, but that human being would not be yourself.
That understood, take a moment and a breath. Repeat these words. "I am wrong about many things. I am wrong about some important things." Get really comfortable with that reality. You'll never be without factual error. You can, however, achieve a state of being less wrong than previously.
Now, the next time you are contradicted on a statement of fact or on the validity of a certain argument, stop and ask yourself a question. Does your faith need you to be right about this? Chances are that the answer is "no".
Do your research to confirm that you were, actually, wrong on this claim, sure. But, denying that you are wrong or, worse, ignoring the correction just so you can go on repeating the same corrected misinformation, only keeps you from becoming less wrong.
At bare minimum, finding out that you are wrong should result in your alteration of your arguments to fit the new information. Some may have to be rethought. Others may have to be dropped entirely. You don't have to stop arguing, just adjust to reality.
Additionally, acknowledging the correction would show a little class.
But, a refusal to acknowledge error doesn't refuse to cede ground. Remember last tip, here, this is not a game. You won't earn points by repeating already corrected misinformation or arguments that rely upon same.
Refusal to acknowledge error only tells us, the nonbelievers, that you lack for honesty and that your faith lacks for the ability cope with contact with reality.
