The truly intellectually honest way to disagree: Take the idea in question, and give it some genuine love. Make an earnest attempt to make some form of the idea work in the context of everything you know.<p>This is my litmus test for first-class minds. I've been using this for the past 25 years and I've found that those who truly take this approach are 1) uncommon, 2) impressively smart, 3) genuinely curious, and 4) seem to offer the highest chance for truly profound and productive interactions.<p>Most often, people fail this test by not using this technique at all, or trying to pass off its doppleganger.<p>Such people are very easy to spot. Simply pay attention to the possible interpretations of what other people say. You are looking for the one who's always interpreting what others say in the best possible light and who runs with other's ideas, often in a delightful and surprising way.<p>EDIT: The fakers are easy to spot, by the their bias towards finding fault for other's ideas or their eager gravitation towards straw-man interpretations when more interesting alternatives are easily imagined.
I was just imagining how different hacker news would be if there were tags on each comment/post indicating what levels of disagreement hierarchy are contained within. I can't imagine a practical way to implement it but imagine the effect it would have on discourse if people were constantly reminded what they were reading/writing.
Tangent:
When I was reading this essay I couldn't help myself from imagining a counter essay (in satire) that argues a reverse valuing of the hierarchy of argument quality indicated by Graham. Additionally the quality of the argument to argue each tier's quality would be made using it's inverse tier's quality.<p>I.e. For DH0, name calling, a thorough argument would be made that it should in fact be the highest tier of argument DH6. It would be elaborate, with supporting examples and scenarios that would refute the central point of DH0 arguments being ineffective.<p>Then by the end, DH6's counter argument would be of quality DH0.
The argument would simply be "This is just dumb, Paul Graham is a fag." [disclaimer: inline with the example given in the DH0 tier. Not actually my opinion :)]<p>On topic:
Arguments that include DH0's tend to invoke a jerk-neck reaction from me, causing me to immediately discredit an entire (possibly well formed) argument. So much so, that even when only affiliated with such behavior good arguments lose all credibility. For example, in the 2008 election, when emails were constantly flying back and forth through the mailing list, I'd see forwarding of articles written in legitimate and well formed manner making valid statements. However, the forwarder would have prefix some DH0 level quip above the quote or article link which immediately made me write off the entire content. I.e "Barack Obama-bin-laden setting up death panels! <insert article link here>". Even if the article was bringing up valid concerns, and itself was well written--it was already sabotaged by being associated with infantile-ness.
<i>The most convincing form of disagreement is refutation.</i><p>The only "problem" is that it may be "objectively" convincing, but it rarely convinces the person who's opinion/belief you refute, especially if there are deep emotional or irrational underpinnings, e.g. religion/fear/indoctrination, etc.
Complementing that essay somewhat, a list of fallacies:
<a href="https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/List_of_fallacies" rel="nofollow">https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/List_of_falla...</a><p>And cognitive biases:
<a href="https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases" rel="nofollow">https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/List_of_cogni...</a><p>Although not all are equally bad.
If you liked this list, you might be interested in:<p>Language in Thought and Action <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Language-Thought-Action-S-I-Hayakawa/dp/0156482401" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/Language-Thought-Action-S-I-Hayakawa/d...</a>
by S I Hayakawa <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SI_Hayakawa" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SI_Hayakawa</a>)<p>The Art of Conversation <a href="http://www.basicincome.com/bp/artofconv.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.basicincome.com/bp/artofconv.htm</a><p>And Ben Franklin's Autobiography <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/148" rel="nofollow">http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/148</a>
The more interesting idea to explore is why people disagree in the first place. Most arguments that I witness are more about relationship positing than trying to prove a point. This includes jockeying for a better spot in the dominance hierarchy or identifying yourself as a part of a group.
Sorry for offtopic, but (with all due respect to author and content) why da heck 95'ish buttons in website menu? They are burning my eyeballs and make me feel old.
"The most convincing form of disagreement is refutation... The most powerful form of disagreement is to refute someone's central point." This is a subjective statement, presented without evidence [DH6, DH5]. In any particular discussion, the most convincing form<i>s</i> of argument depends on the situation, the information both parties have available and their cognitive styles [DH4]. For example [DH3], sometimes highlighting a person's stake in the issue is often very effective. <a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2156623" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2156623</a><p>As an analytical thinker, Paul seems to be projecting his own preferences to others [DH1] -- and he's left out some techniques that are extremely effective such as appealing to the emotions.
"Most people don't really enjoy being mean; they do it because they can't help it."<p>I wish this point had been expanded upon, but I feel like I just saw a bunch of weasels sucking eggs.<p>It would make a very interesting essay on the origins of meanness, clearly (citation needed) it has evolutionary advantage (or is a side effect of such). I wonder if a poll could be constructed that would given to enough people would support or refute pg's claim. Given limited resources and if it comes down to me feed my family or you feed yours I'm pretty sure the past 600million years of brain development would kick in and side with meanness, but we live in a time of relative plenty and given those conditions I truly wonder where human nature falls.
There's also the difference between disagreeing and trying to change the other person's opinion. Disagreeing is cheap: you just don't agree and that's it. You're not obliged to explain yourself to anyone but yourself.
DH0, upvoted to 5 (while my comments are 0 and -1):
<a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2138625" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2138625</a><p>This was my first day. I stuck around for a day or two, then I just logged out and stopped participating. Just use this as a site to find links, and when you're not logged in there's no incentive to go see what people said in reply to you, and no focus on karma score or anything. I don't know if the site requires a certain level of karma to submit new items, but I don't really feel like submitting things here when I don't feel like they'll get a fair shake. (There were good discussions on some of my other comments, but another one where it became clear that I no real discussion was possible because of ideology combined with the "fucking idiot" comment were enough to have me stop participating.<p>This is just FYI. I'd love for there to be a place to have good discussions with people. I don't know how to make HN that place, and so I'm just going to use it as a source of articles to read.<p>I think all news sites that allow downvoting end up operating as a sort of "smear the queer" system for punishing people who have a minority viewpoint, without regard to how well they articulate it or even what they are actually saying (in some cases.)<p>Edit: Yes this topic got me to log in, and I'll be logging out now. I don't really want to debate the topic that I got attacked over, as my original comment was actually trying to defend someone else's perspective. Please whether you agree with me or not, take this as "market feedback" of what a new user experienced, and why I'm not participating. Maybe I have thin skin in your opinion, that's fine. Maybe I'm way too wordy to participate on a site like this! That's fine too.