Friday, March 27, 2009

Arguing and Believing

I've said in the past that I am an arguer and that, as such, I am incapable of not arguing.  Over the years, I have had a lot of practice arguing and spent much time figuring out how to argue better.  Ironically, so much time spent immersed in logic makes a person jaded about the truth.  Every side of every argument has some amount of value to it, so neither side is 100% wrong.  This means I can argue for and against any side and that I don't actually care about either of them.  They stop being little more than games, mere ideas to manipulate and toy with.  I don't believe anything because everything is relative.

However, every now and then, I come across an argument that is different from the others.  In these special arguments, one of the sides is absolutely wrong.  Every claim is either based on incorrect information doesn't logically follow in any way.  Even the very idea of the argument can't be argued.  Or, at least, it can't be argued by me.

When I come across these arguments, one in which I can find no fault in one side and no value in the other, that is when I believe I have found truth.  Truth, or perhaps absolute truth, is so rare to find in general, let alone when arguing, that it is a very special find.  In fact, when I have found such an instance, where I have tried my best to argue both sides, but only one won, then I stop trying to be fair and accept the one side as truth (at least until somebody else can argue against it and win).

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