The natural answer of "it's fine not to" probably isn't very helpful, but I'll put it out there that it's still usually true, beyond certain things where there's a bit of social responsibility...
The natural answer of "it's fine not to" probably isn't very helpful, but I'll put it out there that it's still usually true, beyond certain things where there's a bit of social responsibility involved.
But generally, big ideas and opinions funnel into smaller ones. What someone is doing if they seem to have an opinion on everything is taking their big convictions and beliefs and squeezing them down into the case that's being discussed. You may not have an opinion on a certain piece of immigration law, but if you have opinions about immigration in general (or race/racism, the concept of a nation, or a multitude of other things), all it takes is the basic information that naturally comes out when talking about it to have something to say. No, it's not fully researched or thought out, but that's part of what a conversation is. You're communicating with someone else where you both are coming from and working from there.
Of course, if you're going to be a reasonable person, this should only be a starting point. You should be willing to see individual bits of information that will change your thoughts on the specific case you're discussing and eventually even the core beliefs that lead to your initial response, depending on how far-reaching the specifics are.
How? On what would you base that opinion? Data doesn't have opinions. Data only tells you what is, not what should be. Let's say that you study the data about immigration. It tells you who...
I would want to ask "what does the data say", look at it, and then form an opinion by interpreting the data.
How? On what would you base that opinion?
Data doesn't have opinions. Data only tells you what is, not what should be. Let's say that you study the data about immigration. It tells you who immigrants are, where they come from, where they live, what types of jobs they take, what contributions they make to the economy, and so on. Lots and lots of data.
But your opinion has to come from you and your beliefs. What do you believe? Is it good to welcome people from other countries? Is it bad to take refugees in? Is it good that migrants spend money in your country? Is it bad that they take jobs from other people? The answers to these questions don't come from the data, they come from you. You have some core beliefs. It's up to you to apply those beliefs to everyday topics.
If you find yourself wanting to find data on a topic, you already have an opinion to work with. In order to have something to do with that data, you need to have something you value. That's the...
If you find yourself wanting to find data on a topic, you already have an opinion to work with. In order to have something to do with that data, you need to have something you value.
That's the thing: You can talk in absence of facts without bullshitting. You can say "If the reality is this, then I would think this is the best way to go." You're giving input, the person can inform you (though obviously you shouldn't take what they tell you as gospel), and you can move somewhere from there. Even if it ends up that the premise was false, working through something like that can be worthwhile and interesting for its own sake. It's like testing your beliefs with hypotheticals, and can put you in situations where you have to really consider if those core values are worth keeping, if being consistent could mean something very bad in a different scenario.
Anyway I wouldn't stress too much about it. To a certain degree we all have a responsibility to the others on this planet to improve things and engaging in politics is one way to do that...but you're also a person with your own life and there's no shame in backing away and focusing on you.
You know yourself better than anyone, but I think most of us can learn the basics of the tiny pool of things that come up in daily life. Ever get in a big web of Wikipedia articles and go further and further down? Try going up next time.
A philosopher and psychologist I very much respected, who spent some time on Buddhist psychology, once told me, "When you get right down to it, every person is always asking the world, is this...
A philosopher and psychologist I very much respected, who spent some time on Buddhist psychology, once told me, "When you get right down to it, every person is always asking the world, is this good for me or bad for me?"
While that may seem like a selfish proposition, the underlying survival wiring that's been selected though a billion years of evolution, bends every perception and thought around the orbit of this question. We can layer multiple levels of abstraction, but they're really just elaborations on the basics of "is this good for me or bad for me".
So in that context, you can decide that it's important to be correct, to gather as much information as possible so you won't suffer the "bad for me" social, reputational injuries of being wrong. Or you can decide that it's "good for me" to participate in greater social engagement.
And if you're genuinely interested in changing how you participate in conversations about opinion, understand that whether the participants acknowledge it or not, they're really making statements about whether they perceive, at some level, that the subject of dispute is good for them or bad for them.
My two cents as someone who can often give an opinion on things I either feel quite mildly about or even not at all... It's okay to just feel something is right or wrong or true or not. Everyone...
My two cents as someone who can often give an opinion on things I either feel quite mildly about or even not at all... It's okay to just feel something is right or wrong or true or not. Everyone has biases and it's important to be aware of them, but you're allowed to, and probably already do have, gut feelings about things. And facts alone don't drive opinions. Say everything you researched about a subject is complete and proven true (which is the ideal), that alone won't "logic" your way to a "correct" opinion. For example, if prematurely ending two billion lives (say the disabled elderly, who can no longer contribute, but is a huge drain on social services and resources), will drastically and greatly improve the lives of over four billion people immediately and for future generations. Say we can proven this to be completely true and functionally we have a foolproof way to execute this. Should we do it? I'm guessing you have a reaction to this. A side that you've already picked. And I'm guessing that reaction is driven more by emotion than you may feel comfortable with.
Of course if something you feel is true is proven false or partially inaccurate, you can change your stance.
How do you decide which movie to watch? Likely these people you're conversing with are just stating their weak opinions much more forcefully than you feel comfortable doing. I personally think...
But I can't just make up opinions on topics that are mostly unknown to me, I need to at least watch the movie first and not just rely on a few spoilers that a friend told me about.
How do you decide which movie to watch? Likely these people you're conversing with are just stating their weak opinions much more forcefully than you feel comfortable doing. I personally think your way is laudable but clearly opinions differ.
There is a threshold for the amount of information that one needs to know about something before he can even say anything about it. Depending on how complex a topic is, the threshold is higher.
I certainly agree and think something I am often guilty of is being too sure without enough information. How did you come to hold & act on this belief? Being corrected in my foolishness has certainly helped me be more humble although I wonder if there aren't innate aspects to it?
I didn't mean to misinterpreted your post, sorry for any confusion or assumptions I made. I do get the threshold idea and there is a certain amount of info you need. I personally wouldn't mind if...
I didn't mean to misinterpreted your post, sorry for any confusion or assumptions I made.
I do get the threshold idea and there is a certain amount of info you need. I personally wouldn't mind if I'm discussing something with someone, and they go "give me a minute, I'm just going to wiki this a bit", but of course this depends on your circle.
For many of the conversations that I am part of, the topics often feel quite complex to me. I figure that I likely know a lot less about these topics than most people, and this is why I don't have opinions on them.
I have a little story for this...I once had a "debate" with a friend about how to exit a specific subway station in Hong Kong to get to some street level shop. They were extremely certain of their path and in the end I conceded with a "I haven't been there in a few years, so it might be different now". Then I asked when was the last time they were in Hong Kong. The answer - never. They've never been! (This was before people looked routes up online and such).
I think it's totally fine to reserve your own thoughts and form an opinion when you feel you've reached your threshold of info required, but I wouldn't assume that others have a similar threshold at all. Confidence is not knowledge, but it will pass for it (more often than people admit), lol.
Your problem is quite simple: you're using logic, while everyone else is using rhetoric. I had this same problem years ago, and I was constantly frustrated with my social interactions. Put this in...
Your problem is quite simple: you're using logic, while everyone else is using rhetoric. I had this same problem years ago, and I was constantly frustrated with my social interactions. Put this in your mind: in the real world rhetoric beats logic every time. You should be aware of the correction of your arguments as a matter of ethics, as it would be immoral to support an untrue and harmful line of reasoning. But you must complement logic with rhetoric. And rhetoric is nothing more than the study of persuasion. Start here.
For a great example of rhetoric in action, get acquainted with this guy.
No, you don't have to. Relax :) I think, if this is a concern for you, does it mean that there's at least a basic relationship between you and the other person, which you feel valuable, and...
Should I really have basic opinions about every important thing?
No, you don't have to. Relax :)
I think, if this is a concern for you, does it mean that there's at least a basic relationship between you and the other person, which you feel valuable, and there's already some basic level of trust ,so that you're feeling it's at least possible to engage them with a different opinion? Because if it's not really a strong enough bond, it's just about coping with boring conversations, and wouldn't have been a big concern -- at least this is how I feel about it.
When I find myself in a similar situation, if there's enough trust, I'd bring the conversion closer to the here and now, the personal, from the abstract realms. I'd let my emotional sense feel the side-channel information, the emotions, that care carried by the ostensibly opinionated speech. Perhaps I'd say, When you say ___ about immigration, I feel you're really concerned about it. Is there a particular reason for this concern? Would you like to talk about it?
Sometimes, this could be a conversation-opener that leads to more relatable experiences. But well, this sort of demands active listening, and I can't be emotionally well-tuned all the time, so there's that.
I don't know if you can relate to this experience. I can't really give you advices, but I'm interested to know how you think about it.
One of the off-putting aspects of opinionated conversation is that often, you're really not expected to have an informed understanding of the subject matter. The conversants are overtly or...
One of the off-putting aspects of opinionated conversation is that often, you're really not expected to have an informed understanding of the subject matter.
The conversants are overtly or unconsciously expecting that you'll affirm or deny a tribal affiliation. The beliefs and opinions of the tribe don't need to be internally consistent (e.g. "pro-life" + pro-death penalty in the U.S.). The demonstration of opinion is simply a membership signifier, that you adhere to a nebulous cluster of values which binds tribal identity.
The purpose for the conversation is that in one way or another, you'll out yourself as having an identity in common (ally) or other (enemy).
The best outcome for this is the active listening scenario that @zoec described - you can emphasize your common humanity and allyship by expressing empathy.
But there will be people who identify you as an enemy simply for not showing which tribe you belong to. In a way, you're already demonstrating membership in a tribe of people who value data over strong emotion, who are disinclined to take sides or express an opinion if both sides are wrong or underinformed in some way.
I don't want to oversimplify a complex topic, but would refer to material like this for more detail. You mentioned the problem of opining outside one's expertise, but I've spent enough time...
I don't want to oversimplify a complex topic, but would refer to material like this for more detail.
You mentioned the problem of opining outside one's expertise, but I've spent enough time chasing various curiosities to have heuristics for when I can state an informed-enough opinion.
Wow. Eliza lives! :) This is a classic therapy technique.
Perhaps I'd say, When you say ___ about immigration, I feel you're really concerned about it. Is there a particular reason for this concern? Would you like to talk about it?
Wow. Eliza lives! :) This is a classic therapy technique.
I tend to be one of those folk who seems to have an opinion on just about every topic on the planet. It exhausts people sometimes and has caused me a bit of stress that they think I'm an expert...
I tend to be one of those folk who seems to have an opinion on just about every topic on the planet. It exhausts people sometimes and has caused me a bit of stress that they think I'm an expert just because I know that South Sudan has been in turmoil for a little while now (or whatever the random focus of conversation happens to be).
The way I see it is that I'm kind of a jack of all trades of a conversationalist. I know a little bit about a lot of things, but not all that much about any of them. So I can get a conversation started in a lot of cases, but I can't often sustain it without going into areas I'm less knowledgeable about. Suits me fine usually because if it goes that route the other person is the expert and I can just lean on their knowledge. There is a problem when other people aren't experts though.
Part of this was just developed naturally over time. I've long worked by associating a topic with a random piece of information I learned about it--well, random to me but usually being a reasonably well known or recently reported fact about the topic. The piece of information is usually just a factoid about something that happened. I live with the world of fact much more than I do with the world of opinion, but fortunately that's what other people are for.
That's a lot of the subtext for why I might often steer a conversation toward politics and news. They are topics I'm reasonably sure someone has some view on, even if I am not entirely sure what view I have on the topic myself. It's the same reason some people talk about a recent movie or TV show. Shared experience binds us, and talking about shared knowledge can help break the ice on what might otherwise have been a difficult to start conversation.
I also typically am comfortable talking about any political issue with just about any person regardless of their political beliefs. Most of that is because I don't usually firmly articulate many opinions on the topics (though I do articulate enough to demonstrate I have Feelings(^TM )). For example: "I read recently that elected Republicans are talking more about impeachment than elected democrats. I think the reason is pretty clear: Democrats simply cannot impeach Trump without Republican support, and they won't even try." A nice self-contained, not-too-judgmental political point that can launch from there wherever the listener wants to take it.
I would look for what topics interest or drive you. Surely there's something that interests you, and you probably know much more about that topic than I do (see also: a little bit of everything,...
I would look for what topics interest or drive you. Surely there's something that interests you, and you probably know much more about that topic than I do (see also: a little bit of everything, not a lot of anything). I don't need to ask for your opinion on everything under the sun, because chances are you won't have an opinion on everything under the sun (who cares about the migratory patterns of Monarch butterflies? I ask because there are two hundred or so in my backyard roosting at the moment, but also because almost no one actually does care).
If I'm going to ask you something you probably don't know much about, it'll be because there's a pressing reason it interests me. I'll have to share that reason and the some context that can give you a chance to form your own opinion before I even get too far into sharing my view. It's just polite.
Yes. I've been reading your replies in this thread, and it's clear that you're over-thinking this - probably because you feel like your opinion has to be "correct". You've created a false pressure...
Maybe I'm the only one feeling this slight uneasiness when it occurs while the people I'm talking with don't really mind.
Yes. I've been reading your replies in this thread, and it's clear that you're over-thinking this - probably because you feel like your opinion has to be "correct". You've created a false pressure on yourself to always be right. But you don't have to be right. Opinions don't have to be right, they have to be yours. Opinions are about personal expression, not about being a professor.
It's probably more to do with a specific type of speaker than anything you or I do, I think. There are a (small) group out there of bloviators who enjoy hearing the sound of their own voice, and...
It's probably more to do with a specific type of speaker than anything you or I do, I think. There are a (small) group out there of bloviators who enjoy hearing the sound of their own voice, and don't enjoy listening all that much. Whether it's because they like feeling like only they know about the topic at hand, or because they're just excited to talk to living, breathing people who are also talking to them, or some other reason, I've had a few experiences where I would struggle to get in a word edgewise with people (edit: and it's at this point that people who know me would turn their heads at me in shock that I could be silenced).
I think the main differences between them and me are that I typically am quite interested in what other people are thinking and they ... don't seem to be as much. It's hard to know which of us pops up in a room more often, but I think it's fair to say we're both quite rare.
I have a good buddy and when we where younger we would argue a lot about everything though it was more discussion. 90% of the time I would just take the opposite view or he would, just so we could...
I have a good buddy and when we where younger we would argue a lot about everything though it was more discussion. 90% of the time I would just take the opposite view or he would, just so we could discuss it.
Now I have a bit of a problem because I will do this when talking to other people and often I get opinons atributed to me that I don't really hold because I like to argue.
So I guess try argue from that neutral spot and just take a side also find people that you know well who will not take it to seriously.
The natural answer of "it's fine not to" probably isn't very helpful, but I'll put it out there that it's still usually true, beyond certain things where there's a bit of social responsibility involved.
But generally, big ideas and opinions funnel into smaller ones. What someone is doing if they seem to have an opinion on everything is taking their big convictions and beliefs and squeezing them down into the case that's being discussed. You may not have an opinion on a certain piece of immigration law, but if you have opinions about immigration in general (or race/racism, the concept of a nation, or a multitude of other things), all it takes is the basic information that naturally comes out when talking about it to have something to say. No, it's not fully researched or thought out, but that's part of what a conversation is. You're communicating with someone else where you both are coming from and working from there.
Of course, if you're going to be a reasonable person, this should only be a starting point. You should be willing to see individual bits of information that will change your thoughts on the specific case you're discussing and eventually even the core beliefs that lead to your initial response, depending on how far-reaching the specifics are.
How? On what would you base that opinion?
Data doesn't have opinions. Data only tells you what is, not what should be. Let's say that you study the data about immigration. It tells you who immigrants are, where they come from, where they live, what types of jobs they take, what contributions they make to the economy, and so on. Lots and lots of data.
But your opinion has to come from you and your beliefs. What do you believe? Is it good to welcome people from other countries? Is it bad to take refugees in? Is it good that migrants spend money in your country? Is it bad that they take jobs from other people? The answers to these questions don't come from the data, they come from you. You have some core beliefs. It's up to you to apply those beliefs to everyday topics.
If you find yourself wanting to find data on a topic, you already have an opinion to work with. In order to have something to do with that data, you need to have something you value.
That's the thing: You can talk in absence of facts without bullshitting. You can say "If the reality is this, then I would think this is the best way to go." You're giving input, the person can inform you (though obviously you shouldn't take what they tell you as gospel), and you can move somewhere from there. Even if it ends up that the premise was false, working through something like that can be worthwhile and interesting for its own sake. It's like testing your beliefs with hypotheticals, and can put you in situations where you have to really consider if those core values are worth keeping, if being consistent could mean something very bad in a different scenario.
Anyway I wouldn't stress too much about it. To a certain degree we all have a responsibility to the others on this planet to improve things and engaging in politics is one way to do that...but you're also a person with your own life and there's no shame in backing away and focusing on you.
You know yourself better than anyone, but I think most of us can learn the basics of the tiny pool of things that come up in daily life. Ever get in a big web of Wikipedia articles and go further and further down? Try going up next time.
A philosopher and psychologist I very much respected, who spent some time on Buddhist psychology, once told me, "When you get right down to it, every person is always asking the world, is this good for me or bad for me?"
While that may seem like a selfish proposition, the underlying survival wiring that's been selected though a billion years of evolution, bends every perception and thought around the orbit of this question. We can layer multiple levels of abstraction, but they're really just elaborations on the basics of "is this good for me or bad for me".
So in that context, you can decide that it's important to be correct, to gather as much information as possible so you won't suffer the "bad for me" social, reputational injuries of being wrong. Or you can decide that it's "good for me" to participate in greater social engagement.
And if you're genuinely interested in changing how you participate in conversations about opinion, understand that whether the participants acknowledge it or not, they're really making statements about whether they perceive, at some level, that the subject of dispute is good for them or bad for them.
My two cents as someone who can often give an opinion on things I either feel quite mildly about or even not at all... It's okay to just feel something is right or wrong or true or not. Everyone has biases and it's important to be aware of them, but you're allowed to, and probably already do have, gut feelings about things. And facts alone don't drive opinions. Say everything you researched about a subject is complete and proven true (which is the ideal), that alone won't "logic" your way to a "correct" opinion. For example, if prematurely ending two billion lives (say the disabled elderly, who can no longer contribute, but is a huge drain on social services and resources), will drastically and greatly improve the lives of over four billion people immediately and for future generations. Say we can proven this to be completely true and functionally we have a foolproof way to execute this. Should we do it? I'm guessing you have a reaction to this. A side that you've already picked. And I'm guessing that reaction is driven more by emotion than you may feel comfortable with.
Of course if something you feel is true is proven false or partially inaccurate, you can change your stance.
How do you decide which movie to watch? Likely these people you're conversing with are just stating their weak opinions much more forcefully than you feel comfortable doing. I personally think your way is laudable but clearly opinions differ.
I certainly agree and think something I am often guilty of is being too sure without enough information. How did you come to hold & act on this belief? Being corrected in my foolishness has certainly helped me be more humble although I wonder if there aren't innate aspects to it?
I didn't mean to misinterpreted your post, sorry for any confusion or assumptions I made.
I do get the threshold idea and there is a certain amount of info you need. I personally wouldn't mind if I'm discussing something with someone, and they go "give me a minute, I'm just going to wiki this a bit", but of course this depends on your circle.
I have a little story for this...I once had a "debate" with a friend about how to exit a specific subway station in Hong Kong to get to some street level shop. They were extremely certain of their path and in the end I conceded with a "I haven't been there in a few years, so it might be different now". Then I asked when was the last time they were in Hong Kong. The answer - never. They've never been! (This was before people looked routes up online and such).
I think it's totally fine to reserve your own thoughts and form an opinion when you feel you've reached your threshold of info required, but I wouldn't assume that others have a similar threshold at all. Confidence is not knowledge, but it will pass for it (more often than people admit), lol.
Your problem is quite simple: you're using logic, while everyone else is using rhetoric. I had this same problem years ago, and I was constantly frustrated with my social interactions. Put this in your mind: in the real world rhetoric beats logic every time. You should be aware of the correction of your arguments as a matter of ethics, as it would be immoral to support an untrue and harmful line of reasoning. But you must complement logic with rhetoric. And rhetoric is nothing more than the study of persuasion. Start here.
For a great example of rhetoric in action, get acquainted with this guy.
No, you don't have to. Relax :)
I think, if this is a concern for you, does it mean that there's at least a basic relationship between you and the other person, which you feel valuable, and there's already some basic level of trust ,so that you're feeling it's at least possible to engage them with a different opinion? Because if it's not really a strong enough bond, it's just about coping with boring conversations, and wouldn't have been a big concern -- at least this is how I feel about it.
When I find myself in a similar situation, if there's enough trust, I'd bring the conversion closer to the here and now, the personal, from the abstract realms. I'd let my emotional sense feel the side-channel information, the emotions, that care carried by the ostensibly opinionated speech. Perhaps I'd say, When you say ___ about immigration, I feel you're really concerned about it. Is there a particular reason for this concern? Would you like to talk about it?
Sometimes, this could be a conversation-opener that leads to more relatable experiences. But well, this sort of demands active listening, and I can't be emotionally well-tuned all the time, so there's that.
I don't know if you can relate to this experience. I can't really give you advices, but I'm interested to know how you think about it.
One of the off-putting aspects of opinionated conversation is that often, you're really not expected to have an informed understanding of the subject matter.
The conversants are overtly or unconsciously expecting that you'll affirm or deny a tribal affiliation. The beliefs and opinions of the tribe don't need to be internally consistent (e.g. "pro-life" + pro-death penalty in the U.S.). The demonstration of opinion is simply a membership signifier, that you adhere to a nebulous cluster of values which binds tribal identity.
The purpose for the conversation is that in one way or another, you'll out yourself as having an identity in common (ally) or other (enemy).
The best outcome for this is the active listening scenario that @zoec described - you can emphasize your common humanity and allyship by expressing empathy.
But there will be people who identify you as an enemy simply for not showing which tribe you belong to. In a way, you're already demonstrating membership in a tribe of people who value data over strong emotion, who are disinclined to take sides or express an opinion if both sides are wrong or underinformed in some way.
Welcome, friend!
I don't want to oversimplify a complex topic, but would refer to material like this for more detail.
You mentioned the problem of opining outside one's expertise, but I've spent enough time chasing various curiosities to have heuristics for when I can state an informed-enough opinion.
Wow. Eliza lives! :) This is a classic therapy technique.
I tend to be one of those folk who seems to have an opinion on just about every topic on the planet. It exhausts people sometimes and has caused me a bit of stress that they think I'm an expert just because I know that South Sudan has been in turmoil for a little while now (or whatever the random focus of conversation happens to be).
The way I see it is that I'm kind of a jack of all trades of a conversationalist. I know a little bit about a lot of things, but not all that much about any of them. So I can get a conversation started in a lot of cases, but I can't often sustain it without going into areas I'm less knowledgeable about. Suits me fine usually because if it goes that route the other person is the expert and I can just lean on their knowledge. There is a problem when other people aren't experts though.
Part of this was just developed naturally over time. I've long worked by associating a topic with a random piece of information I learned about it--well, random to me but usually being a reasonably well known or recently reported fact about the topic. The piece of information is usually just a factoid about something that happened. I live with the world of fact much more than I do with the world of opinion, but fortunately that's what other people are for.
That's a lot of the subtext for why I might often steer a conversation toward politics and news. They are topics I'm reasonably sure someone has some view on, even if I am not entirely sure what view I have on the topic myself. It's the same reason some people talk about a recent movie or TV show. Shared experience binds us, and talking about shared knowledge can help break the ice on what might otherwise have been a difficult to start conversation.
I also typically am comfortable talking about any political issue with just about any person regardless of their political beliefs. Most of that is because I don't usually firmly articulate many opinions on the topics (though I do articulate enough to demonstrate I have Feelings(^TM )). For example: "I read recently that elected Republicans are talking more about impeachment than elected democrats. I think the reason is pretty clear: Democrats simply cannot impeach Trump without Republican support, and they won't even try." A nice self-contained, not-too-judgmental political point that can launch from there wherever the listener wants to take it.
I would look for what topics interest or drive you. Surely there's something that interests you, and you probably know much more about that topic than I do (see also: a little bit of everything, not a lot of anything). I don't need to ask for your opinion on everything under the sun, because chances are you won't have an opinion on everything under the sun (who cares about the migratory patterns of Monarch butterflies? I ask because there are two hundred or so in my backyard roosting at the moment, but also because almost no one actually does care).
If I'm going to ask you something you probably don't know much about, it'll be because there's a pressing reason it interests me. I'll have to share that reason and the some context that can give you a chance to form your own opinion before I even get too far into sharing my view. It's just polite.
Yes. I've been reading your replies in this thread, and it's clear that you're over-thinking this - probably because you feel like your opinion has to be "correct". You've created a false pressure on yourself to always be right. But you don't have to be right. Opinions don't have to be right, they have to be yours. Opinions are about personal expression, not about being a professor.
It's probably more to do with a specific type of speaker than anything you or I do, I think. There are a (small) group out there of bloviators who enjoy hearing the sound of their own voice, and don't enjoy listening all that much. Whether it's because they like feeling like only they know about the topic at hand, or because they're just excited to talk to living, breathing people who are also talking to them, or some other reason, I've had a few experiences where I would struggle to get in a word edgewise with people (edit: and it's at this point that people who know me would turn their heads at me in shock that I could be silenced).
I think the main differences between them and me are that I typically am quite interested in what other people are thinking and they ... don't seem to be as much. It's hard to know which of us pops up in a room more often, but I think it's fair to say we're both quite rare.
I have a good buddy and when we where younger we would argue a lot about everything though it was more discussion. 90% of the time I would just take the opposite view or he would, just so we could discuss it.
Now I have a bit of a problem because I will do this when talking to other people and often I get opinons atributed to me that I don't really hold because I like to argue.
So I guess try argue from that neutral spot and just take a side also find people that you know well who will not take it to seriously.