Worth keeping in mind is that seeing one of these things happen doesn’t prove that what is going on is that subconsciously or consciously they believe they are losing the argument. It also shouldn’t be taken as evidence from the universe that your argument is correct.
People are fallible and run on noisy hacky biological computers.
So yeah, it’s worth noticing these sorts of argument breakdowns, but also worth being careful about reading too much into them.
Here’s a hypothetical:
Suppose instead that the person you are arguing with is very knowledgeable about specific topic X. You have dabbled in X and know more than the average layperson, but lack a deep knowledge of the subject. The two of you have a disagreement about X.
The two of you begin arguing about it, but after a few minutes it becomes clear to them that you don’t have a deep knowledge of the subject. They think through what they’d need to teach you in order for you to make a valid argument which would potentially change their mind. They estimate it would require at least 6 hours of lecturing, maybe divided up as 3 lectures, with lots of dense technical sources assigned as prerequisite reading before each lecture. They realize that that investment of time and energy, even if you agreed that you needed it and committed to wholeheartedly tackling it, wouldn’t be worth it to them in order to continue the argument. They give up on you as a conversational partner on the subject of X, and seek a convenient social out to end the conversation as soon as possible.
Here’s another hypothetical:
Someone begins having an argument with you, on a topic which for you is mostly emotionally neutral. You are arguing politely for your point of view in a fair and objective way. They, however, do not have an emotionally neutral stance on this. They start out arguing in an fair and objective way, thinking rationally and logically about each point. Soon however, the debate touches on deep powerful feelings they have, and (consciously or unconsciously) their ability to think objectively and logically about the subject becomes impaired by their emotional associations.
At some point, they realize that they are emotionally impaired. Like many people in such a situation, they don’t feel comfortable admitting this. Their emotional response feels like a vulnerability. They don’t at all think that they are wrong or losing the argument, they just don’t think that they’re going to be able to continue sharing facts and updating your worldview long enough for you to come to agreement with them. The discussion has simply become too uncomfortable for them to continue. They search for a social ‘out’ in order to end the conversation, and plan to never discuss this with you again, while remaining completely convinced that they are in the right.
In either of these hypotheticals, you might well be correct! Or wrong! They work either way!
So while I agree that ‘deciding that they are (or might be) wrong but not wanting to change their position’ is a possible motivating factor for these evasive behaviors, it isn’t the only possible source of motivation. Nor is it exclusive, many motivations may co-exist within a given situation. I do agree that it’s probably a non-zero factor in many cases.
Worth keeping in mind is that seeing one of these things happen doesn’t prove that what is going on is that subconsciously or consciously they believe they are losing the argument. It also shouldn’t be taken as evidence from the universe that your argument is correct.
People are fallible and run on noisy hacky biological computers.
So yeah, it’s worth noticing these sorts of argument breakdowns, but also worth being careful about reading too much into them.
Here’s a hypothetical:
Suppose instead that the person you are arguing with is very knowledgeable about specific topic X. You have dabbled in X and know more than the average layperson, but lack a deep knowledge of the subject. The two of you have a disagreement about X.
The two of you begin arguing about it, but after a few minutes it becomes clear to them that you don’t have a deep knowledge of the subject. They think through what they’d need to teach you in order for you to make a valid argument which would potentially change their mind. They estimate it would require at least 6 hours of lecturing, maybe divided up as 3 lectures, with lots of dense technical sources assigned as prerequisite reading before each lecture. They realize that that investment of time and energy, even if you agreed that you needed it and committed to wholeheartedly tackling it, wouldn’t be worth it to them in order to continue the argument. They give up on you as a conversational partner on the subject of X, and seek a convenient social out to end the conversation as soon as possible.
Here’s another hypothetical:
Someone begins having an argument with you, on a topic which for you is mostly emotionally neutral. You are arguing politely for your point of view in a fair and objective way. They, however, do not have an emotionally neutral stance on this. They start out arguing in an fair and objective way, thinking rationally and logically about each point. Soon however, the debate touches on deep powerful feelings they have, and (consciously or unconsciously) their ability to think objectively and logically about the subject becomes impaired by their emotional associations.
At some point, they realize that they are emotionally impaired. Like many people in such a situation, they don’t feel comfortable admitting this. Their emotional response feels like a vulnerability. They don’t at all think that they are wrong or losing the argument, they just don’t think that they’re going to be able to continue sharing facts and updating your worldview long enough for you to come to agreement with them. The discussion has simply become too uncomfortable for them to continue. They search for a social ‘out’ in order to end the conversation, and plan to never discuss this with you again, while remaining completely convinced that they are in the right.
In either of these hypotheticals, you might well be correct! Or wrong! They work either way!
So while I agree that ‘deciding that they are (or might be) wrong but not wanting to change their position’ is a possible motivating factor for these evasive behaviors, it isn’t the only possible source of motivation. Nor is it exclusive, many motivations may co-exist within a given situation. I do agree that it’s probably a non-zero factor in many cases.