It worked very well! 11 people came and it was suitable for that group size. I made some small changes.
I started with steps 1 − 3 as described above. People had 5 minutes to come up with the reasons why they (dis-)believed the statement (“The earth is a flat disk”) and then 10 minutes to poke holes (5 minutes per partner).
Then we came back to a big circle and ensured everything was clear. I then projected a list of statements onto the wall and gave each person 5 minutes to choose one statement and come up with reasons for (dis-)believing. I explained that making any assumptions or having only a certain degree of conviction was perfectly fine (e.g. I am 60% certain that capitalism has a net positive effect on the world), they should just make that clear to their partner later. Some people struggled making a choice so I offered to choose for them, which they accepted (so having some mechanism for assigning statements at random may be valuable).
Then people split again into (different!) pairs and had 15 minutes (7.5 minutes per person) to poke holes in each other’s reasoning. For the most part people randomly chose different statements from their partner, which made the exercise more interesting because you had to poke holes into something that you hadn’t thought about much yourself. Funnily, in one case, a pair chose the same statement but had opposing opinions on it.
We repeated it two more times with new statements and new partners.
The list of statements I projected onto the wall. Note that I don’t necessarily endorse any of these statements as they are here listed. They are intentionally meant to be though provoking and controversial.
Many people preferred the more controversial statements at the bottom.
Easy
Earth is a flat disk.
The moon is made of cheese.
Humans have walked on the moon.
COVID is a dangerous disease that killed many people.
Vaccines cause autism.
Things fall because of gravity, which accelerates objects at 9.8 m/s^2
Humans use only 10% of their brain.
Humans are the most intelligent in the animal kingdom because they have the biggest total brain size.
The scientific method is the most effective way of achieving knowledge about the world and the universe.
Seeds are the spicy part of chili peppers.
Microwave ovens heat food from the inside out.
(Biological) evolution necessarily causes organisms to evolve from less complex to more complex.
Glass is a high-viscosity liquid at room temperature (e.g. old cathedral windows are thicker at the bottom)
Muscle soreness after exercising is caused by lactic acid.
Rusty metal can cause tetanus infections.
Cold temperatures in winter can cause people to catch a cold.
0.999.… is the same as 1
Human beings have five senses.
Hard
Artificial Intelligence very seriously risks extinguishing all human life within the next 30 years.
Capitalism has a net positive effect on the world.
Colonialism had a net positive effect on the ex-colonies.
Open borders (no travel restrictions between countries) would have a net positive effect on the world.
Human beings are intrinsically more valuable than plants or animals.
Spending significant taxpayer resources (e.g. $1 million) to save five people lost in a submarine has a net positive effect on the world.
Investing significant resources (e.g. $1 million / year) to fight the extinction of animals such as the Sumatran rhinoceros (~ 80 left in existence) has a net positive effect on the world.
God exists.
Religion has a net positive effect on the world.
Gender is (almost) entirely a social construct.
Nuclear energy has a net positive effect on the world.
Every controversial topic should be publicly debated instead of censored.
Liberal democracy is the form of government with the highest net positive effect on the world.
Voting in national elections is a duty for the individual.
If a foreign nation starts a military invasion of your home country you have a moral duty to take up arms.
I’m glad it worked well for you! Thanks for the extra data points :)
“Organizer’s choice” seems like a fine way to help people decide what belief to explore. “Roll a die, count down from the top” seems also reasonable.
How did your time limits work? I often put timers in meetups to keep things moving, and find people almost always want more time.
I am not surprised people preferred the controversial beliefs. I don’t have a big list of options yet, but I sort by directness instead of controversy. “Cars run on faerie power” is direct, because you can flip up the hood on a car and have someone start it plus often people have some memories of being told how cars work. Look, no faeries. “Humans take oxygen from every inhalation and exhale carbon dioxide” is less direct, because you have to get kind of clever to test it and lots of people don’t quite remember learning it but suspect they heard it in a class maybe.
Did any of the controversial pairs get heated? Did it seem like they built as solid maps of where their beliefs come from as the non-controversial sets? The thing I’m worried about (and the source of the suggestion not to do controversial topics early) is people searching for reasons they think are respectable, not things they have as cruxes.
I think in many cases people would have been happy to continue after the timers were done. There was no really heated interaction and I assume it was also because of the time limit. The results would probably look different (better?) with more time.
The thing I’m worried about (and the source of the suggestion not to do controversial topics early) is people searching for reasons they think are respectable, not things they have as cruxes.
Sounds plausible. We did not really try to dig into that.
I would like to repeat the event in the future and maybe I’ll introduce some variation to figure some of these questions out :-)
We ran this in Freiburg, Germany.
It worked very well! 11 people came and it was suitable for that group size. I made some small changes.
I started with steps 1 − 3 as described above. People had 5 minutes to come up with the reasons why they (dis-)believed the statement (“The earth is a flat disk”) and then 10 minutes to poke holes (5 minutes per partner).
Then we came back to a big circle and ensured everything was clear. I then projected a list of statements onto the wall and gave each person 5 minutes to choose one statement and come up with reasons for (dis-)believing. I explained that making any assumptions or having only a certain degree of conviction was perfectly fine (e.g. I am 60% certain that capitalism has a net positive effect on the world), they should just make that clear to their partner later. Some people struggled making a choice so I offered to choose for them, which they accepted (so having some mechanism for assigning statements at random may be valuable).
Then people split again into (different!) pairs and had 15 minutes (7.5 minutes per person) to poke holes in each other’s reasoning. For the most part people randomly chose different statements from their partner, which made the exercise more interesting because you had to poke holes into something that you hadn’t thought about much yourself. Funnily, in one case, a pair chose the same statement but had opposing opinions on it.
We repeated it two more times with new statements and new partners.
The list of statements I projected onto the wall. Note that I don’t necessarily endorse any of these statements as they are here listed. They are intentionally meant to be though provoking and controversial.
Many people preferred the more controversial statements at the bottom.
Easy
Earth is a flat disk.
The moon is made of cheese.
Humans have walked on the moon.
COVID is a dangerous disease that killed many people.
Vaccines cause autism.
Things fall because of gravity, which accelerates objects at 9.8 m/s^2
Humans use only 10% of their brain.
Humans are the most intelligent in the animal kingdom because they have the biggest total brain size.
The scientific method is the most effective way of achieving knowledge about the world and the universe.
Seeds are the spicy part of chili peppers.
Microwave ovens heat food from the inside out.
(Biological) evolution necessarily causes organisms to evolve from less complex to more complex.
Glass is a high-viscosity liquid at room temperature (e.g. old cathedral windows are thicker at the bottom)
Muscle soreness after exercising is caused by lactic acid.
Rusty metal can cause tetanus infections.
Cold temperatures in winter can cause people to catch a cold.
0.999.… is the same as 1
Human beings have five senses.
Hard
Artificial Intelligence very seriously risks extinguishing all human life within the next 30 years.
Capitalism has a net positive effect on the world.
Colonialism had a net positive effect on the ex-colonies.
Open borders (no travel restrictions between countries) would have a net positive effect on the world.
Human beings are intrinsically more valuable than plants or animals.
Spending significant taxpayer resources (e.g. $1 million) to save five people lost in a submarine has a net positive effect on the world.
Investing significant resources (e.g. $1 million / year) to fight the extinction of animals such as the Sumatran rhinoceros (~ 80 left in existence) has a net positive effect on the world.
God exists.
Religion has a net positive effect on the world.
Gender is (almost) entirely a social construct.
Nuclear energy has a net positive effect on the world.
Every controversial topic should be publicly debated instead of censored.
Liberal democracy is the form of government with the highest net positive effect on the world.
Voting in national elections is a duty for the individual.
If a foreign nation starts a military invasion of your home country you have a moral duty to take up arms.
Objective reality exists.
I’m glad it worked well for you! Thanks for the extra data points :)
“Organizer’s choice” seems like a fine way to help people decide what belief to explore. “Roll a die, count down from the top” seems also reasonable.
How did your time limits work? I often put timers in meetups to keep things moving, and find people almost always want more time.
I am not surprised people preferred the controversial beliefs. I don’t have a big list of options yet, but I sort by directness instead of controversy. “Cars run on faerie power” is direct, because you can flip up the hood on a car and have someone start it plus often people have some memories of being told how cars work. Look, no faeries. “Humans take oxygen from every inhalation and exhale carbon dioxide” is less direct, because you have to get kind of clever to test it and lots of people don’t quite remember learning it but suspect they heard it in a class maybe.
Did any of the controversial pairs get heated? Did it seem like they built as solid maps of where their beliefs come from as the non-controversial sets? The thing I’m worried about (and the source of the suggestion not to do controversial topics early) is people searching for reasons they think are respectable, not things they have as cruxes.
I think in many cases people would have been happy to continue after the timers were done. There was no really heated interaction and I assume it was also because of the time limit. The results would probably look different (better?) with more time.
Sounds plausible. We did not really try to dig into that.
I would like to repeat the event in the future and maybe I’ll introduce some variation to figure some of these questions out :-)