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How much value does personal experience hold in a discussion?

Suppose I am discussing the existence of the patriarchy. I could claim that the patriarchy does not exist, maybe using ideas Jordan Peterson has mentioned like a competence hierarchy is more likely than a dominance hierarchy. If someone were to respond with: "well, in my experience, I have not gotten a job at x company because the interviewer was male and did not think I was pretty enough." Excluding the nuances like if the company was a modeling agency or something, how can one reasonably deny a persons experience as evidence? If this person feels adamant about the patriarchy, attempting to explain or even deny their personal experience seems futile. I experienced this, therefore, my clam is true. I guess I am also wondering for the lay person that has not explored theories about truth, how can you explain to them that maybe their personal experience is not evidence for a general claim? Sorry for all the questions and please let me know if I am making any sense lol.

ThomasLadder 4 Feb 23
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It would not have more power to refute than to prove. However if an argument includes an absolute then a single anecdote disproves the absolute.

In general I find personal experience if relayed with honesty is a powerful debate tool which is used often in American presidential debates. Saying something is happening is great, showing a person it happened to is better.

What to do with a personal experience brought up in discussion which falls outside what you know for certain to be the norm? An eccetive tactic is countering with a know personal experience displaying the opposite position. If a woman claims patriarchy due to a personal interview experience be ready with factual knowledge of the opposite, a woman who got a job she shouldn’t have compared to her competition because of affirmative action, or a man from that position who was perfect for a position and lost out to an inexperienced woman.
Essentially deflate the power of the anecdote with your own, then point out where these situations fall relative to the norm and take the discussion back away from the outlier to focus on the mean.

Cheers

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I think personal experience is valid, though not all conclusive. Data is derived from experience on a grand scale. I think the experience is allegorical to the microcosm much more so than a larger discussion. Incidents cannot be denied, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it is the absolute truth. The idea of subjective truth is a good sub-sect this conversation I think. That a persons experience can greatly alter their life-view in ways that we do not often realize.

It's also important to understand a persons experience in order to be able to understand their thought processes. To have a thoughtful discussion we must understand the person, and how they communicate, otherwise we have a tendency to quickly devolve into two people talking independently at each other, which certainly benefits nobody.

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Over the years in debating others on such topics, I find it to be nearly impossible to convince most people that their own personal experience does not necessarily equate to evidence, but alas with some their personal views are too precious to them to come to terms that said views could indeed be distorted...

But think how much valuable time you have saved in this knowledge!

I have friends that can say "I know what he's accomplished but I don't like him" and at that point I know I will only do damage to our friendship AND waste a great deal of time if I persist in what I thought was a sharing of viewpoints.

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Personal experience has no value IMO. We have to govern by generalities and then take outliers individually. Nothing is ever "ALL" so I point out to them that maybe they are an outlier. If that doesn't get thru to them so that they understand there isn't much else u can do. Some people make up their mind and that is just the end of it period, they close their mind to any contradictory facts. It does make it almost impossible to ever come to a compromise when dealing with people like that.

Why do you think personal experience has no value in discussion? I hope that does not come off as rude I am just curious. I see what you're saying about those that are closed in their thinking but I wouldn't want to quit because if you can be conditioned to a certain view then you can be reconditioned to a different view. For example, those that were religious fundamentalists then changed their view.

@ThomasLadder u don't come off as rude, I don't place context on anything I read and just respond to the words so don't worry about me thinking u are rude unless it is an obvious insult or attack.

Having said that, I do agree we shouldn't quit and we should try to show them the truth when possible. The reason I say it don't matter is because one person's experience is not enough reason to regulate or legislate law to accommodate their life. I am empathetic to their experience and will listen to them and offer a helping hand when needed but in the discussion of things we have to only see what the general rule of thumb is for the issue. Then after fixing the general problem that most people face, we can then take individual experience cases and work toward helping that person on that particular occurrence. I'm not saying personal experience isn't important and needs to be ignored altogether, just saying u can't regulate and legislate populations based on a single point of data. U have to look at the full spectrum of data and work from there.

@george Exactly. See my above comment.

I believe personal experience DOES matter!

Not in the context of slamming the gates shut on any further discussion, as in "You have NO idea what it feels like to have been raped and that makes YOUR argument worthless"

But rather as a reason why a different viewpoint is held, a viewpoint everyone is entitled to and which does not necessarily mean it is time TO educate them.

I've always viewed anecdotes as shorthand for where not to go in a discussion if they are provided as proof rather than laying down a synopsis of whatever sort of data they believe they have gathered to bolster their argument.

@Phoenix thanks for the viewpoint on it, we will just have to disagree on this topic. I'm sure other things we will be in agreement with tho.

@george Absolutely! 🙂

I think that experience matters in various degrees in relation to context and whether it was a subjective experience of interpretation (what I assume the case to be with the woman who is not pretty enough) or an objective experience, which when experienced by others the result will be similar if not the same. To give a trivial example, my experience gives me great credibility when describing the feeling of cramming my toe into the bed side table.

@Finnemore4 I agree about a stubbed to but in a larger societal sense when policy is regarded, personal experience don't matter. U have to look at the norm for generals rules and then take cases that are exceptions separately.

2

I've noticed a disturbing pattern of people confusing citation with education. A citation is merely a reference to essentially prove that you're not making shit up. There seems to be an increasing belief that if someone is ignorant on a certain topic, it is the job of whoever is debating them to educate them on the topic at hand. "Can you give me a link" is such trite nonsense, a quick wiki article is not going to give someone enough understanding to intelligently debate something about which they have no previous understanding. I know this wasn't really your original question, but it seemed to be in the same vein; needing to explain basic logic in order to have a logical discussion(and then being told that objective rationality is oppressive).

Well in the context of internet discussions that are not necessarily real-time I guess it makes sense to attempt to include links because they are easily accessible. Compared to in person discussions, it would be a burden to get the uninformed person to pause and read a source. However, I agree with you that citation is not necessarily education and references are to provide backing to claims. I think it would be useful though to provide primary sources in some contexts because then both parties can discuss their interpretations of what is actually being said rather than what they may not remember correctly. Again this can be cumbersome but probably a net positive rather than negative given the proper source. So I do not fully think logic is the be all end all when it comes to discussion; but, it is kind of like if you're going to drive a car (have a discussion that may be controversial or nuanced), then you should know how to change a tire (basic logic or logical fallacies within discussion).

I like your more temperate and less elitist view. I may have fallen down a somewhat reactionary black hole, your balanced approach seems much more viable.

I always equate it to a game of footie. There are rules as to how to play the game. In a pickup match between friends, the rules may not be as formal and constrained as they would be in a professional match, but you're still not allowed to pick up the ball and fling it at people(unless you're playing Irish or Australian rules). I see a lot of people these days challenging someone to a football match, ignoring the rules of the game, and then accusing their opponents of elitism for insisting that the rules be observed. Of course it goes a bit beyond that, since the rules of football are somewhat arbitrary and the rules of debate are based in objective reality, bu I can't have my metaphoric cake and eat it too.

I don't believe that "can you give me a link?" is trite unless you assume the person is just going to tuck that sound bite away without further examination.

In the two days I have been here I have been given links to information sites I did not know existed. I have downloaded 2 books and marked many more for my future reading lists. I have also bookmarked every website mentioned here for further exploration.

I have literally felt like the proverbial kid in a candy store!

Perhaps asking for a link is a sign of respect in that something said was intriguing enough to bear further examination rather than argument.

@Phoenix that's entirely fair, it was a poor choice of words on my part. I didn't intend to imply that all requests for links were trite, I was referring to what I've come to think of as the "archetypal trite link request" for lack of a better term. It's the fervent belief that a quick link can provide someone with enough information to intelligently assess a concept with which they are entirely unfamiliar. Debating finer points and interpreting data often require a fair amount of understanding on a particular subject. I lose my patience when someone who doesn't understand basic biology, for instance, begins to debate an evolutionary biologist about the validity of evolution; if that biologist were to mention genetic drift, sending a link to explain his point regarding genetic drift would be pointless because the other person does not have the required understanding of biology to make use of the link.
I run into that far too often with factoids being available 24/7. I was really only referring to that very specific type of link request, mea culpa for the shoddy clarity.

@Pre-Modernist No need,I did take your point and agreed with it actually.
I needed to question that word because I HAVE gained so many more opportunities to research since I arrived here because people do share links. That is extremely valuable to me, I use that sort of good will often.

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