To create a page: search for a simple name for your argument. If you don't find it, you should be asked if you would like to create a page for what you searched for. Opinion titles should be brief, with words separated by underscores.
Alternatively, set the title parameter to a simple name for the argument and go to that page. Example: http://opendiscourse.org/index.php?title=Main_Page. Here, Main_Page is the title parameter. For Abortion, enter http://opendiscourse.org/index.php?title=Abortion. Then click 'edit' or 'create', create or edit the page, and press 'save' to save the page.
Opinions expressed on opinion pages probably are not opinions supported by opendiscourse.org or its owner, even if I was the one to upload them.
See the Community Portal (on the left sidebar) for a list of all pages, or use the search tool to find an argument. If you create a page, or if you find a page that is not listed in the Community Portal, please add it to the Community Portal.
Post an opinion and all supporting evidence you can think of, as well as where your arguments fall apart. Other people will add their own counterarguments, simplify and reword your arguments, and add more supporting arguments. The end result should be a very complete summary of arguments for and against an opinion. Hopefully it will be enough to educate readers and have them understand an argument as completely as they could. It should hopefully convince readers one way or another, or have them understand where they disagree.
Opendiscourse was created to allow people to present opinions. An initial poster would be encouraged to express an opinion as completely as possible, presenting all supporting points and addressing every reasonable counterpoint. This initial draft will present an incomplete opinion. It will be a poor translation of the writer’s beliefs, but it will be a decent attempt to convince another to adopt this opinion by analysing the presented facts and supporting statements. Others who read this opinion will disagree with it. Others may also agree with part of the opinion but not the whole. They may agree with certain conclusions but not the entirety of what was originally presented. What these onlookers can then do is reason through whether or not the supporting claims are valid. If the supporting points are valid and the opinion follows smoothly from them, then the viewers should be convinced of the opinion; or they should spend a number of hours or days contemplating. During this contemplation they may discover new unforeseen counterpoints; or they may have the opinion grow within them, so that they can come to believe it in short time.
This initial presentation of an opinion will be incomplete. Supporting arguments would not be worded perfectly, they would not be explained fully, and the structure of the presented opinion may not follow logically from the supporting arguments. In addition, many of the supporting arguments will be invalid, logical fallacies will exist in the opinion; the opinion may be wrong altogether. Let us first suppose that the opinion is right, or that it stands out among similar opinions as the simplest and the one which fits the model of a conflict better than any other known opinions, with the best supporting arguments and with no known irrefutable counterpoints.
Those who agree with the opinion would then have the task of filling the holes in the arguments. Any lacking crucial arguments would be filled in. Any arguments that are not necessary but are helpful and lacking can also be inputted if they would make the opinion clearer. Misworded arguments are to be refined, and so should be the logical structure of the arguments building the opinion. In addition to the refining of the mathematically logical infrastructure of the opinion, most sections must be rewritten so that they are easier for the eyes. When simpler words serve all requirements of the logical part of the arguments while also providing the convincing appeal of clear wording, simpler words shall be used. When esoteric terminology is more functional, it shall be used.
After enough input, an argument should hopefully be somewhat close to flawless logically. Not only that, but the opinions should be readable, understandable, and convincing to most people. The job of those who disagree with the opinion is to present counterpoints. If a supporting argument is not valid, a counterargument should be presented, and it too should be as refined as can be done. Any contradicting arguments should be able to be resolved, leading to support for or against the original opinion, to be further resolved.
This process will leave many open arguments; this is progress. Open arguments will be conditional. On the condition that the Holy Bible is the word of God and that said God is infallible, we shall not murder. On the condition that libertarianism is the one true way, we should not murder as it would infringe on the murdered’s liberty to live, as long as he is not infringing on others’ liberties, in which case further consideration is required. On the condition that we should always strive for the greater good, whatever that greater good may be, we should not murder unless that death would lead to an increase in the greater good. The arguments for and against the infallibility of the Bible and God, for and against Libertarianism, and for and against different interpretations of the Greater Good would then further be debated. In addition to these open arguments which break down into smaller parts, there will be many arguments which are open, that we aren’t sure how to prove or disprove, or some that nobody expands on. These arguments serve a purpose because they help explain the limits of our knowledge and reason, and there will be a lot of these. Arguments and counterarguments for the constructed, modified, and refined opinion are to be left open; they not only serve to convince more viewers, but offer a more complete description of the verbal reasoning behind the opinion than would be by deleting the said arguments and counterarguments.
This should leave us with relatively complete and logical conclusions. Where opinions are not concluded, we will know where their supporting arguments fall apart. These opinions should be enough to convince ‘completely rational’ people to agree with the stated opinions, or they should present enough of a background that the said people can gain a deep understanding of the opinion and the ideas behind it. Although this should work with ‘completely rational’ people, it won’t be enough to convince most people. We like to think we are rational but we are very heavily influenced by our environments. Many of our opinions come from how we are nurtured, this is debatable but I will leave it for Opendiscourse to solve, as I think it would be one of the easiest opinions to run through. Those who highly value knowledge might be curious, but they were allowed at some point to exercise this curiosity. They were somehow encouraged to engage in their intellectual longing, even if this encouragement came as reactionary behaviour against being denied answers to seemingly important questions. Maybe in our purest form, we are all very reasonable people, but for some reason most of us are distracted by others. Perhaps our curious need for intellectual stimulation and our love for knowledge are blocked during our upbringings. This is a possibility, but even if it is so most of us are still not perfectly rational, we are still influenced heavily by each other.
I want to bring to mind persuasive essays. Persuasive essays often must be easy to read, they must be convincing and well-worded. The primary task of such an essay is to present and opinion and to back it up with supporting arguments. Rhetorical devices are techniques which make this process easier. Clever wording, although it adds nothing to the logic behind an argument, is incredibly convincing. In spoken debates, ad hominem attacks often help strengthen support from the audience for those who use them, and they often give the audience a poorer impression of the other debater. Along with getting swayed to think poorly of others because these attacks, we generalize and act as if our opinion on the subject at hand has been strengthened. On a basic level, the attack helps explain why the other person is unintelligent, and therefore he is more likely to be wrong. Although this might seem almost reasonable if we had no understanding whatsoever of the topic at hand, that maybe the one who seems more intelligent might be more likely to be right in an argument and therefore his opinion is more likely to be true, this is inexcusable if we have any ability to be logical and if we can mentally grasp any part of what is being discussed. If we can’t, then our opinions are worthless and you aren’t reading this. Logical fallacies should not be used on Opendiscourse, they do not add to an argument and any opinion they help form is an irrational one. Convincing through association, such as by stating one’s profession to present oneself as an expert in a field, is also discouraged, as those who contribute to Opendiscourse should be relatively anonymous. It is to be a collective database of ideas. It should associate with no specific group of people, but it can contain discussions for or against any group of people and any movement. Although logical fallacies and using personal trust to be convincing is discouraged, other forms of rhetoric are almost necessary if Opendiscourse is to be successful in convincing large groups of people. To those who are new to a topic, it would be easier to present an opinion in simple terms than to offer the same arguments one would offer to an expert in the field. For this reason, it would not be discouraged to include, along with the main structure of the opinion, an essay for the layman. This would be heavily revised by many people, like the opinion itself, and hopefully what will result is a piece of writing that can convince the highest number of people to adopt the opinion. The ideal essay to support an argument shouldn’t rely on rhetoric, and an essay that only covers the basics and covers them in layman’s terms would not be convincing to those who have experience in forming their own opinions on the subject. Regardless, not including an introductory essay may prevent more people from reading about the subject and learning about the arguments for and against the opinion. The main structure of the opinion, after heavy collective revision, would be a long form of dialectic which would be full of esoteric references which may require further reading to understand, and this essay, although a more complete one, might convince fewer people than one written by a clever linguist. Part of the reason that it would convince fewer people is because, perhaps, fewer people would choose to read it.
Once any shallow opinion is formed, the reader is welcome to read further and learn why their opinion may or may not be invalid. The exact structure of the opinion page will be left to the collective. I would imagine it would include several essays, sets of bullet points for and against the opinion, and several paragraphs addressing individual points. These would hopefully, over time, be revised to remove redundancy and to address most points more clearly. Even after most of the revisions have been made, however, partly for the reasons discussed above, an opinion may still consist of more than one essay-style piece of writing, and may consist of several supporting paragraphs, each individual of one another. I would also imagine that many topics presented in an opinion would be beyond the understanding of a layman. It is not the duty of Opendiscourse to act as an encyclopedia, the readers may refer themselves to an encyclopedia, and it isn’t necessary for me to state which is probably the most suitable. In the event that an important piece of information might not easily be found, and that for some reason the writer feels that adding to the unsaid encyclopedia would not be sufficient, then the writer would add paragraphs at some part of the opinion page to act as footnotes, or create a new opinion page discussing these topics and make a link to this explanatory opinion page.
Any questions or concerns about the structure of Opendiscourse could probably be reasoned through in such as way that the simplest solution is the one that is likely to be applied.
- Steven