Veganism: Socratic Method is Dead. :-/

I got a message here from a patreon
supporter and this is a super spontaneous non reverse video needless to say unlike my other videos are German which you might think we're carefully scripted but anyway I've got a message here from Emile Emile writes to me on patreon a great topic the problem with debating non-vegans who are insincere from the start is that using Socratic method only gives them more of an opportunity to strengthen their own illogical beliefs and to convince others of them so this is already interested in me because it raises the question of what is Socratic method I often say Socratic method is dead it seems to be out of style like with the internet using generation you don't you mean okay what is Socratic method and does anyone in a chat forum or on YouTube or a Yuman comic youtube comments i should ever use it does anyone face-to-face use it anymore in Socratic method you are actually one of the hard criteria prescribing method is that you are supposed to pretend that you don't already know what the other person's point is what their belief is you are supposed to feign ignorance and now in our culture it's hard to do that without seeming insulting the point is to really say look I'm going to set aside my preconceptions about you I'm going to set aside my preconceptions about your argument and I'm going to really invite you to explain to me what your argument is so there's a certain kind of contrived ignorant so they would mean for example that when you're talking to a mediator and they may say something that's very familiar they may say something about plants having intelligence you don't just jump in and say well I already know what point you're trying to make I already know your assumptions I already know what you're driving at where you would actually set that aside and say okay so that's interesting why don't you explain to me why you think that invalidates veganism or why you believe that or whatever it is right so Socratic method I feel like it's simultaneously kind of overrated and underrated it's a difficult virtue to practice I mean in in Montreal unlike Toronto actually some of the universities they're their official policy in the department political science is that the supposed to use Socratic method in the classroom which is very interested if you're a professor and you're an expert on the more and you have a student who's saying things that are just completely factually wrong with issue they no more does it really work in the classroom I look I'm saying this in some ways I'm a fan of Socratic method but do you really have the time to draw this person out and get them to kind of demonstrate their own ignorance because that's that's what it boils down to is you're you're encouraging the person to fully describe and define aspects of their point of view that may be ambiguous or they may be dishonest with you about themselves about you know through this method and you know in a well-written Socratic dialogue that leads to the person realizing that they're wrong or realizing that some that haven't thought of etcetera etcetera now I mean the reality is most of the Socratic dialogues most of the actual dialogues of Plato are not very well written most of them are not actually very good examples the Socratic method working if you almost let me read the laws by Plato terrible book horribly written and the form of the dialogue also doesn't doesn't really work you know so uh yeah it is what it is in reality could we or should we practice Socratic method within dialogues between between meat eaters and vegans I mean subscribe by the part of it is saying I don't know why don't you tell me you know I don't think works oh like you nobody in your family is vegan except you can you actually say to your brother I'll give you brother if your brother says to you I don't know why you're vegan I don't understand anything is stupid you can't resemble I don't know you tell me yeah you know I don't K so what you can pick any weather any world what are their actual do they have reasons for eating meat or never even guess at that point give the point where they give you reason it's like yes my dad says that animals were put here by God to be eaten this this is actually fascinating though because your father was not a religious man I think in truth he still isn't but just on this topic he goes for for religion right so I don't know I mean true you know the Socratic allegis to really use Socratic method in response to that I'm you have to say something like oh really what would you it would be totally insincere totally got it productive like like a you're going to invite them to convince you that God wants you to eat me you know unless you're really unless you're both true believers in Christianity you want to discuss bible scripture with the evidence of the scriptures like yeah it would lead nowhere it doesn't it doesn't really work ultimately I think it's because he viewed animals as inferior to yea manatee that surely he said sure but of course vegans do too we wear them as inferior we just want to treat them decently we have different standards of decency but yeah I've never I've never really met it'd be good who regards cockroaches as their equals you know but the question is what do we do now how do we live with cockroaches and we live amongst cars anyway anyway so this is the only possibly the first couple of sentences in this email from Emil but I think it actually is anyway so I'm going to talk about what my method is my method is not really Socratic method the meantime when I mentioned Socratic method is when I have disputes with other vegans that's the sad fact so there's there what to do like a twenty minute monologue on that but all the time I'm talking to other vegans and I got to say to them look why don't you restate your accusation as a question why don't you actually question and over my way I also asked like are you actually interested in this thing you're questioning because they send me a question but the question is really just an insult you know it's like well I think actually the debates within veganism that's maybe Davina's amidst political movement and even vegan youtubers and stuff that's probably a situation with swearing that it is much more much more valuable you know so okay so the difference between me and ask yourself ask yourself as a a youtuber does videos are not deleted because he asked me to lead them but I did say to ask yourself directly I said well why don't you try using Socratic method instead why don't you have more of an approach like this and I do think that would have been way more productive by insulting each other which entertained the audience was more entertaining for the audience but sure in that instance two different vegans with two different approaches to veganism and I said I think you should really set aside your logical approach what he considers late and instead think about you know Socratic method other productive ways of questions and open mind what people what what people's real point is and what their what's driving it so that's what Socratic method comes up in my life but yeah in the classroom I'm a teacher right now I don't use Socratic method and if I went back to Canada and we were doing politics and philosophy in the classroom you don't really describe now that I'm in the classroom so simultaneously underrated and over where I don't use out Socratic method when I'm when I'm negotiating with my ex-wife or anything you know what I mean like really in most of your disputes and discussions debates in life Socratic method does not have a lot of utility but hey still worth talking about still worth philosophizing about to be blunt okay so he says this method engaging with meat eaters and Socratic method you end up forcing them to point out the inconsistencies in their reasoning and then arguing about why it's wrong to others who's so sorry this is not stated that clearly but the point is basically results in this rather hostile game of trying to nail the other person for inconsistencies in their reasoning which I have reflected on in recent videos and more than iago also that that can really just be very kind we're just ratcheting up the level of aggression and you're even driving that aggression it is something that's not you know it's not really worth discussing you didn't start having this conversation as you want to talk about formal logic you start having this conversation because somebody was sincerely interested in the ethics of veganism or the ecology of veganism whatever the topic might be I think the main goal so reading this this message from Emil I think the main goal of these logical debates is to convince the audience not the person being debated with and the inconsistencies and contradictions in their moral view this is just material for this this form of entertainment for the audience etcetera etc I personally would like to see more emphasis on questions like why don't you care and how can we make you care in these vegan versus non vegan debates to get a better outcome so I don't know if I agree with that I don't think there's any way for that to be a non-hostile question I don't see why don't you care I don't I don't really know if that's ever productive break supported job I mean I understand I understand the deeper underlying issue but maybe so this message ends with but maybe we should start having a debate among vegans first about how to better answer these questions because they're actually much harder answer the questions but whether or not it's immoral to kill animals for food right so look we're a little bit off center here of this myth account um on my channel for a long long time we have had debate about this I've had many many videos talking about how to engage these issues and this comes back to a topic I think I'm going to do another video on soon you know the philosophy of Max Turner Max Turner is not a very famous philosopher I think a large part of what we do in conversations especially conversations with strangers not conversations with your brother or sister you grew up with after somebody's known you for 20 years a large part of what we're doing is I'm really communicating to you Who I am and why I care about the topic that's really what's being communicated so whether you're going to in frame the discussion in terms of Socratic method or this business of you know rigorous logical fallacies whether you're going to enflame it in political terms or spiritual terms could be a more religious discussion could be a more you know could be a question more about activism and effective activism in the future the movement is on or social justice rhetoric what have you no matter what the context is the discussion if you target someone who's a co-worker or a complete stranger the mean thing you're really communicating is this is who I am and this is why I care and Emile is saying that the conversation could have more of an emphasis on why don't you care I think that's inevitably what gets revealed when you have a productive conversation about about veganism and I mean now is the conversation sincere and sincere when I talk about veganism with my own university professors so people were my superiors you know in this situation I think the conversation is productive precise precise because they are interested in Who I am they're not interested in veganism they're interested in Who I am and why I live the way I do that's the hook and that's why it's compelling when they hear me talk about the ism now if you don't have that if for instance you're talking about a face-to-face confrontation at a street demonstration or a vigil you may be targeted someone who both doesn't care about veganism and doesn't care about who you are and doesn't care about while you're living so that's what was sort of why you're living the way that you are living so that's really hard to see how there's going to be a productive outcome from that I mean I guess if you're engaged with complete strangers then really all it's going to start with is exchange of information in the form of a dry fact and once in a while it may be one person of a hundred will really respond to say oh wow I didn't know that because we're sure my own family like my mom got past the age of fifty she didn't where milk came from she did know the difference in a bull and a steer she didn't know any of the basic facts of how you know animal and how meat and dairy industries worked or those kind of things so it's true maybe one small if you're just presenting a fact someone's going to stop and say wow can you tell me more but I didn't realize that's our milk spurts sure maybe it's one in a hundred maybe it's one of the thousands sure and then that's that's really the remit of the conversation between two complete strangers but I think and again I don't know if this is a Neil's question I think from both most of us as vegans with thinking at least about people who are co-workers or acquaintances or friends or family it's really in those contexts that discussions about veganism are tense and exhausting and and what-have-you I'd like that's where you're we're trying to approach this yeah so look when I tell you what I believe I think that's weaker than just telling you this is who I am this is why I care this is this is the kind of person I am there's no point I mean again this is like the opposite of formal logic in a lot of ways I'm not trying to separate this out as a logical proposition or as a fact you know I'm not pretending this is what I believe therefore this you must believe it also that's you know that's what a lot of people do in the term process vision veganism I think it's a lot more down-to-earth and honest and just productive and those conversations said look this is who I am this is why I care this is the kind of person I am and you can trust that too you say some other beings are most other vegans feel this way about it instead some people approach it this way some people approach it that way and then that the person you're talking to is very likely to respond with the majors respond with hey I never thought of it that way before but they may also respond just as it's being centered they may respond by explaining what they don't care so for you and both the people on camera now we cared about ecology before we care to live again so there's a very real sense of which for us we could stay on a down-to-earth way if we're talking to a meat-eater well you know I really cared about ecology environmentalism and I was concerned about things like the forests and air pollution and water pollution so for me there was this really clear path of connecting the dots okay why do we have water shortages what's why and then seeing the role in meat and dairy industry and then these other issues and I can contrast that to just as casually but you know a lot of vegans they just become vegan because they grew up with a pet dog and they ask themselves why do I treat my pet dog this way and I treat a pig on a farm that well you know they ask themselves those questions and you could do five or six contrasts with that the different kind of roads to veganism but just by framing it that way it's not this game of forcing the other person to point out the logical inconsistency in their reasoning which is the paraphrasing the Mules message and it's not even say it's not saying I'm right and you're wrong it's really saying this is the kind of person I am and therefore this is how I feel and therefore this is the moral code I live by we okay let's personal anecdotes made us a little bit more human we had to have dinner with my mom right so we met up with my mom first time I'd seen my mom and well over ten years maybe fifteen years now I forget how many years so I see my mom face to face and meet in his restaurant and it's this typical situation where she thought the restaurant would be good for vegans and it's not it's terrible and it's going to be a lot of money and we're gonna have nothing but lettuce and fruit juice you know yeah I was willing to deal was like a look I can sit down and just eat lettuce and fruit juice but you know this is I'm not going to lie to you this is a bad choice the restaurant and what was it among the other things my mom said you remember she kind of stopped her but she just said right so I made the comment because walking around this restaurant it's an all-you-can-eat buffet set up and I said something like this is a monument to dead animals there really was there like you know our table over here which is all you know what red meat and then huge amount of seafood and that kind of stuff right right yes some of it was still flipping around and so on yeah I yell it was just an honest response to seeing all these dead and dying animals you know around you and my mom said well you have to respect that no what's that what the precise wording but you have to respect that other people who eat a different language no she she didn't say it that clear because when she first said it I thought she meant she that she and the meat-eaters respected the animals that was my first response and I said I laughed and I said what do you mean you know you don't you know respect the animal are you talking about you know they're dying over there uh you don't want to look at fish suffocating to death you know what I mean and she then clarified she said no that's not what she meant she didn't know you have to respect you know meat eaters choosing to eat meat anyway again I just laughed and said you don't know of course I don't I keep keeping it keeping it all the way real you know I have more respect for people to choose to choose to use cooking than for people who choose to eat meat you know and cocaine you're probably destroying your own life or destroying your own brain but sure knowing why would I want to respect it so you I mean that was no we we managed to have a totally positive conversation um but I didn't get combative she didn't get angry she didn't get offended or anything you know but veganism came up like 20 times in that conversation right like we thought we did talk a lot about veganism but you know I guess that's part and parcel my own view is I'm not making about this about a belief I'm not making it about a fact of not making about I'm right you're wrong I'm not making it about my views are largely consistent yours are inconsistent but it is the world this is that person I am this is what I care about and that's the type of person you are and you you don't care you know or you you care about you care about other things so there absolutely is you can be nice about it you can smile but you can joke about it but sure there's that that element of moral judgment and no I'm you know I don't pretend I mean exactly that situation I don't pretend that I respect my own mother when she eats meat in front of me I don't pretend I respect the choices of others TV ok you anything to add is that a wrap that's a rat Morty ah