Playing With Plato Posted October 15, 2013 Posted October 15, 2013 Hey guys, I'm new to the group. An instant Stef fan. The dude can talk. What I really love about his style is that he's always got a fact to kind of combo punch his way through a debate. I'm a horrible researcher. When I google things, I just get advertisements and all sorts of useless crap. And I'd like to improve my debating skills, and specifically my research skills and just general knowledge base I suppose. I was wondering if anybody was in the charitable mood to lend me some research tips, search engines you find usefull, online libraries, whatever.... I'm not asking about any specific subject. I'm just looking for general pointers for improving my skills at finding new information. I'm living in China right now so learning my way around this gypsy magic we call the internet has become pretty important. Thanks for your time.
David Lozes Posted October 20, 2013 Posted October 20, 2013 I believe that debate skill comes from practice. If you want to be better at debating, then debate. Find where your errors acrue and address them. Research for topics may be inhibited by the state firewall of China. I would suggest TOR or a similar proxy network to access unfiltered search results. For a basis of argument, you can learn logical fallacies to identify them in your debate partner's arguments, and to remove them from your own. Search "introduction to logic" on Google for basic information to start with.
David Lozes Posted October 21, 2013 Posted October 21, 2013 Oh! I would also recommend listening to podcast 2500, Stef's post-debate analysis of Zeitgeist Versus the Market (podcast 2492). Clarity of ideas and how to effecyively communicate them is discussed very well.
Guest darkskyabove Posted October 21, 2013 Posted October 21, 2013 As far as ads go on search engines: I use startpage.com with the AdBlock extension for Firefox. Works like a charm. AdBlock may be available for other browsers. Another good search engine option is duckduckgo.com. Used to use it, and seem to recall it had no ads. Some, or all, of these options may be limited due to the firewall issue in your location. Another option, which I don't use, is that I believe most search engines allows setting search parameters to help weed out the fluff.
gwho Posted October 21, 2013 Posted October 21, 2013 I'm a horrible researcher. When I google things, I just get advertisements and all sorts of useless crap. firefox addon: ad block plus lol. I believe that debate skill comes from practice. If you want to be better at debating, then debate. Find where your errors acrue and address them.. absolutely. you run into so many fallacies and off-topic sophistry so much, you have need to get good at instantly spotting them - and that comes with experience.And learning logic will help greatly in quick spotting as well.I'm personally a thinker who needs some times to digest things. When i'm responding quickly, that's because I've already mulled over the min the past, and have already identified them in the past, thought through them, and distilled the key principles to spit right back.Poisonous people will attack you for taking the time to think, or admitting "that's a good point, let me think about that". If you're around toxic people a lot, you will totally avoid doing this, but it's actually very honest and healthy to do so. You should try to meet people who are open, and vulnerable, and won't attack you for being honest and vulnerable. It can be hard if you never really have. But it's so worth it. After you meet some good people and have them around, you will be able to be strong and vulnerable (oxymoron eh), even in the midst of poisonous people - you will have already had the knowledge, the love, and self-value to shrug off their viscious attacks for being honest and vulnerable, and see them as not worthy of your gems, rather than getting nervous, beat down, worried, and edgy.
Playing With Plato Posted October 21, 2013 Author Posted October 21, 2013 Great advice. You have no idea how much I appreciate your time. I've started taking on myself to bypass the media and go straight to the things they're reporting on. My new thing is reading bills. I found myself destroying one particular one about background checks for fire arms. Trying not to turn into a preacher but we do need to help people see past the emotional crap and to the ethical logic behind it. So I hope that if my thanks are insufficient, you can take pride in knowing you're helping make me better at spreading the word.
gwho Posted October 23, 2013 Posted October 23, 2013 Great advice. You have no idea how much I appreciate your time. I've started taking on myself to bypass the media and go straight to the things they're reporting on. My new thing is reading bills. I found myself destroying one particular one about background checks for fire arms. Trying not to turn into a preacher but we do need to help people see past the emotional crap and to the ethical logic behind it. So I hope that if my thanks are insufficient, you can take pride in knowing you're helping make me better at spreading the word. yea indeed. some things aren't really that complicated to figure out how illogical it is. As i've learned through FDR, most of the resistance stems from the emotional, not he logical. And you might as well focus on people who can focus on the logical, i.e. young.
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