“The time has come, the Walrus said, to talk of many things,
– Lewis Carroll, The Walrus and the Carpenter, from Through the Looking-Glass
Of shoes and ships and sealing-wax, of cabbages and kings,
And why the sea is boiling hot and whether pigs have wings,”
“He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that,”
– John Stuart Mill, On Liberty
Our Mission
To help people from across the viewpoint spectrum to better understand the views of their opponents and to promote more constructive discussion across a range of controversial topics.
Overview
In this era of increasing political polarization, which is compounded by the widespread reliance on information sources powered by attention-seeking algorithms which create partisan media bubbles and echo chambers, the need for informed discussion of our most divisive questions has never been greater.
As Lewis Caroll’s Walrus reminds us, the time has indeed come to speak of many things. While shoes, ships and sealing wax may not be high on our list of priority topics, the vehemence with which partisan commentators and activists attack their opponents, ascribe them malign motivations, and misrepresent their views and statements does bring to mind a “boiling hot sea” of discord rather than anything resembling thoughtful debate.
We firmly agree with John Stuart Mill’s observation that knowing only your own side of an argument means you know little of that. Too often people rely on simplistic “straw man” characterizations of their opponents’ beliefs and intentions, which are easy to burn down or ridicule, but don’t actually capture their opponents’ reasoning. Each side is then effectively talking past the other, tempers rise and rhetoric quickly turns ugly.
We believe that in any debate worth having, people on each side should be able to “steel man” their opponents’ points of view, by making, or at least understanding, their best possible arguments. If they can do that, and then offer thoughtful, valid and respectful critiques of even that best version of their opponents’ thinking, they might actually succeed in changing some minds, or they might undergo some changing of their own minds. Pigs may grow wings first, but consensus may even occasionally break out!
We are optimistic that this is possible, and we have created “BoilingHotSea.com” to try to promote such discourse. Each new post will include the transcript of a discussion between our two guest contributors, Walrus and Carpenter, about a controversial topic. You can find out more about our contributors on our Team page.
We welcome comments on each post, especially critiques of the arguments made by each contributor, and suggestions for how to strengthen their arguments. However, you must adhere to our simple Code of Conduct when making comments.
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