Igniting the discourse - Part I

The inception of online discourse mediums (BBS Mailboxes, Usenet, Online Forums and modern social media) promised an era of unprecedented intellectual exchange, cultivating spaces where diverse viewpoints could burgeon, enlightening the global populace. From early dial up mailboxes, usenet to online forums to modern social media - these platforms were perceived as crucibles for fostering understanding and propagating knowledge, giving a voice to the unheard and allowing the interchange of ideas across geographical boundaries.

However, the potential of these platforms has been gradually obscured by the deteriorating constructive discourse. Particularly platforms like Twitter, Facebook and Youtube have become battlegrounds of cultural wars, more focused on fighting for interpretative predominance than the real exchange of substantive content and knowledge.

Online discourse is now submerged in relentless cultural wars. The noble notion of a digital marketplace where ideas are exchanged, evaluated, and enriched has distorted into an arena where dominance in discussions precedes mutual exchange. This distortion has facilitated the commodification of disinformation and extremist views, sidelining the essence of substantive, enlightened dialogues. Elon Musk exemplifies how influential figures can distort discourse under the pretext of ‘promoting plurality.’ Through his often polarizing and provocative statements, Musk reveals how easily the dialogue can shift from constructive conversations to manipulative discourses, contributing to a skewed understanding of issues.

In this context, the abuse of Schopenhauer's discourse strategies becomes evident. Conversations are less about reaching mutual understanding and more about strategic maneuvering, geared towards undermining opposition. This, in turn, contributes to organized science denial and perpetrates epistemological violence, where certain knowledge is dismissed, marginalized, invalidated or straight up misinterpreted in order to paint a bad picture of certain parts of the population.

Modern discourse is currently facing a critical crisis. The fundamentals of conversation are eroding, replaced by battles for narrative control, where listening is a forgotten art, and the objective is to out-shout the opponent. This crisis is fueled by the pursuit of clout, the propagation of extremist views, and the erosion of the sanctity of facts.

The strategies used are so effective on fast paced social media, that even organised fact checking, contextualisation and other attempts to battle this kind of destructive discourse only have given more reach to it.

Pathways to Resolution

Revitalizing meaningful dialogue online requires creative solutions. The utilization of Large Language Models (LLMs) can offer valuable insights and foster a better understanding on the mis-interpretation of scientific methods. Creating tools that assess documents using FLICC methods showing its use and how these kinds of arguments are built on each other have a potential to educate the masses and help people not to engage with content that is bathed in these methods.

The use of Schopenhauer's 'The Art if Being Right' can be easily detected in Text form and help readers understand the authors intentions much better. The catalogue of deceptive methods in making arguments is quite long and even scholars have a hard time understanding them all. I have been working on several solutions to address the highlighted problems and will detail these initiatives in subsequent blog posts. The objective is to provide tools to b battle the actual state of online discourse and give users ways of detecting undue influence on the reader.

The decline of meaningful conversations online is a pressing concern that requires immediate attention and concerted efforts. We need to reclaim the intellectual sanctity of online spaces, transforming them back into forums for constructive discourse.

How can we, as active participants in online discourse, contribute to the re-establishment of constructive and meaningful conversations and resist the tide of strategic discussions, FLICC Methods, epistemological violence and disinformation? A lot of things have failed to do so. Maybe it is time to burn the discourse as done today for good and make it much harder to manipulate people into being helping hands for science deniers and the alt-right. I think we had enough of it by now - It is time to act.