In this enlightening video, Daniel H. Cohen’s main claim is that war in argument misses out on the real benefits of engaging in active disagreement. He is claiming that there should be new types of arguments that are positive. He supports this claim by explaining that the “loser” in the argument is really the one who gains knowledge so why is he portrayed as the loser. He also explains that war in argument prevents compromise, collaboration, negotiation, and deliberation which all should be things we seek in a good arguments, but war in argument doesn’t allow for this. He says that the only outcome in this type of environment is great triumph or shameful defeat, and this is polarizing. Nothing good can come out of this type of argument, and he rightfully wants to change that.
There were many new ideas that I heard in this Ted Talk. I always believed that the winner in the argument was the one who got the opponent to believe his or her point, but now I see that the opponent or adversary is really the “winner”. They are the winner because they now have gained knowledge and new insight into something they previously did not know. Knowledge is power. I also learned that there are different types of arguments. I never really thought about arguments as performance as a type of discourse, but now that makes a lot of sense for there to be different types of arguments depending on the situation.
I do not have any counterarguments for Cohen, but I do have one question. How would you successfully have an argument without offending someone’s personal beliefs? Because it seems like in many arguments or debates, it is very difficult to have civil discourse with a person who is not willing to even try to believe or listen to anything you are saying. It is especially difficult to argue if they have certain religious or strict beliefs that they have grown up believing.
Ideas from this video certainly have made me think about how to word my argument in my paper so that it does not come off as a “I’m right and you’re wrong” situation. I want it to be a paper that gives new information and knowledge to the person reading who may or may not agree with the topic.