I think trying to win the memetic war and trying to find the truth are fundamentally at odds with each other, so you have to find the right tradeoff. fighting the memetic war actively corrodes your ability to find the truth. this is true even if you constrain yourself to never utter any knowing falsehoods—even just arguing against the bad arguments over and over again calcifies your brain and makes you worse at absorbing new evidence and changing your mind. conversely, committing yourself to finding the truth means you will get destroyed when arguing against people whose only goal is to win arguments.
I think trying to win the memetic war and trying to find the truth are fundamentally at odds with each other, so you have to find the right tradeoff. fighting the memetic war actively corrodes your ability to find the truth. this is true even if you constrain yourself to never utter any knowing falsehoods—even just arguing against the bad arguments over and over again calcifies your brain and makes you worse at absorbing new evidence and changing your mind. conversely, committing yourself to finding the truth means you will get destroyed when arguing against people whose only goal is to win arguments.