those who disagree should aim not for name-calling but for honest counterargument.
I agree that people can use the scale to sort among their arguments and filter out the lower ones, thus raising the level of discourse. But that is not the primary way I use the list. (I think I saw it on your site originally.)
People already subconsciously have a decent handle on what you explicated. What needs the most help is consciously understanding how good the various forms of argument are.
I say that people subconsciously understand these things because when pressed to rationalize, justify, or explain a position, they tend to give the available argument highest on the scale. This is counterbalanced by unique advantages name calling has, such as taking fewer words and lowering the status of the opposing arguers directly. But at least from D2 to D6, people basically get it.
That people are poor at comparing lists of evidence, one for and one against a proposition, does not mean that within each list, they are poor at sorting arguments from best to worst (although such a ranking will include already factored in for each sub-argument how likely it is to be wrong). The scale is most useful for testing the conclusions of entities by seeing where on the scale their best arguments fall, and how many such they have, in addition to checking the quality of them (i.e. how well they prove the sub-conclusions they are claimed to prove). “Entities” includes other people and one’s inner voice.
I agree that people can use the scale to sort among their arguments and filter out the lower ones, thus raising the level of discourse. But that is not the primary way I use the list. (I think I saw it on your site originally.)
People already subconsciously have a decent handle on what you explicated. What needs the most help is consciously understanding how good the various forms of argument are.
I say that people subconsciously understand these things because when pressed to rationalize, justify, or explain a position, they tend to give the available argument highest on the scale. This is counterbalanced by unique advantages name calling has, such as taking fewer words and lowering the status of the opposing arguers directly. But at least from D2 to D6, people basically get it.
That people are poor at comparing lists of evidence, one for and one against a proposition, does not mean that within each list, they are poor at sorting arguments from best to worst (although such a ranking will include already factored in for each sub-argument how likely it is to be wrong). The scale is most useful for testing the conclusions of entities by seeing where on the scale their best arguments fall, and how many such they have, in addition to checking the quality of them (i.e. how well they prove the sub-conclusions they are claimed to prove). “Entities” includes other people and one’s inner voice.