Don't Get But'ed
Stop people from progressing the conversation without addressing your arguments.
“Gift cards are a scam. Starbucks makes nearly $200 Million a year from unfulfilled gift cards. There are billions of dollars of gift cards that go unused each year. Unlike cash, they can only be used at select, restricted locations. They often have expiry dates. They’re easy to lose. And even when you do use them, there’s some amount that will go unused or there isn’t quite enough to buy what you want, leading to an upsell.” Jimmy says to his girlfriend, Josephine, while they walk and talk about what to get their friends for their wedding. “Okay, but it’s the thought that counts. Getting a gift card to a place someone likes is more thoughtful than just giving cash, isn’t it?” Josephine responds. “I guess so…” Jimmy says meekly, accepting the last statement as the conclusion to the discussion.
“Okay, but…” is not an honest response to an argument. It’s the initiation of a diabolical conversational technique that I call But’ing. But’ing is where the person you’re talking to tries to progress the conversation without addressing your arguments. It exploits your lack of focus and expectation that when someone says “but” they usually follow with a statement that counters what you’ve just said. And if you aren’t paying attention, it works. You’ll gloss over the fact they haven’t addressed any of your previous arguments and you’ll feel as though you have to contend with the statement they’ve just made using new information that you haven’t already shared. If you find yourself reflecting on a conversation and you don’t remember what the counterpoints to your arguments were, it’s probably because there weren’t any, and you were just but’ed.
But’ing works because humans have a really poor short-term memory. The average human can hold ~7 pieces of information in their short-term memory at once and will forget that information in 15 to 30 seconds if they don’t start to repeat it out loud. Throw in the emotions of a heated debate and we’re like goldfish. We frequently forget the arguments we’ve made just two sentences ago, let alone whether or not they were addressed.
To make matters worse, we also have a really hard time accepting that both sides of a debate can be right. We subconsciously assume that if one side is right about something, the other side is wrong about everything. If you can trick someone into thinking their arguments have been addressed, then force them to contend with a true argument of your own, they’ll feel like you’re right and they’re wrong.
The best way to recognize when you’ve been but’ed is to know how to do it yourself:
Let the other person state their arguments. You may need to make one or two follow-up statements to get them to exhaust all of their points.
Say, “Okay, but…” followed by your argument, which is tangential to their previous arguments.
End with a rhetorical question, making the person you’re talking to feel as though they need to immediately address the point you’ve just made.
Speak loud and clear while maintaining eye contact for the best results. If the person you’re talking to responds with anything other than “Wait…”, accepting your artificial progression, you’ve succeeded.
To avoid getting but’ed, you cannot let the conversation progress without your arguments being addressed. Listen carefully and ensure the person you’re talking to actually responds to what you’ve said. If they start to go off on a tangent, halt the conversation. Force them to address your argument before allowing the conversation to progress.
I hate to be the one to say this, but this clearly is not argumentation. It is called sophistry because it relies not on logic or reason but on an emotional appeal, albeit a psychologically inherent one that all humanity shares.
This example you provide is quite minor, compared to the more common hegelian dialectic and other critical methods not based in logic but instead used for malign influence, what you mention in your article is nothing in comparison, because these tactics and their uses are truly diabolical.
At first glance, it sounds like an argument, but it really couldn't be further from it. Deceitful people commonly use these tactics to confuse, and disorient their critics, or create a similar strawman in a question form, seeking agreement, so they can use your own psychology against you. The 5 or 6 basic principles are outlined in Robert Cialdini's book, Influence; as levers of influence. They are psychological blindspots, and mass manipulation is all about using those non-alerting tactics to coerce people to do what you want. Sometimes its a win-win for both parties, but that is often very rare.
When you agree to something, psychology doesn't reverse, and you defend that standpoint to remain consistent. You see a perfect example of this when you try to convince someone they are wrong (when they clearly are). The more you try, the less receptive and more defensive they get. It's called the consistency principle. If you trick someone into it, their psychology aligns with what they agreed to. This is also how brainwashing worked in PoW camps in the Korean War (1950s). They started off with giving them the choice of writing essays on topics like "Why the US isn't the best government" with the alternative torture/hard labor. This was reinforced through radio broadcasts the camps were required to listen to, and then progressed slowly to why Communism is the best government.
Mao did horrific things in struggle sessions designed to break people's psychology. People ultimately either had a psychotic break or aligned with the ideology. This is described in historical documentation/observation in the book the Psychology of Totalism by Robert Lifton.
Given that Logic and Reasoning is no longer taught in schools aside from college courses for specific majors, and persuasion/communication is almost not taught at all. Very few people really understand the dangers, such as Sapir-Whorf or the psychological blindspots, and it is being used regularly but floats just beneath the surface just about everywhere that matters today.
News, social media, anywhere an echo chamber exists (i.e. many fake profiles to one [you]). The more exposure, the more likely you are to accept it, and remain consistent with what you accepted.
The use of these techniques for malign purposes, or purposes that cause any kind of loss directly or indirectly is a greater evil, and unfortunately most people today are taught to be blind to evil. Most cultures have some local form of good vs. evil, and thus this statement can't be dismissed solely as a normative statement with no basis (such as this just being my personal opinion). There is quite a lot of old school literature dealing with the nature of lies and falsity in its many forms. The worst notably often being the most tempting, such as where is the harm...
As far as I'm aware, there is no practical application of use for these techniques in defense. The only use is that by knowing them you can sidestep the pitfalls, or potentially create your own associative triggers of alarm; and re-evaluate if you were tricked, although that is much more difficult as it involves knowing a lot about psychology and creating associative anchors.
Hegelian dialectic structure, comes in many forms, but bears mostly on association where there may be none. Its circular, with valid purposes in philosophy as meta-analysis but has been re-purposed in more modern times for deceit.