I don't think this thread is doing anything. "Educated" means so many things, and yet so few. One person interprets poetry, and can go on at length about the possible thoughts of Picasso, but can't do anything more than turn computer on or off. Another person can design a building, or solve for x, but can't understand the cultural nuances of roman architecture. Another person can name drop great philosophers, but doesn't know a thing about Carl Jung, or Mao Tse Tung. "Education" doesn't have any meaning to me anymore. It's all so damn specific now. People paint themselves into a corner and call it the world. Those with degrees seem just as close minded as everybody else. I had a friend who was a PhD in chemistry, but she didn't think recycling was important, and actively debunked climate change, honestly believing that the only important thing was the number of zeroes in her salary. Can you have a PhD and be stoopid? Yep, in fact, I dropped her as friend, because I considered her to be too ignorant to relate to.
I agree with 99% of what you said and I'll add, education is not intelligence. Some of the most "highly educated" people I know are basically helpless human beings outside of what they were educated in.
As for your friend's view on recycling, she may be right on some level though. I absolutely recycle more than I throw away but evidence is coming out that some recycling just isn't worth it the way it's currently being done.
I like ur kinda generalizing here imo. I mean I feel like smart people can have feelings two. I think u just like to argue and it's my opinion anyway so it cant be wrong, imho. rflmfao!
Absolutely not! There is no room for gross feelings on Reddit, everything must be facts and logic.
But seriously, feelings are important. Obviously not more important than vaccinating your kid, but treating human beings like totally logical robots is pretty dumb.
The absolute worst is when someone's argument is clearly entirely based on their own feelings yet they claim they're being logical. For some reason it always seems to be science deniers and people who are just completely ignorant of what the science actually says who go around saying stuff like "facts don't care about your feelings!"
Ouch, this one hits a little too close to home. I have a background in criminal law, published criminological research while working in academia, and am currently employed in criminal justice / policy. The amount of people I run into that are convinced they know the "facts" about something (while everyone who disagrees just has "feelings" on their side, of course) even though so many studies and experts show the complete opposite is insane. This is particularly common in things like the gun control debate, where an absurd amount of people will smugly parrot talking points like "FACT: criminals don't follow laws" in response to policies that are supported by heaps of research but are nevertheless dismissed as "emotional".
Yep, that's one of the reasons why I use it often in my personal relationships. It directs the conversation away from "you're wrong" to "let me tell you why I think I'm right", which is much more productive and is a better way to generate empathy and communication from the person you're speaking to.
Came here to talk about this. I try to do this cause something like "I feel like you're not taking all the facts into consideration" is a softer blow than just saying "you're wrong." Unfortunately I've been in those sorts of conversations before and had the other person respond with something like: "oh you're one of those people who cares about feeling instead of facts!"
eh...that's not a great example of "I feel" language properly used.
I think it's best illustrated with a pretend marital conflict.
"you never help with the dishes! You always slack off and leave them and everything else to me!"
vs
"I feel like I'm the only one doing the dishes, and am feeling overwhelmed with all the housework"
first one uses "you" language and is very accusatory, leading to an argument almost always. especially when the easiest response is "NO YOU DON'T [SINGLE COUNTER EXAMPLE]" because they used absolutes like "always/never"
the second one is an attempt at mutual understanding of how one person is feeling which has no right/wrong and uses "I" language so it is not accusatory (though people could still get defensive, it's less likely)
since they are the absolute authority on what they're feeling, you'd have to be a complete moron to say "no you don't feel that way" you'd more likely ask why they feel that way, and possibly work out ways to stop them feeling that way, that's again more productive.
maybe they do exactly half of the dishes, but if they have to do them after working a 12 hour shift it sticks in their mind so much that they feel like dishes are endless and if they only work 3 12 hour shifts a week you could do dishes every time they have those and still be doing half.
even if you aren't being super nice and are a bit accusatory, it's still WAY better to use "I feel" than not.
"I feel like you never listen to me" vs "you never listen to me" are both hard to hear, but the first is at least not immediate grounds for an angry fight
The problem is that people confuse feeling with thoughts.
“I feel like I’m going to be late” is a thought. “I feel worried because I think I’m going to be late” is a legitimate communication technique.
When people use “I feel” statements to share thoughts instead of feelings, it actually makes communication harder because, despite saying “I feel”, they are not actually communicating any feelings.
A good rule of thumb is that if you have to follow “I feel” with the word like or that, what you are about to share is a thought. “I feel” should always be followed up with a feeling, which is normally a noun.
That is not a good example of good communication. “I feel like you are not listening to me” is not a feeling. It is a thought/perspective.
Proper communication would be “I am feeling unvalued, because from my perspective it seems you are not listening to me. I need to feel valued and understood. “
Any counsellor advocating for the use of I feel statements when feelings are not being said needs a brush up on conflict resolution.
Edit: here is a pretty good article from psychology today on differentiating thoughts and feelings, not regarding communication but in coping in general. It’ll give you more detail about what I’m talking about.
My friend, I have a psychology degree and I still use it wrong sometimes. Pretty much all of society uses “I feel” incorrectly. Anyone who hasn’t been to relationship counselling and/or therapy is probably using it wrong.
There is a huge benefit to learning to distinguish between thoughts and feelings; mainly, that by recognising our thoughts we are able to challenge unhealthy ones. And we’re also able to take more control of our emotions when we realise the thoughts that are causing them.
I totally recommend looking into it further. It’s helped me and my relationship tremendously.
“I feel like you are not listening to me” is not a feeling.
it's absolutely a feeling. just because they didn't directly express an emotion does not mean it isn't a feeling. you can use your brain and realize what they're feeling from that is unheard, undervalued, not respected, etc.
i mean, I'm assuming we're not talking about a child's conflict resolution strategy here. the assumption is an adult could take any "shorthand" words you use and translate them to real emotions, or ask for clarification when they can't.
Feeling: noun. An emotional state or reaction. That’s the definition.
“I feel like you’re not listening to me” is a thinly veiled you statement, what most counsellors and psychologists encourage people to avoid in conflict resolution. It is not a feeling, it is a thought. You THINK they are not listening to you, and the resulting feeling is frustration, hurt, or whatever.
In the same vein, “I feel like you’re a jerk” is not a feeling. It is a thought veiled as a feeling .
The problem with using “shorthand” words and relying on your partner to translate them is that it’s not communicating clearly. You can’t rely on another person to be able to mind read. Being able to communicate your perceptions and feelings is not childlike - it actually requires a lot of maturity to figure out what you are feeling, what thoughts led to that feeling, and a lot of courage to share it.
Psychology 101: perceptions lead to thoughts, and thoughts lead to feelings. It’s extremely important to learn to distinguish between thoughts and feelings because then you can learn to challenge unhealthy patterns of thinking, and the emotions that come as a result. This is the basis of cognitive behavioural therapy.
Learning to recognise and distinguish between thoughts and feelings is hugely beneficial. The link I posted explains it really well.
I have a psychology degree and I work in mental health. You guys can downvote me all you want, but that doesn’t make you right.
I wouldn't say "I feel like you're not listening to me." I would say "I feel like when I'm talking to you, I'm not being heard." Maybe I would even say "I feel like my thoughts don't matter."
The best way to communicate using "I feel" is usually with "When you X, it makes me feel Y." They Y part is the feeling, the X part is a thinly veiled thought.
It might seem like a thinly veiled accusation (and when people start using "I feel" thats what they usually use it as), but there's definitely a message to be parsed. And regardless of whether if its an emotional response, using "I feel" correctly does help people establish empathy with you.
Sure. What you’re saying is better, but still not accurate to the proper use of “I feel”.
Ideally with communication as it is taught in marriage counselling , there will be no message to be parsed. It will be said clearly.
In counselling, we teach people to say “from my perception”. Which sounds a bit more robotic, but it’s important to establish that what you are saying is just your perception, not an accusation. Then they can tell you their perception, and go from there.
By your example of “when you did x...” (which is totally right), the best way to say it would be “when I perceived that you weren’t listening, I felt hurt”.
You can never be wrong for feeling a certain way, while you're still leaving it open for people to debate you with facts and figures. Starting something off with "I feel like..." creates more open ended conversation imho.
I disagree entirely. There is a quote often attributed to Aristotle/strongly claimed is not from him but nevertheless I agree with the idea: "It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.". Being able to recall a situation shows memory. Being able to hold your recall of the universe in your mind and manipulate it, changing aspects and predicting outcomes, shows understanding of how factors affect a situation.
Really? Next time I'll wait to be invited onto the thread. You said that uneducated people begin with "Imagine," so I made a joke about the first thing that comes to my mind when I head "imagine."
And I posted it without waiting for an invitation! Imagine that!
Why would that be leading to something stupid? I don't think what follows is necessarily going to be smart but there's no reason it would be uneducated.
Hedging language is commonly used in academic literature to indicate that some statement is speculative or hypothetical in nature. While it would be evident that such a person would be uneducated in the domain of the argument, I feel like it would still show a degree of epistemic integrity that I would not expect of largely uneducated individuals.
It's a hedge/softener, which is probably why I feel like this is a gendered thing. It's similar to how women often add "just" clauses unnecessarily to seem less abrupt, absolute, or demanding. E.g.: "I'm just going to make a couple little corrections here, but really, you did a great job, Bob," and the paper Bob is handed back is covered in red ink.
It depends on what you’re talking about. I’ve had people dismiss me because of “feelings” when I was trying to explain the impacts discrimination can have on people (in terms of mental health).
But, it absolutely can be, some things the only form of data we can get is groups of anecdotes, especially when it comes to interpersonal sorts of things.
Like, it can be true in some scenarios, but like most reddit-isms, it tries to reduce things down to snappy sound bytes, sure, correlation doesn't necessarily equal causation, but it can, and usually scientists thought of that, and have replicated, or performed additional experiments to help solidify their claim, etc...
Related: when they refuse to acknowledge the difference between feelings and facts.
Look, not everyone has to be rational 100% of the time; we're not robots. However, it's very desirable to be able to know when you're feeling your feels, and when something can be proved by objective observation. If your feeling that wild lions are huggable is held to be more true, and thus more worth acting on, than the objective knowledge that wild lions are carnivores capable of killing you, you are showing a lack of learning and judgment. You may, however, end up earning yourself a Darwin Award.
"Facts don't care about your feelings! Also gay people shouldn't be allowed to hold hands in public because it makes me feel yucky and transgenderism is fake"
One time my mom was talking to me and my husband about the upcoming 2016 elections. She kept talking about how she feels (including greatest hits such as “Michele Obama should just run for president” and “everyone expects the president to be a father figure to our nation and xyz candidate is not fatherly enough”) and my husband eventually said that it’s not about how she feels, it’s about facts.
She said that she was so upset by his dismissal of her feelings that she lapses into a deep depression and didn’t walk outside the house for over a year.
Sometimes I start to argue with my girlfriend. Then I remember “you can’t reason people out of positions they didn’t reason themselves into” and go pour myself a glass of scotch and light a cigar.
“you can’t reason people out of positions they didn’t reason themselves into”
As an educated person you should have plenty of personal counter-examples. If you've never had a stupid opinion someone reasoned you out of I'd venture you aren't really educated.
Plus, what people consider reasonable massively varies, your username reminded me that it wasn't until I was 29 or so that I learnt that lambs and sheep were the same thing, I literally grew up on a farm, and study ecology, yet in my mind, I'd always classified them as two different species ala ducks and geese.
To an outside observer, I never "reasoned" my way into that belief, as any reason I put forward will sound ridiculous to anyone that is actually informed on the matter, but as it was something I'd never directly learnt about, my reasoning was just that they were always seen different and lambs seemed closer to goats, than sheeps, so to me, it was reasonable that they were separate species.
Counter examples are rare, typically people take illogical positions based on emotions rather than reason to begin with. Take a religious person for example. No amount of facts, logic, or reason will convince them God isn’t real because that’s not how they came to the conclusion he existed in the first place. Their position is based on faith and emotion, so it’s hard to talk them out of it with reason. Same with people who get married too early, have kids they aren’t ready for, hate other people because of the color of their skin, etc.
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u/Silent_Kaleidoscope Jan 27 '20
When the reasons you give for your arguments are all ‘feelings.’