Welcome to Hear Me Out. I'm your host Celeste Headley.

You know, our nation has a love-hate relationship with argument. A lot of us love to argue, but

even more of us hate the results. This show is an antidote to fighting for the sake of

winning. We'll tackle challenging topics. We'll talk. And we'll listen.

So why are we doing this? Well, our first guest contends that arguing with each other

isn't just a good practice, it's a moral one. Even if nobody's going to change their mind.

Engaging in an argument is one of the really profound ways that we can respect another person,

showing the person that we think it's important what they think, that we might actually have

something that we can learn from them. We'll unpack that and much more with philosopher Hugh

Breakey on this first episode of Hear Me Out. Right after this break, stay with us.

We're back on Hear Me Out. I'm Celeste Headley. An argument is a systemic attempt to make other

people think as we think. If we argue with any sort of seriousness at all, our desire must be to

make the thoughts of our viewers conform to our own. Otherwise, we are not arguing, but merely

disputing. That is, our effort will degenerate into an idle controversy of the Tiz Tait kind.

That's an excerpt from How to Debate, an instructional textbook by Robert Babcock and John Powell.

This year, that textbook turns 100 years old. Since 1923, a lot has changed.

I am not going to exploit for political purposes my opponents' youth and inexperience.

Senator Obama's plan is dangerous. That's not the case.

That's what he said was a precipitous and withdrawal would be dangerous, but that's what happened.

That's what Alan said. You could put half of Trump supporters into what I call the basket of

deplorables. I think there's blame on both sides and I have no doubt about it and you don't have

any doubt about it either. But the way we argue with each other has stayed pretty consistent with what

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