[jonnathanson]

Absolutely.

I would even go so far as to say that it's not about making a "weaker" argument; it's about making a more socially nuanced argument. Context counts. Subtext counts. They count especially when there's an audience to the argument (real or perceived). When someone feels his face, or dignity, or credibility is on the line, he feels intense pressure to stick to his guns -- and to keep his guns blazing.

Conversational softeners ("You make some great points, but...," or "I agree about X, but have you considered...") are not necessarily about weakening your own argument. They're about lowering psychological defensiveness to your argument. They increase the chances you might actually wind up with a productive dialogue, and after all, results matter more than absolute correctness. IMO, an effective argument is one that makes some headway -- ergo, this isn't really "weakening."

[DanHulton]

This feels a lot like John Cleese's advice on creativity within teams: You need to be surrounded by people who will build on ideas with you, not people who will lead with "no". The moment you have a person in the room with you who will shoot you down on an idea, trust falters and creativity dies.

Honestly, I've thought a lot lately about how I argue, and I find I get a lot more accomplished when I lead with "Yes, and". I feel like I should have taken drama instead of band when I was younger and I'd have reached this point sooner.

[oscilloscope]

"Yes, and" refers to one of the techniques of improvisational theatre.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Improvisational_theatre#Applyi...

Basically you must accept the reality your scene partners put forth and build on it. Otherwise you end up with a confused, amorphous environment with no clear direction.

Improv theatre still needs tension and conflict to emerge. This comes out of the structure of the scene spontaneously. It could be some kind of repetition, pattern, contradiction, physical motion, etc. Ideally, the players don't just rehash old games but are eager to make a new, unusual play.

"Unusual" in this sense relates to the context of the world you're playing in. In a scene, it's not unusual for a coven of witches to kidnap children and boil them in a brew. But it could be unusual for a scientist to discover that brew has miraculous healing properties and to publish the results in Nature. This could be humorous to an audience, because normally there's absolutely no legitimate utilitarian imperative to mix children into a brew.

There are more interesting ideas in improv that relate to politics/business. I recommend anyone interested check out Impro For Storytellers by Keith Johnstone.

http://appliedimprov.ning.com/profiles/blogs/7-keith-johnsto...

[simonh]

> I feel like I should have taken drama instead of band when I was younger and I'd have reached this point sooner.

I took drama lessons when I was a kid and have never regretted it. It's helped me in interviewing, meeting and greeting customers, giving presentations, providing training, all sorts. It's always hard to consider hypotheticals like how would I have fared without the drama training, but I have no doubt it has been a huge help. I'm encouraging my kids to do the same.

[jakobe]

I wish HN had a "star" button or so to keep track of insightful comments.

[aray]

Also not making a discussion into an argument between adversaries.

> The arguments that are most threatening to opponents are viewed as the strongest and cited most often. Liberals are baby-killers while conservatives won’t let women control their own body. [[examples from the article]]

Both of these are not only threatening, they're over-generalizing to the point of being wrong, and demeaning to the point of being insulting.