A Medium for Rational Thinking and Discussion

I have an idea that I seriously think might change the world — a medium for rational thinking and discussion. Let me explain.


To start, consider how claims work. Claims are often dependent on each other. For example, claim A might be dependent on claim B, which might be dependent on C and D. So to prove A, you have to start out by first proving C and D. Sorta like a concept map.

Most people don’t see this. They don’t see the dependencies of claims. And they often jump from one claim to another recklessly (without exploring the claims that are prerequisites for the claim in question). They usually jump to tangential claims, which makes the problem even worse. This all plays a big role in why arguments are often unproductive. To be productive in an argument, you have to progress through the points in a structured and controlled manner.

So here’s my idea: force people to do this with a web app that facilitates discussion.

  • Make users declare the claims to be discussed.
  • Make users declare the relationships between the claims (“we need to prove C and D in order for B to be true”).
  • Allow users to discuss each of the claims. My initial idea is just a standard messaging thing (like Facebook messaging), but I think some brainstorming could produce something better than that. Maybe by letting users draw, in addition to letting them type.
  • Have the users update the statuses of the claim, by saying how confident they are in each of them. Like this. (An alternative could be a simple agree/disagree status for each claim.)

The above features alone are very valuable. Additionally…

  • To make it easy to have discussions with large numbers of people, and to make it easy for new members to join a discussion, there should be summary (similar to answer wiki’s) for each claim.
  • As far as real time discussion goes, interrupting is a huge problem. Not as much online as in person, but still a problem. Sometimes interrupting is useful, and sometimes it isn’t. I think the person typing should have the option of raising a flag that doesn’t let anyone interrupt him (to be used when he’s making an important point). On the other hand, if other people think the talker needs to be interrupted (rambling, tangents, quick point of fact), they could raise certain flags that show the typer what the objection is.

I haven’t fully brainstormed and thought this out, but hopefully you get the gist.


So now the question becomes, “how is this useful?”.

  • Some people say, “no one thinks like this, and no one wants this”. I think these are too strong of statements to make. I think that there are probably communities, like lesswrong and HN that would adopt this if it were available as a plugin like disqus. I think that at the very least, this could be a niche idea.
  • Personally, I could see this being adopted pretty widely. I think a lot of people would find this useful. I think that when the claims and their relationships are laid out so clearly in front of you, it’ll make arguing way more productive. And I think that people will find more productive arguments to be more enjoyable. I think that there’ll probably still be a place for the standard commenting platforms that we’re used to today, but there’ll still be room for this idea to be pretty widely adopted.
  • One very important way that this can be useful, is that it might put pressure on people like politicians to map out their arguments in this format. Think about it, if lots of people agree that there’s a quick, reasonable, and effective way for politicians to justify their positions, then there’ll be pressure on them to do it. Especially considering how easy it’ll be for them to do it. If they don’t do it, people will protest that this politician isn’t a rational thinker if he can’t do something a simple as lay out his argument for us, which will cause lots of political damage for him.
  • Probably the most important way in which this’ll be useful is that it’ll make the people who use it better thinkers. Making someone a better thinker has compounding benefits (they think better, they make better decisions etc.), and I think that the aggregation of these compounded benefits is huge!