LTYM - Talking your way through to the answer

Letters to a Young Manager

Talking your way through to the answer, #112
LTYM > Strategy

Dear Adam,

***

Something I discovered just a couple of decades ago was that my thinking on topics gets better when I'm in a dialogue with somebody else who's also thinking about it. The back-and-forth leads to better insights, better phrasing, better conclusions that I might not have otherwise articulated well. So if I sit down to write an essay or a blog post, for example, I find it's not as robust than if I have a conversation with somebody about it.

I first learned that in graduate school. I was taking a philosophy course on the Ontology of Language. A heady topic that was pushing me to the limits of thinking.

I was working on my paper for the course, and I asked to see the professor. And he said, oh, come on over to the house. He lived in the next town, and we sat out on his porch with a cup of tea. It was a nice day, and I asked if it was okay if I recorded the conversation. I had one of those little cassette recorders. And he said, sure.

So I recorded the discussion and our back and forth on his porch about what I was studying, what I was looking at, writing about. I actually developed the ideas in the conversation to the point where it became the paper. And the paper was one of my better ones, where I knew I had hit on something. When the professor afterwards asked me for a copy of the paper, that was a good sign.

That experience was like instant learning for me, the way to better thinking. And, of course, this is very Socratic.[1] The dialogue is the way to climb the mountain of truth. And so choosing to put myself in a dialogue means I'm usually better at what I write.

So when you have a problem to solve, choose to put yourself in conversation about it. And take notes!

***

Sincerely,
Ed

________________________

[1] The Socratic method: dialectics: truth comes out of dialog of opposites: Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socratic_method

Takeaways:

Dialog often clarifies thinking better than thinking alone

Discussion Questions:

1. Have you been part of an engaging conversation that clarified the issues and possibilities for you? If not, have you seen this happen for others?
2. How is such a conversation similar to a debate? How is it different?
3. What are some ways you can put yourself into a conversation about a problem?

For Further Reading:

See "May I have a copy?" Letter #526

See my 11/15/23 conversation with John King

"Socratic method (or method of elenchos or Socratic debate) is a dialectic method of inquiry, largely applied to the examination of key moral concepts and first described by Plato in the Socratic Dialogues. For this, Socrates is customarily regarded as the father and fountainhead for ethics or moral philosophy.

It is a form of philosophical enquiry. It typically involves two speakers at any one time, with one leading the discussion and the other agreeing to certain assumptions put forward for his acceptance or rejection. The method is credited to Socrates, who began to engage in such discussion with his fellow Athenians after a visit to the Oracle of Delphi."

....

"The practice involves asking a series of questions surrounding a central issue, and answering questions of the others involved. Generally this involves the defense of one point of view against another and is oppositional. The best way to 'win' is to make the opponent contradict themselves in some way that proves the inquirer's own point.."

Dialectics: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialectic

In classical philosophy, dialectic (Greek: διαλεκτική) is an exchange of propositions (theses) and counter-propositions (antitheses) resulting in a synthesis of the opposing assertions, or at least a qualitative transformation in the direction of the dialogue. It is one of the three original liberal arts or trivium (the other members are rhetoric and grammar) in Western culture. In ancient and medieval times, both rhetoric and dialectic were understood to aim at being persuasive (through dialogue). The aim of the dialectical method, often known as dialectic or dialectics, is to try to resolve the disagreement through rational discussion. One way — the Socratic method — is to show that a given hypothesis (with other admissions) leads to a contradiction; thus, forcing the withdrawal of the hypothesis as a candidate for truth. Another way of trying to resolve a disagreement is by denying some presupposition of the contending thesis and antithesis; thereby moving to a third (syn)thesis.