The point of this discussion is NOT how to discuss/argue with your wife but to learn how to evaluate when and when NOT to engage your Oak qualities. To some this may not be of value, to others it might be. As we unplug men face seemingly reasonable arguments from their wives, some do not. I compare it to the the story of the Gordian Knot. Some are able to just cut the knot and achieve their goals, others need to study it.

Reasoning must follow all the rules of logic, it must avoid fallacies. The problem, like I said, is that reasonable arguments mainly rely on rhetoric (talking) in order to be successful and from rhetoric comes the greater chance of fallacies and ego based statements.

For instance a reasonable argument would be:

  • Premise 1: Men are stronger then women.
  • Premise 2: Tarzan is a man
  • Premise 3: Jane is a woman

Therefore

Conclusion: Tarzan is stronger then jane.

This is a true argument….maybe. Premise 1 is true Premise 2 is true so is Premise 3. The conclusion lines up. That is of course if Jane isn’t a powerlifter, or Tarzan isn’t 97 pounds or an invalid.

We’ve all been engaged in purely reasonable arguments. It comes at you like a tidal wave and doesn't relent. I often call reasonable arguments the brute force method of discussion. This brute force can be emotional or a flood of facts that support the premise someone is trying to push on you. Either way they literally trying to overpower you with a flood of premises and facts so you don’t have time to evaluate what’s going on. While this does use a fallacy, it doesn’t have to be fallacious to be wrong or bad.

The conclusion of a reasonable argument is intended to “go beyond” the content of the premises. The premises will be similar to the conclusion but the conclusion itself will go further and almost seem to “jump the shark”.

Such an argument may take any of several forms: predictions about the future, arguments from analogy, inductive generalizations, arguments from authority, arguments based on signs, and causal inferences, to name just a few. With an MRP lens does this sound familiar? Of course it does. It’s a shit test.

Disregarding the nature and reason for it (the why) a shit test can be a reasonable argument. We are going to dissect them, NOT to learn their nature because we know that, but in order to better understand their composition and perhaps identify them more easily. Then with that knowledge learn when to listen to them and when to STFU. SOme find this harder then others, but this is how I began to identify them with my wife. YMMV.

The tone, presentation, and manner of address of a reasonable argument are designed for a specific reason, but it’s merely a disguise to prevent you from using your logical mind to decipher what’s going on. This is why MRP advice for the beginning stages of unplugging guys is to STFU.

Not only are you not prepared to deal with the premises of her reasonable argument, but doing so you could blow shit up fast. The other devices AA, AM….are there to help deal with these premises and conclusion over time, but notice how in adhering to my advice about NOT attacking premises lines up with MRP advice on dealing with shit test while first unplugging? Amazing how it all lines up. Even still you don’t directly deal with the argument. You side step it. Amused Mastery, Agree/Amplify…all these allow you side step, to not have to deal with it.

Another way to look at dealing with reasonable arguments is playing a game. Your wife has already determined the rules of the game. Working within her frame you play that game. To remove yourself think about playing her game, but with different rules. Just don't tell her the new rules.

When I taught squad tactics at Benning I used this analogy. I would place a coin in one of my hands. Ask a student to pick the hand. I would go on about how no one ever found the coin. Not in 2 years I'd been there. I even made a big deal about disguising which hand it was in. The students took the bait. What they didn't realize, and what I didn't tell them was that I had changed the rules without notice. The new goal was to NOT find the coin. trouble was I had two coins, one in each hand.

It was a dick move to be sure, but it taught a lesson, and is analogous to here. Don't go head on.

For example, you are out on a drive with your wife. She suddenly starts telling you where to go, big arm gestures, angry tone, criticizes your driving, and choice of routes….

because traffic is lousy in this area. Whenever she drives here it’s bad she tells you. Therefore traffic is going to be bad.

This seems reasonable. After all her experience is that traffic is bad in this area and you want to allow her that. Yet what she isn’t saying that she only is here during the hours of 8am-9am, or maybe she was here only once and it left an indelible image on how had it was. It is now 5pm or the construction, accident, or traffic light outage is no longer a factor. It's a different situation.

You can argue the premise and facts or you can STFU and keep going. Or you can pull one of the other tactics out:

"yeah? I like bad traffic. I can improve my grand theft auto skills."

In the next post I will get into examples. They will largely be from my life and the things my wife has said. I will put them into a logical format, any reading of emotion or context is to the reader, as I am more concerned more about structure. To those knowledgable in logic you will recognize these as inductive arguments. To the unschooled inductive reasoning is perfectly viable and can create sound arguments, but even within the philosophy of logic there are huge debates over their value. Mainly because inductive reasoning can leave large gaps between premise and conclusion. Sometimes it’s a tactic in an argument, other times it’s ignorance.