As I said: my usual goal in those discussions is to see if there's any merit at all to either the arguments of, or discourse with, a specific person. I've yet to be convinced.
When I repeatedly call out an individual's failings (Noel Yap would be another G+ instance) and they never once apologize or admit error ... again, any last shred of respect has been lost. In his case I'd largely taken to deleting his idiotic comments to my own posts, and finally just blocked him -- the idiocy was too much to take. The icing in his case was repeatedly failing to read or comprehend the text directly before him to which he was responding.
When I make a glaring error, and am called on it, I admit it and appreciate the correction. I don't insist on being wrong.
What is it you perceive your job as?
Learn from others, help them learn from me, and together approach truth in our understandings of the world. When people feel attacked, they shut down. Associating arguments with attacks does poor things to human wetware.
Sometimes the truth I arrive at is that someone is an idiot (deliberately or otherwise) and that a belief system is wrong.
I've already noted several of the problems I've encountered (non-intellectual motivations / tactical stupidity). The other is the sheer volume of crap most Libertarian's I've run into believe (or at least profess). As I said, I may (and likely will) address it in written form. But it's akin to dealing with climate denialists, creationists, flat-earthers, and others who are vested in an illogical and counterfactual belief system. Very simply not worth the effort.
Trust me: in cases where this gets used it's already a lost cause.
Chaplin's "The Great Dictator" showed that sometimes ridicule is precisely the right tool for the job. No, he didn't change the minds of those he was portraying, but he clearly demonstrated to everyone else the reality. Stewart and Colbert continue his tradition.
I disagree. In noting that a doctrine has no foundation, bearing, or interest in the truth or verifiability, you're saving a lot of wasted time and breath.
As for collectives, last I checked most humans were collectives of a few trillion or so individual cells, comprising multiple gene lines and species.
Do you want?
Do you want?"
When we say "want" we are, when not speaking metaphorically, speaking at the level of the individual. Call this want1. Want1 is not constructed from a collection of want0s of my individual cells, but follows from specific constructions of cells designed to want1. The existence of a want2 was something I wanted to limit my stipulation of - I make no strong claim of its absence. Constructing it from collected want1s often leads to things like circular preferences, though, so there are clearly at least some caveats.
You are forgetting that you're dealing with actual people.