I'll ask my friends occasionally, "Why you believe that?", and I'm amazed when I realize that beyond a few brief soundbites, there's no real foundation beneath their viewpoints. Strong emotions but little rationale.
If you get a chance, take a look at Jonathan Haidt's excellent book The Righteous Mind, which is about, among other things, how people come to believe what they do (I wrote a little about it here: http://jakeseliger.com/2012/03/25/jonathan-haidts-the-righte...).
A better strategy in my experience is go up a meta level to something like, "How do people come to believe what they believe?"
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I'll ask my friends occasionally, "Why you believe that?", and I'm amazed when I realize that beyond a few brief soundbites, there's no real foundation beneath their viewpoints. Strong emotions but little rationale.
If you get a chance, take a look at Jonathan Haidt's excellent book The Righteous Mind, which is about, among other things, how people come to believe what they do (I wrote a little about it here: http://jakeseliger.com/2012/03/25/jonathan-haidts-the-righte...).
A better strategy in my experience is go up a meta level to something like, "How do people come to believe what they believe?"