Bryan, you sure knocked over the wasps' nest! I applaud your replies to hostile comments to try to save the dialogue. Your case in your piece is well thought out and articulated.

It's amazing in a way how you can't say to someone "I know you're wrong and I know I'm right, but howabout we drop our defenses, test each other's ideas, and see where we end up?"

There's something paradoxical in someone declaring "how dare you say I'm wrong when they're blithely implying you're the one who's wrong."

That said, ultimately you're never completely right, you're just more right than the other person.

If two people are truly reasonable, I believe they will eventually come to some kind of agreement. I think disagreement is because people are operating in different contexts. They each see a slightly different problem and so see a different solution.

In other words, disagreement occurs when not all the information is on the table. The person who is most right should take the lead in identifying the missing information. The other is more wrong mostly because they have less information.

Sorry I'm not so coherent writing this. Again, my hat's off to you for nailing down so many facets of these issues.