Originally posted by FMF
It's not about pre-empting what people who disagree with you might say, it's about people like you and me ~ within ourselves [not fielding questions from others in a debate with others] ~ about our respective beliefs, and whether our beliefs are in any way sustained or protected by selectivity in the sources of information we use.
We all protect our thoughts with reasons.
You might consider reasons to be the protective wall surrounding what needs to be protected - our thoughts.
That in and of itself does not say anything about the truthfulness of what we think or its falsehood. But it says we think a certain way. And we protect that way of thinking with reasons.
I don't know about Internet conversations, but an astute scholar would study more than one side of an issue always. He or she would examine one angle carefully and examine another angle carefully. If that student doesn't do that then they are not a very good scholar.
Now on a typical Internet Discussion Forum people are probably not going to take the time to volunteer a lot of source material contrary to what they want to believe. But a well written book or a graduate level text should present contrary viewpoints and do so with impeccable
fairness and objectivity.
The honest researcher should ask himself then, "Am I understanding and representing this contrary opinion to my own fairly ?"