In my 15+ years of conversing online, migrating from usenet to slashdot, to reddit, to eventually here, I've learned that online arguing by and large is a waste of time - most of the conversations superficial, many of the thoughts I express and agree with, or even disagree with, having little to no consequence on anything tangible.

I've gotten lots of positive responses over the years, from sideline viewers and even the people I was directly conversing with, but I've also received more than my share of negativity, 'trolling' and hostility.

I agree with you, that one way to carry an argument to a conclusion is to avoid aiming to convince the other person of anything, to simply illustrate your point, and allow whoever is reading to be able to read your point without feeling as though their own ideas and beliefs are under attack.

The slightly humorous thing is, the more people agreed with me and rallied behind me, the less I wanted to converse. I neither sought debate for the purposes of constructing heated arguments, but I began to fear that I had learned some kind of argument algorithm, that made my perspective more appealing to listen to and agree with. I felt as though I was combining elements of logic and rhetoric in ways that seemed to directly reveal truth, but when I walked away from my computer, I felt none the wiser for what I had expressed. On top of this, I realized much of the time, I wasn't even really thinking about what I was saying, and in retrospect, I wound up trailing down paths of ideas that seemed to have more control over me, than I did over them, just because the argument itself seemed to stitch itself together so eloquently.

I pop my head in from time to time, place to place, but I think it's much more enjoyable and valuable to learn what my opinions are, isolated, than what they are, publicly. I have had far more questions about my own ideas, when I don't feel compelled to distill them down to something easily digestible, easily understood, and easily communicated.

There is a lot of loneliness in this, I will say that. And there was a lot of growth I had myself, in conversing with so many people, so I don't discredit it entirely. A balance between knowing one's own self, and being able to effectively communicate one's own ideas is probably the ideal, but this itself requires just as much, if not more time, to achieve directly, than it does to experience life, observe it, derive opinions from it, and express them on any other subject matter. It was that realization, that made me realize how superficial my opinions were. These were ideas that I connected strongly to my identity, and because of the response I received, I thought they were valuable, deep, well thought out, worthy of holding tightly to.

I'd like to learn to converse again, one day, but I would hope that the things I get to talk about affect both myself and the people who want to interact with me, in ways that are not so short lived. Small talk can be nice, but I've learned that even the most intellectually challenging subjects can find ways to turn themselves into small talk. When I hit that realization, I felt that every bit of knowledge I had acquired had just turned into one giant dump of 'stuff' that I had to sift through once again, to distinguish fluff from truth.

With regard to bystanders though - I wouldn't be so quick to make assumptions. In many internet contexts, I am inclined to agree with you, in theory and from direct personal experience and observation. I don't know if it's some sort of effect of psychological projection - when I used to quickly jump to agreement while following along a well sustained and well worded conversation with multiple participants, I thought it was obvious that everyone would be in agreement easily, their minds skimming and snapping into the same places my mind would. Even if they were in silent disagreement, that too was knowable, capable of having something said about it, without it being directly revealed. But the more time I spent in disagreement, in silence, the more doubt I have on that kind of certainty. It has taken me years to learn enough self control, such that I can still interact while disagreeing, without communicating any sort of passive disagreement - and this I am sure I have yet to master. But it's just possible that every mind is like that - there is no predictability in knowing how anyone will respond to anything, and even through thorough observation, there is no certainty that what is to be observed in the future will conform to what was observed in the past.