Virtuous Arguing

One core kind of conversation is an argument. I take it that there is a prevailing consensus that these days people argue badly (i.e., even worse than previously). The general idea is that the information age seems to have corrupted us in core respects such that we are unable to enter into the kind of good faith arguments that drive social progress, leading us instead into a kind of intellectual dead-end whereby each shouts loudly at the other from their own cultural silo. This, at any rate, is how the issue is presented by various commentators, from mainstream media to intellectuals, and I suspect there is at least some truth in it. In any case, whatever the merits of this idea that there is a particular contemporary social malaise on this front, it is surely of philosophical interest to clarify what it would mean to argue well, if only to discern what we are presently doing wrong when we argue badly.