It's ok to argue with an interviewee, but, gosh, who does it like that?
While "brainwashed" Liu Cixin is "deaf to the argument", the journalist ignores opponent's arguments because of her (commendable, of course) "inflexible sense of morality" and "principles to be upheld regardless of outcomes".
In case the reader is not susceptible to the journalist's line of thought, let's plug a couple of bits like "as if I were minding a small child" and "he sounds almost like a child" in seemingly innocent contexts. Of course, it has nothing to do with how Liu Cixin's words should be perceived in the other contexts.
But what if the reader is still not sure who's won the argument?
The journalist tells what she had read in Liu Cixin's mind: "he sighed, as if exhausted by a debate going on in his head." Of course, he sighs because he doubts what he says, what else that could possibly be?
"I looked at him, studying his face. He blinked" - oh, Jiayang Fan, you are magnificent.