Quotes About Persuasion

A good debater is not necessarily an effective vote-getter: you can find a hole in your opponent's argument through which you could drive a coach and four ringing jingle bells all the way, and thrill at the crystallization of a truth wrung out from a bloody dialogue - which, however, may warm only you and your muse, while the smiling paralogist has in the meantime made votes by the tens of thousands.

yes, words were superior; they maintained a superior control; they touched without your touching; they were at once the bait, the hook, the line, the pole, and the water in between.

If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; but if you really make them think, they'll hate you.

The are of will-making chiefly consists in baffling the importunity of expectation.

Of all eloquence a nickname is the most concise; of all arguments the most unanswerable.

To impress the idea of power on others, they must be made in some way to feel it.

Disconfirmation of deeply held beliefs causes severe psychic pain; what better way of alleviating it than in the company of newly won believers? As put by Festinger, "If more and more people can be persuaded that the system of belief is correct, then clearly it must, after all, be correct.

a high degree of narrative transportation impairs one's critical facilities.

If you want to convince someone, target their System 1 with narrative, not their System 2 with facts and data.

The whole drift of my education goes to persuade me that the world of our present consciousness is only one out of many worlds of consciousness that exist.

If a man, holding a belief which he was taught in childhood or persuaded of afterwards, keeps down and pushes away any doubts which arise about it in his mind, purposely avoids the reading of books and the company of men that call in question or discuss it, and regards as impious those questions which cannot easily be asked without disturbing it—the life of that man is one long sin against mankind.

The only outside power capable of persuading Israel to modify its policies and enter into negotiations was the United States. However, the United States would not exercise its influence in this matter until the PLO recognized the state of Israel, something it had steadfastly refused to do.

The power which has always started the greatest religious and political avalanches in history rolling has from time immemorial been the magic power of the spoken word, and that alone. The broad masses of the people can be moved only by the power of speech.

When an opponent declares, 'I will not come over to your side,'" he said in a speech on November 6, 1933, "I calmly say, 'Your child belongs to us already… What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community.

But it is hard to say no to my brother, whose invitations feel like commands. He says You wanna play golf? with the same presumption that a rich man says to his driver Will you bring the car around?

Christians have an unfair advantage in the marketplace of ideas: We have truth on our side! You

Good apologetics involves "speaking the truth in love" (Eph. 4:15). Is Apologetics Biblical?

Dios aún te ama y te hace responsable. Haré todo lo posible para presentarte buenos argumentos. Pero al final tienes que tratar, no con argumentos, sino con Dios mismo.

The radio was shouting at you, pleading with you, and seducing you.

Using guilt is not productive. Appealing to the greatness of others is what works for Warren, and it will work for you.

Academics don't normally manage to alter people's way of thinking through their strength of argument.

SOCRATES: You have? Oh – you said that you honour Athenians for our openness to persuasion. And for our defiance of bullies. But

The real rivals among your peers will be room-changers. Certain people, when they walk into a room, alter the atmosphere. Everybody else adjusts their posture, their willingness to listen, their ideas. This is not a full definition of leadership, only its most obvious symptom.

You do not convince me. You rationalize your actions and because the result is favorable you become right.