The Other Half of Changing Someone’s Opinion

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The Other Half of Changing Someone’s Opinion by Daniel Miessler.

So my current thought is that the majority of rhetorical skill during discussion (not debate, because that’s antagonistic by design), should be focused on managing the receptiveness of the receiver, not on building some mythical argument that cannot be denied. When a mind is closed, no such argument exists.

Stated plainly, there are two phases to effectively changing someone’s mind:

  1. Getting them into a state where they’re willing to do so
  2. Presenting a decent argument for why they should hold a different opinion