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How to win friends & influence people
Jul. 5th, 2002 10:25 amA while ago, I was thinking about people whose argument technique is to cry “you aren’t listening to me!” when someone doesn’t agree with them, and the difference between listening and disagreement.
The problem is that most opinions are formed on the basis of personal feeling and reaction, and justifications for those opinions are developed later – this is a process called cognitive dissonance. So, in most disagreements, it will prove nigh-impossible to change peoples opinions or beliefs, as you are in fact trying to change a part of them – the arguments that are presented in defence by that person are in fact largely a smoke screen of justifications of why they believe something, not actually reasons for that belief.
This is compounded by the fact that all ideas are just abstractions – there are no absolutes. The Pythagorean idea that it is possible to mathematically model ideas such as justice or love have been rejected (but not disproved – you can’t disprove anything), and the fact (although there are no facts) remains that there is no absolute reason why one form of government is ‘better’ than another, or why anchovies are worse pizza toppings than pineapple. Everything is a matter of personal choice, and more importantly, a matter of personal benefit. People make decisions on how they will benefit, and then add the justifications for those decisions on top later.
Now the question of ‘benefit’ is a tricky one, because people get different things out of the same events or circumstances. Some people benefit by wealth, others by the approbation of their peers. We have martyrs and saints, people who want to be rewarded or punished for their actions in different ways at different times.
Thus we see that reasoned argument, is, to a large extent, a waste of time. At a basic level people aren’t interested in reason, they’re interested in how they can fulfil their personal objectives, whether they are aware of that or not. Therefore the way to convince people is to make an attempt to understand their personal objectives and motivations, and demonstrate to them how changing their actions or beliefs will help them better achieve those objectives.
This is something that people tend to forget; before you can convince someone, you have to understand what they want and show them that doing things your way will get them that more efficiently than what they are doing now. Simply saying “but my idea is self-evidently obviously right” is not only doomed to failure (unless in the rare cases where the person you are talking to matches your personal needs closely enough), it will also lead to frustration on your part as people reject your ideas – and in doing so, reject a part of you. And if you are not a person who deals well with rejection, this will be personally damaging.
Of course, there is always the possibility that people who refuse to acknowledge the above are actually motivated by failure and rejection; the opportunity to complain about failing is more important to them than actually succeeding. Motivations are funny things, and when you analyse what people actually want you can get some damned odd answers.
The problem is that most opinions are formed on the basis of personal feeling and reaction, and justifications for those opinions are developed later – this is a process called cognitive dissonance. So, in most disagreements, it will prove nigh-impossible to change peoples opinions or beliefs, as you are in fact trying to change a part of them – the arguments that are presented in defence by that person are in fact largely a smoke screen of justifications of why they believe something, not actually reasons for that belief.
This is compounded by the fact that all ideas are just abstractions – there are no absolutes. The Pythagorean idea that it is possible to mathematically model ideas such as justice or love have been rejected (but not disproved – you can’t disprove anything), and the fact (although there are no facts) remains that there is no absolute reason why one form of government is ‘better’ than another, or why anchovies are worse pizza toppings than pineapple. Everything is a matter of personal choice, and more importantly, a matter of personal benefit. People make decisions on how they will benefit, and then add the justifications for those decisions on top later.
Now the question of ‘benefit’ is a tricky one, because people get different things out of the same events or circumstances. Some people benefit by wealth, others by the approbation of their peers. We have martyrs and saints, people who want to be rewarded or punished for their actions in different ways at different times.
Thus we see that reasoned argument, is, to a large extent, a waste of time. At a basic level people aren’t interested in reason, they’re interested in how they can fulfil their personal objectives, whether they are aware of that or not. Therefore the way to convince people is to make an attempt to understand their personal objectives and motivations, and demonstrate to them how changing their actions or beliefs will help them better achieve those objectives.
This is something that people tend to forget; before you can convince someone, you have to understand what they want and show them that doing things your way will get them that more efficiently than what they are doing now. Simply saying “but my idea is self-evidently obviously right” is not only doomed to failure (unless in the rare cases where the person you are talking to matches your personal needs closely enough), it will also lead to frustration on your part as people reject your ideas – and in doing so, reject a part of you. And if you are not a person who deals well with rejection, this will be personally damaging.
Of course, there is always the possibility that people who refuse to acknowledge the above are actually motivated by failure and rejection; the opportunity to complain about failing is more important to them than actually succeeding. Motivations are funny things, and when you analyse what people actually want you can get some damned odd answers.
