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Persuasion Quotes

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Persuasion Quotes

“People aren’t rational. But when it comes to our most important communications, we tend to try and convince each other with rational argument. Attempting to win trust with arguments is hard work, because trust is a feeling.”

“In intertwining sentimentality, healing, narcissism, and authority, modern evangelicals give authority to those emotions themselves...The sentimental becomes evidence and authority in a world in which most evangelicals have given up intellectual pursuits and concerns over doctrine. Essentially, sentimentality represents an abandonment of theology and critical introspection in popular evangelicalism. Instead of crafting intellectual responses to the challenges to evangelicalism, popular evangelicals appeal to the power of feeling as an authority to counteract science and criticism of the Bible. They offer their audiences the opportunity to FEEL that evangelicalism is right rather than asking them to accept the veracity of doctrinal positions of evangelicalism.”

“To inquire and to learn is the function of the mind, By learning I do not mean the mere cultivation of memory or the accumulation of knowledge, but the capacity to think clearly and sanely without illusion, to start from facts and not from beliefs and ideals. There is no learning if thought originates from conclusions. Merely to acquire information of knowledge is to not to learn. Learning implies the love of understanding and the love of doing a thing for itself. Learning is possible only when there is no coercion through influence, thought attachment or threat, through persuasive encouragement or subtle forms of reward. Most people think that learning is encouraged through comparison, whereas the contrary is the fact. Comparison brings about frustration and merely encourages envy, which is called competition. Like other forms of persuasion, comparison prevents learning and breeds fear.”

“You went to school," Lee said. "I mean, at some point. And it didn't suit you very well. They wanted to teach you things you didn't care about. Dates and math and trivia about dead presidents. They didn't teach persuasion. Your ability to persuade is the single most important determinant of your quality of life, and they didn't cover that at all. Well, we do. And we're looking for students with natural aptitude.”

“We stay the same as we've always been, keeping to the path we've walked our whole lives. Paths that carry so much importance and perceived stability that we are utterly convinced it is the only one to walk – that anyone not walking it with us is being misled.”

“When you plant lettuce, you don’t blame the lettuce if it does not grow well. You look into the reasons why it is not doing well. It may need fertilizer, or more water, or less sun. You never blame the lettuce. Yet if we have problems with our friends or our family, we blame the other person. But if we know how to take care of others, they will grow well, just like the lettuce. Blaming has no positive effect at all, nor does trying to persuade by means of reason or argument. That is my experience. No blame, no reasoning, no argument—just understanding. If you understand, and you show that you understand, you can love, and any difficult situation will improve.”

“Every man walks his own path, and every path has its fair share of locked doors. You never know who holds the key to a door you’ll need to open one day, so you best treat people as if they are all keyholders.”

“Arminius, appealing to Lactantius, held that: 'To recommend faith to others, we must make it the subject of persuasion, and not of compulsion'. He insisted that the true religion from Christ does not deteriorate into dissention. In the exercise of Christian liberty there will be sincere and honest differences. These differences cannot and should not be stamped out by means of coercion. In confronting the Scripture, Christians should be able to agree on what is necessary for salvation. But when mutual consent and agreement cannot be obtained on some articles, 'then the right hand of fellowship should be extended by both parties'. Each party should 'acknowledge the other for partakers of the same faith and fellow-heirs of the same salvation, although they may hold different sentiments concerning the nature of faith and the manner of salvation'.”

“I know a little something about fear, honey. I know what a relief it feels like to give into it at first. It’s not hard to persuade yourself that you’re doing the right thing—that you’re making the smart, safe decision. But fear is insidious. It takes anything you’re willing to give it, the parts of your life you don’t mind cutting out, but when you’re not looking, it takes anything else it damn well pleases, too.”

“Giving people information is like giving them a bunch of dots and letting them come to their own conclusion. 'Let the facts speak for themselves.' The problem is, they rarely do.”

“You can lead and motivate people without a certificate or title, what you need to do is to tell people a compelling secret that was only known to you.”

“I know I want and do not have what I want. A weight hangs suspended from a hook; being suspended, it suffers because it cannot fall: it cannot get off the hook, for insofar as it is weight it suspends, and as long as it suspends it depends. [...] Its life is this want of life. If it no longer wanted but were finished, perfect, if it possessed its own self, it would have ended its existence. At that point, as its own impediment to possessing life, the weight would not depend on what is external as much as on its own self, in that it is not given the means to be satisfied. The weight can never be persuaded. Nor is any life ever satisfied to live in any present, for insofar as it is life it continues, and it continues into the future to the degree that it lacks life. If it were to possess itself completely here and now and be in want of nothing—if it awaited nothing in the future—it would not continue: it would cease to be life. So many things attract us in the future, but in vain do we want to possess them in the present.”

“You're welcome to as much wine as you can drink, Ares." ...[Ares] watched two bare-breasted women stroll by. "Am I welcome to your worshippers as well?" "If they'll have you. Force yourself on anyone, though, and the cat gets to gnaw on your anatomy." Dionysos nodded to Agria, who prowled around the crowd. "Those are the rules." Ares smirked. ... "No problem there. I'm very persuasive." Hermes shook his head at Dionysos and mouthed in comical exaggeration, *No, he's not.*”

“Stories are not confrontational. Storytelling is about entering the mind of your audience so that they connect the dots, according to the pattern you want them to see.”

“A long list of propositions does not necessarily make a coherent argument”

“his feelings as to a first, strong attachment; sentences begun which he could not finish, his half averted eyes and more than half expressive glance; all, all declared that he had a heart returning to her at least; that anger, resentment, avoidance, were no more; and that they were succeeded, not merely by friendship or regard, but by the tenderness of the past. Yes, some share of the tenderness of the past. she could not contemplate the change as implying less. He must love her.”