The single most effective technique to instill doubt and help people change their minds is to ask, “Under what conditions could [insert belief] be wrong?”19 This is called disconfirmation.

There is one time, and one time only, to bring up facts in your conversation: when your partner explicitly makes the request. Even then, double-check. Avoid offering facts unless you’re certain of their accuracy and invite your partner to check them independently. If facts do enter the conversation, model intellectual humility by expressing your re

The most difficult thing to accept for people who work hard at forming their beliefs on the basis of evidence is that not everyone forms their beliefs in that way. The mistake made by people who form their beliefs on the evidence is thinking that if the person with whom they’re speaking just had a certain piece of evidence then they wouldn’t believ

Dennett neatly summarizes Rapoport’s Rules in his book Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking. If your goal is to engage someone successfully, take these steps in this order: 1. Attempt to re-express your target’s position so clearly, vividly, and fairly that your target says, “Thanks, I wish I’d thought of putting it that way.” 2. List any p

Five Advanced Skills for Contentious Conversations How to Rethink Your Conversational Habits #1—KEEP RAPOPORT’S RULES Re-express, list points of agreement, mention what you learned, only then rebut #2—AVOID FACTS Do not bring facts into a conversation #3—SEEK DISCONFIRMATION How could that belief be incorrect? #4—YES, AND… Eliminate the word but fr

The creation of a “them” linguistically constructs the negotiator and the hostage taker as two people attempting to work together against another party. By creating this perceived alignment, the negotiator is placing him- or herself in a position to convince the hostage taker to surrender.34

3. Remember the marriage counseling adage, “You can be right or you can be married.”

If someone reasons her way to a false moral view, this doesn’t make her a bad person. It just means her reasoning was in error.9

I never considered a difference of opinion in politics, in religion, in philosophy, as cause for withdrawing from a friend. —Thomas Jefferson to William Hamilton, April 22, 1800