Quote Of The Day: How to Convince Someone When Facts Fail

It's been a while since I've done a "Quote Of The Day" series on this site, probably because I've put blogging on the back end in recent months due to other projects taking precedent. As a result of course I just haven't been churning out posts as frequent as I used to, which used to be at least 2 per week. So I'm going to try to pepper the long periods in between the more detailed longer posts with shorter QOTD or random thoughts style posts, and hopefully that will remedy (at least a bit) the eerie silence.

Since this blog is mostly about making arguments that are designed to help convince people of various different views, I came across this article on Scientific American about how to convince people when facts fail. It has 6 steps to take:

If corrective facts only make matters worse, what can we do to convince people of the error of their beliefs? From my experience, 1 keep emotions out of the exchange, 2 discuss, don't attack (no ad hominem and no ad Hitlerum), 3 listen carefully and try to articulate the other position accurately, 4 show respect, 5 acknowledge that you understand why someone might hold that opinion, and 6 try to show how changing facts does not necessarily mean changing worldviews. These strategies may not always work to change people's minds, but now that the nation has just been put through a political fact-check wringer, they may help reduce unnecessary divisiveness.

I've violated all 6 numerous times. Guilty as charged.