> By process, I mean a general purpose algorithm that someone could follow that's more effective than alternative algorithms at making your opponent say "you kn

> By process, I mean a general purpose algorithm that someone could follow that's more effective than alternative algorithms at making your opponent say "you know what, you're right" I'm 99% sure that there is such thing, that it was studied, described and used. It has it's own name even. I'm not talking about propaganda, rhetoric or marketing, it's something deeper, from which these emerge. I'm even sure there is a book considered 'canonical' on this topic. Unfortunately, I don't remember any specifics. I more or less remember how I came to know this, but it was a blog post of a journalist, and, unfortunately, his archive spans multiple years and thousands of posts and I couldn't find the one about this topic now. Summary: the process your looking for is well defined, although not widely known; and I will try looking for relevant info some more and I'll post it when I find it.