by Gary C. Gibson

Created on: May 16, 2009   Last Updated: November 09, 2009

Persuasion is not a form of art; it's a stimulus-response feedback circuit by a controller or would be controller of a human subject or subjects. Persuasion in the context of verbal communication may be highly skilled or threatening-the complete range of expressible forms of speech are possible from false promises to misdirection though talk isn't the only method of persuasion.

Art is the shaping of beautiful things. Reason is the ability to evaluate and prioritize things. Are most people persuaded more by eloquence than by reason? Disregard for the moment the ineloquent slop that stimulates consumerism through broadcast advertising. Though it has little reason and is entirely art and Americans go for it like pigs to a trough full of hot vittals, does that make all people more inclined to be persuaded by puff balls of gee gaws and shiny things rather than by hard, cold facts?

How did the United States build up 12 trillion of public debt, have another ten trillion scheduled by the administration and have a likely target of 50 trillion dollars of debt by 2030? Were the public persuaded by the art of political discourse or by the pure plain corrupting of facts? Is lying really an art? Is incompetence art? Is corporate treason that invests abroad and digs pits of doom for the Americans of today and tomorrow in a hot global mess ruled by foreign investors artistic? A belief that persuasion is an art is to find in favor of the reciprocal that Americans are shallow and narcissistic minded. It isn't a nation of Spocks that can find the way to the half mile course to the objective rather than the artfully appointed 50 trillion dollar way a saleswoman foists upon us.

Starvation with sanctions is one political tool intended to bring individuals or governments in to political submission. Forced homelessness and lack of medical care, destruction of dating and family life affordability and a plethora of aversive conditioning devices may be a persuasive coercion such that a subject may change his or her behavior into conformity with the will of the controller(s). Positive reinforcement is also persuasive-that buxom beauty with the splendid personality can become an irresistibly persuasive argument to throwing one's congress to the sharks, historically. How many have switched to the opposition party in return for the silky caress of the svelte woman?

Art museums have painting and sculptures a thief might steal for if persuaded by the greed or purchasing power of the goods

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