Scott Adams and Philosophy Read online

  That’s why Adams isn’t a Trump shill, despite what those on the alt-right, the anti-Trump right, or the progressive left might think. Attacking or ignoring Adams as a Trump shill just confirms his idea that confirmation bias is a key feature of the operating system. Trump found (whether by accident or design) something that worked, an available means of persuasion (as Aristotle might put it). Scott Adams identified these means and labeled them. Arguing for his hypothesis, he ultimately proved more correct than most political pundits, observers, and other apparent experts.

  Adams likes to claim Trump plays “3D” persuasion, whereas most of us think of persuasion in two dimensions, thereby defying the predictions of pundits opposed to him. I personally am not sure whether this 3D persuasive ability is completely intentional on Trump’s part, or whether Adams suffers from confirmation bias towards his own “Master Persuader” hypothesis, but the fact is Trump won. Rather than write off Adams as a pro-Trump troll or otherwise rich straight white guy who supported the rich straight white guy for President, I think it best that both supporters and opponents of Trump take a better look at what really happened.

  Does this mean that Scott Adams himself is a Sophist? Here’s where things get somewhat odd. Adams seems to have a Sophistic view of rhetoric, where all that matters is the tropes, figures, and moves you make when attempting persuasion. And yet, Adams wrote the following in a March 27th 2011 blog post:

  . . . the goal of my writing is to be interesting and nothing else. I’m not trying to change anyone’s opinion, largely because I don’t believe humans can be influenced by exposure to better arguments, even if I had some. But I do think people benefit by exposure to ideas that are different from whatever they are hearing, even when the ideas are worse. That’s my niche: something different.

  This actually shares (somewhat) in the Socratic ideal that people can and should use rhetoric to improve the souls of their audience. Adams isn’t trying so much to change the world by persuading people to agree with him. He wants to improve the world by exposing people to arguments and ideas they might otherwise never entertain. Ultimately, I feel Adams is mostly in the Sophistic mode, as he focuses on what rhetorical moves are most persuasive and feels that the right appeals function like programming code (or magic) on human brains. But Adams still borrows some of that Socratic ideal of persuasive techniques, causing people to break out of their mental chains, upgrading their moist robot operating systems.

  To deal effectively with Trump, those who oppose him need to see how he won and what he did to win. Those who support Trump should be aware of what Trump did as well, since even Adams likes to point out how Trump supporters often rationalize away their decisions without realizing how persuasion worked on them. Adams may not have all the answers, but he has enough of them. I don’t advocate going “full Adams” (on this, or anything, really), but I do advocate for carefully considering his insights on one aspect of Trump’s victory.

  And, of course, I have been attempting to persuade you, the reader, that Adams actually does have some of the answers. Do I agree with Adams? That depends on what you mean by “agree”—and I’m not sophistically dodging the question. I agree with Adams that too often people let their cognitive dissonance and confirmation biases overcome their ability to rationally consider ideas. I agree that far too often, a crafty politician (or boss or whatever) can use rhetorically powerful yet irrational arguments to win the day. Yet, at the same time, I’m not ready to give up the Socratic ideal that people can think rationally, and that it is possible to overcome your cognitive biases if you try hard enough. And that’s what this chapter is really about—I want those who write Adams off as a far-right, pro-Trump troll to understand what Adams is really doing, learning what they can from his insights. And, I hope that those who see Adams as a hero of the Trump movement realize what’s really going on and perhaps find themselves more aware of how persuasion (whether from Trump, Adams, me, or anyone else) attempts to cast a spell on them/rewrite their programming.

  Adams may have abandoned the idea of rational discourse that overcomes cognitive biases; I’m hoping to move the conversation in a more rational direction (although I admit Adams has a bigger audience and more engaging writing style, so from a Sophistic standpoint, he’s way ahead).

  2

  Persuade Me Once, Shame on You . . .

  RICHARD GREENE

  In Win Bigly: Persuasion in a World Where Facts Don’t Matter Scott Adams argues that Donald Trump is what he calls a “Master Persuader” (the rarest of persuaders, whose peers include the likes of Steve Jobs and Warren Buffett) who has “weapons-grade persuasion skills.”

  Adams himself is a self-proclaimed “commercial-grade” persuader who has thought and written extensively on the topic, and asserts he has the ability to raise his persuasion powers to weapons-grade when called upon to do so. If Adams is right about this, then a lot of us have quite a bit of rethinking to do on the question of whether Trump is masterful at anything. To at least a large segment of the world population, Trump is a kind of buffoon, or a caricature of a politician. Of course, if Adams is in fact a commercial-grade persuader (again with weapons-grade persuasion skills at his disposal), he should have no trouble convincing even the most hardened skeptic of the truth of his claims. We’ll see.

  Believe Me Folks, The Following Argument Is Not Good, That Much I Can Tell You!

  One argument in favor of the view that Trump is a Master Persuader lies in the fact that he won the election. Trump did convince enough people to vote for him, such that he received more than enough electoral college votes to secure victory. It’s fair to say that in an election, precisely what candidates are doing is attempting to persuade people to vote for them, and that’s exactly what Trump did.

  This is not an argument offered by Adams, and with good reason. There are a number of problems with this argument. Most importantly, to adopt this view would be to hold that anyone who won an election (or at least a significant election) would count as a Master Persuader. Related to this is the fact that a lot of factors go into determining who wins an election, many of which have little to do with the actions of the candidates involved. For example, the political and economic climate at the time often play a huge role. After the Watergate scandal, there was virtually no hope that any Republican candidate would win the 1976 Presidential Election. Few, I believe, hold the view that Jimmy Carter was a Master Persuader. Many people hold him in extremely high esteem (especially for his principles and humanitarian work), but even his most ardent supporters are loath to praise his persuasion skills.

  Another related factor is the fact that it’s not just the candidates themselves, in an election, who are doing the persuading. There are literally hundreds of surrogates out speaking on behalf of the candidates at nearly all times. They are attempting to persuade voters to vote for their candidate of choice on cable news programs, at rallies, at $1,500 a plate dinners, and at scores of other events. In addition to the army of surrogates, there are people not officially affiliated with the campaigns also doing a lot of persuading. Celebrities are making their endorsements, and people in bars are attempting to convince their friends whom to vote for. This list goes on and on.

  A second worry about this argument is that it waters down the concept of “Master Persuader.” It’s almost never a good idea to define a concept in terms of success related to the goals of that concept. For example, we don’t want to define a “good quarterback” as one who almost always wins football games, even though winning football games is the sort of thing that good quarterbacks generally or routinely do. Famous Trump supporter Tom Brady is a good quarterback and he routinely wins games, but he is not a good quarterback merely because he routinely wins games. He’s a good quarterback because he has the requisite skills (reads defenses well, retains his composure while under pressure, throws the football accurately, manages the clock well, and so forth).

  By contrast, Archie Manning was also considered a great quarterback.
He was dynamic, could make plays, had a great arm, etc., but spent his entire career on really bad teams. We don’t want to define quarterback greatness, purely in terms of success, and the same applies to presidential candidates. Further there are many marginal quarterbacks who almost always win games because other players on their teams are really good (recall the year the Baltimore Ravens won the Super Bowl with Trent Dilfer as their quarterback). Thus, I think we can dispense with the idea that Trump is a Master Persuader just because he won.

  Adams’s position that Trump is a Master Persuader, much to his credit, is a more nuanced position, and it relies on a considerably more complex argument than the one just canvassed.

  So just what is Adam’s argument for the position that Trump is a Master Persuader? It’s a two-phase argument where in the first phase he describes the characteristics a Master Persuader must have, arguing further that Trump, indeed, has those characteristics, and in the second phase argues that Trump has somehow changed reality, and that via a different way of viewing reality, it becomes clear that Trump is a Master Persuader. The idea is that only a Master Persuader could do such things, or his doing so constitutes evidence for his being a Master Persuader.

  With This Argument, Adams Is Winning Again!

  Just what is a Master Persuader? On Adams’s view, persuasion is a matter of using tools and techniques to change people’s minds. This can occur with or without facts or reason. A Master Persuader (one with weapons-grade persuasion skills) is one who can do this deftly and effectively, and presumably does not make a great deal of persuasive mistakes along the way. In an appendix to Win Bigly: Persuasion in a World Where Facts Don’t Matter, Adams lists a number of Trump’s notable mistakes (for example, Trump University), but none of them appear to be mistakes in an attempt to persuade.

  Apparently, on Adams’s account, the way to spot a Master Persuader is to find someone who has done some serious persuading and see if they do the things that master persuaders do. So, what are those things? Adams details a number of things that Master Persuaders do.

  Master Persuaders who are attempting to make a deal start with big demands and then move back to the middle. He cites Trump’s campaign promises pertaining to the mass deportation of immigrants as an example of this. On the campaign trail Trump repeatedly promised to “round up” illegals and send them home (making similar claims about keeping out Muslims). The idea here is that getting what you want is often a matter of negotiation. A nuanced view will seem more reasonable and facilitate getting one what you want.

  The worry about applying this tactic to Trump is that it is not at all clear that this is what he was intending to do. At the time this is being written, Trump has not nuanced his position on illegal immigrants, nor offered anything of a more reasonable nature. And for that matter, he initially attempted to enact his extreme-sounding ban on Muslims entering the country only to have the courts thwart his efforts. Further, while it seems right to say that this is a strategy that Master Persuaders employ, it hardly counts as evidence that someone is a Master Persuader, as it is a strategy that virtually everyone employs when they find themselves negotiating. My twelve-year-old son employs this strategy whenever he wants to stay out with his friends later than we agreed upon. His opening salvo is always “Can I have two more hours?” knowing full well that I’ll come back with “How about one?”

  To be sure, Adams is not arguing that anyone who does something that a Master Persuader does is herself a Master Persuader. Nor is he arguing that only Master Persuaders do these things. Rather, his position appears to be that anyone who does most or all of the things on his list must be a Master Persuader. (Note that he never actually says this, but if this is not his position, it’s not at all clear why he’s arguing in this way. Perhaps he’s attempting to be a Master Persuader by just saying “Trump” and “Master Persuader” a lot in the same sentences, without regard for the facts, in hopes of getting us to believe that Trump is one.) While I’m inclined to leave “starting with big demands and moving towards the middle” off the list of necessary and sufficient conditions for Master Persuader status, I’m willing to move on to some of the other claims in hopes of definitively settling the question of whether Trump is, in fact, a Master Persuader.

  Adams’s next claim is that, at times, Master Persuaders can still be persuasive while ignoring facts. In fact, Trump routinely employs a strategy that Adams calls “The Intentional Wrongness Persuasion Play.” The idea is that the persuader says something intentionally wrong, but somehow in the direction of something truthful (for example, when he exaggerates a fact). This leads to people thinking about and discussing what was said for considerably longer than they would have, had he said something accurate, which combines with the basic psychological fact that the more time someone spends thinking about something the more important it will seem to that person, and the higher priority they will place on it. Later Adams sums up this point by stating that facts are weaker than fiction.

  It’s well documented that Trump’s relation with facts and the truth is, putting it mildly, a tenuous one at best. The question is whether his playing fast and loose with the facts stems from an understanding of something like The Intentional Wrongness Persuasion Play (or some close variant) or something else entirely. For example, he may just be a serial liar, or he might enjoy the media attention he gets when his lies are discussed (he has been telling public lies, such as lies about Obama not being born in the U.S., since long before he became a presidential candidate).

  At this point, however, it’s worth noting that Trump isn’t obviously intentionally using false statements in accordance with some persuasive strategy, such as the Intentional Wrongness Persuasion Play. It could well be the case that he believes the things he says. For example, I’ve met people who have a strong inclination to believe anything that they think, as if their thinking it makes it seem reasonable. Perhaps Trump is one of these types. I don’t think that he is, but Adams owes an argument that 1. rules out this possibility, and 2. provides good reason to believe that Trump is employing the same strategies that a Master Persuader would employ.

  Another strategy that Master Persuaders employ is to create a desire to reciprocate in the person being persuaded. If Trump does things for folks along the campaign trail, then they might feel obligated to reciprocate (Adams says that humans are hard-wired to reciprocate). To the extent that Trump was giving his voters what they wanted (such as a place for their racist “Build the Wall” chant), he was likely playing on their desire to reciprocate.

  Adams also points out that Master Persuaders don’t apologize too much, and display lots of confidence. Apologizing causes people to remember that you were wrong. Confidence makes folks believe that you’re not wrong. Combining this with some of the considerations above, being wrong can be good, as it gets folks talking and thinking, but having their final impression on any matter be that you were wrong, is ultimately bad. Certainly no one would accuse Trump of being a serial apologizer. Whether he was intentionally employing the strategies of creating a desire to reciprocate, exuding confidence, and not apologizing too much is another question. Adams, again, owes us more if he is going to make the case that Trump is a Master persuader, and not just coincidentally doing things that master persuaders do.

  Finally, it’s not enough to do these things, but you need what Adams calls: a “Talent Stack,” that is a strong series of skills. According to his view, Trump’s talent stack is impressive. It includes: publicity skills, a good reputation, strategic skills, negotiating skills, skills of persuasion, public speaking skills, a good sense of humor, quickness on his feet, being thick-skinned, being high-energy, having a certain stature, and above average intelligence. In the interest of brevity, I’ll not tackle these one by one. Suffice it so say that in some cases the jury is still out with respect to Trump, and in other cases it is clear that he has the talents Adams attributes to him, but it certainly seems true that these could be useful traits to have were one in
terested in being a Master Persuader.

  To this point we’ve not been given much of an argument that Trump is a Master Persuader. We’ve seen that he does some of the things that Master Persuaders do (ignores facts when it suits them, doesn’t apologize, makes grand claims, exhibits confidence, create a desire to in folks reciprocate, and so forth), but merely doing things that a Master Persuader does is not sufficient to make you a Master Persuader. Paraphrasing Immanuel Kant (who was speaking in another context), it’s not enough to do the right thing; you must do the right thing for the right reason.

  Further, Adams has not actually supported the claim that Trump has persuaded anyone of anything. If we consider persuasion a matter of getting people to believe something, Trump’s consistently low poll numbers tend to indicate that few who didn’t already believe the things that he was saying were convinced by him. If we consider persuasion a matter of getting people to behave in certain ways his pretty low voter turnout, as compared with Hillary Clinton, tends to indicate that few who weren’t already inclined to vote for him (or vote Republican or vote against Clinton) were persuaded to vote for him. The Electoral College can be a fickle mistress.

  We’re Going to Make Reality Great Again!

  The second phase of Adams’s argument that Trump is a Master Persuader is more interesting. Adam’s states that “the common worldview, shared by most humans, is that there is one objective reality, and we humans can understand that reality through a rigorous application of facts and reason.”

  He cites a number of philosophers from Plato to Hume to Kant and beyond to support the idea that reality is not something immediately accessible to us. Hume is quite agnostic on the nature of reality, and Kant postulates two realities (the phenomenal world and the noumenal world) one of which we have access to, and one of which we do not, but Plato actually holds the opposite view that Adams is using him to support. Adams at one point says “the main theme of this book is that humans are not rational.” A corollary of this claim is that humans are mistaken when they believe that their rationality will lead them to understand their reality. Plato believes that only our rationality will lead us to an understanding of reality, even if reality is different from what we initially take it to be.