Flipnosis: The Art of Split-Second Persuasion
Kevin Dutton
Language: English
Pages: 400
ISBN: 0099505622
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
'What if I were to tell you that a psychopathic arsonist might also be the person most likely to save you from a burning building'? This book is about a special kind of persuasion: 'flipnosis'. It has an incubation period of just seconds, and can instantly disarm even the most discerning mind. Flipnosis is black-belt mind control. It doesn't just turn the tables, it kicks them over. From the malign but fascinating powers of psychopaths, serial killers and con men to the political genius of Winston Churchill - via the grandmasters of martial arts, Buddhist monks, magicians, advertisers, salesmen, CEOs and frogs that mug each other - Kevin Dutton's brilliantly original and revelatory book explores what cutting-edge science can teach us about the techniques of persuasion.
And into a taxi home. When it comes to persuasion we could learn a thing or two from magicians and pickpockets. Take Ron Cooper, for example, in the howling wind and rain. Irrespective of how hot they may be, who in their right mind would start taking their clothes off in those conditions? Would you? Cooper, of course, has a reason for what he’s doing. The T-shirt. But the guy on the ledge doesn’t know that. Instead, he must play along – as with each loosened button, the standoff gets more
the usual route of overt confrontation, he goes, instead, for the complete opposite. In direct contrast to what the guy in the tracksuit is expecting (a challenge) he joins him instead (‘Got a light?’) – knowing full well, of course, that such collusion is bound to provoke a reaction from one of the other people in the carriage. Which it does. But by the time that reaction materialises, the game’s already up. Crucially, there’s now no longer just the one transgressor in the frame, but two. The
hardware of empathy. Difficult to come by if you’re a psychopath. Suddenly, it got me thinking. If SPICE really was a universal model of influence, then what, precisely, were the psychopaths up to? Hidden Shallows The advent of sophisticated brain imaging techniques such as Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) and Magnetoencephalography (MEG) has sometimes been likened to the lunar landing. Finally, at our fingertips, we have the technology to launch ourselves not into outer but
neurobiology as theirs is able to take, quite literally, the heat out of the moment. And allow them, in tight situations where cool, peppermint logic is at a premium, to zone in on details that the rest of us might miss. Plus, of course, to take chances – to come up with the line the rest of us might ‘think better’ of. ‘I’m the coldest son-of-a-bitch you’ll ever meet,’ said Ted Bundy, who killed, decapitated and screwed – in that order – 35 women over a four-year period.3 And he was right. But
in. Mr Nice, on average, got 5.8 years; Mr Nasty, 11.2.2 And this, remember, was in spite of the fact that the participants – right from the word go – had been told quite clearly that the character descriptions were false. Sometimes you can’t unbelieve everything you read. Belief Immunodeficiency The implications of Gilbert’s study definitely take some getting used to. On the other hand, however, certain things fall into place. We can see, all of a sudden, why empathy and perceived