“Socratic Persuasion: Giving Opinionated Yet Truth-Seeking Advice” by Neel Nanda
The full post is long, but you can 80/20 the value with the 700 word summary! Over half the post is eight optional case studies. Thanks to Jemima Jones, Claude 4 Opus and Gemini 2.5 Pro for help copy-editing and drafting TL;DR: I recommend giving advice by asking questions to walk someone through key steps in my argument — often I’m missing key info, which comes up quickly as an unexpected answer, while if I’m right I’m more persuasive, and can still express my case. This is useful in a wide range of settings, as a manager, managee, friend, and mentor, and is better for both parties, if you have the time and energy and are able to seriously engage with whether you are wrong.Summary Socratic Persuasion: When trying to persuade someone, especially if giving advice, I much prefer the Socratic method over directly presenting my case. I take my argument/thought [...] ---Outline:(00:57) Summary(06:57) Why does this matter?(10:27) Caveats & Warnings(13:26) Case Studies(13:51) Managing/prioritisation: Convincing a team member that a project is a better use of their time(18:27) Debugging/giving negative feedback: Retrospectives on Time Management(21:14) Interpersonal/conflict resolution: Friend Having a Dispute(23:06) Domain knowledge/negative feedback: Critiquing Research Project Ideas(25:43) Ambition/career advice: Encouraging Someone to Drop Out of a PhD (to Accept a Job Offer)(29:19) Debating: Convincing Someone We Can't Just Turn Misaligned AI Off(32:22) Reflection/self-improvement: Receiving Negative Feedback(35:23) Coaching/career advice: Giving Career Advice to Someone I've Just Met(38:30) ConclusionThe original text contained 7 footnotes which were omitted from this narration. --- First published: May 26th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/hAcFgXa2juRDWYmsp/socratic-persuasion-giving-opinionated-yet-truth-seeking --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.