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I was just listening to Stefan, and he used the phrase "convince people rather than inspire them" (he was actually advocating the later) and it "inspired" me to post this open ended question. I'm intrigued by how this "woke me up" so to speak to write this, how it stimulated me to focus my mind on the essence of inspiration. Stef's statement was interesting b/c he moved away from the ultra rationality of reason, logic and empirical evidence we typically see from him toward a more right brain perspective. I'm not saying Stef has changed in any fundamental way, only that this statement was a less common expression of his creative, imaginative side while being coupled to argumentation, persuasion, and the underlying mission of FDR to change the world by (inspiration | persuasion) ?. I have a related series of posts on this subject (just search "plenty to say" to find it), but I wanted this topic to be open ended and more of a solicitation / free association exercise to see if other people's input further inspire me and help me figure out why this is such an invigorating topic to me. When I think back over the course of my life going all the way back to high school, it's questions like this that drew me into philosophical discussions and motivated me to stay up all night talking to people about it. It feels kind of "electric".

So recently I got into a debate with a family member over taxation & welfare. I told him that taxation is theft & presented him with a comparison of a thief & government. He then kept saying that there is a difference between the two to which I replied no there isn't & he kept saying yes. While that family member has shown their highly irrational thought process what are some other approaches I could take in regards to convincing someone that taxation is theft.