Persuasion is too superficial. It is an attempt to shortcut knowledge and truth.

If someone is persuaded, what happens when they change their mind? Do you start over, and reconvince them? What if you have a lot of time, money and effort invested?

There is also the problem that you might not have the purest realities, motives or plans in trying to persuade. Even if you do, your realities, motives and plans are not going to mix with someone else's, if you need to persuade them.

Because persuasion is a shortcut, people have integrated it into social norms so thoroughly that it is almost sacred. At the level of routine and trivial interactions, persuasion may seem necessary just to get things done. Isn't there an element of persuasion in just about anything a person says? There is. It's the degree that's the problem. Persuasion should not be carried beyond the trivial level. Not only is it a substitute for truth and knowledge, but it has elements of force with it. It's like the difference between closing a door softly and slamming it too hard.

Where does this leave politics? Isn't persuasion the larges part of what politicians do? Here, the purpose of persuation is extremely limited, so it is not substituting for truth and knowledge.

How then do you avoid persuasion where concerns get relevant? The answer to this question is extremely important. It is the answer to a lot of social problems including raising kids and making marriages work.

The alternative to persuasion is explanation. Explanation is rudimentary education, where knowledge is increased instead of force prevailing.

At the most extreme levels of conflict, increasing knowledge through explanations is not possible, and then, only truth will move things forward. Truth, however, is difficult to produce. There is a lot of opposition to it, because it bowls over a lot of errors and corrupt motives.

Superficial truth is of little consequence, because it is undermined by more basic conflicts in realities and motives. For truth to be significant, it has to be basic enough to expose basic errors and corrupt motives. And since it has to be basic, it needs to be developed gradually over time; it is not an instant fix.

In the minds of many persons, it is socially unacceptable to produce basic truth, because it results in a large amount of conflict. But the conflict is not caused by the truth but by the errors and corruptions. Allowing the errors and corruptions to continue to destroy life is far worse than correcting them through basic truth.

This is why Christ said he came to divide, not create peace (Luke 12:51). It was somewhat of a facetious statement, because he also said he was creating peace (John 14:27). Truth divides and creates peace. It creates conflicts for trouble makers who won't accept it, while it defines life and solves problems for moral persons. Since there is so much corruption in the world, producing truth creates conflicts with corrupters. It is still the best approach to significantly developed problems, because corrupters cannot defy the truth. Even though it antagonizes them, it also stops their corruptions, because truth is the size of the universe and the only force which corrupters cannot subdue.