If rationality is about overcoming bias, then I think of the "dark arts" as the weaponization bias. While we don't believe bias ought to be wielded as a weapon, learning how to swing a sword is vital to defending against it.

In this post I'll discuss a dark art I call "inception". Inception is a 2010 film whose premise is planting an idea in someone else's mind (through the power of dreams). Leonardo DiCaprio's mission to is to plant in Cillian Murphy's mind the idea that he should dissolve his father's company.

Why the idea had to be "planted", and not merely communicated in normal conversation, is because people are very attached to their own ideas. No one wants your ideas, regardless of how much more meritorious they are. People have a very strong attachment to the insights they came up with themselves. No one defends, evangelizes, or holds on to an idea more vigorously than one that they came up with themselves.

This bias the basis of this dark art. The art of Inception is about getting people to come up with your ideas. Obviously, this is counterproductive if you want credit for your ideas, but the upshot is your idea gets the vigorous action in a person that accompanies idea ownership. Inception is more powerful than mere conviction.

I'll now describe the basic method. I'll be putting it into a corporate/organizational context of "incepting" a decision maker with an idea X, but the method is general.

The wrong thing to do is to meet with the DM, present X, and all the reasons why the company/nation/org should accept X. You might accomplish conviction, but you won't accomplish the much-more-powerful inception, and that's what we're going for here.

So instead of directly communicating your full idea like an honest human being, you want to act as a means for the DM to figure out the idea "on his own". It won't really be their own realization; you'll have carefully guided them to realizing your idea for themselves. Here are a few variations on how to do this:

Present an inferior idea instead

In the 1950s, Betty Crocker devised a cake mix for busy housewives. All you needed to do was mix the dry ingredients with water, put the the pan in the oven and bake. But that proved too "complete" -- housewives felt guilty over how easy it was, and the product was failing as a result. The solution? BC added one step to the recipe: "add an egg". An instance of the "IKEA effect...

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