The Art of Persuasion Is a Lie

TL;DR: You cannot persuade anyone of anything. What we call "persuasion" is just discovering what someone already wants, then making it look like their idea. Han Fei wrote the manual 2,300 years ago. Nothing has changed.

James here, CEO of Mercury Technology Solutions. Hong Kong — July 2026

A reader asked me: "How do you convince people to accept your point of view?"

Straight answer: You don't.

The question itself is wrong. It's like asking "How do I make water flow uphill?" You can build elaborate pumps, you can spend enormous energy, you can even create the illusion of success for a moment. But gravity doesn't care. And neither does human nature.

This isn't a new insight. It was systemically analyzed, documented, and solved over two millennia ago. The author was Han Fei. Yes, that Han Fei — the Legalist philosopher who wrote the manual on statecraft, power, and the mechanics of human motivation.

His essay is called Shui Nan (說難). "The Difficulty of Persuasion." It opens with the premise that the reader already accepts: convincing others is hard. Then he explains why it's actually impossible.

The Two Stories That Break Your Brain

Han Fei gives two examples. Both are from the Warring States period. Both destroy the illusion that facts or logic can change a mind.

Story one: The rich man of Song.

A wealthy man's wall was damaged. His neighbor warned him to repair it. His son warned him to repair it. He ignored both. A thief entered through the broken wall and robbed him.

Afterward, the man praised his son for foresight. And immediately suspected his neighbor was the thief.

Same advice. Same outcome. One praised, one condemned. What changed? Not the facts. The relationship.

Story two: The favorite of the Wei king.

A courtier borrowed the king's carriage without permission to rush to his sick mother. The king praised his filial piety. Another time, the courtier offered the king a half-eaten peach. The king praised his generosity and loyalty.

Later, the courtier fell from favor. The king reviewed these same events. Now the carriage theft looked like selfishness — a man who puts family above duty. The half-eaten peach looked like disrespect — a servant who treats his master as an equal.

Same actions. Same king. Opposite interpretations. What changed? Not the facts. The emotional frame.

**The Han Fei Principle:** Events don't have fixed meanings. Their meanings are assigned retroactively based on how we feel about the people involved.

This is the first level of the game. Reading people — 觀人術 — gives you information. But information alone is worthless. The question is what you do with it.

The Eight Characters That Govern Everything

Han Fei's prescription, distilled to its essence: 尊重人性，尊重利益.

Respect human nature. Respect self-interest.

Respecting human nature means giving people what they need emotionally. Validation. Recognition. The feeling that they are right, that they are valued, that they are the kind of person who makes good decisions.

Respecting self-interest means understanding what they actually want — not what they say they want, not what they pretend to want in meetings, but what they need.

Every executive in a boardroom talks about company growth and technological advancement. Few are actually thinking about that. Each department has its own agenda. Each person has their own calculation. The CFO wants to protect margins. The CTO wants to build empire. The CMO wants to avoid blame. The CEO wants to survive the quarter.

What people say and what they want are rarely the same thing.

The Two Faces of Every Human

Han Fei breaks human motivation into two components: 面子 (face) and 裡子 (substance).

Face is the public self. The person who wants to be seen as correct, as principled, as the kind of leader who makes tough decisions for the right reasons. Face demands that the narrative makes them look good.

Substance is the private self. The actual needs, fears, and desires that drive behavior. The things people won't say out loud because saying them would damage their face.

You persuade someone — or rather, you create the appearance of persuasion — only when you address both simultaneously. You give them the outcome they want (substance), wrapped in a story that makes them feel virtuous (face).

But here's the critical distinction: You didn't persuade them. You discovered them.

They already wanted what you offered. You just made it feel like their idea.

The Performance of Power: Cao Pi and the Abdication

The most elegant example of this mechanism is the abdication of the Han dynasty.

Cao Pi wanted to replace the Han emperor. That was his substance — his real interest. But he could never say it. To demand the throne would be to admit he was a usurper. That would destroy his face.

So Hua Xin, his minister, built a bridge. Hua Xin organized the court officials to "persuade" the Han emperor to abdicate voluntarily. Cao Pi then performed reluctance — refusing multiple times, protesting his unworthiness, demanding they stop asking. After the third refusal, he finally "yielded" to their "persistent entreaties."

This is the three-refusals ritual (三辭三讓). It appears throughout Chinese history. It looks like humility. It is theater. Cao Pi got his substance (the throne) while preserving his face (he didn't take it; it was given to him).

But look at the other side. Hua Xin was also playing the same game with the Han emperor. The emperor's substance was survival. He wanted to live. But his face demanded that he not look like a coward surrendering to threats. He needed a narrative: he wasn't abdicating out of fear; he was following the will of Heaven.

Hua Xin provided that narrative. A cloud of mystical reasoning about celestial mandates and dynastic cycles. The emperor could step down while feeling — and appearing — principled.

Did Hua Xin persuade the emperor? No. The emperor already wanted to live. Hua Xin just gave him a story that made surrender feel like wisdom.

When the Substance Doesn't Match: The Death of Cao Mao

For contrast, look at Cao Mao — the last emperor of Wei, facing the same threat from Sima Zhao that the Han emperor had faced from Cao Pi.

Cao Mao's advisor Wang Shen gave him the same advice: yield, survive, preserve your dynasty through strategic patience. But Cao Mao's substance was different. He wasn't driven by survival. He was driven by honor. He would rather die than submit.

So he armed himself, drove his carriage to the palace gates, and charged at Sima Zhao's guards with a sword. He was killed instantly.

Was Wang Shen a worse persuader than Hua Xin? No. Wang Shen's logic was identical. The difference was the substance of the person being "persuaded." Cao Mao wanted something that no narrative could reframe. He wanted to fight. He wanted to die on his feet.

This is the ultimate lesson: persuasion is not a technique. It's a discovery.

You cannot make someone want what they don't want. You can only discover what they already want, then help them get it in a way that preserves their face.

The Jia Xu Method: How to Carry Private Cargo in Public Speech

Jia Xu was the most skilled practitioner of this art in the Three Kingdoms period. He "persuaded" Zhang Xiu to surrender to Cao Cao — twice.

The first time, Zhang Xiu wanted to surrender. Jia Xu provided the reasoning. Simple enough.

But after Zhang Xiu rebelled and killed Cao Cao's eldest son, nephew, and bodyguard Dian Wei, the situation changed. Cao Cao and Yuan Shao were heading toward war. Zhang Xiu had to choose a side. Jia Xu again advised surrender to Cao Cao.

His reasoning was masterful. He told Zhang Xiu: Yuan Shao is stronger now, so your surrender would be insignificant — a minor addition to a massive force. But Cao Cao is weaker, so your surrender would be magnified. Cao Cao also needs to demonstrate magnanimity to win the loyalty of other warlords. He cannot afford to punish you without destroying his own reputation for tolerance.

Zhang Xiu agreed. It was logical. It was correct. It was also incomplete.

Jia Xu never mentioned what he knew: once Cao Cao unified the realm, he would no longer need to demonstrate magnanimity. Zhang Xiu would be disposable. And indeed, years later, Cao Pi — Cao Cao's son — hounded Zhang Xiu with reminders of his murdered brother until Zhang Xiu committed suicide. His clan was later exterminated.

Jia Xu knew this. He was too intelligent not to. But he didn't say it. Because his real interest wasn't Zhang Xiu's welfare. It was his own. He wanted to be on the winning side. He wanted to survive. Everything he told Zhang Xiu was true. It just wasn't the whole truth.

**The Jia Xu Principle:** Effective communication is never about the speaker's true intent. It's about packaging the speaker's true intent inside a narrative that serves the listener's face and substance.

The Honest Path: When You Stop Trying to Persuade

But there's another path. The path of the person who doesn't play the game at all.

Tian Feng, advisor to Yuan Shao, knew his advice would be rejected. He knew Yuan Shao would not only ignore him but eventually kill him for his insubordination. He gave the advice anyway.

Was he a bad persuader? No. He wasn't trying to persuade. He was trying to be recorded.

He didn't care about Yuan Shao's decision. He cared about the historical record. He wanted future historians to know that among Yuan Shao's advisors, there was at least one person who saw clearly, who spoke truth, who was not a sycophant. He was writing his own epitaph in real-time.

This is the same logic as Hai Rui's famous memorial to the Jiajing Emperor — a document so brutally honest that it was essentially a suicide note. Hai Rui wasn't trying to change the emperor. He was trying to be remembered as the man who told the truth to power.

Two paths. Both ancient. Both valid.

The Jia Xu path: Read the other person. Give them face. Discover their substance. Package your interest inside their narrative. Collect your reward.

The Tian Feng path: Say what you believe. Accept that you will be ignored, punished, or killed. Write your truth for the historical record, not for the person in front of you.

The Modern Application: Why the Internet Rewards Liars

This mechanism hasn't changed in 2,300 years. It has just accelerated.

Tell a modern audience that China needs to stimulate domestic luxury consumption to prevent capital flight and create jobs for unemployed graduates. Present the logic. Show the data. Make the case.

Almost no one will agree with you.

Why? Because most people aren't wealthy. They hear your argument and feel attacked. They don't evaluate your logic. They evaluate your loyalty. Are you on my side? Are you speaking for me?

If you tell them what they want to hear — that their problems are someone else's fault, that solutions are simple, that change can happen overnight — you become a hero. You gain followers. You become an influencer.

Because 99% of people are not looking for truth. They are looking for feeling. They want to be told they are valued, that their struggles are seen, that the world is simple and fixable.

This is why the most successful communicators on the internet are essentially Jia Xu. They read their audience. They give them face. They discover their substance (the need for validation, the fear of irrelevance, the desire for simple answers). Then they package their own interests — clicks, ad revenue, influence — inside a narrative that feels like advocacy.

They don't persuade. They perform alignment.

And if you refuse to play this game? If you speak the truth as you see it, without calculating your audience's emotional needs? You lose the 99%. You speak to the 1% who are actually looking for understanding, not comfort.

The Choice

So here is the framework. Three options. They haven't changed since the Warring States period.

Option 1: The Jia Xu Path

Read the room. Understand face and substance. Package your interest inside their narrative. Collect the reward. This is what most successful people do. It is effective. It is also, in a strict sense, manipulation.

Option 2: The Tian Feng Path

Speak your truth. Accept irrelevance or punishment. Write for the historical record, not for the person in front of you. This is what most remembered people do. It is ineffective in the moment. It is immortal in retrospect.

Option 3: The Hybrid

Understand the game, choose when to play it. Use Jia Xu's methods when the stakes are low and the outcome matters. Use Tian Feng's methods when the stakes are high and the truth matters more than the reward.

Most people think they want to be persuasive. They don't. They want to be effective. And effectiveness requires understanding that persuasion is not a skill you apply to others. It is a reality you discover within them.

You cannot change what someone wants. You can only discover what they already want, then decide if you're willing to give it to them.

Han Fei knew this 2,300 years ago. The internet is just now catching up.

Mercury Technology Solutions: Accelerate Digitality.