Remember the spoof 'If Microsoft sold Macs' viral where Apple's lovely design became smothered with spec? Well long before the art of persuasion became an industry and shortly after the invention of the wheel Cicero certainly understood the principles of captivating an audience.
Here he offers some helpful advice to the poet Catallus.
“Now nothing in oratory, Catullus, is more
important than to win for the orator the favour
of his hearer, and to have the latter so effective
as to be swayed by something resembling a
mental impulse or emotion, rather than by
judgement or deliberation.
For men decide more problems by hate or love
or lust or rage or sorrow or joy or hope or fear
or illusion or some other inward emotion than
by rationality or authority or any legal standard,
or judicial precedent or statute.” Cicero, De Oratore
This might not be much help next time we're deciding which washing powder to buy or searching for the cheapest DVD (and excuse me for preaching to the converted), but faced with a brief for either we should always look to express the 'science bit', price, features, benefits or any other statistics in a way that entertains.
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