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by covexcom 4317 days ago
When people get confused their brains tend to lock up and all their attention gets absorbed trying to figure out what's happening. Any ambiguous statement works. It's especially effective if it's the first thing you say. Now not only do they have to evaluate what you said, but who you are, what your intent is, etc. It's a much higher cognitive burden.

It's a trick that hypnotists use frequently. I think that's what is going on here.

Also interesting is that people will typically draw a conclusion about what you meant, and then become strangely certain that must reflect reality. Despite their confusion just a second ago, they're remarkably confident they've interpreted things accurately and won't even realize that alternate interpretations might exist. It's bizarre and a lot of fun to spot this constantly happening in the wild.

2 comments

I discovered this on my own. English is my 3rd language so while walking in a bad part of town and teenagers looking for trouble started to get interested me. I got nervous and responded with nonsense, by accident. They all froze, as if their brains glitched for a couple of seconds. That gave me enough time to walk away far enough for them to not bother with me.

Since then I used it multiple times. Accidentally bumped in a drunk person's girlfriend at a festival. I apologized but he was getting aggressive so I said "Alright, I'll talk to you later at 4" and walked away. He drunk brain was presumably trying to make sense of my gibberish.

With pan-handlers (which I admit is rude) when they ask for money I just say "No thanks, I'm good". As if they were offering me something.

You can go for plain "No thanks" as a slightly less variant. Still works, but does not emphasize your "superior" status and can be passed on really friendly, as when "thanking them for an opportunity to help them" (which you don't need to use).
Derren Brown (a hypnotist / mentalist) explains this phenomenon very well: http://www.shortlist.com/entertainment/derren-browns-guide-t...