Oops.
Work on essay about 'the real American Dream'; typed draft due THURS.
Here’s something that happened back in July. I was working on my driveway with a small tractor (a ‘mini-excavator’) when a soft section of the road gave way and the tractor started sliding off the hillside.That's a fairly steep drop of about seventy feet on the downhill side.
I had to get a wrecker to hook a cable to hold the tractor so it wouldn't slide off the hillside, then get back on the tractor and turn it until it was facing downhill and I could back it back up on the road. It was hairy-scary.
I told the wrecker driver that I HAD been feeling pretty smart that morning, until I almost drove the tractor off the side of the mountain.
I told the wrecker driver that I HAD been feeling pretty smart that morning, until I almost drove the tractor off the side of the mountain.
HOMEWORK and class notes:
10th
11/12
Work on Personal Narrative Essay; typed draft due Friday
8th
1. Vocab 1B
2. Organize your ‘My Place’ brainstorming into an IDEA TREE.
9th
Work on ‘Christian World View’ essay; draft at least one paragraph (body, intro or conclusion) for tomorrow. Remember, the typed first draft is due THURSDAY.
Rhetoric
No homework. Review class notes.
Yesterday we discussed two important aspects of Aristotle’s view of rhetoric:
1) He believed that if ideas are allowed to compete, the best ideas would eventually be recognized and accepted. He believed that in a public debate truth would tend to prevail over falsehood, wisdom over folly. In modern terms we can say that this attitude shows faith in the ‘marketplace of ideas’. Just as the theory of free economic markets holds that letting services, products and companies compete for customers will bring the best products and services to market at the best prices, this theory of competitive debate holds that the best ideas will tend to win, that ‘truth will out’ if we allow different points of view to compete freely.
This belief in the power of true ideas to defeat false ones is the basis of the scientific method, which functions on the premise that free debate, using reasoning based on evidence, will tend to eliminate false ideas and elevate true ones.
We can look at the health problems caused by tobacco and fast foods, however, and wonder if free competition always produces the best result. The fact that most tobacco advertising is now outlawed seems to challenge the ‘free marketplace’ concept.
And if we look at the influence of ideas and media in our society, do the best ideas always come out on top?
The Aristotelian idea that free debate produces truth only applies if the debate is reasonable. Since Aristotle also taught his students how to manipulate the emotions of their audiences, and how to put on an appearance of virtue and likeability, we can ask whether reason is really the most important criterion people apply when making judgments, or whether they commonly let emotion and false appearances sway their opinions?
2) A second key concept of Aristotle’s thinking about rhetoric is that he saw it as a necessary tool of self-defense. He said that, just as a man should train to defend himself and his nation in physical combat, so he should also train to defend himself, and the best interests of his family and community, in verbal combat.
Some things to think about: How do we reconcile the idea of rhetoric as verbal combat where the strongest and most skilled (the slickest talker with the most money) often wins, with the idea that in debate the truth will become clear? Does the influence of emotion and pretended good character sometimes override the influence of reason in public debate? What about in advertising?
Does the pervasive influence of television, TV commercials, and other types of emotion-manipulating media make us more or less susceptible to manipulative persuasion?
Why is it important that Aristotle wrote that debaters would have to use enthymemes, or arguments that appear more logical than they actually are, to persuade audiences that don’t have the knowledge, intelligence or attention span to understand the real reasoning for a complex choice?
