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WRITING 122
FROM CRITICAL
THINKING to
ARGUMENT
A Portable Guide
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FROM CRITICAL
THINKING to
ARGUMENT
A Portable Guide
Sylvan Barnet
Tufts University
Hugo Bedau
Tufts University
Bedford/St. Martin’s BOSTON ◆ NEW YORK
THIRD EDITION
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For Bedford /St. Martin’s
Developmental Editor: Adam Whitehurst
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Cover Art and Design: Donna Lee Dennison
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Printing and Binding: RR Donnelley and Sons
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Editor in Chief: Karen S. Henry
Director of Marketing: Karen R. Soeltz
Director of Editing, Design, and Production: Susan W. Brown
Associate Director of Editorial Production: Elise S. Kaiser
Managing Editor: Elizabeth M. Schaaf
Library of Congress Control Number: 2010920449
Copyright © 2011, 2008, 2005, by Bedford/St. Martin’s
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except as may be
expressly permitted by the applicable copyright statutes or in writing by the
Publisher.
Manufactured in the United States of America.
5 4 3 2 1 0
f e d c b a
For information, write: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 75 Arlington Street,
Boston, MA 02116 (617-399-4000)
ISBN-10: 0–312–60161–1
ISBN-13: 978–0–312–60161–4
Acknowledgments
Acknowledgments and copyrights are continued at the back of the book on pages 355–56,
which constitute an extension of the copyright page. It is a violation of the law to
reproduce these selections by any means whatsoever without the written permission of
the copyright holder.
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Preface
This brief book is about reading other people’s arguments and writ-
ing your own. In a moment we will be more specific, but first we
want to mention our chief assumptions about the aims of a course
that might use From Critical Thinking to Argument: A Portable Guide,
Third Edition.
Probably most students and instructors would agree that, as
critical readers, students should be able to
• Summarize accurately an argument they have read;
• Locate the thesis (the claim) of an argument;
• Locate the assumptions, stated and unstated;
• Analyze and evaluate the strength of the evidence and the
soundness of the reasoning offered in support of the thesis; and
• Analyze, evaluate, and account for discrepancies among var-
ious readings on a topic (for example, explain why certain
facts are used, why probable consequences of a proposed
action are examined, and why others are ignored, or why
two sources might interpret the same facts differently).
Probably, too, students and instructors would agree that, as thought-
ful writers, students should be able to
• Imagine an audience and write effectively for it (for instance,
by using the appropriate tone and providing the appropriate
amount of detail);
v
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• Present information in an orderly and coherent way;
• Be aware of their own assumptions;
• Locate sources and incorporate them into their own writing,
not simply by quoting extensively or by paraphrasing but also
by having digested material so that they can present it in their
own words;
• Properly document all borrowings—not merely quotations
and paraphrases but also borrowed ideas; and
• Do all these things in the course of developing a thoughtful
argument of their own.
In writing an essay one is engaging in a serious effort to know
what one’s own ideas are and, having found them, to contribute to
a multisided conversation. One is not setting out to trounce an
opponent, and that is partly why such terms as marshaling evidence,
attacking an opponent, and defending a thesis are misleading. True, on
television talk shows we see right-wingers and left-wingers who
have made up their minds and who are concerned only with push-
ing their own views and brushing aside all others. But in an aca-
demic community, and indeed in our daily lives, we learn
• by listening to others and also
• by listening to ourselves.
We draft a response to something we have read, and in the
very act of drafting we may find—if we think critically about the
words we are putting down on paper—we are changing (perhaps
slightly, perhaps radically) our own position. In short, one reason
that we write is so that we can improve our ideas. And even if we
do not drastically change our views, we and our readers at least
come to a better understanding of why we hold the views we do.
WHAT’S IN THIS BOOK
In Part One, the first four chapters deal with recognizing and evalu-
ating assumptions—in both texts and images—as a way to start
annotating, summarizing, and analyzing arguments. Among the
topics discussed are critical thinking, analysis, summary and para-
phrase, reasoning, and the uses of humor, emotion, and images.
Chapter 4, Visual Rhetoric: Images as Arguments, not only helps
vi PREFACE
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students to analyze advertisements but also offers suggestions
about using visuals such as maps, graphs, tables, and pie charts in
their own arguments.
Chapters 5 and 6 focus principally on writing. Students are
expected to apply the critical thinking and reading skills they have
learned to writing analytical and argumentative papers. We include
sample student papers as models. Chapter 7, on research, includes
information on finding, evaluating, and documenting electronic
and other sources and discusses ways to choose topics for research,
take notes, avoid plagiarism, integrate quotations, and document
sources. Two annotated student papers—one in MLA style and one
in APA style—provide models for reading and reference.
Part Two, a kind of appendix, presents alternative perspectives
on argument: the Toulmin model, logical reasoning (a detailed dis-
cussion of induction, deduction, and fallacies), and a description of
Rogerian argument (named for the psychologist Carl Rogers).
Students and instructors will find additional material on argument
at a companion Web site, bedfordstmartins.com/barnetbedau.
We trust that this book is brief enough and affordable enough to
be assigned as an accompaniment to a separate anthology of readings
or as a supplement to a selection of individual longer works that do
not include necessary instruction in critical thinking and argument.
WHAT’S NEW
We have made some significant changes in the Third Edition that
we believe enrich the book and make the content more accessible.
Expanded and up-to-date coverage of research. Chapter
7, Using Sources, features new annotated images of database and
Web pages that show students where to find the information they
need to confidently evaluate and cite electronic sources.
Idea Prompts model academic writing strategies. Spanning
such topics as definition, cartoon analysis, making transitions, and
visualizing pros and cons, this new recurring feature helps students
choose among different sentence-level rhetorical strategies as they
construct arguments by giving them model sentences that show these
strategies in action.
A new section on synthesis demonstrates important strate-
gies students will need to inject their own voices into their papers
in conversation with the sources they use.
PREFACE vii
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Finally, it is our pleasant duty to thank those who have strengthened
the book by their comments and advice on the third edition: Liz
Canfield, Virginia Commonwealth University; L. Andrew Cooper,
Georgia Institute of Technology; Carol Enns, College of the Sequoias;
Christina Fisanick, California University of Pennsylvania; Gina
Richards, Delta College; Jason Webb, Columbine High School; Mary
Werner, Madisonville Community College.
We also appreciate the helpful feedback given in response to the
first two editions: Scott D. Banville, Lisa Breger, Joyce D. Brotton,
Barbara Butler, Deborah Cordonnier, John Eliason, Gawain Emanuel,
Martha G. Jaillet, Caroline Kimberly, Stephen Levin, Jon Petty, Rick
Piet, Melissa Stevenson, and Sharmain Van Blommenstein.
We would also like to thank Barbara Fister, who improved our
discussion of research, and Susen Doheny and Diane Kraut who
adeptly managed art research and text permissions, respectively.
We are also deeply indebted to the people at Bedford/St. Martin’s,
especially to our editor, Adam Whitehurst, who is wise, patient, sup-
portive, and unfailingly helpful. Others at Bedford/St. Martin’s to
whom we are deeply indebted include Charles H. Christensen, Joan
E. Feinberg, Elizabeth Schaaf, Kerri Cardone, Steve Scipione,
Maura Shea, John Sullivan, Sandy Schechter, Emily Berleth, and
Karen Stocz, all of whom have offered countless valuable (and
invaluable) suggestions. Intelligent, informed, firm yet courteous,
persuasive—all of these folks know how to think and how to
argue.
viii PREFACE
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Brief
Contents
Preface v
PART ONE FROM CRITICAL THINKING TO ARGUMENT
AND RESEARCH 1
1 Critical Thinking 3
2 Critical Reading: Getting Started 30
3 Critical Reading: Getting Deeper into Arguments 51
4 Visual Rhetoric: Images as Arguments 96
5 Writing an Analysis of an Argument 127
6 Developing an Argument of Your Own 145
7 Using Sources 188
PART TWO FURTHER VIEWS ON ARGUMENT 273
8 A Philosopher’s View: The Toulmin Model 275
9 A Logician’s View: Deduction, Induction, Fallacies 289
10 A Psychologist’s View: Rogerian Argument 340
Index of Terms 357
ix
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Contents
Preface v
PART ONE FROM CRITICAL THINKING TO ARGUMENT
AND RESEARCH 1
1 Critical Thinking 3
Thinking about Drivers’ Licenses and Photographic
Identification 4
Thinking about Another Issue Concerning Drivers’ Licenses:
Imagination, Analysis, Evaluation 9
Thinking about Student Evaluations of Their Professors 11
IDEA PROMPT: VISUALIZING PROS AND CONS 12
Writing as a Way of Thinking 13
Getting Ideas 14
IDEA PROMPT: UNDERSTANDING CLASSICAL TOPICS 16
A CHECKLIST FOR CRITICAL THINKING 19
A Short Essay Illustrating Critical Thinking 20
xi
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HARLAN COBEN, The Undercover Parent 21
Many parents won’t consider installing spyware on their kid’s
computer—but, Coben argues, it is a good idea.
LETTER OF RESPONSE BY CAROL WESTON 26
A CHECKLIST FOR EVALUATING LETTERS OF
RESPONSE 27
Examining Assumptions 28
A CHECKLIST FOR EXAMINING ASSUMPTIONS 28
2 Critical Reading: Getting Started 30
Active Reading 30
Previewing, 30 Skimming: Finding the Thesis, 31 Reading
with a Pencil: Underlining, Highlighting, Annotating, 32 “This;
Therefore, That,” 33 First, Second, and Third Thoughts, 34
Summarizing and Paraphrasing 36
A Note about Paraphrase and Plagiarism, 39 Last Words (Almost)
about Summarizing, 40
SUSAN JACOBY, A First Amendment Junkie 43
A feminist argues against those feminists who seek to ban pornography.
Summarizing Jacoby, Paragraph by Paragraph 46
A CHECKLIST FOR GETTING STARTED 48
EXERCISE: LETTER TO THE EDITOR 49
3 Critical Reading: Getting Deeper into Arguments 51
Persuasion, Argument, Dispute 51
Reason Versus Rationalization 53
Some Procedures In Argument 55
Definition 55
IDEA PROMPT: WAYS TO GIVE DEFINITIONS 60
Assumptions, 60 Premises and Syllogisms, 62 Deduction, 62
Sound Arguments, 64 Induction, 67 Evidence:
Experimentation, Examples, Authoritative Testimony, Statisitcs, 69
xii CONTENTS
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A CHECKLIST FOR EVALUATING STATISTICAL
EVIDENCE 80
Nonrational Appeals 81
Satire, Irony, Sarcasm, Humor, 81 Emotional Appeals, 82
Does all Writing Contain Arguments? 85
A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING AN ARGUMENT 86
An Example: An Argument and a Look at the Writer’s
Strategies 87
GEORGE F. WILL, Being Green at Ben and Jerry’s 87
Statistics and humor are among the tools this essayist uses in arguing on
behalf of drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
George F. Wills’s Strategies 90
4 Visual Rhetoric: Images as Arguments 96
Some Uses of Images 96
Appeals to the Eye 96
Are Some Images Not Fit to Be Shown? 101
Politics and Pictures 105
EXERCISE 107
EXERCISES: THINKING ABOUT IMAGES 109
Reading Advertisements 110
A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING IMAGES (ESPECIALLY
ADVERTISEMENTS) 115
Writing about a Political Cartoon 116
A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING POLITICAL
CARTOONS 117
IDEA PROMPT: ANALYSIS OF A POLITICAL
CARTOON 118
JACKSON SMITH (STUDENT ESSAY), Pledging
Nothing? 120
Visuals as Aids to Clarity: Maps, Graphs, Tables, and
Pie Charts 122
CONTENTS xiii
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A CHECKLIST FOR CHARTS AND GRAPHS 123
A Note on Using Visuals in Your Own Paper 123
A Note on Formatting Your Paper: Document Design 125
5 Writing an Analysis of an Argument 127
Analyzing an Argument 127
Examining the Author’s Thesis, 127 Examining the Author’s
Purpose, 128
IDEA PROMPT: DRAWING CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLYING
PROOF 129
Examining the Author’s Methods, 129 Examining the Author’s
Persona, 130 Summary, 132
A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING A TEXT 133
An Argument, Its Elements, and a Student’s Analysis of the Argument 134
NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF, For Environmental Balance, Pick
Up a Rifle 134
“Let’s bring back hunting.”
BETSY SWINTON (STUDENT ESSAY), Tracking Kristof 140
An Analysis of the Student’s Analysis 143
A CHECKLIST FOR WRITING AN ANALYSIS OF
AN ARGUMENT 143
6 Developing an Argument of Your Own 145
Planning, Drafting, and Revising an Argument 146
Getting Ideas, 146 The Thesis, 155
A CHECKLIST FOR A THESIS STATEMENT 156
Imagining an Audience, 156 The Audience as Collaborator, 157
A CHECKLIST FOR IMAGINING AN AUDIENCE 160
The Title, 161 The Opening Paragraphs, 162 Organizing and
Revising the Body of the Essay, 165
IDEA PROMPT: USING TRANSITIONS IN ARGUMENT 169
The Ending, 170 Two Uses of an Outline, 171 Tone and the
Writer’s Persona, 172 We, One, or I? 176 Avoiding Sexist
Language, 176
xiv CONTENTS
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A CHECKLIST FOR ATTENDING TO THE NEEDS OF THE
AUDIENCE 177
Peer Review 178
A Student’s Essay, from Rough Notes to Final Version 178
A PEER REVIEW CHECKLIST FOR A DRAFT OF
AN ARGUMENT 179
EMILY ANDREWS, Why I Don’t Spare “Spare Change” 183
The Essay Analyzed 186
EXERCISE 186
7 Using Sources 188
Why Use Sources? 188
Choosing a Topic 191
Finding Material 193
Finding Quality Information on the Web, 193 Finding Articles
Using Library Databases, 195
A WORD ABOUT WIKIPEDIA 195
Locating Books 197
Interviewing Peers and Local Authorities 198
Evaluating Your Sources 199
Taking Notes 203
A CHECKLIST FOR EVALUATING PRINT SOURCES 203
A CHECKLIST FOR EVALUATING ELECTRONIC
SOURCES 204
A Note on Plagiarizing, Paraphrasing, and Using Common
Knowledge 206
A CHECKLIST FOR AVOIDING PLAGIARISM 208
Compiling an Annotated Bibliography 209
Writing the Paper 211
Organizing Your Notes, 211 The First Draft, 212 Later
Drafts, 212 A Few More Words about Organization, 213
Choosing a Tentative Title, 213 The Final Draft, 214
CONTENTS xv
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Quoting from Sources 214
Incorporating Your Reading into Your Thinking: The Art and Science of
Synthesis, 214 The Use and Abuse of Quotations, 217 How to
Quote, 217
A CHECKLIST FOR USING QUOTATIONS RATHER THAN
SUMMARIES 218
IDEA PROMPT: SIGNAL PHRASES 219
Documentation 220
A Note on Footnotes (and Endnotes), 220 MLA Format: Citations
within the Text, 221 MLA Format: The List of Works Cited, 227
APA Format: Citations within the Text, 240 APA Format: The List
of References, 241
A CHECKLIST FOR PAPERS USING SOURCES 245
An Annotated Student Research Paper in MLA Format 246
THERESA WASHINGTON, Why Trials Should Not
Be Televised 247
An Annotated Student Research Paper in APA Format 263
LAURA DEVEAU, The Role of Spirituality and Religion in
Mental Health 264
PART TWO FURTHER VIEWS ON ARGUMENT 273
8 A Philosopher’s View: The Toulmin Model 275
The Claim 276
Grounds 276
Warrants 277
Backing 279
Modal Qualifiers 279
Rebuttals 281
A Model Analysis Using the Toulmin Method 281
A CHECKLIST FOR USING THE TOULMIN METHOD 284
Putting the Toulmin Method to Work: Responding to an Argument 285
xvi CONTENTS
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MICHAEL S. DUKAKIS AND DANIEL J. B. MITCHELL, Raise
Wages, Not Walls 285
Thinking with Toulmin’s Method 287
9 A Logician’s View: Deduction, Induction, Fallacies 289
Deduction 289
Induction 303
Observation and Inference, 303 Probability, 305 Mill’s
Methods, 308 Confirmation, Mechanism, and Theory, 310
Fallacies 311
Fallacies of Ambiguity, 312 Ambiguity, 312 Division, 313
Composition, 313 Equivocation, 313 Fallacies of
Presumption, 315 Distorting the Facts, 315 Post Hoc, Ergo
Propter Hoc, 315 Many Questions, 316 Hasty Generalization
316 The Slippery Slope, 316 False Analogy, 318 Straw
Man, 319 Special Pleading, 319 Begging the Question, 319
False Dichotomy, 320 Oversimplification, 320 Red Herring,
320 Fallacies of Relevance, 321 Tu Quoque, 321 The
Genetic Fallacy, 321 Poisoning the Well, 322 Appeal to
Ignorance, 322 Ad Hominem, 323 Appeal to Authority, 323
Appeal to Fear, 324 Death by a Thousand Qualifications, 324
Protecting the Hypothesis, 325
A CHECKLIST FOR EVALUATING AN ARGUMENT FROM A
LOGICAL POINT OF VIEW 326
EXERCISE: FALLACIES—OR NOT? 327
MAX SHULMAN, Love Is a Fallacy 329
A short story about the limits of logic: “Can you give me one logical
reason why you should go steady with Petey Bellows?”
10 A Psychologist’s View: Rogerian Argument 340
Rogerian Argument: An Introduction 340
CARL R. ROGERS, Communication: Its Blocking and Its
Facilitation 343
A psychotherapist explains why we must see things from the other
person’s point of view.
CONTENTS xvii
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A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING ROGERIAN
ARGUMENT 350
EDWARD O. WILSON, Letter to a Southern Baptist
Minister 350
An internationally renowned evolutionary biologist appeals for help
from a literalist interpreter of Christian Holy Scripture.
Index of Terms 357
xviii CONTENTS
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FROM CRITICAL
THINKING to
ARGUMENT
A Portable Guide
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FROM CRITICAL
THINKING to
ARGUMENT and
RESEARCH
PART ONE
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Critical Thinking
What is the hardest task in the world? To think.
— RALPH WALDO EMERSON
I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking
at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.
— JOAN DIDION
In all affairs it’s a healthy thing now and then to hang a question
mark on the things you have long taken for granted.
— BERTRAND RUSSELL
Although Emerson said simply “to think,” he pretty clearly was
using the word think in the sense of critical thinking. By itself, think-
ing can mean almost any sort of mental activity, from idle day-
dreaming (“During the chemistry lecture I kept thinking about how
I’d like to go camping”) to careful analysis (“I’m thinking about
whether I can afford more than one week—say two weeks—of
camping in the Rockies,” or even “I’m thinking about whether
Emerson’s comment is true”).
In short, when we add the adjective critical to the noun think-
ing, we pretty much eliminate reveries, just as we also eliminate
snap judgments. We are talking about searching for hidden
assumptions, noticing various facets, unraveling different strands,
and evaluating what is most significant. The word critical comes
from a Greek word, krinein, meaning “to separate,” “to choose”; it
implies conscious, deliberate inquiry, and especially it implies
adopting a skeptical state of mind. To say that it implies a skeptical
state of mind is by no means to say that it implies a self-satisfied
fault-finding state of mind. Quite the reverse: Because critical
1
3
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thinkers seek to draw intelligent conclusions, they are sufficiently
open-minded that they can adopt a skeptical attitude
• Toward their own ideas,
• Toward their own assumptions, and
• Toward the evidence they themselves tentatively offer,
as well as toward the assumptions and evidence offered by others.
When they reread a draft they have written, they read it with a
skeptical frame of mind, seeking to improve the thinking that has
gone into it.
THINKING ABOUT DRIVERS’ LICENSES
AND PHOTOGRAPHIC IDENTIFICATION
By way of illustration, let’s think about a case that was in the news
in 2003. When Sultaana Freeman, an American Muslim woman
in Florida, first applied for a driver’s license, she refused on reli-
gious grounds to unveil her face for the photograph that Florida
requires. She was allowed to remain veiled for the photo, with
only her eyes showing. Probably in a response to the terrorist
attacks of September 11, 2001, she was informed in 2002 that her
license would be revoked if she refused to allow the Department of
Motor Vehicles to photograph her face. She sued the state of
Florida, saying that unveiling would violate her Islamic beliefs. “I’m
fighting for the principle and the religious freedom of all people in
the country,” she said. “It’s not about me.”
Well, let’s think about this—let’s think critically, and to do this,
we will use a simple aid that is equal to the best word processor, a
pencil. Your own experience has already taught you that thinking
is largely a matter of association; one thought leads to another, as
when you jot down “peanut butter” on a shopping list and then
add “bread,” and “bread” somehow reminds you—you don’t know
why—that you also need paper napkins. As the humorist Finley
Peter Dunne observed, philosophers and cows have the gift of med-
itation, but “others don’t begin to think till they begin to talk or
write.” So what are some thoughts that come to mind when we
begin to talk or write about this Florida case?
Critical thinking means questioning not only the assumptions
of others, but also questioning your own assumptions. We will dis-
cuss this point at some length later in this chapter, but here we
4 1 / CRITICAL THINKING
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want to say only that when you write an argument, you ought to
be thinking, evaluating evidence and assumptions, not merely col-
lecting evidence to support a preestablished conclusion.
Back to the Florida case: Here is what we came up with in a few
minutes, using a process called clustering. (We illustrate clustering
again on page 7.)
In the center of a sheet of paper, we jotted down a phrase
summarizing the basic issue, and then we began jotting down what
must be the most obvious justification for demanding the picture—
national safety. (We might equally well have begun with the most
obvious justifications for refusing to be photographed—religious
belief and perhaps privacy, to think of arguments that Sultaana
Freeman—or, more likely, her lawyer—might set forth.) Then we
THINKING ABOUT DRIVERS’ LICENSES AND . . .
5
4. Not the point: She believes her face
ought not to be seen by a cop who might
ask for her license.
3. Compromise:
Maybe have a woman
photographer take
the picture in private.
2. National security
is more important
than private beliefs.
1. Infringement on one’s
religious beliefs.
5. She is not being discriminated
against, as a Muslim. All people who
want a Florida license need a photo.
6. Not quite true. Temporary
licenses are issued without a photo.
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let our minds work, and one thought led to another. Sometimes
almost as soon as we jotted down an idea we saw that it wasn’t
very good, but we made considerable progress.
In the illustration, we have added numbers to the ideas, simply
so that you can see how our minds worked, which is to say how we
jumped around. Notice, for instance, that our fifth point—our fifth
idea—is connected to our second point. When we were rereading
our first four jottings, the fifth idea — that she is not being discrim-
inated against as a Muslim — came to mind, and we saw that it
should be linked with the second point. Our sixth point—a modifi-
cation of our fifth, occurred to us even before we finished writing
the fifth. The sixth point, that temporary licenses in Florida are
issued without photographs, prompted us to start thinking more
vigorously about the arguments that Ms. Freeman, or her lawyer,
might offer.
A very brief digression: A legal case is pretty much a matter
of guilty or not guilty, right or wrong, yes or no. Of course in some
trials a defendant can be found guilty of certain charges and inno-
cent of others, but, again, it is usually an either/or situation: The
prosecution wins, or the defense wins. But in many other aspects
of life, there is room for compromise, and it may well be that both
sides win—by seeing what ground they share and by developing
additional common ground. We go into this topic at greater length
in Chapter 10, where we discuss Rogerian argument (named for Carl
Rogers, a psychotherapist) and in our introduction to several chap-
ters that offer pairs of debates.
Now back to Freeman v. State of Florida, Department of Highway
Safety and Motor Vehicles, where we began by trying to list arguments
on one side versus arguments on the other.
• After making our seventh note, which goes directly back to
the central issue (hence we connected it with a line to the
central issue) and which turned out to be an argument that
the government rather than the plaintiff might make, we
decided to keep thinking about government positions, and
wrote the eighth note—that some states do not require pic-
tures on drivers’ licenses.
• The ninth note—that the government is prohibiting a belief,
not a harmful action—in some degree refutes our seventh
note, so we connected it to the seventh.
Again, if you think with a pencil and a sheet of paper and let your
mind make associations, you will find, perhaps to your surprise,
6 1/ CRITICAL THINKING
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THINKING ABOUT DRIVERS’ LICENSES AND . . . 7
4. Not the point: She believes her face
ought not to be seen by a cop who might
ask for her license.
3. Compromise:
Maybe have a woman
photographer take
the picture in private.
2. National security
is more important
than private beliefs.
1. Infringement on one’s
religious beliefs.
5. She is not being discriminated
against, as a Muslim. All people who
want a Florida license need a photo.
6. Not quite true. Temporary
licenses are issued without a photo.
7. Maybe infringement. But the
gov’t sometimes prohibits beliefs it
considers harmful to society. It
does not permit the use of drugs in
religious ceremonies, or sacrifice.
9. But those things
are harmful actions
that the believer engages
in. In the case at issue,
the believer is not
engaging in harmful
action. It’s the gov’t
that is doing the
acting — taking a picture.
8. Some states do not require
pictures on licenses.
10. Florida itself issues temporary
licenses without photos.
that you have plenty of interesting ideas. Doubtless you will also
have some not-so-interesting ones. We confess that we have
slightly edited our notes; originally they included two points that
we are ashamed we thought of:
• “What is she complaining about? In some strict Islamic coun-
tries they don’t even let women drive, period.”
• “Being deprived of a license isn’t a big deal. She can take the
bus.”
It will take only a moment of reflection to decide that these
thoughts can scarcely be offered as serious arguments: What people
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do in strict Islamic countries has nothing to do with what we
should do in ours, and that bus service is available is utterly irrele-
vant to the issue of whether this woman’s rights are being
infringed. Still, if a fear of making fools of ourselves had prevented
us from jotting down ideas, we would not have jotted down any
decent ideas, and the page would not have gotten written.
The outcome of the driver’s license photo case? Judge Janet C.
Thorpe ruled against the plaintiff, explaining that “the State has
always had a compelling interest in promoting public safety. That
interest is served by having the means to accurately and swiftly
determine identities in given circumstances.” (You can read Judge
Thorpe’s entire decision online — sixteen highly readable double-
spaced pages — by going to Google and typing in “Sultaana
Lakiana.”)
8 1/ CRITICAL THINKING
Plaintiff in Freeman v. State of Florida, Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles.
(Peter Cosgrove/© AP/Worldwide Photos.)
A RULE FOR WRITERS: One good way to start writing an essay is to
start generating ideas—and at this point don’t worry that some of
them may be nonsense. Just get ideas down on paper, and evaluate
them later.
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TOPICS FOR CRITICAL THINKING AND WRITINGS
1. Think about Judge Thorpe’s comment, quoted in the preceding para-
graph. Even if we agree that a photograph establishes identity—
itself a debatable point — one might raise a question: Given the
fact that Florida has not passed a law requiring a photo ID, why
should it say that the driver of a vehicle must provide a photo ID?
Isn’t a driver’s license a mere certification of permission to drive?
2. Judge Thorpe wrote the following as part of her explanation for
her decision:
Although the Court acknowledges that Plaintiff herself most likely
poses no threat to national security, there likely are people who
would be willing to use a ruling permitting the wearing of fullface
cloaks in driver’s license photos by pretending to ascribe to religious
beliefs in order to carry out activities that would threaten lives.
Is the judge in effect saying that we should infringe on Sultaana
Free-man’s religious beliefs because someone else might do
something wicked?
3. In England in 2006 a Muslim woman—a British citizen—was
removed from her job as a schoolteacher because she wore a veil.
The stated reason was that the veil prevented her from effectively
communicating with children. What do you think of the view that
a woman has a right to wear a veil, but when she enters the mar-
ketplace she may rightly be denied certain jobs? What are your
reasons?
THINKING ABOUT ANOTHER ISSUE
CONCERNING DRIVERS’ LICENSES:
IMAGINATION, ANALYSIS, EVALUATION
Let’s think critically about a law passed in West Virginia in 1989.
The law provides that although students may drop out of school at
the age of sixteen, no dropout younger than eighteen can hold a
driver’s license. (Several states now have comparable laws.)
What ought we to think of such a law?
• Is it fair?
• What is its purpose?
• Is it likely to accomplish its purpose?
• Might it unintentionally cause some harm?
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• If so, can we weigh the potential harm against the potential
good?
Suppose you had been a member of the West Virginia state legisla-
ture in 1989: How would you have voted?
In thinking critically about a topic, we try to see it from all sides
before we come to our conclusion. We conduct an argument with
ourselves, advancing and then questioning opinions:
• What can be said for the proposition, and
• What can be said against it?
Our first reaction may be quite uncritical, quite unthinking:
“What a good idea!” or “That’s outrageous!” But critical thinking
requires us to reflect further, trying to support our position and
also trying to see the other side. One can almost say that the heart
of critical thinking is a willingness to face objections to one’s own
beliefs, a willingness to adopt a skeptical attitude not only toward
authority and toward views opposed to our own but also toward
common sense — that is, toward the views that seem obviously
right to us. If we assume we have a monopoly on the truth and
we dismiss as bigots those who oppose us, or if we say our oppo-
nents are acting merely out of self-interest and we do not in fact
analyze their views, we are being critical but we are not engaged
in critical thinking.
10 1/ CRITICAL THINKING
A RULE FOR WRITERS: Early in the process of jotting down your
ideas on a topic, stop to ask yourself, “What might reasonably be
offered as an objection to my view?”
Critical thinking requires us to use our imaginations, seeing things
from perspectives other than our own and envisioning the likely
consequences of our positions. (This sort of imaginative thinking—
grasping a perspective other than our own and considering the pos-
sible consequences of positions—is, as we have said, very different
from daydreaming, an activity of unchecked fantasy.)
Thinking critically involves, along with imagination (so that we
can see our own beliefs from another point of view), a twofold
activity:
analysis, finding the parts of the problem and then separating
them, trying to see how things fit together; and
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evaluation, judging the merit of our claims and assumptions
and the weight of the evidence in their favor.
If we engage in imaginative, analytic, and evaluative thought, we
will have second and third ideas; almost to our surprise we may
find ourselves adopting a position that we initially couldn’t imagine
we would hold. As we think about the West Virginia law, we might
find ourselves coming up with a fairly wide variety of ideas, each
triggered by the preceding idea but not necessarily carrying it a step
further. For instance, we may think X and then immediately think,
“No, that’s not quite right. In fact, come to think of it, the opposite
of X is probably true.” We haven’t carried X further, but we have
progressed in our thinking.
THINKING ABOUT STUDENT EVALUATIONS
OF THEIR PROFESSORS
Many colleges and universities invite students to evaluate the
courses they take, usually by filling out a questionnaire. Customarily
the evaluations are made available to instructors after grades have
been handed in. At Tufts University, for instance, students are invited
to write about each of their courses and also to respond to specific
questions by indicating a rating that ranges from 5 to 1 (5 � excel-
lent, 4 � above average, 3 � average, 2 � below average, 1 � poor;
na � not applicable). Among the eleven questions about the instruc-
tor, students are asked to rate “clarity of presentation” and “tolerance
of alternative views”; among the three questions about the course,
students are asked to rate “overall organization.”
What is the point of such evaluations? Might there be argu-
ments against using questionnaires illustrating negative aspects to
their use? Consider the Idea Prompt which lays out the pros and
cons (Idea Prompt 1.1).
We have already mentioned that the questionnaires may be
used when administrators consider awarding merit increases, and
in the last few years a new angle appeared. At Texas A & M, for
instance, bonuses ranging from $2,500 to $10,000 are awarded to
certain professors who are chosen by a committee of students. (At
Texas A & M, tenure and promotion are not involved in the pro-
gram, only money.) The gist of the Texas plan, approved by the
Faculty Senate, is this: Members of the faculty who wish to com-
pete—this particular practice is voluntary—may invite students in
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their classes to fill out a questionnaire prepared by a committee
created by the Student Government Association. (In preparing the
questionnaire, the committee drew on suggestions made by the
faculty, students, administrators, and “system officials.”) Eleven
students examine the questionnaires, and it is these students who
decide who gets the bonus money, and how much. At the
University of Oklahoma’s College of Engineering and College of
Business a somewhat comparable program exists, with bonuses
ranging from $5,000 to $10,000: In the College of Engineering, for
instance, those faculty members who participate and who score in
the top 5 percent on the evaluation are each awarded $5,000. Each
of those who score in the next 15 percent receives $ 2,500.
The Texas A & M questionnaire has sixteen questions, to which
students are asked to respond on a five-point scale, ranging from
“strongly agree” to “strongly disagree.” Here are two sample questions.
1. My instructor seemed to be very knowledgeable about the
subject matter.
2. My instructor seemed to present the course material in an
organized manner.
Finalists in the evaluation must then submit a syllabus and a state-
ment of their teaching philosophy, and the head of the department is
invited to submit a comment. Students on the committee also may
12 1/ CRITICAL THINKING
IDEA PROMPT 1.1 VISUALIZING PROS AND CONS
Benefits of Arguments against
evaluations evaluations
Instructors Learn how they may May be reluctant to give
improve their teaching low grades because of
fear of student retaliation
Students Will benefit in the future Are not always qualified
because the instructor to give fair evaluations
will do a better job
Administrators Receive additional May rely too heavily on
information to help evaluations as evidence
them make decision of a course’s merit
about promotion, the
award of tenure, or
salary increases
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examine the grade distribution curve. The questionnaire, however, is
said to be the chief criterion.
TOPICS FOR CRITICAL THINKING AND WRITING
1. Jot down any arguments you think of, not already mentioned, pro
and con, for the use of evaluation questionnaires in college classes.
2. Even if you do not favor such questionnaires, jot down three
questions that you think might be useful on such a questionnaire.
3. What do you think would be the best way to form a student eval-
uation committee? Explain the merits of your proposal with
respect to possible alternatives.
4. How would you distinguish between a good teacher and a popular
teacher?
5. Draft a brief essay, about 500 words, arguing for or against the use
of questionnaires in college courses. Be sure to indicate the pur-
pose(s) of the questionnaires. Are the questionnaires to be used by
administrators, by students, or both? Should they help to deter-
mine promotion, tenure, and compensation?
WRITING AS A WAY OF THINKING
“To learn to write,” Robert Frost said, “is to learn to have ideas.”
But how do you “learn to have ideas”? Often we discover ideas
while we are in the process of talking with others. A friend says X
about some issue, and we—who have never really thought much
about the matter—say,
• “Well, yes, I see what you are saying, but, come to think of
it, I’m not of your opinion. I see it differently— not X but Y.”
Or maybe we say,
• “Yes, X, sure, and also a bit of Y too.”
Mere chance—the comment of a friend—has led us to an idea
that we didn’t know we had. This sort of discovery may at first
seem something like the discovery we make when we reach under
the couch to retrieve a ball that the dog has pushed and we find a
ten-dollar bill instead. “How it got there, I’ll never know, but I’m
glad I found it.”
In fact, learning to have ideas is not largely a matter of chance.
Or if chance is involved, well, as Louis Pasteur put it, “Chance favors
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the prepared mind.” What does this mean? It means that somehow,
lurking in the mind, are some bits of information or hints or maybe
hunches that in the unexpected circumstance—when talking, or
when listening to a lecture or a classroom discussion, or especially
when reading—are triggered and result in useful thoughts. A sort of
seat-of-the-pants knowledge that, when brought to the surface,
when worked on, produces good results.
Consider the famous episode of Archimedes, the ancient Greek
mathematician, who discovered a method to determine the volume
of an irregularly shaped object. The problem: A king gave a gold-
smith a specific weight of gold with which to make a crown in the
shape of laurel leaves. When the job was finished the king weighed
the crown, found that it was the weight of the gold he had pro-
vided, but he nevertheless suspected that the goldsmith might have
substituted some silver for the gold. How could Archimedes find
out (without melting or in any other way damaging the crown) if
the crown was pure gold? Meditating produced no ideas, but when
he entered a bathtub Archimedes noticed that the level of water
rose as he immersed his body. He suddenly realized that he could
thus determine the volume of the crown—by measuring the
amount of displaced water. Since silver is less dense than gold, it
takes a greater volume of silver to equal a given weight of gold.
That is, a given weight of gold will displace less water than the
same weight of silver. Archimedes then immersed the given weight
of gold, measured the water it displaced, and found that indeed the
crown displaced more water than the gold did. In his excitement at
hitting upon his idea, Archimedes is said to have leaped out of the
tub and run naked through the street, shouting “Eureka” (Greek
for “I have found it”).
Getting Ideas
Why do we tell this story? Partly because we like it, but chiefly
because the word eureka comes from the same Greek word that has
given our language the word heuristic (pronounced hyooRIStik), a
method or process of discovering ideas, in short, of thinking. In this
method, one thing triggers another. (Note: In computer science
heuristic has a more specialized meaning.) Now, one of the best ways
of getting ideas is to hear what is going on around you—and what
is going on around you is talk, in and out of the classroom, and talk
in the world of books. You will find, as we said at the beginning of
this discussion, that your response may be, “Well, yes, I see what
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you are saying, but, come to think of it, I don’t see it quite that way.
I see it differently—not X but Y.” For instance,
“Yes, solar power is a way of conserving energy, but do we need
to despoil the Mojave Desert and endanger desert life with —
literally — fifty thousand solar mirrors, so that folks in Los
Angeles can heat their pools? Doesn’t it make sense to reduce
our use of energy, rather than merely to develop sources of
renewable energy that violate the environment? Some sites
should be off-limits.”
Or maybe your response to the proposal (now at least ten years
old) that wind turbines be placed in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, is,
“Given our need for wind power, how can a reasonable person object to
the proposal that we put 130 wind turbines in Cape Cod,
Massachusetts? Yes, the view will be changed, but in fact the
turbines are quite attractive. No one thinks that windmills in
Holland spoil the landscape. So the view will be changed, but not
spoiled, and furthermore wind turbines do not endanger birds or
aquatic life.
When you are asked to write about something you have read in
this book, if your first response is that you have no ideas, remem-
ber the responses that we have mentioned—“No, I don’t see it that
way,” or “Yes, but,” or “Yes, and moreover”—and see if one of
them helps you to respond to the work—helps you, in short, to get
ideas.
A related way of getting ideas practiced by the ancient Greeks
and Romans and still regarded as among the best ways, is to con-
sider what the ancients called topics, from the Greek word topos,
meaning “place,” as in our word topography (a description or repre-
sentation of a place). For the ancients, certain topics, put into the
form of questions, were in effect places where one went to find
ideas. Among the classical topics were definition, comparison, rela-
tionship, and testimony. By prompting oneself with questions
about these topics, one finds oneself moving toward answers (see
Idea Prompt 1.2).
If you think you are at a loss for ideas when confronted with
an issue (and when confronted with an assignment to write about
it), you probably will find ideas coming to you if you turn to the
relevant classical topics and begin jotting down your responses. (In
classical terminology, you are engaged in the process of invention,
from the Latin invenire, “to come upon,” “to find.”) Seeing your
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ideas on paper —even in the briefest form—will help bring other
ideas to mind and will also help you to evaluate them. For instance,
after jotting down ideas as they come and responses to them,
1. You might go on to organize them into two lists, pro and con;
2. Next, you might delete ideas that, when you come to think
about them, strike you as simply wrong or irrelevant; and
3. Then you might develop those ideas that strike you as pretty
good.
You probably won’t know where you stand until you have gone
through some such process. It would be nice if we could make a
quick decision, immediately justify it with three excellent rea-
sons, and then give three further reasons showing why the oppos-
ing view is inadequate. In fact, however, we almost never can
come to a reasoned decision without a good deal of preliminary
thinking.
16 1/ CRITICAL THINKING
IDEA PROMPT 1.2 UNDERSTANDING CLASSICAL TOPICS
Definition What is it? “The West Virginia law
defines a high-school dropout
as . . .”
Comparison What is it like “Compared with the national
or unlike? rate of teenagers involved in
fatal accidents, teenagers
from West Virginia . . .”
Relationship What caused it, “The chief cause of teenage
and what will fatal driving accidents is
it cause? alcohol. Admittedly, there are
no statistics on whether high
school dropouts have a higher
rate of alcoholism than
teenagers who remain in
school, but nevertheless . . .”
Testimony What is said “Judge Smith, in sentencing
about it, for the youth, said that in all of
instance, by his long experience . . .”
experts?
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Consider again the West Virginia law we discussed earlier in
this chapter. Here is a kind of inner dialogue that you might engage
in as you think critically about it:
The purpose is to give students an incentive to stay in school by
making them pay a price if they choose to drop out.
Adolescents will get the message that education really is
important.
But come to think of it, will they? Maybe they will see this as
just another example of adults bullying young people.
According to a newspaper article, the dropout rate in West
Virginia decreased by 30 percent in the year after the bill was
passed.
Well, that sounds good, but is there any reason to think that
kids who are pressured into staying really learn anything? The
assumption behind the bill is that if would-be dropouts stay in
school, they—and society—will gain. But is the assumption
sound? Maybe such students will become resentful, will not
learn anything, and may even be so disruptive that they will
interfere with the learning of other students.
Notice how part of the job is analytic, recognizing the elements or
complexities of the whole, and part is evaluative, judging the adequacy
of all of these ideas, one by one. Both tasks require imagination.
So far we have jotted down a few thoughts and then immedi-
ately given some second thoughts contrary to the first. Of course, the
counterthoughts might not immediately come to mind. For instance,
they might not occur until we reread the jottings, or try to explain
the law to a friend, or until we sit down and begin drafting an essay
aimed at supporting or undermining the law. Most likely, in fact,
some good ideas won’t occur until a second or third or fourth draft.
Here are some further thoughts on the West Virginia law. We list
them more or less as they arose and as we typed them into a com-
puter—not sorted out neatly into two groups, pro and con, or eval-
uated as you would want to do in further critical thinking of your
own. And of course, a later step would be to organize the material
into some useful pattern. As you read, you might jot down your
own responses in the margin.
Education is not optional, something left for the individual to take
or not to take—like going to a concert, jogging, getting annual
health checkups, or getting eight hours of sleep each night. Society
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has determined that it is for the public good that citizens have a
substantial education, so we require education up to a certain age.
Come to think about it, maybe the criterion of age doesn’t make much
sense. If we want an educated citizenry, it would make more sense to
require people to attend school until they demonstrated competence
in certain matters rather than until they reached a certain age.
Exceptions, of course, would be made for mentally retarded persons
and perhaps for certain other groups.
What is needed is not legal pressure to keep teenagers in school
but schools that hold the interest of teenagers.
A sixteen-year-old usually is not mature enough to make a decision
of this importance.
Still, a sixteen-year-old who finds school unsatisfying and who
therefore drops out may become a perfectly useful citizen.
Denying a sixteen-year-old a driver’s license may work in West
Virginia, but it would scarcely work in a state with great urban areas,
where most high school students rely on public transportation.
We earn a driver’s license by demonstrating certain skills. The state
has no right to take away such a license unless we have demon-
strated that we are unsafe drivers.
To prevent a person of sixteen from having a driver’s license prevents
that person from holding certain kinds of jobs, and that’s unfair.
A law of this sort deceives adults into thinking that they have
really done something constructive for teenage education, but it
may work against improving the schools. It may be counterproduc-
tive: If we are really serious about educating youngsters, we have
to examine the curriculum and the quality of our teachers.
Doubtless there is much that we haven’t said, on both sides, but
we hope you will agree that the issue deserves thought. In fact, sev-
eral states now revoke the driver’s license of a teenager who drops
out of school, and four of these states go even further and revoke
the licenses of students whose academic work does not reach a
given standard. On the other hand, Louisiana, which for a while
had a law like West Virginia’s, dropped it in 1997.
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If you were a member of a state legislature voting on this pro-
posal, you would have to think about the issue. But just as a
thought experiment, try to put into writing your tentative views.
One other point about this issue. If you had to think about the
matter today, you might also want to know whether the West
Virginia legislation of 1989 is considered a success and on what
basis. That is, you would want to get answers to such questions as
the following:
• What sort of evidence tends to support the law or tends to
suggest that the law is a poor idea?
• Did the reduction in the dropout rate continue, or did the
reduction occur only in the first year following the passage
of the law?
• If indeed students who wanted to drop out did not, was their
presence in school a good thing, both for them and for their
classmates?
• Have some people emerged as authorities on this topic? What
makes them authorities, and what do they have to say?
• Has the constitutionality of the bill been tested? With what
results?
WRITING AS A WAY OF THINKING 19
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR CRITICAL THINKING
Attitudes
� Does my thinking show imaginative open-mindedness and
intellectual curiosity?
� Am I willing to examine my assumptions?
� Am I willing to entertain new ideas—both those that I
encounter while reading and those that come to mind while
writing?
� Am I willing to exert myself— for instance, to do research—
to acquire information and to evaluate evidence?
Skills
� Can I summarize an argument accurately?
� Can I evaluate assumptions, evidence, and inferences?
� Can I present my ideas effectively— for instance, by
organizing and by writing in a manner appropriate to my
imagined audience?
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Some of these questions require you to do research on the topic.
The questions raise issues of fact, and some relevant evidence
probably is available. If you are to arrive at a conclusion in which
you can have confidence, you will have to do some research to
find out what the facts are.
Even without doing any research, however, you might want to
look over the ideas, pro and con, perhaps adding some totally new
thoughts or perhaps modifying or even rejecting (for reasons that
you can specify) some of those already given. If you do think a bit
further about this issue, and we hope that you will, notice an inter-
esting point about your own thinking: It probably is not linear (mov-
ing in a straight line from A to B to C) but recursive, moving from A
to C and back to B or starting over at C and then back to A and B.
By zigging and zagging almost despite yourself, you’ll get to a con-
clusion that may finally seem correct. In retrospect it seems obvi-
ous; now you can chart a nice line from A to B to C —but that was
not at all evident to you at the start.
A SHORT ESSAY ILLUSTRATING
CRITICAL THINKING
When we read an essay, we expect the writer to have thought
things through, at least to a considerable degree. We do not want to
read every false start, every fuzzy thought, every ill-organized para-
graph that the writer knocked off. Yes, writers make false starts, put
down fuzzy thoughts, write ill-organized paragraphs, but then they
revise and revise yet again, and they end by giving us a readable
essay that seems effortlessly written. Still—and here we get to our
real point—in argumentative essays, writers need to show their
readers that they have made some effort; they need to show us how
they got to their final (for the moment) views. It is not enough for
the writer to say, “I believe X”; rather, the writer must in effect say,
“I believe X —and I hope you will believe it also—because Y and Z,
though attractive, just don’t stand up to inquiry as well as X does. Y
is superficially plausible, but . . . , and Z, which is an attractive alter-
native to Y, nevertheless fails because . . .”
Notice in the following short essay — on parents putting spy-
ware into the computers of their children — that Harlan Coben fre-
quently brings up objections to his own position; that is, he shows
his awareness of other views, and then tries to show why he
thinks his position is preferable. Presumably he thus communi-
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cates to his readers a sense that he is thoughtful, well-informed,
and fair-minded.
Harlan Coben
Harlan Coben (b. 1962) is the author of Hold Tight (2009). Reprinted
here is an essay published in the New York Times on March 16, 2008.
Following are some letters that were written in response and were later
published in the Times.
The Undercover Parent
Not long ago, friends of mine confessed over dinner that they
had put spyware on their fifteen-year-old son’s computer so they
could monitor all he did online. At first I was repelled at this inva-
sion of privacy. Now, after doing a fair amount of research, I get it.
Make no mistake: If you put spyware on your computer, you
have the ability to log every keystroke your child makes and thus a
good portion of his or her private world. That’s what spyware is—
at least the parental monitoring kind. You don’t have to be an
expert to put it on your computer. You just download the software
from a vendor and you will receive reports—weekly, daily, what-
ever—showing you everything your child is doing on the machine.
Scary. But a good idea. Most parents won’t even consider it.
Maybe it’s the word: spyware. It brings up associations of Dick
Cheney sitting in a dark room, rubbing his hands together and
reading your most private thoughts. But this isn’t the government
we are talking about—this is your family. It’s a mistake to confuse
the two. Loving parents are doing the surveillance here, not face-
less bureaucrats. And most parents already monitor their children,
watching over their home environment, their school.
Today’s overprotective parents fight their kids’ battles on the
playground, berate coaches about playing time and fill out college
applications—yet when it comes to chatting with pedophiles or
watching beheadings or gambling away their entire life savings,
then . . . then their children deserve independence?
Some will say that you should simply trust your child, that if
he is old enough to go on the Internet he is old enough to know
the dangers. Trust is one thing, but surrendering parental responsi-
bility to a machine that allows the entire world access to your
home borders on negligence.
COBEN / THE UNDERCOVER PARENT 21
5
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Some will say that it’s better just to use parental blocks that
deny access to risky sites. I have found that they don’t work.
Children know how to get around them. But more than that—and
this is where it gets tough — I want to know what’s being said in
e-mail and instant messages and in chat rooms.
There are two reasons for this. First, we’ve all read about the
young boy unknowingly conversing with a pedophile or the girl
who was cyberbullied to the point where she committed suicide.
Would a watchful eye have helped? We rely in the real world on
teachers and parents to guard against bullies—do we just dismiss
bullying on the Internet and all it entails because we are entering
difficult ethical ground?
Second, everything your child types can already be seen by the
world—teachers, potential employers, friends, neighbors, future
dates. Shouldn’t he learn now that the Internet is not a haven of
privacy?
One of the most popular arguments against spyware is the
claim that you are reading your teenager’s every thought, that in
today’s world, a computer is the little key-locked diary of the past.
But posting thoughts on the Internet isn’t the same thing as hiding
them under your mattress. Maybe you should buy your children
one of those little key-locked diaries so that they too can under-
stand the difference.
Am I suggesting eavesdropping on every conversation? No.
With new technology comes new responsibility. That works both
ways. There is a fine line between being responsibly protective and
irresponsibly nosy. You shouldn’t monitor to find out if your daugh-
ter’s friend has a crush on Kevin next door or that Mrs. Peterson
gives too much homework or what schoolmate snubbed your son.
You are there to start conversations and to be a safety net. To bor-
row from the national intelligence lexicon—and yes, that’s uncom-
fortable—you’re listening for dangerous chatter.
Will your teenagers find other ways of communicating to their
friends when they realize you may be watching? Yes. But text mes-
sages and cellphones don’t offer the anonymity and danger of the
Internet. They are usually one-on-one with someone you know. It
is far easier for a predator to troll chat rooms and MySpace and
Facebook.
There will be tough calls. If your sixteen-year-old son, for
example, is visiting hardcore pornography sites, what do you do?
When I was sixteen, we looked at Playboy centerfolds and read
Penthouse Forum. You may argue that’s not the same thing, that
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Internet pornography makes that stuff seem about as harmful as
“SpongeBob.”
And you’re probably right. But in my day, that’s all you could
get. If something more graphic had been out there, we probably
would have gone for it. Interest in those, um, topics is natural. So
start a dialogue based on that knowledge. You should have that
talk anyway, but now you can have it with some kind of context.
Parenting has never been for the faint of heart. One friend of
mine, using spyware to monitor his college-bound, straight-A
daughter, found out that not only was she using drugs but she was
sleeping with her dealer. He wisely took a deep breath before con-
fronting her. Then he decided to come clean, to let her know how
he had found out, to speak with her about the dangers inherent in
her behavior. He’d had these conversations before, of course, but
this time he had context. She listened. There was no anger. Things
seem better now.
Our knee-jerk reaction as freedom-loving Americans is to be
suspicious of anything that hints at invasion of privacy. That’s a
good and noble thing. But it’s not an absolute, particularly in the
face of the new and evolving challenges presented by the Internet.
And particularly when it comes to our children.
Do you tell your children that the spyware is on the com-
puter? I side with yes, but it might be enough to show them this
article, have a discussion about your concerns and let them
know the possibility is there.
Overall View of the Essay
Before we comment in some detail on Coben’s essay, we need to
say that in terms of the length of its paragraphs, this essay is not a
model for you to imitate. Material in newspapers customarily is
given in very short paragraphs, partly because readers are reading it
while eating breakfast or while commuting to work, and partly
because the columns are narrow; a paragraph of only two or three
sentences may still be an inch or two deep.
The title, “The Undercover Parent” is provocative, attention-
getting.
Paragraph 1 contains cues that telegraph the reader that there
will be a change (“Not long ago,” “At first,” and “Now”.) These cues
set up expectations, and then Coben to some degree fulfills the
expectations. We say “to some degree” because the essay still has a
number of paragraphs to go.
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Paragraph 2 presses the point, almost aggressively (“Make no
mistake”).
Paragraph 3 pretty much does the same. The writer is clearly
reassuring the readers that he knows how most of them feel. The
idea is “scary,” yes—and then comes a crucial word, “but,” signaling
to the reader that Coben takes a different view. We then expect him
to tell us why. And—who knows?—he may even convince us.
Paragraph 4 reassures us that Coben does have some idea of
why the idea is “scary,” and it goes on—with another “but”—to
clarify the point. We may not agree with Coben, but it is evident
that he is thinking, inching along from one idea to the next, fre-
quently to an opposing idea.
Paragraph 5 shows that again Coben has a sense of what is
going on in the world (“Today’s overprotective parents”), or, rather,
he has two senses, because he adds “yet,” equivalent to “but.” In
effect he says, “Yes A, but also B.”
Paragraph 6 begins “Some will say,” another indication that the
writer knows what is going on. And we can expect that “some will
say” will, sooner or later, lead into another “but” (or other compa-
rable word), indicating that although some say X, he says Y.
Paragraph 7 again begins “Some will say.” We will say that again
the reader knows Coben’s report of what “some” say will lead to a
report that what Coben says (i.e. thought) is different.
Paragraph 8 begins, “There are two reasons.” OK, we as readers
know where we will be going: We will hear two reasons. Now, when
Coben drafted this paragraph he may—who knows?—have first
written “There are three reasons,” or “There is one reason.”
Whatever he wrote as a prompt, it got him moving, got him think-
ing, and then, in the course of writing, of finding ideas, he revised
when he found out exactly how many reasons he could offer. In any
case, in the paragraph as we have it, he promises to give two reasons,
and in this paragraph he gives the first, nicely labeled “First.” Notice
too, that he provides evidence, and he draws in the reader: “we’ve all
read.” In short, he establishes a cozy relationship with his reader.
Paragraph 9 begins, helpfully, “Second.” Fine, we know exactly
where Coben is taking us: He is giving us the second of the two rea-
sons that he discovered, and that he implicitly promised to give
when in the previous paragraph he said, “There are two reasons.”
Paragraph 10 begins, “One of the most popular arguments
against spying is,” and so we know, again, where Coben will be
taking us: He will, in effect, be telling us what some folks—but not
Coben—say. Very simple, very obvious—Coben will be summarizing
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one of the most popular arguments against spying—and we are
grateful to him for letting us know at the beginning of the para-
graph what his intentions are.
Paragraph 11 continues his intimate relation with the reader
(“Am I suggesting eavesdropping . . . ?”) He thus lets us know that
he has a good sense of how the reader probably is responding. As
we will say several times in this book, good writers are able to put
themselves into their readers’ shoes. Because they have a sense of
how the reader is responding, they offer whatever the reader needs
at the moment, for instance a definition, or an example.
Paragraph 12 begins with a question (“Will your teenagers find
other ways of communicating . . . ?”), and this question again indi-
cates that Coben is walking in the shoes of his readers; he knows
that this question is on their minds. His answer is twofold, “Yes,”
and “But.” Again the “but” is a sign of critical thinking, a sign that
Coben has a clear sense of position A, but wants to move his reader
from A to B.
Paragraph 13, beginning “There will be tough calls,” is yet
another example of Coben’s demonstration to his readers that he
is aware of their doubts, aware that they may be thinking Coben
has simplified things.
Paragraph 14 (beginning “And you’re probably right”) contin-
ues his demonstration that he is aware of how his readers may
respond—but it is immediately followed with a “But.” Again, he is
nudging us from position A to his position, Position B.
Paragraph 15, like several of the earlier paragraphs, shows
Coben is sympathetic to the real-world problems of his readers
(“Parenting has never been for the faint of heart”), and it also
shows that he is a person of experience. In this paragraph, where
he refers to the problem of a friend, he tells us of the happy solu-
tion. In short, he tells us that life is tough, but experience shows
that there is hope. (The letter-writer, Carol Weston, strongly implies
that this bit of experience Coben offers in this paragraph is not at all
typical.)
Paragraph 16 again indicates the writer’s sense of the reader
(“Our knee-jerk reaction”), and it again evokes a “But.”
Paragraph 17, the final paragraph, pretty directly addresses the
reader (“Do you tell your children that the spyware is on the com-
puter?”), and it offers a mixed answer: “I side with yes, but . . . .”
Again Coben is showing not only his awareness of the reader, but
also his awareness that the problem is complicated: There is some-
thing to be said for A, but also something to be said for B. He ends by
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suggesting that indeed this article might be discussed by parents with
their children, thereby conveying to his readers the suggestion that he
is a fair-minded guy, willing to have his ideas put up for discussion.
Following is Carol Weston’s response to Coben’s essay that the
Times later published (March 23, 2008).
Letter of Response by Carol Weston
To the Editor:
In “The Undercover Parent” (Op-Ed, March 16), the novelist
Harlan Coben writes that putting spyware on a child’s computer is a
“good idea.”
As a mother and advice columnist for girls, I disagree. For most
families, spyware is not only unnecessary, but it also sends the
unfortunate message, “I don’t trust you.”
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Mr. Coben said a friend of his “using spyware to monitor his
college-bound, straight-A daughter, found out that not only was
she using drugs but she was sleeping with her dealer.” He con-
fronted her about her behavior. “She listened. There was no anger.
Things seem better now.”
Huh?! No anger? No tears or shouting or slammed doors?
C’mon. If only raising teenagers were that simple.
Parenting is both a job and a joy. It does not require spyware,
but it does require love, respect, time, trust, money, and being as
available as possible 24/7. Luck helps, too.
CAROL WESTON
New York, March 16, 2008
The writer is an advice columnist for Girls’ Life magazine.
TOPICS FOR CRITICAL THINKING AND WRITING
1. How important is the distinction (para. 4) between government
invasion of privacy and parental invasion of privacy?
2. Complete the following sentence: An invasion of privacy is per-
missible if and only if . . .
3. Identify the constructive steps a normal parent might consider tak-
ing before going so far as to install spyware.
4. Do you agree with Weston’s statement that installing spyware
translates to “I don’t trust you”? Would you feel differently or not
if you were a parent?
LETTER OF RESPONSE BY CAROL WESTON 27
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR EVALUATING LETTERS OF RESPONSE
After reading the letters responding to an editorial or to a
previous letter, go back and read each letter. Have you asked
yourself the following questions?
� What assumption(s) does the letter-writer make? Do you share
the assumption(s)?
� What is the writer’s claim?
� What evidence, if any, does the writer offer to support the claim?
� Is there anything about the style of the letter— the distinctive
use of language, the tone— that makes the letter especially
engaging or especially annoying?
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5. Write your own letter to the editor, indicating your reasons for
supporting or rejecting Coben’s argument.
EXAMINING ASSUMPTIONS
In Chapter 3 we will discuss assumptions in some detail, but here
we want to introduce the topic by emphasizing the importance of
identifying and examining assumptions—the assumptions you will
encounter in the writings of others and the assumptions you will
rely on in your own essays.
With this in mind, let’s return again to considering the West
Virginia driver’s license law. What assumptions did the legislature
make in enacting this statute? We mentioned earlier one such
assumption: If the law helped to keep teenagers from dropping out
of school, then that was a good thing for them and for society in
general. For all we know, the advocates of this legislation may have
made this assumption explicit in the course of their argument in
favor of the statute. Perhaps they left this assumption tacit, believing
that the point was obvious and that everyone shared this assump-
tion. The assumption may be obvious, but it was not universally
shared; the many teenagers who wanted to drop out of school at
sixteen and keep their drivers’ licenses did not share it.
28 1/ CRITICAL THINKING
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR EXAMINING ASSUMPTIONS
� What assumptions does the writer’s argument presuppose?
� Are these assumptions explicit or implicit?
� Are these assumptions important to the author’s argument or
only incidental?
� Does the author give any evidence of being aware of the
hidden assumptions in her or his argument?
� Would a critic be likely to share these assumptions, or are they
exactly what a critic would challenge?
� What sort of evidence would be relevant to supporting or
rejecting these assumptions?
� Am I willing to grant the author’s assumptions?
� If not, why not?
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Another assumption that the advocates of this legislation may
have made is this:
The provisions of this statute are the most efficient way to keep
teenagers in high school.
Defending such an assumption is no easy task because it requires
identifying other possible legislative strategies and evaluating their
merits against those of the proposed legislation.
Consider now two of the assumptions involved in the Sultaana
Freeman case. Thanks to the “clustering” exercise (pp. 5–7), these
and other assumptions are already on display. Perhaps the most
important and fundamental assumption Ms. Freeman made is this:
Where private religious beliefs conflict with duly enacted laws,
the former should prevail.
This assumption is widely shared in our society and is by no means
unique to Muslim women seeking drivers’ licenses in Florida after
September 11, 2001. Freeman’s opponents probably assumed a very
different but equally fundamental proposition:
Private religious practices and beliefs must yield to the
demands of national security.
Obviously these two assumptions were on a collision course and
neither side could hope to prevail so long as the key assumptions of
the other side were ignored.
EXAMINING ASSUMPTIONS 29
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Critical Reading:
Getting Started
Some books are to be tasted, others to be chewed, and some few to
be chewed and digested.
— FRANCIS BACON
ACTIVE READING
In the passage that we quote at the top of this page, Bacon makes
at least two good points. One is that books are of varying worth;
the second is that a taste of some books may be enough.
But even a book (or an essay) that you will chew and digest is
one that you first may want to taste. How can you get a taste—that
is, how can you get some sense of a piece of writing before you sit
down to read it carefully?
Previewing
Even before you read a work, you may have some ideas about it,
perhaps because you already know something about the author.
You know, for example, that a work by Martin Luther King Jr. will
probably deal with civil rights. You know, too, that it will be serious
and eloquent. On the other hand, if you pick up an essay by Woody
Allen, you will probably expect it to be amusing. It may be serious—
Allen has written earnestly about many topics, especially those con-
cerned with the media—but it’s your hunch that the essay will be at
least somewhat entertaining and probably will not be terribly diffi-
cult to understand. In short, a reader who has some knowledge of
2
30
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the author probably has some idea of what the writing will be like,
and so the reader reads it in a certain mood. Admittedly, most of the
authors represented in this book are not widely known, but we give
biographical notes that may provide you with some sense of what to
expect.
The place of publication may also tell you something about
the essay. For instance, the National Review is a conservative jour-
nal. If you notice that an essay on affirmative action was published
in the National Review, you are probably safe in tentatively assum-
ing that the essay will not endorse affirmative action. On the other
hand, Ms. Magazine is a liberal publication, and an essay on affir-
mative action published in Ms. will probably be an endorsement.
The title of an essay, too, may give you an idea of what to expect.
Of course, a title may announce only the subject and not the author’s
thesis or point of view (“On Gun Control,” “Should Drugs Be
Legal?”), but fairly often it will indicate the thesis too, as in “Give
Children the Vote” and “Gay Marriages: Make Them Legal.” Knowing
more or less what to expect, you can probably take in some of the
major points even on a quick reading.
Skimming: Finding the Thesis
Although most of the material in this book is too closely argued to
be fully understood by merely skimming, still, skimming can tell
you a good deal. Read the first paragraph of an essay carefully
because it may announce the author’s thesis (chief point, major
claim), and it may give you some sense of how the argument for
that thesis will be conducted. (What we call the thesis can also be
called the main idea, the point, or even the argument, but in this
book we use argument to refer not only to the thesis statement but
also to the entire development of the thesis in the essay.) Run your
eye over the rest, looking for key expressions that indicate the
author’s conclusions, such as “It follows, then, that . . .” Passages of
this sort often occur as the first or last sentence in a paragraph. And
of course, pay attention to any headings within the text. Finally,
pay special attention to the last paragraph because it probably will
offer a summary and a brief restatement of the writer’s thesis.
Having skimmed the work, you probably know the author’s
thesis, and you may detect the author’s methods—for instance,
whether the author supports the thesis chiefly by personal experi-
ence, by statistics, or by ridiculing the opposition. You also have a
clear idea of the length and some idea of the difficulty of the piece.
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You know, then, whether you can read it carefully now before din-
ner or whether you had better put off a careful reading until you
have more time.
Reading with a Pencil: Underlining,
Highlighting, Annotating
Once you have a general idea of the work—not only an idea of its
topic and thesis but also a sense of the way in which the thesis is
argued—you can then go back and start reading it carefully.
As you read, underline or highlight key passages, and make
annotations in the margins (but not in library books, please).
Because you are reading actively, or interacting with the text, you
will not simply let your eye rove across the page.
• You will underline or highlight what seem to be the chief
points, so that later when you review the essay you can eas-
ily locate the main passages.
• But don’t overdo a good thing. If you find yourself underlin-
ing or highlighting most of a page, you are probably not
thinking carefully enough about what the key points are.
• Similarly, your marginal annotations should be brief and
selective. They will probably consist of hints or clues, things
like “really?,” “doesn’t follow,” “good,” “compare with Jones,”
and “check this.”
• In short, in a paragraph you might underline or highlight a
key definition, and in the margin you might write “good,” or,
“on the other hand,” “?” if you think the definition is fuzzy
or wrong.
You are interacting with the text and laying the groundwork for
eventually writing your own essay on what you have read.
What you annotate will depend largely on your purpose. If
you are reading an essay in order to see the ways in which the
writer organizes an argument, you will annotate one sort of thing.
If you are reading in order to challenge the thesis, you will anno-
tate other things. Here is a passage from an essay entitled “On
Racist Speech,” with a student’s rather skeptical, even aggressive
annotations. But notice that at least one of the annotations—
“Definition of ‘fighting words’”—apparently was made chiefly in
order to remind the reader of where an important term appears in
the essay. The essay is by Charles R. Lawrence III, a professor of law
at Georgetown University. It originally appeared in the Chronicle of
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Higher Education (October 25, 1989), a publication read chiefly by
college and university faculty members and administrators.
University officials who have formulated policies to respond to
incidents of racial harassment have been characterized in the
press as “thought police,” but such policies generally do noth-
ing more than impose sanctions against intentional face-to-
face insults. When racist speech takes the form of face-to-face
insults, catcalls, or other assaultive speech aimed at an individ-
ual or small group of persons, it falls directly within the “fight-
ing words” exception to First Amendment protection. The
Supreme Court has held that words which “by their very
utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach
of the peace” are not protected by the First Amendment.
If the purpose of the First Amendment is to foster the
greatest amount of speech, racial insults disserve that purpose.
Assaultive racist speech functions as a preemptive strike. The
invective is experienced as a blow, not as a proffered idea,
and once the blow is struck, it is unlikely that a dialogue will
follow. Racial insults are particularly undeserving of First
Amendment protection because the perpetrator’s intention is
not to discover truth or initiate dialogue but to injure the
victim. In most situations, members of minority groups realize
that they are likely to lose if they respond to epithets by fight-
ing and are forced to remain silent and submissive.
“This; Therefore, That”
To arrive at a coherent thought or a coherent series of thoughts
that will lead to a reasonable conclusion, a writer has to go through
a good deal of preliminary effort. On page 13 we talked about pat-
terns of thought that stimulate the generation of specific ideas. The
path to sound conclusions involves similar thought patterns that
carry forward the arguments presented in the essay:
• While these arguments are convincing, they fail to consider . . .
• While these arguments are convincing, they must also
consider . . .
• These arguments, rather than being convincing, instead
prove . . .
• While these authors agree, in my opinion . . .
• Although it is often true that . . .
All of these patterns can serve as heuristics or prompts—that is,
they can stimulate the creation of ideas.
ACTIVE READING 33
Example of such a policy?
Example?
? What about
sexist
speech?
Definition
of “fighting
words”
Why must
speech
always
seek “to
discover
truth”?
Really?
Probably
depends
on the
individual.
How does
he know?
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And if the writer is to convince the reader that the conclusion
is sound, the reasoning that led to the conclusion must be set forth
in detail, with a good deal of “This; therefore, that”; If this, then
that”; and “It might be objected at this point that . . .” The argu-
ments in this book require more comment than President Calvin
Coolidge provided when his wife, who hadn’t been able to go to
church on a Sunday, asked him what the preacher’s sermon was
about. “Sin,” he said. His wife persisted: “What did the preacher say
about it?” Coolidge’s response: “He was against it.”
But, again, when we say that most of the arguments in this
book are presented at length and require careful reading, we do not
mean that they are obscure; we mean, rather, that the reader has to
take the sentences thoughtfully, one by one. And speaking of one
by one, we are reminded of an episode in Lewis Carroll’s Through
the Looking-Glass:
“Can you do Addition?” the White Queen asked. “What’s one
and one and one and one and one and one and one and one
and one and one?”
“I don’t know,” said Alice. “I lost count.”
“She can’t do Addition,” the Red Queen said.
It’s easy enough to add one and one and one and so on, and Alice
can, of course, do addition, but not at the pace that the White
Queen sets. Fortunately, you can set your own pace in reading the
cumulative thinking set forth in the essays we reprint. Skimming
won’t work, but slow reading—and thinking about what you are
reading—will.
When you first pick up an essay, you may indeed want to skim
it, for some of the reasons mentioned on page 31, but sooner or
later you have to settle down to read it and to think about it. The
effort will be worthwhile. John Locke, the seventeenth-century
English philosopher, said,
Reading furnishes the mind with materials of knowledge; it is
thinking [that] makes what we read ours. We are of the
ruminating kind, and it is not enough to cram ourselves with a
great load of collections; unless we chew them over again they
will not give us strength and nourishment.
First, Second, and Third Thoughts
Suppose you are reading an argument about pornographic pictures.
For the present purpose, it doesn’t matter whether the argument
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favors or opposes censorship. As you read the argument, ask your-
self whether pornography has been adequately defined. Has the
writer taken the trouble to make sure that the reader and the
writer are thinking about the same thing? If not, the very topic
under discussion has not been adequately fixed; and therefore fur-
ther debate over the issue may well be so unclear as to be futile.
How, then, ought a topic such as this be defined for effective critical
thinking?
It goes without saying that pornography can’t be defined simply
as pictures of nude figures or even of nude figures copulating, for
such a definition would include not only photographs taken for
medical, sociological, and scientific purposes but also some of the
world’s great art. Nobody seriously thinks that such images should
be called pornography.
Is it enough, then, to say that pornography “stirs lustful
thoughts” or “appeals to prurient interests”? No, because pictures
of shoes probably stir lustful thoughts in shoe fetishists, and pic-
tures of children in ads for underwear probably stir lustful thoughts
in pedophiles. Perhaps, then, the definition must be amended to
“material that stirs lustful thoughts in the average person.” But
will this restatement do? First, it may be hard to agree on the char-
acteristics of “the average person.” In other matters, the law often
does assume that there is such a creature as “the reasonable per-
son,” and most people would agree that in a given situation there
might be a reasonable response—for almost everyone. But we can-
not be so sure that the same is true about the emotional responses
of this “average person.” In any case, far from stimulating sexual
impulses, sadomasochistic pictures of booted men wielding whips
on naked women probably turn off “the average person,” yet this is
the sort of material that most people would agree is pornographic.
Something must be wrong, then, with the definition that
pornography is material that “stirs lustful thoughts in the average
person.” We began with a definition that was too broad (“pictures
of nude figures”), but now we have a definition that is too narrow.
We must go back to the drawing board. This is not nitpicking. The
label “average person” was found to be inadequate in a pornogra-
phy case argued before the Supreme Court; because the materials
in question were aimed at a homosexual audience, it was agreed
that the average person would not find them sexually stimulating.
One difficulty has been that pornography is often defined
according to its effect on the viewer (“genital commotion,” Father
Harold Gardiner, S.J., called it, in Catholic Viewpoint on Censorship),
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5
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but different people, we know, may respond differently. In the first
half of the twentieth century, in an effort to distinguish between
pornography and art—after all, most people don’t want to regard
Botticelli’s Venus or Michelangelo’s David as “dirty”—it was com-
monly said that a true work of art does not stimulate in the specta-
tor ideas or desires that the real object might stimulate. But in
1956, Kenneth Clark, probably the most influential English-speak-
ing art critic of the twentieth century, changed all that; in a book
called The Nude he announced that “no nude, however abstract,
should fail to arouse in the spectator some vestige of erotic feeling.”
SUMMARIZING AND PARAPHRASING
Perhaps the best approach to a fairly difficult essay is, after first
reading, to reread it and simultaneously to take notes on a sheet of
paper, perhaps summarizing each paragraph in a sentence or two.
Writing a summary will help you to
• Understand the contents and
• See the strengths and weaknesses of the piece.
Don’t confuse a summary with a paraphrase. A paraphrase is a
word-by-word or phrase-by-phrase rewording of a text, a sort of
translation of the author’s language into your own. A paraphrase is
therefore as long as the original or even longer; a summary is much
shorter. A book may be summarized in a page, or even in a para-
graph or a sentence. Obviously the summary will leave out all
detail, but—if the summary is a true summary—it accurately
states the gist, the essential thesis or claim or point of the original.
Why would anyone ever summarize, and why would anyone
ever paraphrase? Because, as we have already said, these two activ-
ities—in different ways —help readers follow the original author’s
ideas. But, again, summarizing and paraphrasing are not the same.
• When you summarize, you are standing back, saying very
briefly what the whole adds up to; you are seeing the forest,
not the individual trees.
• When you paraphrase, you are inching through the forest,
scrutinizing each tree—that is, finding a synonym for almost
every word in the original, in an effort to make sure that you
know exactly what you are dealing with. (Caution: Do not
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incorporate a summary or a paraphrase into your own essay
without acknowledging your source and stating that you are
summarizing or paraphrasing.)
Let’s examine the distinction between summary and paraphrase
in connection with the first two paragraphs of Paul Goodman’s
essay, “A Proposal to Abolish Grading,” which is excerpted from
Goodman’s book, Compulsory Miseducation and the Community of
Scholars (1966). The two paragraphs run thus:
Let half a dozen of the prestigious universities—Chicago,
Stanford, the Ivy League — abolish grading, and use testing only
and entirely for pedagogic purposes as teachers see fit.
Anyone who knows the frantic temper of the present schools
will understand the transvaluation of values that would be
effected by this modest innovation. For most of the students, the
competitive grade has come to be the essence. The naive teacher
points to the beauty of the subject and the ingenuity of the
research; the shrewd student asks if he is responsible for that on
the final exam.
A summary of these two paragraphs might run thus:
If some top universities used tests only to help students to learn,
students would stop worrying about grades and might share the
teacher’s interest in the beauty of the subject.
We hope we have accurately summarized Goodman’s point, though
we know we have lost his flavor, his style—for instance, the wry tone
in his pointed contrast between “the naive teacher” and “the
shrewd student.”
Now for a paraphrase. Suppose you are not quite sure what
Goodman is getting at, maybe because you are uncertain about the
meanings of some words (perhaps pedagogic and transvaluation?), or
maybe just because the whole passage is making such a startling
point that you want to make sure that you have understood it. In
such a case, you may want to move slowly through the sentences,
translating them (so to speak) into your own English. For instance,
you might turn Goodman’s “pedagogic purposes” into “goals in
teaching” or “attempts to help students to learn,” or some such thing.
Here is a paraphrase—not a summary but an extensive rewording—
of Goodman’s paragraphs:
Suppose some of the top universities—such as Chicago, Stanford,
Harvard, and Yale, and whatever other schools are in the Ivy
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League — stopped using grades and used tests only in order to help
students to learn.
Everyone who is aware of the hysterical mood in schools
today will understand the enormous change in views of what is
good and bad that would come about by this small change. At
present, instructors, unworldly folk, talk about how beautiful their
subjects are, but smart students know that grades are what count,
so they listen to instructors only if they know that the material the
instructor is talking about will be on the exam.
In short, you may want to paraphrase an important text that your
imagined reader may find obscure because it is written in special-
ized, technical language, for instance, the language of psychiatry or
of sociology. You want the reader to see the passage itself—you
don’t want to give just the gist, just a summary—but you know
that the full passage will puzzle the reader, so you offer help, giving
a paraphrase before going on to make your own point about the
author’s point.
A second good reason to offer a paraphrase is if there is sub-
stantial disagreement about what the text says. The Second
Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is a good example of this sort
of text:
A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free
State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be
infringed.
Exactly what, one might ask, is a “Militia”? And what does it mean
for a militia to be “well regulated”? And does “the people” mean
each individual, or does it mean—something very different—the
citizenry as some sort of unified group? After all, elsewhere in the
document, when the Constitution speaks of individuals, it speaks of
a “man” or a “person,” not “the people.” To speak of “the people” is
to use a term (some argue) that sounds like a reference to a unified
group—perhaps the citizens of each of the thirteen states?—rather
than a reference to individuals. On the other hand, if Congress did
mean a unified group rather than individuals, why didn’t it say
“Congress shall not prohibit the states from organizing militias”?
In fact, thousands of pages have been written about this sen-
tence, and if you are going to talk about it, you certainly have to let
your reader know exactly what you make out of each word. In
short, you almost surely will paraphrase it, going word by word,
giving your reader your sense of what each word or phrase says.
Here is one paraphrase:
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Because an independent society needs the protection of an armed
force if it is to remain free, the government may not limit the right
of the individuals (who may some day form the militia needed to
keep the society free) to possess weapons.
In this interpretation, the Constitution grants individuals the right
to possess weapons, and that is that. Other students of the Constitu-
tion, however, offer very different paraphrases, usually along these
lines:
Because each state that is now part of the United States may need
to protect its freedom [from the new national government], the
national government may not infringe on the right of each state to
form its own disciplined militia.
This second paraphrase says that the federal government may not
prevent each state from having a militia; it says nothing about every
individual person having a right to possess weapons. The first of
these two paraphrases, or something like it, is one that might be
offered by the National Rifle Association or any other group that
interprets the Constitution as guaranteeing individuals the right to
own guns. The second paraphrase, or something like it, might be
offered by groups that seek to limit the ownership of guns.
Why paraphrase? Here are two reasons (perhaps the only two
reasons) why you might paraphrase a passage:
• To help yourself to understand it. In this case, the paraphrase
does not appear in your essay.
• To help your reader to understand a passage that is especially
important but that for one reason or another is not immedi-
ately clear. In this case, you paraphrase the passage to let the
reader know exactly what it means. This paraphrase, of
course, does appear in your essay.
A Note about Paraphrase and Plagiarism
If you offer a paraphrase, be sure to tell the reader, explicitly, what
you are doing and why you are doing it. If you do not explicitly say
that you are paraphrasing Jones’s material, you are plagiarizing. If
you merely cite the author (“As Jones says”) and then you give a
paraphrase, you are plagiarizing. How, you may ask, can you be
accused of plagiarism if you cite your source? Here is how: If you
do not explicitly say that you are paraphrasing Jones, the reader
assumes you have digested Jones’s point and are giving it in a
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summary form, entirely in your own words; the reader does not
think (unless you say that you are paraphrasing) that you are merely
following Jones’s passage phrase by phrase, sentence by sentence,
changing some words but not really writing your own sentences. In
short, when you paraphrase you are translating, not writing. (For a
further comment on plagiarism, see page 206.)
40 2 / CRITICAL READING: GETTING STARTED
A RULE FOR WRITERS: Your essay is likely to include brief summaries
of points of view that you are agreeing or disagreeing with, but it
will rarely include a paraphrase unless the original is obscure and
you think you need to present a passage at length but in words that
are clearer than those of the original. If you do paraphrase, explic-
itly identify the material as a paraphrase.
Last Words (Almost) about Summarizing
Summarizing each paragraph or each group of closely related para-
graphs will help you to follow the thread of the discourse and,
when you are finished, will provide you with a useful map of the
essay. Then, when you reread the essay yet again, you may want to
underline passages that you now understand are the author’s key
ideas—for instance, definitions, generalizations, summaries—and
you may want to jot notes in the margins, questioning the logic,
expressing your uncertainty, or calling attention to other writers
who see the matter differently. Here is a paragraph from a 1973
decision of the U.S. Supreme Court, written by Chief Justice
Warren Burger, setting forth reasons that the government may cen-
sor obscene material. We follow it with a sample summary.
If we accept the unprovable assumption that a complete education
requires the reading of certain books, and the well-nigh universal
belief that good books, plays, and art lift the spirit, improve the
mind, enrich the human personality, and develop character, can
we then say that a state legislature may not act on the corollary
assumption that commerce in obscene books, or public exhibitions
focused on obscene conduct, have a tendency to exert a
corrupting and debasing impact leading to antisocial behavior?
The sum of experience, including that of the past two decades,
affords an ample basis for legislatures to conclude that a sensitive,
key relationship of human existence, central to family life,
community welfare, and the development of human personality,
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can be debased and distorted by crass commercial exploitation of
sex. Nothing in the Constitution prohibits a State from reaching
such a conclusion and acting on it legislatively simply because
there is no conclusive empirical data.
Now for a student’s summary. Notice that the summary does not
include the reader’s evaluation or any other sort of comment on
the original; it is simply an attempt to condense the original. Notice
too that, because its purpose is merely to assist the reader to grasp
the ideas of the original by focusing on them, it is written in a sort
of shorthand (not every sentence is a complete sentence), though,
of course, if this summary were being presented in an essay, it
would have to be grammatical.
Unprovable but acceptable assumption that good books etc. shape
character, so that legislature can assume obscene works debase
character. Experience lets one conclude that exploitation of sex
debases the individual, family, and community. Though “there is no
conclusive empirical data” for this view, the Constitution lets
states act on it legislatively.
Notice that
• A few words (in the last sentence of the summary) are
quoted exactly as in the original. They are enclosed within
quotation marks.
• For the most part, the original material is drastically reduced.
The first sentence of the original, some eighty words, is
reduced in the summary to nineteen words.
Of course, the summary loses much of the detail and flavor of the
original: “Good books etc.” is not the same as “good books, plays,
and art”; and “shape character” is not the same as “lift the spirit,
improve the mind, enrich the human personality, and develop
character.” But the statement in the summary will do as a rough
approximation, useful for a quick review. More important, the act
of writing a summary forces the reader to go slowly and to think
about each sentence of the original. Such thinking may help the
reader-writer to see the complexity — or the hollowness — of the
original.
The sample summary in the preceding paragraph was just that, a
summary; but when writing your own summaries, you will often
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find it useful to inject your own thoughts (“seems far-fetched,”
“strong point,” “I don’t get it”), enclosing them within square brack-
ets or in some other way to keep these responses distinct from your
summary of the writer’s argument.
Review: If your instructor asks you to hand in a summary,
• It should not contain ideas other than those found in the
original piece.
• You can rearrange these, add transitions as needed, and so
forth, but the summary should give the reader nothing but a
sense of the original piece.
• If the summary includes any of the original wording, these
words should be enclosed within quotation marks.
• In your notes, keep a clear distinction between your writing
and the writing of your source. For the most part you will
summarize, but if you paraphrase, indicate that the words
are a paraphrase, and if you quote directly, indicate that you
are quoting.
We don’t want to nag you, but we do want to emphasize the need
to read with a pencil in hand. If you read slowly and take notes,
you will find that what you read will give you the “strength and
nourishment” that John Locke spoke of.
42 2 / CRITICAL READING: GETTING STARTED
A RULE FOR WRITERS: Remember that when you write a summary,
you are putting yourself into the author’s shoes.
Having insisted that the essays in this book need to be read
slowly because the writers build one reason on another, we will
now seem to contradict ourselves by presenting an essay that can
almost be skimmed. Susan Jacoby’s essay originally appeared in the
New York Times, a thoroughly respectable newspaper but not one
that requires its readers to linger over every sentence. Still, com-
pared with most of the news accounts, Jacoby’s essay requires close
reading. When you read the essay, you will notice that it zigs and
zags, not because Jacoby is careless or wants to befuddle her read-
ers but because she wants to build a strong case to support her
point of view and must therefore look at some widely held views
that she does not accept; she must set these forth and then give her
reasons for rejecting them.
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Susan Jacoby
Susan Jacoby (b. 1946), a journalist since the age of seventeen, is well
known for her feminist writings. “A First Amendment Junkie” (our title)
appeared in the Hers column in the New York Times in 1978.
A First Amendment Junkie
It is no news that many women are defecting from the ranks of
civil libertarians on the issue of obscenity. The conviction of Larry
Flynt, publisher of Hustler magazine—before his metamorphosis
into a born-again Christian—was greeted with unabashed feminist
approval. Harry Reems, the unknown actor who was convicted by a
Memphis jury for conspiring to distribute the movie Deep Throat, has
carried on his legal battles with almost no support from women
who ordinarily regard themselves as supporters of the First
Amendment. Feminist writers and scholars have even discussed the
possibility of making common cause against pornography with
adversaries of the women’s movement—including opponents of the
equal rights amendment and “right-to-life” forces.
All of this is deeply disturbing to a woman writer who believes,
as I always have and still do, in an absolute interpretation of the First
Amendment. Nothing in Larry Flynt’s garbage convinces me that the
late Justice Hugo L. Black was wrong in his opinion that “the Federal
Government is without any power whatsoever under the
Constitution to put any type of burden on free speech and expres-
sion of ideas of any kind (as distinguished from conduct).” Many
women I like and respect tell me I am wrong; I cannot remember
having become involved in so many heated discussions of a public
issue since the end of the Vietnam War. A feminist writer described
my views as those of a “First Amendment junkie.”
Many feminist arguments for controls on pornography carry the
implicit conviction that porn books, magazines, and movies pose a
greater threat to women than similarly repulsive exercises of free
speech pose to other offended groups. This conviction has, of course,
been shared by everyone—regardless of race, creed, or sex—who
has ever argued in favor of abridging the First Amendment. It is the
argument used by some Jews who have withdrawn their support
from the American Civil Liberties Union because it has defended the
right of American Nazis to march through a community inhabited
by survivors of Hitler’s concentration camps.
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If feminists want to argue that the protection of the Constitution
should not be extended to any particularly odious or threatening
form of speech, they have a reasonable argument (although I don’t
agree with it). But it is ridiculous to suggest that the porn shops on
42nd Street are more disgusting to women than a march of neo-
Nazis is to survivors of the extermination camps.
The arguments over pornography also blur the vital distinc-
tion between expression of ideas and conduct. When I say I
believe unreservedly in the First Amendment, someone always
comes back at me with the issue of “kiddie porn.” But kiddie porn
is not a First Amendment issue. It is an issue of the abuse of
power — the power adults have over children — and not of
obscenity. Parents and promoters have no more right to use their
children to make porn movies than they do to send them to work
in coal mines. The responsible adults should be prosecuted, just as
adults who use children for back-breaking farm labor should be
prosecuted.
Susan Brownmiller, in Against Our Will: Men, Women, and
Rape, has described pornography as “the undiluted essence of
antifemale propaganda.” I think this is a fair description of some
types of pornography, especially of the brutish subspecies that
equates sex with death and portrays women primarily as objects
of violence.
The equation of sex and violence, personified by some glossy
rock record album covers as well as by Hustler, has fed the illusion
that censorship of pornography can be conducted on a more rational
basis than other types of censorship. Are all pictures of naked women
obscene? Clearly not, says a friend. A Renoir nude is art, she says,
and Hustler is trash. “Any reasonable person” knows that.
But what about something between art and trash — some-
thing, say, along the lines of Playboy or Penthouse magazines? I
asked five women for their reactions to one picture in Penthouse
and got responses that ranged from “lovely” and “sensuous” to
“revolting” and “demeaning.” Feminists, like everyone else, seldom
have rational reasons for their preferences in erotica. Like members
of juries, they tend to disagree when confronted with something
that falls short of 100 percent vulgarity.
In any case, feminists will not be the arbiters of good taste if it
becomes easier to harass, prosecute, and convict people on obscen-
ity charges. Most of the people who want to censor girlie magazines
are equally opposed to open discussion of issues that are of vital
concern to women: rape, abortion, menstruation, contraception,
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lesbianism—in fact, the entire range of sexual experience from a
women’s viewpoint.
Feminist writers and editors and filmmakers have limited
financial resources: Confronted by a determined prosecutor, Hugh
Hefner1 will fare better than Susan Brownmiller. Would the
Memphis jurors who convicted Harry Reems for his role in Deep
Throat be inclined to take a more positive view of paintings of the
female genitalia done by sensitive feminist artists? Ms. magazine
has printed color reproductions of some of those art works; Ms. is
already banned from a number of high school libraries because
someone considers it threatening and/or obscene.
Feminists who want to censor what they regard as harmful
pornography have essentially the same motivation as other would-be
censors: They want to use the power of the state to accomplish what
they have been unable to achieve in the marketplace of ideas and
images. The impulse to censor places no faith in the possibilities of
democratic persuasion.
It isn’t easy to persuade certain men that they have better uses
for $1.95 each month than to spend it on a copy of Hustler? Well,
then, give the men no choice in the matter.
I believe there is also a connection between the impulse toward
censorship on the part of people who used to consider themselves
civil libertarians and a more general desire to shift responsibility
from individuals to institutions. When I saw the movie Looking for
Mr. Goodbar, I was stunned by its series of visual images equating
sex and violence, coupled with what seems to me the mindless
message (a distortion of the fine Judith Rossner novel) that casual
sex equals death. When I came out of the movie, I was even more
shocked to see parents standing in line with children between the
ages of ten and fourteen.
I simply don’t know why a parent would take a child to see
such a movie, any more than I understand why people feel they
can’t turn off a television set their child is watching. Whenever I
say that, my friends tell me I don’t know how it is because I
don’t have children. True, but I do have parents. When I was a
child, they did turn off the TV. They didn’t expect the Federal
Communications Commission to do their job for them.
I am a First Amendment junkie. You can’t OD on the First
Amend-ment, because free speech is its own best antidote.
JACOBY / A FIRST AMENDMENT JUNKIE 45
10
15
1Hugh Hefner Founder and longtime publisher of Playboy magazine. [Editors’ note.]
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Summarizing Jacoby, Paragraph by Paragraph
Suppose we want to make a rough summary, more or less para-
graph by paragraph, of Jacoby’s essay. Such a summary might look
something like this (the numbers refer to Jacoby’s paragraphs):
1. Although feminists usually support the First Amendment,
when it comes to pornography, many feminists take pretty
much the position of those who oppose ERA and abortion
and other causes of the women’s movement.
2. Larry Flynt produces garbage, but I think his conviction rep-
resents an unconstitutional limitation of freedom of speech.
3, 4. Feminists who want to control (censor) pornography
argue that it poses a greater threat to women than similar
repulsive speech poses to other groups. If feminists want to
say that all offensive speech should be restricted, they can
make a case, but it is absurd to say that pornography is a
“greater threat” to women than a march of neo-Nazis is to
survivors of concentration camps.
5. Trust in the First Amendment is not refuted by kiddie porn;
kiddie porn is not a First Amendment issue but an issue of
child abuse.
6, 7, 8. Some feminists think censorship of pornography can
be more “rational” than other kinds of censorship, but a
picture of a nude woman strikes some women as base and
others as “lovely.” There is no unanimity.
9, 10. If feminists censor girlie magazines, they will find that
they are unwittingly helping opponents of the women’s
movement to censor discussions of rape, abortion, and so
on. Some of the art in the feminist magazine Ms. would
doubtless be censored.
11, 12. Like other would-be censors, feminists want to use the
power of the state to achieve what they have not achieved
in “the marketplace of ideas.” They display a lack of faith in
“democratic persuasion.”
13, 14. This attempt at censorship reveals a desire to “shift respon-
sibility from individuals to institutions.” The responsibility—
for instance, to keep young people from equating sex with
violence—is properly the parents’.
15. We can’t have too much of the First Amendment.
Jacoby’s thesis, or major claim, or chief proposition—that any
form of censorship of pornography is wrong—is clear enough,
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even as early as the end of her first paragraph, but it gets its life or
its force from the reasons offered throughout the essay. If we want
to reduce our summary even further, we might say that Jacoby
supports her thesis by arguing several subsidiary points. We will
merely assert them briefly, but Jacoby argues them—that is, she
gives reasons:
a. Pornography can scarcely be thought of as more offensive
than Nazism.
b. Women disagree about which pictures are pornographic.
c. Feminists who want to censor pornography will find that
they help antifeminists to censor discussions of issues advo-
cated by the women’s movement.
d. Feminists who favor censorship are in effect turning to the gov-
ernment to achieve what they haven’t achieved in the free
marketplace.
e. One sees this abdication of responsibility in the fact that
parents allow their children to watch unsuitable movies and
television programs.
If we want to present a brief summary in the form of one
coherent paragraph—perhaps as part of our own essay to show the
view we are arguing in behalf of or against—we might write some-
thing like this summary. (The summary would, of course, be prefaced
by a lead-in along these lines: “Susan Jacoby, writing in the New York
Times, offers a forceful argument against censorship of pornography.
Jacoby’s view, briefly, is . . .”.)
When it comes to censorship of pornography, some feminists take a
position shared by opponents of the feminist movement. They
argue that pornography poses a greater threat to women than
other forms of offensive speech offer to other groups, but this
interpretation is simply a mistake. Pointing to kiddie porn is also a
mistake, for kiddie porn is an issue involving not the First
Amendment but child abuse. Feminists who support censorship of
pornography will inadvertently aid those who wish to censor dis-
cussions of abortion and rape or censor art that is published in
magazines such as Ms. The solution is not for individuals to turn to
institutions (that is, for the government to limit the First
Amendment) but for individuals to accept the responsibility for
teaching young people not to equate sex with violence.
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Whether we agree or disagree with Jacoby’s thesis, we must
admit that the reasons she sets forth to support it are worth think-
ing about. Only a reader who closely follows the reasoning with
which Jacoby buttresses her thesis is in a position to accept or
reject it.
TOPICS FOR CRITICAL THINKING AND WRITING
1. What does Jacoby mean when she says she is a “First Amendment
junkie” (para. 15)?
2. The essay is primarily an argument against the desire of some femi-
nists to try to censor pornography of the sort that appeals to some
heterosexual adult males, but the next-to-last paragraph is about tel-
evision and children. Is the paragraph connected to Jacoby’s overall
argument? If so, how?
3. Evaluate the final paragraph as a final paragraph. (Effective final
paragraphs are not, of course, all of one sort. Some, for example,
round off the essay by echoing something from the opening; others
suggest that the reader, having now seen the problem, should think
further about it or even act on it. But a good final paragraph, what-
ever else it does, should make the reader feel that the essay has
come to an end, not just broken off.)
4. This essay originally appeared in the New York Times. If you are
unfamiliar with this newspaper, consult an issue or two in your
library. Next, in a paragraph, try to characterize the readers of the
paper— that is, Jacoby’s audience.
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✓ A CHECKLIST FOR GETTING STARTED
� Have I adequately previewed the work?
� Can I state the thesis?
� If I have jotted down a summary,
� Is the summary accurate?
� Does the summary mention all the chief points?
� If there are inconsistencies, are they in the summary or the
original selection?
� Will the summary be clear and helpful?
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5. Jacoby claims in paragraph 2 that she “believes . . . in an absolute
interpretation of the First Amendment.” What does such an inter-
pretation involve? Would it permit shouting “Fire!” in a crowded
theater even though the shouter knows there is no fire? Would it
permit shouting racist insults at blacks or immigrant Vietnamese?
Spreading untruths about someone’s past? If the “absolutist”
interpretation of the First Amendment does permit these state-
ments, does that argument show that nothing is morally wrong
with uttering them? (Does the First Amendment, as actually inter-
preted by the Supreme Court today, permit any or all of these
claims? Consult your reference librarian for help in answering
this question.)
6. Jacoby implies that permitting prosecution of persons on obscenity
charges will lead eventually to censorship of “open discussion” of
important issues such as “rape, abortion, menstruation, contracep-
tion, lesbianism” (para. 9). Do you find her fears convincing? Does
she give any evidence to support her claim?
EXERCISE: LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Your college newspaper has published a letter that links a hateful
attribute to a group and that clearly displays hate for the entire
group. (For instance, the letter charges that interracial marriages
should be made illegal because “African Americans contain a crim-
inal gene,” or that “Jews should not be elected to office because
their loyalty is to Israel, not the United States,” or that “Muslims
should not be allowed to enter the country because they are intent
on destroying America.”) The letter generates many letters of
response; some responses, supporting the editor’s decision to pub-
lish the letter, make these points:
• The writer of the offending letter is a student in the college, and
she has a right to express her views.
• The point of view expressed is probably held only by a few persons,
but conceivably it expresses a view held by a significant number of
students.
• Editors should not act as censors.
• The First Amendment guarantees freedom of speech.
• Freedom of expression is healthy, i.e., society gains.
On the other hand, among the letters opposing the editor’s
decision to publish, some make points along these lines:
• Not every view of every nutty student can be printed; editors must
make responsible choices.
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• The First Amendment, which prohibits the government from con-
trolling the press, has nothing to do with a college newspaper.
• Letters of this sort do not foster healthy discussion; they merely
heat things up.
Write a 250- to 500-word letter to the editor, expressing your
view of the editor’s decision to publish the first letter. (If you wish,
you can assume that the letter was on one of the topics we specify
in the second sentence of this exercise. But in any case, address
the general issue of the editor’s decision, not only the specific issue
of the charge or charges made in the first letter.)
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Critical Reading: Getting
Deeper into Arguments
He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves, and sharpens our
skill. Our antagonist is our helper.
— EDMUND BURKE
PERSUASION, ARGUMENT, DISPUTE
When we think seriously about an argument (not name calling or
mere rationalization), not only do we hear ideas that may be unfa-
miliar, but we are also forced to examine closely our own cherished
opinions, and perhaps for the first time really come to see the
strengths and weaknesses of what we believe. As John Stuart Mill
put it, “He who knows only his own side of the case knows little.”
It is customary, and useful, to distinguish between persuasion
and argument. Persuasion has the broader meaning. To persuade
is to win over — whether
• by giving reasons (that is, by argument),
• by appealing to the emotions, or, for that matter,
• by using torture.
Argument, one form of persuasion, relies on reason; it offers state-
ments as reasons for other statements. Rhetoricians often use the Greek
word logos, which merely means “word” or “reason,” to denote this
aspect of persuasive writing — the appeal to reason. An appeal to
reason may include such things as an appeal to
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• Physical evidence;
• The testimony of experts;
• Common sense; and
• Probability.
The appeal to the emotions is known as pathos. Strictly speak-
ing, pathos is Greek for “feeling,” and especially for “suffering,” but
it now covers all sorts of emotional appeal — for instance, to one’s
sense of pity or sympathy (Greek for “feeling with”) or one’s sense
of patriotism.
Notice that an argument, in the sense of statements that are
offered as reasons for other statements, does not require two speak-
ers or writers who represent opposed positions. The Declaration of
Independence is an argument, setting forth the colonists’ reasons for
declaring their independence. In practice, of course, someone’s
argument usually advances reasons for a claim in opposition to
someone else’s position or belief. But even if one is writing only
for oneself, trying to clarify one’s thinking by setting forth rea-
sons, the result is an argument. Dispute, however, is a special
kind of argument in which two or more people express views that
are at odds.
Most of this book is about argument in the sense of the presen-
tation of reasons in support of claims, but of course, reason is not
the whole story. If an argument is to be effective, it must be pre-
sented persuasively. For instance, the writer’s tone (attitude
toward self, topic, and audience) must be appropriate if the dis-
course is to persuade the reader. The careful presentation of the self
is not something disreputable, nor is it something that publicity
agents or advertising agencies invented. Aristotle (384–22 B.C.E.)
emphasized the importance of impressing on the audience that the
speaker is a person of good sense and high moral character. (He
called this aspect of persuasion ethos, the Greek word for “charac-
ter,” as opposed to logos, which we have noted is the word for per-
suasion by appealing to reason.)
Writers convey their trustworthiness by
• Avoiding vulgar language;
• Showing an awareness of the complexity of the issue (for
instance, by granting the goodwill of those offering other
points of view and by recognizing that there may be some
merit to contrary points of view); and
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• Showing attention to detail (for instance, by citing relevant
statistics).
In short, writers who are concerned with ethos — and all writers
should be — employ devices that persuade readers that the writers are
trustworthy, are persons in whom the reader can have confidence.
We talk at length about tone, along with other matters such as
the organization of an argument, in Chapter 5, Writing an Analysis
of an Argument, but here we deal with some of the chief devices
used in reasoning, and we glance at emotional appeals.
We should note at once, however, that an argument presupposes
a fixed topic. Suppose we are arguing about Thomas Jefferson’s
assertion, in the Declaration of Independence, that “all men are cre-
ated equal.” Jones subscribes to this statement, but Smith says it is
nonsense and argues that one has only to look around to see that
some people are brighter than others, or healthier, or better coordi-
nated, or whatever. Jones and Smith, if they intend to argue the
point, will do well to examine what Jefferson actually wrote:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created
equal: that they are endowed by their Creator with certain
unalienable rights; and that among these are life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness.
There is room for debate over what Jefferson really meant and
about whether he is right, but clearly he was talking about equality
of rights. If Smith and Jones wish to argue about Jefferson’s view of
equality — that is, if they wish to offer their reasons for accepting,
rejecting, or modifying it — they will do well first to agree on what
Jefferson said or what he probably meant to say. Jones and Smith
may still hold different views; they may continue to disagree on
whether Jefferson was right and proceed to offer arguments and
counterarguments to settle the point. But only if they can agree on
what they disagree about will their dispute get somewhere.
REASON VERSUS RATIONALIZATION
Reason may not be our only way of finding the truth, but it is a
way we often rely on. The subway ran yesterday at 6:00 A.M. and
the day before at 6:00 A.M. and the day before, and so I infer from
this evidence that it will also run today at 6:00 A.M. (a form of reason-
ing known as induction). Bus drivers require would-be passengers
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to present the exact change; I do not have the exact change; there-
fore, I infer I cannot ride on the bus (deduction). (The terms
deduction and induction are discussed in more detail on pages 62–63
and 67–69.)
We also know that, if we set our minds to a problem, we can
often find reasons (not necessarily sound ones but reasons never-
theless) for almost anything we want to justify. Here is an enter-
taining example from Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography:
I believe I have omitted mentioning that in my first voyage from
Boston, being becalmed off Block Island, our people set about
catching cod and hauled up a great many. Hitherto I had stuck to
my resolution of not eating animal food, and on this occasion, I
considered with my master Tryon the taking of every fish as a
kind of unprovoked murder, since none of them had or ever could
do us any injury that might justify the slaughter. All this seemed
very reasonable. But I had formerly been a great lover of fish, and
when this came hot out of the frying pan, it smelt admirably well.
I balanced some time between principle and inclination, till I
recollected that when the fish were opened I saw smaller fish
taken out of their stomachs. Then thought I, if you eat one
another, I don’t see why we mayn’t eat you. So I dined upon cod
very heartily and continued to eat with other people, returning
only now and then occasionally to a vegetable diet. So convenient
a thing it is to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find
or make a reason for everything one has a mind to do.
Franklin is being playful; he is not engaging in critical thinking.
He tells us that he loved fish, that this fish “smelt admirably well,”
and so we are prepared for him to find a reason (here one as weak
as “Fish eat fish, therefore people may eat fish”) to abandon his
vegetarianism. (But think: Fish also eat their own young. May we
therefore eat ours?)
Still, Franklin touches on a truth: If necessary, we can find
reasons to justify whatever we want. That is, instead of reasoning
we may rationalize (devise a self-serving but dishonest reason), like
the fox in Aesop’s fables who, finding the grapes he desired were
out of his reach, consoled himself with the thought they were
probably sour.
Perhaps we can never be certain that we are not rationalizing,
except when, like Franklin, we are being playful — but we can seek
to think critically about our own beliefs, scrutinizing our assump-
tions, looking for counterevidence, and wondering if different con-
clusions can reasonably be drawn.
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SOME PROCEDURES IN ARGUMENT
Definition
Definition, we mentioned in our first chapter, is one of the classical
topics, a “place” to which one goes with questions; in answering
the questions, one finds ideas. When we define, we are answering
the question “What is it?” and in answering this question as pre-
cisely as we can, we will find, clarify, and develop ideas.
We have already glanced at an argument over the proposition
that “all men are created equal,” and we saw that the words needed
clarification. Equal meant, in the context, not physically or mentally
equal but something like “equal in rights,” equal politically and
legally. (And of course, “men” meant “white men and women.”)
Words do not always mean exactly what they seem to: There is no
lead in a lead pencil, and a standard 2-by-4 is currently 15/8 inches in
thickness and 33/8 inches in width.
Definition by Synonym Let’s return, for a moment, to pornography,
a word that, we saw, is not easily defined. One way to define a
word is to offer a synonym. Thus, pornography can be defined, at
least roughly, as “obscenity” (something indecent). But definition
by synonym is usually only a start because we find that we will
have to define the synonym and, besides, that very few words have
exact synonyms. (In fact, pornography and obscenity are not exact
synonyms.)
Definition by Example A second way to define something is to
point to an example (this is often called ostensive definition,
from the Latin ostendere, “to show”). This method can be very help-
ful, ensuring that both writer and reader are talking about the same
thing, but it also has its limitations. A few decades ago many people
pointed to James Joyce’s Ulysses and D. H. Lawrence’s Lady
Chatterley’s Lover as examples of obscene novels, but today these
books are regarded as literary masterpieces. Possibly they can be
obscene and also be literary masterpieces. (Joyce’s wife is reported
to have said of her husband, “He may have been a great writer,
but . . . he had a very dirty mind.”)
One of the difficulties of using an example, however, is that the
example is richer and more complex than the term it is being used
to define, and this richness and complexity get in the way of
achieving a clear definition. Thus, if one cites Lawrence’s Lady
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Chatterley’s Lover as an example of pornography, a listener may erro-
neously think that pornography has something to do with British
novels or with heterosexual relationships outside of marriage. Yet
neither of these ideas is part of the concept of pornography.
We are not trying here to formulate a satisfactory definition of
pornography. Our object is to show that
• An argument will be most fruitful if the participants first
agree on what they are talking about;
• One way to secure such agreement is to define the topic
ostensively; and
• Choosing the right example, one that has all the central or
typical characteristics, can make a topic not only clear but
also vivid.
Definition by Stipulation In arguing, you can legitimately offer a
stipulative definition, saying, perhaps, that by Native American you
mean any person with any Native American blood; or you might say,
“For the purpose of the present discussion, I mean by a Native
American any person who has at least one grandparent of pure Native
American blood.” A stipulative definition is appropriate where
• No fixed or standard definition is available, and
• Some arbitrary specification is necessary to fix the meaning
of a key term in the argument.
Not everyone may be willing to accept your stipulative definition,
and alternatives can probably be defended. In any case, when you
stipulate a definition, your audience knows what you mean by the
term thus defined.
It would not be reasonable, of course, to stipulate that by Native
American you mean anyone with a deep interest in North American
aborigines. That’s just too idiosyncratic to be useful. Similarly, an
essay on Jews in America will have to rely on some definition of
the key idea. Perhaps the writer will stipulate the definition used in
Israel: A Jew is a person who has a Jewish mother or, if not born of
a Jewish mother, a person who has formally adopted the Jewish
faith. Or perhaps the writer will stipulate another meaning: Jews
are people who consider themselves to be Jews. Some sort of rea-
sonable definition must be offered.
To stipulate, however, that by Jews you mean “persons who
believe that the area formerly called Palestine rightfully belongs to
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the Jews” would hopelessly confuse matters. Remember the old
riddle and the answer: If you call a dog’s tail a leg, how many legs
does a dog have? Answer: Four. Calling a tail a leg doesn’t make it
a leg.
Later in this chapter you will see, in an essay called “When
‘Identity’ Politics Is Rational,” Stanley Fish begin by stipulating a
definition. His first paragraph begins thus:
If there’s anything everyone is against in these election times, it’s
“identity politics,”a phrase that covers a multitude of sins. Let me
start with a definition. (It may not be yours, but it will at least
allow the discussion to be framed.) You’re practicing identity
politics when you vote for or against someone because of his or
her skin color, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or
any other marker that leads you to say yes or not independently
of a candidate’s ideas or policies.
Fish will go on to argue, in later paragraphs, that sometimes iden-
tity politics makes very good sense, that it is not irrational, is not
logically indefensible, but here we simply want to make two
points — one about how a definition helps the writer, the second
about how it helps the reader:
• A definition is a good way to get yourself started when you
are drafting an essay, a useful stimulus (idea prompt, pattern,
template, heuristic) that will help you to think about the
issue, a device that will stimulate your further thinking.
• A definition lets readers be certain that they are clear about
what the author means by a crucial word.
Readers may disagree with Fish, but at least they know what he
means when he speaks of identity politics.
A stipulation may be helpful and legitimate. Here is the open-
ing paragraph of an essay by Richard B. Brandt titled “The Morality
and Rationality of Suicide” (from A Handbook for the Study of Suicide,
edited by Seymour Perlin). Notice that
• The author first stipulates a definition, and
• Then, aware that the definition may strike some readers as
too broad and therefore unreasonable or odd, he offers a rea-
son on behalf of his definition:
“Suicide” is conveniently defined, for our purposes, as doing
something which results in one’s death, either from the intention
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of ending one’s life or the intention to bring about some other
state of affairs (such as relief from pain) which one thinks it
certain or highly probable can be achieved only by means of death
or will produce death. It may seem odd to classify an act of heroic
self-sacrifice on the part of a soldier as suicide. It is simpler,
however, not to try to define “suicide” so that an act of suicide is
always irrational or immoral in some way; if we adopt a neutral
definition like the above we can still proceed to ask when an act of
suicide in that sense is rational, morally justifiable, and so on, so
that all evaluations anyone might wish to make can still be made.
Sometimes a definition that at first seems extremely odd can be
made acceptable, if strong reasons are offered in its support.
Sometimes, in fact, an odd definition marks a great intellectual step
forward. For instance, in 1990 the U.S. Supreme Court recognized
that speech includes symbolic nonverbal expression such as protest-
ing against a war by wearing armbands or by flying the American
flag upside down. Such actions, because they express ideas or emo-
tions, are now protected by the First Amendment. Few people
today would disagree that speech should include symbolic gestures.
(We include an example of controversy over precisely this issue, in
Derek Bok’s “Protecting Freedom of Expression on the Campus,” in
Chapter 2, Critical Reading: Getting Started.)
A definition that seems notably eccentric to many readers and
thus far has not gained much support is from page 94 of Peter
Singer’s Practical Ethics, in which the author suggests that a non-
human being can be a person. He admits that “it sounds odd to call
an animal a person” but says that it seems so only because of our
bad habit of sharply separating ourselves from other species. For
Singer, persons are “rational and self-conscious beings, aware of
themselves as distinct entities with a past and a future.” Thus,
although a newborn infant is a human being, it is not a person;
on the other hand, an adult chimpanzee is not a human being but
probably is a person. You don’t have to agree with Singer to know
exactly what he means and where he stands. Moreover, if you
read his essay, you may even find that his reasons are plausible
and that by means of his unusual definition he has enlarged your
thinking.
The Importance of Definitions Trying to decide on the best way to
define a key idea or a central concept is often difficult as well as
controversial. Death, for example, has been redefined in recent
years. Traditionally, a person was dead when there was no longer
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any heartbeat. But with advancing medical technology, the medical
profession has persuaded legislatures to redefine death as cessation
of cerebral and cortical functions — so-called brain death.
Some scholars have hoped to bring clarity into the abortion
debate by redefining life. Traditionally, human life begins at birth or
perhaps at viability (the capacity of a fetus to live independently of
the uterine environment). However, some have proposed a “brain
birth” definition, in the hope of resolving the abortion controversy.
A New York Times story of November 8, 1990, reported that these
thinkers want abortion to be prohibited by law at the point where
“integrated brain functioning begins to emerge — about seventy
days after conception.” Whatever the merits of such a redefinition,
the debate is convincing evidence of just how important the defini-
tion of certain terms can be.
Last Words about Definition Since Plato’s time, in the fourth cen-
tury B.C., it has often been argued that the best way to give a defi-
nition is to state the essence of the thing being defined. Thus, the
classic example defines man as “a rational animal.” (Today, to
avoid sexist implications, instead of man we would say human
being or person.) That is, the property of rational animality is taken
to be the essence of every human creature, and so it must be men-
tioned in the definition of man. This statement guarantees that the
definition is neither too broad nor too narrow. But philosophers
have long criticized this alleged ideal type of definition, on several
grounds, one of which is that no one can propose such definitions
without assuming that the thing being defined has an essence in
the first place — an assumption that is not necessary. Thus, we
may want to define causality, or explanation, or even definition itself,
but it is doubtful whether it is sound to assume that any of these
things has an essence.
A much better way to provide a definition is to offer a set of
sufficient and necessary conditions. Suppose we want to define
the word circle and are conscious of the need to keep circles distinct
from other geometrical figures such as rectangles and spheres. We
might express our definition by citing sufficient and necessary con-
ditions as follows: “Anything is a circle if and only if it is a closed
plane figure and all points on the circumference are equidistant
from the center.” Using the connective “if and only if” (called the
biconditional) between the definition and what is being defined
helps to force into our consciousness the need to make the defini-
tion neither too exclusive (too narrow) nor too inclusive (too
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broad). Of course, for most ordinary purposes we don’t require
such a formally precise and explicit definition. Nevertheless, per-
haps the best criterion to keep in mind when assessing a proposed
definition is whether it can be stated in the “if and only if “ form,
and whether, if it is so stated, it is true; that is, if it truly specifies all
and only the things covered by the word being defined. Idea Prompt
3.1 provides examples.
We are not saying that the four sentences in the table are
incontestable. They are arguable. We offer them merely to show
ways of defining, and the act of defining is one way of helping you
to get your own thoughts going. Notice, too, that the fourth of
these examples, a “statement of necessary and sufficient condi-
tions” (indicated by “if and only if”) is a bit stiff for ordinary writ-
ing. An informal prompt along this line might begin, “Essentially,
something can be called pornography if it presents. . . .”
Assumptions
In Chapter 1, Critical Thinking, we discussed the assumptions
made by the authors of two essays on campus discipline. But we
have more to say about assumptions. We have already said that in
the form of discourse known as argument certain statements are
offered as reasons for other statements. But even the longest and
most complex chain of reasoning or proof is fastened to assump-
tions — one or more unexamined beliefs. (Even if such a belief is
shared by writer and reader, it is no less an assumption.) Benjamin
Franklin argued against paying salaries to the holders of executive
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IDEA PROMPT 3.1 WAYS TO GIVE DEFINITIONS
Synonym “Pornography, simply stated, is obscenity.”
Example “Pornography is easily seen in D.H.
Lawrence’s Lady Chatterly’s Lover in the scene
where . . .”
Stipulation “For the purposes of this essay, pornography
refers to . . .”
Statement of “Something can be called pornography if and
necessary and only if it presents sexually stimulating material
sufficient without offering anything of redeeming social
conditions value.”
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offices in the federal government on the grounds that men are
moved by ambition (love of power) and by avarice (love of money)
and that powerful positions conferring wealth incite men to do their
worst. These assumptions he stated, though he felt no need to argue
them at length because he assumed that his readers shared them.
An assumption may be unstated. A writer, painstakingly argu-
ing specific points, may choose to keep one or more of the argu-
ment’s assumptions tacit. Or the writer may be as unaware of some
underlying assumption as of the surrounding air. For example,
Franklin didn’t even bother to state another assumption. He must
have assumed that persons of wealth who accept an unpaying job
(after all, only persons of wealth could afford to hold unpaid gov-
ernment jobs) will have at heart the interests of all classes of people,
not only the interests of their own class. Probably Franklin did not
state this assumption because he thought it was perfectly obvious,
but if you think critically about the assumption, you may find rea-
sons to doubt it. Surely one reason we pay our legislators is to make
certain that the legislature does not consist only of people whose
incomes may give them an inadequate view of the needs of others.
An Example: Assumptions in the Argument
Permitting Abortion
1. Ours is a pluralistic society, in which we believe that the reli-
gious beliefs of one group should not be imposed on others.
2. Personal privacy is a right, and a woman’s body is hers, not
to be violated by laws that tell her she may not do certain
things to her body.
But these (and other) arguments assume that a fetus is not — or not
yet — a person and therefore is not entitled to the same protection
against assaults that we are. Virtually all of us assume that it is usu-
ally wrong to kill a human being. Granted, we may find instances
in which we believe it is acceptable to take a human life, such as
self-defense against a would-be murderer. But even here we find a
shared assumption that persons are ordinarily entitled not to be
killed.
The argument about abortion, then, usually depends on
opposed assumptions: For one group, the fetus is a human being
and a potential person — and this potentiality is decisive. But for
the other group it is not. Persons arguing one side or the other of
the abortion issue ought to be aware that opponents may not share
their assumptions.
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Premises and Syllogisms
Premises are stated assumptions used as reasons in an argument.
(The word comes from a Latin word meaning “to send before” or
“to set in front.”) A premise thus is a statement set down —
assumed — before the argument is begun. The joining of two prem-
ises — two statements taken to be true — to produce a conclusion, a
third statement, is called a syllogism (Greek for “a reckoning
together”). The classic example is this:
Major premise: All human beings are mortal.
Minor premise: Socrates is a human being.
Conclusion: Socrates is mortal.
Deduction
The mental process of moving from one statement (“All human
beings are mortal”) through another (“Socrates is a human being”)
to yet a further statement (“Socrates is mortal”) is called deduction,
from Latin for “lead down from.” In this sense, deductive reasoning
does not give us any new knowledge, although it is easy to construct
examples that have so many premises, or premises that are so com-
plex, that the conclusion really does come as news to most who
examine the argument. Thus, the great detective Sherlock Holmes
was credited by his admiring colleague, Dr. Watson, with unusual
powers of deduction. Watson meant in part that Holmes could see
the logical consequences of apparently disconnected reasons, the
number and complexity of which left others at a loss. What is com-
mon in all cases of deduction is that the reasons or premises offered
are supposed to contain within themselves, so to speak, the conclu-
sion extracted from them.
Often a syllogism is abbreviated. Martin Luther King Jr.,
defending a protest march, wrote in “Letter from Birmingham Jail”:
You assert that our actions, even though peaceful, must be
condemned because they precipitate violence.
Fully expressed, the argument that King attributes to his critics
would be stated thus:
Society must condemn actions (even if peaceful) that precipi-
tate violence.
This action (though peaceful) will precipitate violence.
Therefore, society must condemn this action.
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An incomplete or abbreviated syllogism in which one of the prem-
ises is left unstated, of the sort found in King’s original quotation, is
called an enthymeme (Greek for “in the mind”).
Here is another, more whimsical example of an enthymeme, in
which both a premise and the conclusion are left implicit. Henry
David Thoreau remarked that “circumstantial evidence can be very
strong, as when you find a trout in the milk.” The joke, perhaps
intelligible only to people born before 1930 or so, depends on the
fact that milk used to be sold “in bulk” — that is, ladled out of a big
can directly to the customer by the farmer or grocer. This practice
was finally prohibited in the 1930s because for centuries the sellers,
in order to increase their profit, were diluting the milk with water.
Thoreau’s enthymeme can be fully expressed thus:
Trout live only in water.
This milk has a trout in it.
Therefore, this milk has water in it.
These enthymemes have three important properties: Their prem-
ises are true, the form of their argument is valid, and they leave
implicit either the conclusion or one of the premises.
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(© The New Yorker Collection 2003: Robert Mankoff from cartoonbank.com.
All rights reserved.)
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Sound Arguments
The purpose of a syllogism is to present reasons that establish its
conclusion. This is done by making sure that the argument satisfies
both of two independent criteria:
• First, all of the premises must be true.
• Second, the syllogism must be valid.
Once these criteria are satisfied, the conclusion of the syllogism is
guaranteed. Any such argument is said to establish or to prove its
conclusion, or to use another term, it is said to be sound. Here’s an
example of a sound argument, a syllogism that proves its conclusion:
Extracting oil from the Arctic Wildlife Refuge would adversely
affect the local ecology.
Adversely affecting the local ecology is undesirable, unless
there is no better alternative fuel source.
Therefore, extracting oil from the Arctic Wildlife Refuge is
undesirable, unless there is no better alternative fuel source.
Each premise is true, and the syllogism is valid, so it establishes its
conclusion.
But how do we tell in any given case that an argument is
sound? We perform two different tests, one for the truth of each of
the premises and another for the validity of the argument.
The basic test for the truth of a premise is to determine whether
what it asserts corresponds with reality; if it does, then it is true, and
if it doesn’t, then it is false. Everything depends on the content of the
premise — what it asserts — and the evidence for it. (In the preceding
syllogism, the truth of the premises can be tested by checking the
views of experts and interested parties, such as policymakers, envi-
ronmental groups, and experts on energy.)
The test for validity is quite different. We define a valid argu-
ment as one in which the conclusion follows from the premises, so
that if all the premises are true then the conclusion must be true,
too. The general test for validity, then, is this: If one grants the
premises, one must also grant the conclusion. Or to put it another
way, if one grants the premises but denies the conclusion, is one
caught in a self-contradiction? If so, the argument is valid; if not,
the argument is invalid.
The preceding syllogism passes this test. If you grant the
information given in the premises but deny the conclusion, you
have contradicted yourself. Even if the information were in error,
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the conclusion in this syllogism would still follow from the prem-
ises — the hallmark of a valid argument! The conclusion follows
because the validity of an argument is a purely formal matter
concerning the relation between premises and conclusion based
on what they mean.
This relationship can be seen more clearly by examining an
argument that is valid but that, because one or both of the premises
are false, does not establish its conclusion. Here is an example of
such a syllogism:
The whale is a large fish.
All large fish have scales.
Therefore, whales have scales.
We know that the premises and the conclusion are false: Whales
are mammals, not fish, and not all large fish have scales (sharks
have no scales, for instance). But when the validity of the argu-
ment is being determined, the truth of the premises and the con-
clusion is beside the point. Just a little reflection assures us that if
both of these premises were true, then the conclusion would have
to be true as well. That is, anyone who grants the premises of this
syllogism and yet denies the conclusion has contradicted herself. So
the validity of an argument does not in any way depend on the
truth of the premises or the conclusion.
A sound argument, as we said, is an argument that passes both
the test of true premises and the test of valid inference. To put it
another way, a sound argument
• Passes the test of content (the premises are true, as a matter
of fact) and it
• Passes the test of form (its premises and conclusion, by virtue
of their very meanings, are so related that it is impossible for
the premises to be true and the conclusion false).
Accordingly, an unsound argument, an argument that fails to
prove its conclusion, suffers from one or both of two defects.
• First, not all of the premises are true.
• Second, the argument is invalid.
Usually, we have in mind one or both of these defects when we
object to someone’s argument as “illogical.” In evaluating some-
one’s deductive argument, therefore, you must always ask: Is it
vulnerable to criticism on the ground that one (or more) of its
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premises is false? Or is the inference itself vulnerable because even
if all the premises are all true, the conclusion still wouldn’t follow?
A deductive argument proves its conclusion if and only if two
conditions are satisfied: (1) All the premises are true, and (2) it
would be inconsistent to assert the premises and deny the conclusions.
A Word about False Premises Suppose that one or more of
the premises of a syllogism is false but the syllogism itself is valid.
What does that tell us about the truth of the conclusion? Consider
this example:
All Americans prefer vanilla ice cream to other flavors.
Tiger Woods is an American.
Therefore, Tiger Woods prefers vanilla ice cream to other flavors.
The first (or major) premise in this syllogism is false. Yet the argu-
ment passes our formal test for validity; it is clear that if one grants
both premises, then one must accept the conclusion. So we can
say that the conclusion follows from its premises, even though the
premises do not prove the conclusion. This is not as paradoxical as it
may sound. For all we know, the conclusion of this argument may
in fact be true; Tiger Woods may indeed prefer vanilla ice cream,
and the odds are that he does because consumption statistics show
that a majority of Americans prefer vanilla. Nevertheless, if the
conclusion in this syllogism is true, it is not because this argument
proved it.
A Word about Invalid Syllogisms Usually, one can detect a false
premise in an argument, especially when the suspect premise
appears in someone else’s argument. A trickier business is the
invalid syllogism. Consider this argument:
All terrorists seek publicity for their violent acts.
John Doe seeks publicity for his violent acts.
Therefore, John Doe is a terrorist.
In the preceding syllogism, let us grant that the first (major)
premise is true. Let us also grant that the conclusion may well be
true. Finally, the person mentioned in the second (minor) premise
could indeed be a terrorist. But it is also possible that the conclusion
is false; terrorists are not the only ones who seek publicity for their
violent acts; think, for example, of the violence committed against
doctors, clinic workers, and patients at clinics where abortions are
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performed. In short, the truth of the two premises is no guarantee
that the conclusion is also true. It is possible to assert both premises
and deny the conclusion without self-contradiction.
How do we tell, in general and in particular cases, whether a
syllogism is valid? Chemists use litmus paper to enable them to tell
instantly whether the liquid in a test tube is an acid or a base.
Unfortunately, logic has no litmus test to tell us instantly whether
an argument is valid or invalid. Logicians beginning with Aristotle
have developed techniques that enable them to test any given
argument, no matter how complex or subtle, to determine its valid-
ity. But the results of their labors cannot be expressed in a para-
graph or even a few pages; not for nothing are semester-long
courses devoted to teaching formal deductive logic. Apart from
advising you to consult Chapter 9, A Logician’s View: Deduction,
Induction, Fallacies, all we can do here is repeat two basic points.
First, validity of deductive arguments is a matter of their form
or structure. Even syllogisms like the one on the Arctic Wildlife
Refuge on page 64 come in a large variety of forms (256 different
ones, to be precise), and only some of these forms are valid.
Second, all valid deductive arguments (and only such arguments)
pass this test: If one accepts all the premises, then one must accept
the conclusion as well. Hence, if it is possible to accept the premises
but reject the conclusion (without self-contradiction, of course),
then the argument is invalid.
Let us exit from further discussion of this important but diffi-
cult subject on a lighter note. Many illogical arguments masquer-
ade as logical. Consider this example: If it takes a horse and carriage
four hours to go from Pinsk to Chelm, does it follow that a carriage
with two horses will get there in two hours?
Note: In Chapter 9, we discuss at some length other kinds of
deductive arguments, as well as fallacies, which are kinds of invalid
reasoning.
Induction
Whereas deduction takes our beliefs and assumptions and extracts
their hidden consequences, induction uses information about
observed cases to reach a conclusion about unobserved cases. (The
word comes from the Latin in ducere, “to lead into” or “to lead up
to.”) If we observe that the bite of a certain snake is poisonous, we
may conclude on this evidence that another snake of the same gen-
eral type is also poisonous. Our inference might be even broader. If
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we observe that snake after snake of a certain type has a poisonous
bite and that these snakes are all rattlesnakes, we are tempted to
generalize that all rattlesnakes are poisonous.
By far the most common way to test the adequacy of a general-
ization is to confront it with one or more counterexamples. If the
counterexamples are genuine and reliable, then the generalization
must be false. We are constantly testing our generalizations against
actual or possible counterexamples.
Unlike deduction, induction gives us conclusions that go
beyond the information contained in the premises used in their
support. Not surprisingly, the conclusions of inductive reasoning
are not always true, even when all the premises are true. On page
53, we gave as an example our observation that on previous days
a subway has run at 6:00 A.M. and that therefore we believe that it
runs at 6:00 A.M. every day. Suppose, following this reasoning, we
arrive at the subway platform just before 6:00 A.M. on a given day
and wait an hour without a train. What inference should we
draw to explain this? Possibly today is Sunday, and the subway
doesn’t run before 7:00 A.M. Or possibly there was a breakdown
earlier this morning. Whatever the explanation, we relied on a
sample that was not large enough (a larger sample might have
included some early morning breakdowns) or not representative
enough (a more representative sample would have included the
later starts on holidays).
A Word about Samples When we reason inductively, much
depends on the size and the quality of the sample. We may inter-
view five members of Alpha Tau Omega and find that all five are
Republicans, yet we cannot legitimately conclude that all members
of ATO are Republicans. The problem is not always one of failing
to interview large numbers. A poll of ten thousand college stu-
dents tells us very little about “college students” if all ten thousand
are white males at the University of Texas. Such a sample, because
it leaves out women and minority males, obviously is not suffi-
ciently representative of “college students” as a group. Further,
though not all of the students at the University of Texas are from
Texas or even from the Southwest, it is quite likely that the stu-
dent body is not fully representative (for instance, in race and in
income) of American college students. If this conjecture is correct,
even a truly representative sample of University of Texas students
would not allow one to draw firm conclusions about American
college students.
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In short: An argument that uses samples ought to tell the
reader how the samples were chosen. If it does not provide this
information, the argument may rightly be treated with suspicion.
Evidence: Experimentation, Examples,
Authoritative Testimony, Statistics
Different disciplines use different kinds of evidence:
• In literary studies, the texts are usually the chief evidence.
• In the social sciences, field research (interviews, surveys)
usually provides evidence.
In the sciences, reports of experiments are the usual evidence; if an
assertion cannot be tested — if an assertion is not capable of being
shown to be false — it is a belief, an opinion, not a scientific hypothesis.
Experimentation Induction is obviously useful in arguing. If, for
example, one is arguing that handguns should be controlled, one
will point to specific cases in which handguns caused accidents or
were used to commit crimes. If one is arguing that abortion has a
traumatic effect on women, one will point to women who testify to
that effect. Each instance constitutes evidence for the relevant
generalization.
In a courtroom, evidence bearing on the guilt of the accused is
introduced by the prosecution, and evidence to the contrary is
introduced by the defense. Not all evidence is admissible (hearsay,
for example, is not, even if it is true), and the law of evidence is a
highly developed subject in jurisprudence. In the forum of daily life,
the sources of evidence are less disciplined. Daily experience, a par-
ticularly memorable observation, an unusual event we witnessed —
any or all of these may be used as evidence for (or against) some
belief, theory, hypothesis, or explanation. The systematic study of
what experience can yield is what science does, and one of the most
distinctive features of the evidence that scientists can marshal on
behalf of their claims is that it is the result of experimentation.
Experiments are deliberately contrived situations that are often
complex in their technology and designed to yield particular obser-
vations. What the ordinary person does with unaided eye and ear,
the scientist does, much more carefully and thoroughly, with the
help of laboratory instruments.
The variety, extent, and reliability of the evidence obtained in
daily life and in the laboratory are quite different. It is hardly a
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surprise that in our civilization much more weight is attached to the
“findings” of scientists than to the corroborative (much less the con-
trary) experiences of the ordinary person. No one today would seri-
ously argue that the sun really does go around the earth just
because it looks that way; nor would we argue that because viruses
are invisible to the naked eye they cannot cause symptoms such as
swellings and fevers, which are quite plainly visible.
Examples One form of evidence is the example. Suppose that we
argue that a candidate is untrustworthy and should not be elected to
public office. We point to episodes in his career — his misuse of
funds in 1998 and the false charges he made against an opponent in
2002 — as examples of his untrustworthiness. Or if we are arguing
that President Truman ordered the atom bomb dropped to save
American (and, for that matter, Japanese) lives that otherwise
would have been lost in a hard-fought invasion of Japan, we point
to the stubbornness of the Japanese defenders in battles on the
islands of Saipan, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa, where Japanese soldiers
fought to the death rather than surrender.
These examples, we say, show us that the Japanese defenders
of the main islands would have fought to their deaths without sur-
rendering, even though they knew they would be defeated. Or if
we argue that the war was nearly won when Truman dropped the
bomb, we can cite secret peace feelers as examples of the Japanese
willingness to end the war.
An example is a sample; these two words come from the same
Old French word, essample, from the Latin exemplum, which means
“something taken out” — that is, a selection from the group. A
Yiddish proverb shrewdly says that “‘For example’ is no proof,” but
the evidence of well-chosen examples can go a long way toward
helping a writer to convince an audience.
In arguments, three sorts of examples are especially common:
• Real events,
• Invented instances (artificial or hypothetical cases), and
• Analogies.
We will treat each of these briefly.
REAL EVENTS In referring to Truman’s decision to drop the
atom bomb, we have already touched on examples drawn from
real events — the battles at Saipan and elsewhere. And we have
also seen Ben Franklin pointing to an allegedly real happening, a
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fish that had consumed a smaller fish. The advantage of an
example drawn from real life, whether a great historical event or a
local incident, is that its reality gives it weight. It can’t simply be
brushed off.
On the other hand, an example drawn from reality may not
provide as clear-cut an instance as could be wished for. Suppose,
for instance, that someone cites the Japanese army’s behavior on
Saipan and on Iwo Jima as evidence that the Japanese later would
have fought to the death in an American invasion of Japan and
would therefore have inflicted terrible losses on themselves and on
the Americans. This example is open to the response that in June
and July 1945, Japanese diplomats sent out secret peace feelers, so
that in August 1945, when Truman authorized dropping the bomb,
the situation was very different.
Similarly, in support of the argument that nations will no
longer resort to atomic weapons, some people have offered as evi-
dence the fact that since World War I the great powers have not
used poison gas. But the argument needs more support than this
fact provides. Poison gas was not decisive or even highly effective
in World War I. Moreover, the invention of gas masks made it
obsolete.
In short, any real event is so entangled in its historical circum-
stances that it might not be adequate or even relevant evidence in
the case being argued. In using a real event as an example (and real
events certainly can be used), the writer ordinarily must demon-
strate that the event can be taken out of its historical context and
be used in the new context of argument. Thus, in an argument
against using atomic weapons in warfare, the many deaths and
horrible injuries inflicted on the Japanese at Hiroshima and
Nagasaki can be cited as effects of nuclear weapons that would
invariably occur and did not depend on any special circumstances
of their use in Japan in 1945.
INVENTED INSTANCES Artificial or hypothetical cases —
invented instances — have the great advantage of being protected
from objections of the sort just given. Recall Thoreau’s trout in
the milk; that was a colorful hypothetical case that nicely illus-
trated his point. An invented instance (“Let’s assume that a burglar
promises not to shoot a householder if the householder swears not
to identify him. Is the householder bound by the oath?”) is some-
thing like a drawing of a flower in a botany textbook or a diagram
of the folds of a mountain in a geology textbook. It is admittedly
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false, but by virtue of its simplifications it sets forth the relevant
details very clearly. Thus, in a discussion of rights, the philosopher
Charles Frankel says,
Strictly speaking, when we assert a right for X, we assert that Y
has a duty. Strictly speaking, that Y has such a duty presupposes
that Y has the capacity to perform this duty. It would be nonsense
to say, for example, that a nonswimmer has a moral duty to swim
to the help of a drowning man.
This invented example is admirably clear, and it is immune to
charges that might muddy the issue if Frankel, instead of referring
to a wholly abstract person, Y, talked about some real person, Jones,
who did not rescue a drowning man. For then he would get bogged
down over arguing about whether Jones really couldn’t swim well
enough to help, and so on.
Yet invented cases have their drawbacks. First and foremost,
they cannot be used as evidence. A purely hypothetical example
can illustrate a point or provoke reconsideration of a generaliza-
tion, but it cannot substitute for actual events as evidence support-
ing an inductive inference. Sometimes such examples are so
fanciful, so remote from life that they fail to carry conviction with
the reader. Thus the philosopher Judith Jarvis Thomson, in the
course of her argument entitled “A Defense of Abortion,” asks you
to imagine that you wake up one day and find that against your
will a celebrated violinist whose body is not adequately function-
ing has been hooked up into your body, for life support. Do you
have the right to unplug the violinist? Readers of the essays in this
book will have to decide for themselves whether the invented
cases proposed by various authors are helpful or whether they are
so remote that they hinder thought. Readers will have to decide,
too, about when they can use invented cases to advance their own
arguments.
But we add one point: Even a highly fanciful invented case can
have the valuable effect of forcing us to see where we stand. We may
say that we are, in all circumstances, against vivisection. But what
would we say if we thought that an experiment on one mouse
would save the life of someone we love? Or conversely, if one
approves of vivisection, would one also approve of sacrificing the last
giant panda to save the life of a senile stranger, a person who in any
case probably would not live longer than another year? Artificial
cases of this sort can help us to see that, well, no, we didn’t really
mean to say such-and-such when we said so-and-so.
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ANALOGIES The third sort of example, analogy, is a kind of
comparison. An analogy asserts that things that are alike in some
ways are alike in yet another way. Example: “Before the Roman
Empire declined as a world power, it exhibited a decline in morals
and in physical stamina; our culture today shows a decline in morals
(look at the high divorce rate, and look at the crime rate) and we also
show a decline in physical culture (just read about obesity in chil-
dren). America, like Rome, will decline as a world power.”
Strictly, an analogy is an extended comparison in which different
things are shown to be similar in several ways. Thus, if one wants to
argue that a head of state should have extraordinary power during
wartime, one can argue that the state at such a time is like a ship in a
storm: The crew is needed to lend its help, but the decisions are best
left to the captain. (Notice that an analogy compares things that are
relatively unlike. Comparing the plight of one ship to another or of
one government to another is not an analogy; it is an inductive infer-
ence from one case of the same sort to another such case.)
Or take another analogy: We have already glanced at Judith
Thomson’s hypothetical case in which the reader wakes up to find
himself or herself hooked up to a violinist. Thomson uses this situ-
ation as an analogy in an argument about abortion. The reader
stands for the mother, the violinist for the unwanted fetus. Whether
this analogy is close enough to pregnancy to help illuminate our
thinking about abortion is something that you may want to think
about.
The problem with argument by analogy is this: Two admittedly
different things are agreed to be similar in several ways, and the
arguer goes on to assert or imply that they are also similar in another
way — the point that is being argued. (That is why Thomson argues
that if something is true of the reader-hooked-up-to-a-violinist, it is
also true of the pregnant mother-hooked-up-to-a-fetus.) But the
two things that are said to be analogous and that are indeed similar
in characteristics A, B, and C are also different — let’s say in charac-
teristics D and E. As Bishop Butler is said to have remarked in the
early eighteenth century, “Everything is what it is, and not another
thing.”
Analogies can be convincing, especially because they can make
complex issues simple. “Don’t change horses in midstream,” of
course, is not a statement about riding horses across a river but
about choosing leaders in critical times. Still, in the end, analogies
do not necessarily prove anything. What may be true about riding
horses across a stream may not be true about choosing leaders in
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troubled times or about deciding on a given change of leadership.
Riding horses across a stream and choosing leaders are, at bottom,
different things, and however much these activities may be said to
resemble one another, they remain different, and what is true for
one need not be true for the other.
Analogies can be helpful in developing our thoughts. It is
sometimes argued, for instance — on the analogy of the doctor-
patient or the lawyer-client, or the priest-penitent relationship —
that newspaper and television reporters should not be required to
reveal their confidential sources. That is worth thinking about: Do
the similarities run deep enough, or are there fundamental differ-
ences? Or take another example: Some writers who support abor-
tion argue that the fetus is not a person any more than the acorn is
an oak. That is also worth thinking about. But one should also
think about this response: A fetus is not a person, just as an acorn is
not an oak, but an acorn is a potential oak, and a fetus is a potential
person, a potential adult human being. Children, even newborn
infants, have rights, and one way to explain this claim is to call
attention to their potentiality to become mature adults. And so
some people argue that the fetus, by analogy, has the rights of an
infant, for the fetus, like the infant, is a potential adult.
Three analogies for consideration: First, let’s examine a brief com-
parison made by Jill Knight, a member of the British Parliament,
speaking about abortion:
Babies are not like bad teeth, to be jerked out because they cause
suffering.
Her point is effectively put; it remains for the reader to decide
whether or not fetuses are babies and if a fetus is not a baby, why it
can or can’t be treated like a bad tooth.
Now, a second bit of analogical reasoning, again about abor-
tion: Thomas Sowell, an economist at the Hoover Institute, grants
that women have a legal right to abortion, but he objects to a
requirement that the government pay for abortions:
Because the courts have ruled that women have a legal right to an
abortion, some people have jumped to the conclusion that the
government has to pay for it. You have a constitutional right to
privacy, but the government has no obligation to pay for your
window shades. (Pink and Brown People, 1981, p. 57)
We leave it to the reader to decide whether the analogy is
compelling — that is, if the points of resemblance are sufficiently
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significant to allow one to conclude that what is true of people want-
ing window shades should be true of people wanting abortions.
And one more: A common argument on behalf of legalizing gay
marriage draws an analogy between gay marriage and interracial
marriage, a practice that was banned in sixteen states until 1967,
when the Supreme Court declared miscegenation statutes unconstitu-
tional. The gist of the analogy is this: Racism and discrimination
against gay and lesbian people are the same. If marriage is a funda-
mental right — as the Supreme Court held in its 1967 decision when it
struck down bans on miscegenation — then it is a fundamental right
for gay people as well as heterosexual people.
Authoritative Testimony Another form of evidence is testimony,
the citation or quotation of authorities. In daily life we rely heavily
on authorities of all sorts: We get a doctor’s opinion about our
health, we read a book because an intelligent friend recommends
it, we see a movie because a critic gave it a good review, and we
pay at least a little attention to the weather forecaster.
In setting forth an argument, one often tries to show that one’s
view is supported by notable figures, perhaps Jefferson, Lincoln,
Martin Luther King Jr., or scientists who won the Nobel Prize. You
may recall that in the second chapter, in talking about definitions
of pornography, we referred to Kenneth Clark. To make certain
that you were impressed by his testimony even if you had never
heard of him, we described him as “probably the most influential
English-speaking art critic of our time.” But heed some words of
caution:
• Be sure that the authority, however notable, is an authority
on the topic in question (a well-known biologist might be an
authority on vitamins but not on the justice of a war).
• Be sure that the authority is not biased. A chemist employed
by the tobacco industry isn’t likely to admit that smoking
may be harmful, and a “director of publications” (that means
a press agent) for a hockey team isn’t likely to admit that
watching or even playing ice hockey stimulates violence.
• Beware of nameless authorities: “a thousand doctors,” “lead-
ing educators,” “researchers at a major medical school.”
• Be careful when using authorities who indeed were great
authorities in their day but who now may be out of date
(Adam Smith on economics, Julius Caesar on the art of war,
Louis Pasteur on medicine).
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• Cite authorities whose opinions your readers will value.
William F. Buckley Jr.’s conservative/libertarian opinions
mean a good deal to readers of the magazine that he founded,
the National Review, but probably not to most liberal thinkers.
Gloria Steinem’s liberal/feminist opinions carry weight with
the readers of the magazines that she cofounded, New York
and Ms. magazine, but probably not to most conservative
thinkers. If you are writing for the general reader, your usual
audience, cite authorities who are likely to be accepted by the
general reader.
One other point: You may be an authority. You probably aren’t
nationally known, but on some topics you perhaps can speak with
the authority of personal experience. You may have been injured on
a motorcycle while riding without wearing a helmet, or you may
have escaped injury because you wore a helmet; you may have
dropped out of school and then returned; you may have tutored a
student whose native language is not English, or you may be such a
student and you may have received tutoring. You may have attended
a school with a bilingual education program. In short, your personal
testimony on topics relating to these issues may be invaluable, and a
reader will probably consider it seriously.
Statistics The last sort of evidence we discuss here is quantitative
or statistical. The maxim “More is better” captures a basic idea of
quantitative evidence. Because we know that 90 percent is greater
than 75 percent, we are usually ready to grant that any claim sup-
ported by experience in 90 percent of the cases is more likely to be
true than an alternative claim supported by experience only 75
percent of the time. The greater the difference, the greater our con-
fidence. Consider an example. Honors at graduation from college
are often computed on a student’s cumulative grade-point average
(GPA). The undisputed assumption is that the nearer a student’s
GPA is to a perfect record (4.0), the better scholar he or she is and
therefore the more deserving of highest honors. Consequently, a
student with a GPA of 3.9 at the end of her senior year is a
stronger candidate for graduating summa cum laude than
another student with a GPA of 3.6. When faculty members on
the honors committee argue over the relative academic merits of
graduating seniors, we know that these quantitative, statistical dif-
ferences in student GPAs will be the basic (even if not the only)
kind of evidence under discussion.
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GRAPHS, TABLES, NUMBERS Statistical information can be
marshaled and presented in many forms, but it tends to fall into
two main types: the graphic and the numerical. Graphs, tables, and
pie charts are familiar ways of presenting quantitative data in an
eye-catching manner. (See page 122.) To prepare the graphics,
however, one first has to get the numbers themselves under con-
trol, and for some purposes it may be acceptable simply to stick
with the numbers themselves.
But should the numbers be presented in percentages or in frac-
tions? Should one report, say, that the federal budget underwent a
twofold increase over the decade, that it increased by 100 percent,
that it doubled, or that the budget at the beginning of the decade
was one-half what it was at the end? Taken strictly, these are
equivalent ways of saying the same thing. Choice among them,
therefore, in an example like this perhaps will rest on whether
one’s aim is to dramatize the increase (a 100 percent increase looks
larger than a doubling) or to play down the size of the increase.
THINKING ABOUT STATISTICAL EVIDENCE Statistics often get a
bad name because it is so easy to misuse them, unintentionally or
not, and so difficult to be sure that they have been correctly gath-
ered in the first place. (We remind you of the old saw “There are
lies, damned lies, and statistics.”) Every branch of social science and
natural science needs statistical information, and countless deci-
sions in public and private life are based on quantitative data in sta-
tistical form. It is important, therefore, to be sensitive to the sources
and reliability of the statistics and to develop a healthy skepticism
when confronted with statistics whose parentage is not fully
explained.
Consider, for instance, statistics that kept popping up during
the baseball strike of 1994. The owners of the clubs said that the
average salary of a major-league player was $1.2 million. (The
average in this case — technically the mean — is the result of
dividing the total number of salary dollars by the number of play-
ers.) The players’ union, however, did not talk about the average;
rather, the union talked about the median, which was less than
half of the average, a mere $500,000. (The median is the middle
value in a distribution. Thus, of the 746 players, 363 earned less
than $500,000, 361 earned more, and 22 earned exactly $500,000.)
The union said, correctly, that most players earned a good deal less
than the $1.2 million figure that the owners kept citing; but the
$1.2 million average sounded more impressive to the general public,
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and that is the figure that the guy in the street mentioned when
asked for an opinion about the strike.
Consider this statistic: In Smithville in 2005, 1 percent of the
victims in fatal automobile accidents were bicyclists. In 2006 the
percent of bicyclists killed in automobile accidents was 2 percent.
Was the increase 1 percent (not an alarming figure), or was it
100 percent (a staggering figure)? The answer is both, depending
on whether we are comparing (a) bicycle deaths in automobile acci-
dents with all deaths in automobile accidents (that’s an increase of 1
percent), or (b) bicycle deaths in automobile accidents only with other
bicycle deaths in automobile accidents (an increase of 100 percent).
An honest statement would say that bicycle deaths due to automo-
bile accidents doubled in 2006, increasing from 1 to 2 percent. But
here’s another point: Although every such death is lamentable, if
there was one such death in 2006 and two in 2010, the increase
from one death to two (an increase of 100 percent!) hardly suggests
that there is a growing problem that needs attention. No one would
be surprised to learn that in the next year there were no deaths, or
only one or even two.
One other example may help to indicate the difficulties of
interpreting statistics. According to the San Francisco police
department, in 1990 the city received 1,074 citizen complaints
against the police. Los Angeles received only half as many com-
plaints in the same period, and Los Angeles has five times the pop-
ulation of San Francisco. Does this mean that the police of San
Francisco are much rougher than the police of Los Angeles?
Possibly. But some specialists who have studied the statistics not
only for these two cities but also for many other cities have con-
cluded that a department with proportionately more complaints
against it is not necessarily more abusive than a department with
fewer complaints. According to these experts, the more confidence
that the citizens have in their police force, the more the citizens
will complain about police misconduct. The relatively small num-
ber of complaints against the Los Angeles police department thus
may indicate that the citizens of Los Angeles are so intimidated and
have so little confidence in the system that they are afraid to com-
plain or they do not bother to complain.
If it is sometimes difficult to interpret statistics, it is often at least
equally difficult to establish accurate statistics. Consider this example:
Advertisements are the most prevalent and toxic of the mental
pollutants. From the moment your radio alarm sounds in the
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morning to the wee hours of late-night TV, microjolts of
commercial pollution flood into your brain at the rate of about
three thousand marketing messages per day. (Kalle Lasn, Culture
Jam, 1999, pp. 18–19)
Lasn’s book includes endnotes as documentation, so, curious about
the statistics, we turn to the appropriate page and we find this
information concerning the source of his data:
“three thousand marketing messages per day.” Mark Landler,
Walecia Konrad, Zachary Schiller, and Lois Therrien, “What
Happened to Advertising?” BusinessWeek, September 23, 1991,
page 66. Leslie Savan in The Sponsored Life (Temple University
Press, 1994), page 1, estimated that “16,000 ads flicker across an
individual’s consciousness daily.” I did an informal survey in
March 1995 and found the number to be closer to 1,500 (this
included all marketing messages, corporate images, logos, ads,
brand names, on TV, radio, billboards, buildings, signs, clothing,
appliances, in cyberspace, etc., over a typical twenty-four hour
period in my life). (219)
Well, this endnote is odd. In the earlier passage, you will recall, the
author asserted that “about three thousand marketing messages per
day” flood into a person’s brain. Now, in the documentation, he
helpfully cites a source for that statistic, from BusinessWeek —
though we have not the faintest idea of how the authors of the
article in BusinessWeek came up with that figure. Oddly, he goes on
to offer a very different figure (16,000 ads), and then, to our utter
confusion, he offers yet a third figure, 1,500, based on his own
“informal survey.”
Probably the one thing we can safely say about all three figures
is that none of them means very much. Even if the compilers of the
statistics told us exactly how they counted — let’s say that among
countless other criteria they assumed that the average person reads
one magazine per day and that the average magazine contains 124
advertisements — it would be hard to take them seriously. After all,
in leafing through a magazine, some people may read many ads,
some may read none. Some people may read some ads carefully —
but perhaps to enjoy their absurdity. Our point: Although the
author in his text said, without implying any uncertainty, that
“about three thousand marketing messages per day” reach an indi-
vidual, it is evident (if one checks the endnote) that even he is con-
fused about the figure he gives.
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Some last words about the unreliability of some statistical infor-
mation, stuff that looks impressive but that is, in fact, insubstantial.
Marilyn Jager Adams studied the number of hours that families read
to their children in the five or so years before the children go to
school. In her book on the topic, Beginning to Read: Thinking and
Learning about Print (Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press,
1990), she pointed out that in all those preschool years, poor families
read to their children only twenty-five hours, whereas in the same
period middle-income families read 1,000 to 1,700 hours. The figures
were much quoted in newspapers and by children’s advocacy groups.
Dr. Adams could not, of course, interview every family in these two
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✓ A CHECKLIST FOR EVALUATING STATISTICAL
EVIDENCE
Regard statistical evidence (like all other evidence) cautiously, and
don’t accept it until you have thought about these questions:
� Was it compiled by a disinterested source? Of course, the
name of the source does not always reveal its particular angle
(for example, People for the American Way), but sometimes the
name lets you know what to expect (National Rifle Association,
American Civil Liberties Union).
� Is it based on an adequate sample? (A study pointed out that
criminals have an average IQ of 91 to 93, whereas the
general population has an IQ of 100. The conclusion drawn
was that criminals have a lower IQ than the general
population. This reading may be accurate, but some doubts
have been expressed. For instance, because the entire sample
of criminals consisted only of convicted criminals, this sample
may be biased; possibly the criminals with higher IQs have
enough intelligence not to get caught. Or if they are caught,
perhaps they are smart enough to hire better lawyers.)
� Is the statistical evidence recent enough to be relevant?
� How many of the factors likely to be relevant were identified
and measured?
� Are the figures open to a different and equally plausible
interpretation?
� If a percent is cited, is it the average (or mean), or is it the
median?
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groups; she had to rely on samples. What were her samples? For
poor families, she selected twenty-four children in twenty families,
all in Southern California. One might wonder if families from only
one geographic area can provide an adequate sample, but let’s think
about Dr. Adams’s sample of middle-class families. How many fami-
lies constituted the sample? Exactly one, her own. We leave it to you
to decide how much value her findings — again, they were much
cited — have.
We are not suggesting that everyone who uses statistics is try-
ing to deceive or even that many who use statistics are uncon-
sciously deceived by them. We mean to suggest only that statistics
are open to widely different interpretations and that often those
columns of numbers, so precise with their decimal points, are in
fact imprecise and possibly even worthless because they may be
based on insufficient or biased samples.
QUIZ
What is wrong with the following statistical proof that children do not
have time for school?
One-third of the time they are sleeping (about 122 days);
One-eighth of the time they are eating (three hours a day, totaling 45
days);
One-fourth of the time is taken up by summer and other vacations (91
days);
Two-sevenths of the year is weekends (104 days).
Total: 362 days — so how can a kid have time for school?
NONRATIONAL APPEALS
Satire, Irony, Sarcasm, Humor
In talking about definition, deduction, and evidence, we have been
talking about means of rational persuasion. But as mentioned ear-
lier, there are also other means of persuasion. Take force, for
example. If X kicks Y, threatens to destroy Y’s means of livelihood,
or threatens Y’s life, X may persuade Y to cooperate. One form of
irrational but sometimes highly effective persuasion is satire — that
is, witty ridicule. A cartoonist may persuade viewers that a politi-
cian’s views are unsound by caricaturing (and thus ridiculing) the
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politician’s appearance or by presenting a grotesquely distorted
(funny, but unfair) picture of the issue.
Satiric artists often use caricature; satiric writers, also seeking
to persuade by means of ridicule, often use verbal irony. Irony
of this sort contrasts what is said and what is meant. For
instance, words of praise may be meant to imply blame (when
Shakespeare’s Cassius says, “Brutus is an honorable man,” he
means his hearers to think that Brutus is dishonorable), and
words of modesty may be meant to imply superiority (“Of
course, I’m too dumb to understand this problem”). Such lan-
guage, when heavy-handed, is called sarcasm (“You’re a great
guy,” said to someone who will not lend the speaker ten dollars).
If it is witty — if the jeering is in some degree clever — it is called
irony rather than sarcasm.
Although ridicule is not a form of argument (because it is not a
form of reasoning), passages of ridicule, especially verbal irony,
sometimes appear in essays that are arguments. These passages,
like reasons, or for that matter like appeals to the emotions, are
efforts to persuade the hearer to accept the speaker’s point of view.
The great trick in using humor in an argument is, on the one hand,
to avoid mere wisecracking, which makes the writer seem like a
smart aleck, and, on the other hand, to avoid mere clownishness,
which makes the writer seem like a fool. Later in this chapter (p. 88),
we print an essay by George F. Will, that is (or seeks to be?)
humorous in places. You be the judge.
Emotional Appeals
It is sometimes said that good argumentative writing appeals only
to reason, never to emotion, and that any sort of emotional appeal
is illegitimate, irrelevant. “Tears are not arguments,” the Brazilian
writer Machado de Assis said. Logic textbooks may even stigmatize
with Latin labels the various sorts of emotional appeal — for
instance, argumentum ad populam (appeal to the prejudices of the
mob, as in “Come on, we all know that schools don’t teach any-
thing anymore”) and argumentum ad misericordiam (appeal to pity, as
in “No one ought to blame this poor kid for stabbing a classmate
because his mother was often institutionalized for alcoholism and
his father beat him”).
True, appeals to emotion may get in the way of the facts of the
case; they may blind the audience by, in effect, throwing dust in its
eyes or by stimulating tears.
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Learning from Shakespeare A classic example is found in
Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, when Marc Antony addresses the Roman
populace after Brutus, Cassius, and others have assassinated Caesar.
The real issue is whether Caesar was becoming tyrannical (as the
assassins claim) and would therefore curtail the freedom of the
people. Antony turns from the evidence and stirs the mob against
the assassins by appealing to its emotions. In the ancient Roman
biographical writing that Shakespeare drew on, Sir Thomas North’s
translation of Plutarch’s Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans,
Plutarch says that Antony,
perceiving that his words moved the common people to compas-
sion, . . . framed his eloquence to make their hearts yearn [that is,
grieve] the more, and, taking Caesar’s gown all bloody in his hand,
he laid it open to the sight of them all, showing what a number of
cuts and holes it had upon it. Therewithal the people fell presently
into such a rage and mutiny that there was no more order kept.
Here are a few extracts from Antony’s speeches in Shakespeare’s
play. Antony begins by asserting that he will speak only briefly:
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
After briefly offering some rather insubstantial evidence that
Caesar gave no signs of behaving tyrannically (for example, “When
that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept”), Antony begins to
play directly on the emotions of his hearers. Descending from the
platform so that he may be in closer contact with his audience (like
a modern politician, he wants to work the crowd), he calls atten-
tion to Caesar’s bloody toga:
If you have tears, prepare to shed them now.
You all do know this mantle; I remember
The first time ever Caesar put it on:
‘Twas on a summer’s evening, in his tent,
That day he overcame the Nervii.
Look, in this place ran Cassius’ dagger through;
See what a rent the envious Casca made;
Through this, the well-belovèd Brutus stabbed. . . .
In these few lines Antony
• First prepares the audience by suggesting to them how they
should respond (“If you have tears, prepare to shed them
now”),
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• Then flatters them by implying that they, like Antony, were
intimates of Caesar (he credits them with being familiar with
Caesar’s garment),
• Then evokes a personal memory of a specific time (“a sum-
mer’s evening”) — not just any old specific time but a very
important one, the day that Caesar won a battle against the
Nervii (a particularly fierce tribe in what is now France).
In fact, Antony was not at the battle, and he did not join Caesar
until three years later.
Antony does not mind being free with the facts; his point here
is not to set the record straight but to stir the mob against the assas-
sins. He goes on, daringly but successfully, to identify one particular
slit in the garment with Cassius’s dagger, another with Casca’s, and
a third with Brutus’s. Antony cannot know which slit was made by
which dagger, but his rhetorical trick works.
Notice, too, that Antony arranges the three assassins in climac-
tic order, since Brutus (Antony claims) was especially beloved by
Caesar:
Judge, O you gods, how dearly Caesar loved him!
This was the most unkindest cut of all;
For when the noble Caesar saw him stab,
Ingratitude, more strong than traitor’s arms,
Quite vanquished him. Then burst his mighty heart. . . .
Nice. According to Antony, the noble-minded Caesar — Antony’s
words have erased all thought of the tyrannical Caesar — died not
from the wounds inflicted by daggers but from the heartbreaking
perception of Brutus’s ingratitude. Doubtless there was not a dry
eye in the house. We can all hope that if we are ever put on trial,
we have a lawyer as skilled in evoking sympathy as Antony.
Are Emotional Appeals Fallacious? The oration is obviously suc-
cessful in the play and apparently was successful in real life, but it is
the sort of speech that prompts logicians to write disapprovingly of
attempts to stir feeling in an audience. (As mentioned earlier in this
chapter, the evocation of emotion in an audience is called pathos,
from the Greek word for “emotion” or “suffering.”) There is nothing
inherently wrong in stimulating our audience’s emotions, but when
an emotional appeal confuses the issue that is being argued about or
shifts the attention away from the facts of the issue, we can reason-
ably speak of the fallacy of emotional appeal.
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No fallacy is involved, however, when an emotional appeal
heightens the facts, bringing them home to the audience rather
than masking them. If we are talking about legislation that would
govern police actions, it is legitimate to show a photograph of the
battered, bloodied face of an alleged victim of police brutality.
True, such a photograph cannot tell the whole truth; it cannot tell
us if the subject threatened the officer with a gun or repeatedly
resisted an order to surrender. But it can tell us that the victim
was severely beaten and (like a comparable description in words)
evoke in us emotions that may properly enter into our decision
about the permissible use of police evidence. Similarly, an animal
rights activist who is arguing that calves are cruelly confined
might reasonably tell us about the size of the pen in which the
beast — unable to turn around or even to lie down — is kept.
Others may argue that calves don’t much care about turning
around or have no right to turn around, but the verbal descrip-
tion, which unquestionably makes an emotional appeal, can
hardly be called fallacious or irrelevant.
In appealing to emotions then, the important things are
• Not to falsify (especially by oversimplifying) the issue and
• Not to distract attention from the facts of the case.
Focus on the facts and concentrate on offering reasons (essentially,
statements linked with “because”), but you may also legitimately
bring the facts home to your readers by seeking to induce in them
the appropriate emotions. Your words will be fallacious only if you
stimulate emotions that are not rightly connected with the facts of
the case.
DOES ALL WRITING CONTAIN ARGUMENTS?
Our answer to the question we have just posed is no — but probably
most writing does contain an argument of sorts. Or put it this way:
The writer wants to persuade the reader to see things the way the
writer sees them — at least until the end of the essay. After all, even
a recipe for a cherry pie in a food magazine — a piece of writing that
is primarily expository (how to do it) rather than argumentative
(how a reasonable person ought to think about this topic) — proba-
bly includes, near the beginning, a sentence with a hint of an argu-
ment in it, such as “Because [a sign that a reason will be offered] this
pie can be made quickly and with ingredients (canned cherries) that
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are always available, give it a try, and it will surely become one of
your favorites.” Clearly, such a statement cannot stand as a formal
argument — a discussion that takes account of possible counterargu-
ments, that relies chiefly on logic and little if at all on emotional
appeal, and that draws a conclusion that seems irrefutable.
Still, the statement is something of an argument on behalf of
making a pie with canned cherries. In this case, a claim is made
(the pie will become a favorite), and two reasons are offered in sup-
port of this claim:
• It can be made quickly, and
• The chief ingredient — because it is canned — can always be at
hand.
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✓ A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING AN ARGUMENT
� What is the writer’s claim or thesis? Ask yourself:
� What claim is being asserted?
� What assumptions are being made — and are they
acceptable?
� Are important terms satisfactorily defined?
� What support (evidence) is offered on behalf of the claim? Ask
yourself:
� Are the examples relevant, and are they convincing?
� Are the statistics (if any) relevant, accurate, and complete?
Do they allow only the interpretation that is offered in the
argument?
� If authorities are cited, are they indeed authorities on this
topic, and can they be regarded as impartial?
� Is the logic — deductive and inductive — valid?
� If there is an appeal to emotion — for instance, if satire is used
to ridicule the opposing view — is this appeal acceptable?
� Does the writer seem to you to be fair? Ask yourself:
� Are counterarguments adequately considered?
� Is there any evidence of dishonesty or of a discreditable
attempt to manipulate the reader?
� How does the writer establish the image of himself or herself
that we sense in the essay? What is the writer’s tone, and is
it appropriate?
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The underlying assumptions are
• You don’t have a great deal of time to waste in the kitchen,
and
• Canned cherries are just as tasty as fresh cherries — and even
if they aren’t, well, you wouldn’t know the difference.
When we read a lead-in to a recipe, then, we won’t find a for-
mal argument, but we probably will get a few words that seek to
persuade us to keep reading. And most writing does contain such
material — sentences that give us a reason to keep reading, that
engage our interests, and that make us want to stay with the writer
for at least a little longer. If the recipe happens to be difficult and
time-consuming, the lead-in may say, “Although this recipe for a
cherry pie, using fresh cherries that you will have to pit, is a bit
more time-consuming than the usual recipe that calls for canned
cherries, once you have tasted it you will never go back to canned
cherries.” Again, although the logic is scarcely compelling, the per-
suasive element is evident. The assumption here is that you have a
discriminating palate; once you have tasted a pie made with fresh
cherries, you will never again enjoy the canned stuff. The writer is
not giving us a formal argument, with abundant evidence and with
a detailed refutation of counterarguments, but we do know where
the writer stands and how the writer wishes us to respond.
AN EXAMPLE: AN ARGUMENT AND A LOOK
AT THE WRITER’S STRATEGIES
This essay concerns President George W. Bush’s proposal that
drilling be allowed in part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
(ANWR, pronounced “An-war”). The section of the ANWR that is
proposed for drilling is called the “1002 area,” as defined by Section
1002 of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act of
1980. In March 2003, the Senate rejected the Bush proposal, but
the issue remains alive.
We follow George F. Will’s essay with some comments about
the ways in which he constructs his argument.
George F. Will
George F. Will (b. 1941), a syndicated columnist whose writing appears in
460 newspapers, was born in Champaign, Illinois, and educated at Trinity
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College (Hartford), Oxford University, and Princeton University. Will has
served as the Washington, D.C., editor of the National Review and now
writes a regular column for Newsweek. His essays have been collected in
several books.
Being Green at Ben and Jerry’s
Some Environmental Policies Are Feel-Good
Indulgences for an Era of Energy Abundance
If you have an average-size dinner table, four feet by six feet,
put a dime on the edge of it. Think of the surface of the table as the
Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. The dime is larger than
the piece of the coastal plain that would have been opened to
drilling for oil and natural gas. The House of Representatives voted
for drilling, but the Senate voted against access to what Sen. John
Kerry, Massachusetts Democrat and presidential aspirant, calls “a
few drops of oil.” ANWR could produce, for twenty-five years, at
least as much oil as America currently imports from Saudi Arabia.
Six weeks of desultory Senate debate about the energy bill
reached an almost comic culmination in . . . yet another agriculture
subsidy. The subsidy is a requirement that will triple the amount of
ethanol, which is made from corn, that must be put in gasoline,
ostensibly to clean America’s air, actually to buy farmers’ votes.
Over the last three decades, energy use has risen about 30 per-
cent. But so has population, which means per capita energy use is
unchanged. And per capita GDP has risen substantially, so we are
using 40 percent less energy per dollar output. Which is one reason
there is no energy crisis, at least none as most Americans under-
stand such things — a shortage of, and therefore high prices of,
gasoline for cars, heating oil for furnaces and electricity for air con-
ditioners.
In the absence of a crisis to concentrate the attention of the
inattentive American majority, an intense faction — full-time
environmentalists — goes to work. Spencer Abraham, the secretary
of Energy, says “the previous administration . . . simply drew up a
list of fuels it didn’t like — nuclear energy, coal, hydropower, and
oil — which together account for 73 percent of America’s energy
supply.” Well, there are always windmills.
Sometimes lofty environmentalism is a cover for crude politics.
The United States has the world’s largest proven reserves of coal.
But Mike Oliver, a retired physicist and engineer, and John Hospers,
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professor emeritus of philosophy at USC, note that in 1996
President Clinton put 68 billion tons of America’s cleanest-burning
coal, located in Utah, off-limits for mining, ostensibly for environ-
mental reasons. If every existing U.S. electric power plant burned
coal, the 68 billion tons could fuel them for forty-five years at the
current rate of consumption. Now power companies must import
clean-burning coal, some from mines owned by Indonesia’s Lippo
Group, the heavy contributor to Clinton, whose decision about
Utah’s coal vastly increased the value of Lippo’s coal.
The United States has just 2.14 percent of the world’s proven
reserves of oil, so some people say it is pointless to drill in places like
ANWR because “energy independence” is a chimera. Indeed it is.
But domestic supplies can provide important insurance against
uncertain foreign supplies. And domestic supplies can mean export-
ing hundreds of billions of dollars less to oil-producing nations, such
as Iraq.
Besides, when considering proven reserves, note the adjective.
In 1930 the United States had proven reserves of 13 billion barrels.
We then fought the Second World War and fueled the most fabu-
lous economic expansion in human history, including the electric-
ity-driven “New Economy.” (Manufacturing and running computers
consume 15 percent of U.S. electricity. Internet use alone accounts
for half of the growth in demand for electricity.) So by 1990 proven
reserves were . . . 17 billion barrels, not counting any in Alaska or
Hawaii.
In 1975 proven reserves in the Persian Gulf were 74 billion
barrels. In 1993 they were 663 billion, a ninefold increase. At the
current rate of consumption, today’s proven reserves would last
150 years. New discoveries will be made, some by vastly improved
techniques of deep-water drilling. But environmental policies will
define opportunities. The government estimates that beneath the
U.S. outer continental shelf, which the government owns, there
are at least 46 billion barrels of oil. But only 2 percent of the shelf
has been leased for energy development.
Opponents of increased energy production usually argue for
decreased consumption. But they flinch from conservation mea-
sures. A new $1 gasoline tax would dampen demand for gasoline,
but it would stimulate demands for the heads of the tax increasers.
After all, Americans get irritable when impersonal market forces
add 25 cents to the cost of a gallon. Tougher fuel-efficiency require-
ments for vehicles would save a lot of energy. But who would save
the legislators who passed those requirements? Beware the wrath
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of Americans who like to drive, and autoworkers who like to make
cars that are large, heavy, and safer than the gasoline-sippers that
environmentalists prefer.
Some environmentalism is a feel-good indulgence for an era
of energy abundance, which means an era of avoided choices. Or
ignored choices — ignored because if acknowledged, they would
not make the choosers feel good. Karl Zinsmeister, editor in chief
of the American Enterprise magazine, imagines an oh-so-green
environmentalist enjoying the most politically correct product on
the planet — Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. Made in a factory that
depends on electricity-guzzling refrigeration, a gallon of ice
cream requires four gallons of milk. While making that much
milk, a cow produces eight gallons of manure, and flatulence
with another eight gallons of methane, a potent “greenhouse”
gas. And the cow consumes lots of water plus three pounds of
grain and hay, which is produced with tractor fuel, chemical fer-
tilizers, herbicides and insecticides, and is transported with truck
or train fuel:
“So every time he digs into his Cherry Garcia, the conscientious
environmentalist should visualize (in addition to world peace) a
pile of grain, water, farm chemicals, and energy inputs much bigger
than his ice cream bowl on one side of the table, and, on the other
side of the table, a mound of manure eight times the size of his
bowl, plus a balloon of methane that would barely fit under the
dining room table.”
Cherry Garcia. It’s a choice. Bon appêtit.
George F. Will’s Strategies
Now let’s look at Will’s essay, to see some of the techniques that he
uses, techniques that enable him to engage a reader’s interest and
perhaps enable him to convince the reader, or at least make the
reader think, that Will probably is on to something.
We need hardly add that if you think some or all of his tech-
niques — his methods, his strategies — are effective, you will con-
sider adapting them for use in your own essays.
The title, “Being Green at Ben and Jerry’s,” does not at all prepare
the reader for an argument about drilling in the National Arctic
Wildlife Refuge, but if you have read any of Will’s other columns in
Newsweek, you probably know that he is conservative and that he
will be poking some fun at the green folk — the environmentalists.
Will can get away with using a title that is not focused because he
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has a body of loyal readers — people who will read him because they
want to read him, whatever the topic is — but the rest of us writers
have to give our readers some idea of what we will be talking about.
In short, let your readers know early, perhaps in the title, where you
will be taking them.
The subtitle, “Some Environmental Policies Are Feel-Good
Indulgences for an Era of Energy Abundance,” perhaps added by
an editor of the magazine, does suggest that the piece will concern
energy, and the words “feel-good indulgence” pretty clearly tell read-
ers that Will believes the environmentalists are indulging themselves.
Paragraph 1 offers a striking comparison. Will wants us to
believe that the area proposed for drilling is tiny, so he says that if
we imagine the entire Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as a dinner
table, the area proposed for drilling is the size of a dime. We think
you will agree that this opening seizes a reader’s attention. Assuming
the truth of the figure — but there seems to be some dispute, since
opponents have said that the area would be more like the size of
a dinner plate — the image is highly effective. A dime is so small!
And is worth so little! Still, one might ask (but probably one
doesn’t, because Will’s figure is so striking) if the tininess of the
area really is decisive. One might easily, and apparently with rea-
son, dismiss as absurd the idea that a minuscule tsetse fly could
kill a human being, or that the plague is spread by fleas that have
bitten rats, because these proposals sound ridiculous — but they
are true.
One other point about the first paragraph: Will’s voice sounds
like a voice you might hear in your living room: “If you have an
average-size dinner table,” “the dime is larger,” ”at least as much
oil.” Don’t think that in your own essays you need to adopt a
highly formal style. Your reader should think of you as serious but
not solemn.
Will goes on to say that Senator John Kerry, an opponent of
drilling and therefore on the side that Will opposes, dismisses the
oil in the refuge as “a few drops.” Will replies that it “could pro-
duce, for twenty-five years, at least as much oil as America cur-
rently imports from Saudi Arabia.” Kerry’s “a few drops” is, of
course, not to be taken literally; he means, in effect, that the oil is a
drop in the bucket. But when one looks into the issue, one finds
that estimates by responsible sources vary considerably, from 3.2
billion barrels to 11. 5 billion barrels.
Paragraph 2 dismisses the Senate’s debate (“almost comic, actu-
ally to buy farmers’ votes”).
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Paragraph 3 offers statistics to make the point that “there is no
energy crisis.” Here, as in the first paragraph (where he showed his
awareness of Kerry’s view), Will indicates that he is familiar with
views other than his own. In arguing a case, it is important for the
writer to let readers know that indeed there are other views —
which the writer then goes on to show are less substantial than the
writer’s. Will is correct in saying that “per capita energy use is
unchanged,” but those on the other side might say, “Yes, per capita
consumption has not increased, but given the population increase,
the annual amount has vastly increased, which means that resources
are being depleted and that pollution is increasing.”
Paragraph 4 asserts again that there is no energy crisis, pokes
fun at “fulltime environmentalists” (perhaps there is a suggestion
that such people really ought to get a respectable job), and ends
with a bit of whimsy: These folks probably think we should go back
to using windmills.
Paragraph 5, in support of the assertion that “Sometimes lofty
environmentalism is a cover for crude politics,” cites an authority
(often an effective technique), and, since readers are not likely to
recognize the name, it also identifies him (“professor emeritus of
philosophy at USC”), and it then offers further statistics (again
effective). The paragraph begins by talking about ”crude politics”
and ends with the assertion that “Now power companies must
import clean-burning coal, some from mines owned by Indonesia’s
Lippo Group, the heavy contributor to Clinton.” In short, Will does
what he can to suggest that the views of at least some environmen-
talists are rooted in money and politics.
Paragraph 6 offers another statistic (“The United States has just
2.14 percent of the world’s proven reserves of oil”), and he turns it
against those who argue that therefore it is pointless for us to drill in
Alaska. In effect, Will is replying to people like Senator Kerry who
say that the Arctic refuge provides only “a few drops of oil.” The
point, Will suggests, is not that we can’t achieve independence; the
point is that “domestic supplies can provide important insurance
against uncertain foreign supplies.”
Paragraph 7 begins nicely with a transition, “Besides,” and then
offers additional statistics concerning the large amount of oil that
we have. It was, for instance, enough to fuel “the most fabulous
economic expansion in human history.”
Paragraph 8 offers additional statistics, first about “proven
reserves” in the Persian Gulf and then about an estimate — but it is
only an estimate — of oil “beneath the U.S. outer continental shelf.”
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We are not certain of Will’s point, but in any case the statistics sug-
gest to a reader that the author has done his homework.
Paragraph 9 summarizes the chief position (as Will sees it) of
those on the other side: They usually argue for decreased consump-
tion, but they are afraid to argue for the sort of tax on gasoline that
might indeed decrease consumption because they know that many
Americans want to drive large, heavy cars. Further, the larger,
heavier cars that the environmentalists object to are in fact “safer
than the gasoline-sippers that environmentalists prefer.”
Paragraph 10 uses the term “feel-good indulgence,” which is
also found in the subtitle of the essay, and now, in the third sen-
tence of the paragraph, we hear again of Ben and Jerry, who have
not been in our minds since the title of the essay, “Being Green at
Ben and Jerry’s.” Perhaps we have been wondering all this while
why Ben and Jerry are in the title. Almost surely the reader knows
that Ben and Jerry are associated with ice cream and therefore with
cows and meadows, and probably many readers know, at least
vaguely, that Ben and Jerry are somehow associated with environ-
mentalism and with other causes often thought to be on the left.
Will (drawing on an article by Karl Zinsmeister, editor of the
American Enterprise), writes what we consider an extremely amus-
ing paragraph in which he points out that the process of making ice
cream “depends on electricity-guzzling refrigeration” and that the
cows are, so to speak, supported by fuel that transports fertilizers,
herbicides, and insecticides. Further, in the course of producing the
four gallons of milk that are required for one gallon of ice cream,
the cows themselves — those darlings of environmentalists — con-
tribute “eight gallons of manure, and flatulence with another eight
gallons of methane, a potent ‘greenhouse’ gas.” As we see when we
read Will’s next paragraph, the present paragraph is in large mea-
sure a lead-in for the following quotation. Will knows it is is not
enough to give a quotation; a writer has to make use of the quota-
tion — has to lead in to it or, after quoting, has to comment on it, or
do both.
Paragraph 11 is entirely devoted to quoting Zinsmeister, who
imagines an environmentalist digging into a dish of one of Ben and
Jerry’s most popular flavors, Cherry Garcia. We are invited to see
the bowl of ice cream on one side of the table — here Will effec-
tively evokes the table of his first paragraph — and a pile of manure
on the other side, “plus a balloon of methane that would barely fit
under the dining room table.” Vulgar, no doubt, but funny too.
George Will knows that humor as well as logic (and statistics and
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other kinds of evidence) can be among the tools a writer uses in
getting an audience to accept or at least to consider an argument.
Paragraph 12 consists of three short sentences, adding up to less
than a single line of type: “Cherry Garcia. It’s a choice. Bon appêtit.”
None of the sentences mentions oil or the Arctic Refuge or statis-
tics, and therefore this ending might seem utterly irrelevant to the
topic, but we think Will is very effectively saying, “Sure, you have a
choice about drilling in the Arctic Refuge; any sensible person will
choose the ice cream (drilling) rather than the manure and the gas
(not drilling).
TOPICS FOR CRITICAL THINKING AND WRITING
1. What, if anything, makes Will’s essay interesting? What, if any-
thing, makes it highly persuasive? How might it be made more
persuasive?
2. In paragraph 10, Will clowns a bit about the gas that cows emit,
but apparently this gas, which contributes to global warming, is no
laughing matter. The government of New Zealand, in an effort to
reduce livestock emissions of methane and nitrous oxide, pro-
posed a tax that would subsidize future research on the emissions.
The tax would cost the average farmer $300 a year. Imagine that
you are a New Zealand farmer. Write a letter to your representa-
tive, arguing for or against the tax.
3. Senator Barbara Boxer, campaigning against the proposal to drill
in ANWR, spoke of the refuge as “God’s gift to us” (New York Times,
March 20, 2002). How strong an argument is she offering? Some
opponents of drilling have said that drilling in ANWR is as unthink-
able as drilling in Yosemite or the Grand Canyon. Again, how
strong is this argument? Can you imagine circumstances in which
you would support drilling in these places? Do we have a moral
duty to preserve certain unspoiled areas?
4. The Inupiat (Eskimo) who live in and near ANWR by a large
majority favor drilling, seeing it as a source of jobs and a source of
funding for schools, hospitals, and police. But the Ketchikan
Indians, who speak of themselves as the “Caribou People,” see
drilling as a threat to the herds that they depend on for food and
hides. How does one balance the conflicting needs of these two
groups?
5. Opponents of drilling in ANWR argue that over its lifetime of fifty
years, the area would produce less than 1 percent of the fuel we
need during the period and that therefore we should not risk
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disturbing the area. Further, they argue that drilling in ANWR is
an attempt at a quick fix to U.S. energy needs, whereas what is
needed are sustainable solutions, such as the development of
renewable energy sources (e.g., wind and sun) and fuel-efficient
automobiles. How convincing do you find these arguments?
6. Proponents of drilling include a large majority — something like
75 percent of the people of Alaska, including its governor and its
two senators. How much attention should be paid to their voices?
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Visual Rhetoric:
Images as Arguments
A picture is worth a thousand words.
— CHINESE PROVERB
“What is the use of a book,” thought Alice, “without
pictures or conversations?”
— LEWIS CARROLL
SOME USES OF IMAGES
Most visual materials that accompany written arguments serve one
of two functions—they appeal to the emotions (a photograph of a
calf in a pen so narrow that the calf cannot turn, in an essay on ani-
mal liberation) or they clarify numerical data (a graph showing five
decades of male and female law school enrollments). There are of
course additional uses for pictures, for example cartoons may add a
welcome touch of humor or satire, but in this chapter we concen-
trate on appeals to emotion and briefly on graphs and related images.
APPEALS TO THE EYE
We began the preceding chapter by distinguishing between argu-
ment, which we said relies on reason (logos), and persuasion, which
we said is a broad term that can include appeal to the emotions
(pathos)—for example, an appeal to pity. Threats, too, can be per-
suasive. As Al Capone famously said, “You can get a lot more done
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9
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with a kind word and a gun than with a kind word alone.” Indeed,
most of the remarks that we can think of link persuasion not with
the power of reason but with the power of emotional appeals, of
flattery, of threats, and of appeals to self-interest. We have in mind
passages spoken not only by the likes of the racketeer Al Capone,
but by more significant figures. Consider these two remarks, which
both use the word interest in the sense of “self-interest”:
Would you persuade, speak of Interest, not Reason.
—Ben Franklin
There are two levers for moving men—interest and fear.
—Napoleon Bonaparte
An appeal to self-interest is obviously at the heart of most adver-
tisements: “Buy X automobile, and members of the opposite sex
will find you irresistible,” “Use Y instant soup, and your family will
love you more,” “Try Z cereal and enjoy regularity.” We will look at
advertisements later in this chapter, but first let’s talk a bit more
about the use and abuse of visual material in persuasion.
When we discussed the appeal to emotion (p. 82), we quoted
from Mark Antony’s speech to the Roman populace in Shakespeare’s
Julius Caesar. You will recall that Antony stirred the mob by display-
ing Caesar’s blood-stained mantle, that is, by supplementing his
words with visual material:
Look, in this place ran Cassius’ dagger through;
See what a rent the envious Casca made;
Through this, the well-belovèd Brutus stabbed. . . .
In courtrooms today, trial lawyers and prosecutors still do this sort
of thing when
• They exhibit photos of a bloody corpse, or
• They introduce as witnesses small children who sob as they
describe the murder of their parents.
The appeal clearly is not to reason but to the jurors’ emotions—
and yet, can we confidently say that this sort of visual evidence—
this attempt to stir anger at the alleged perpetrator of the crime
and
pity for the victims —is irrelevant? Why shouldn’t jurors vicariously
experience the assault?
When we think about it—and it takes only a moment of
thinking—the appeal in the courtroom to the eye and then to the
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Martin Luther King Jr. delivering his “I Have a Dream” speech on August
28, 1963, from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. The visual aspects —the
setting (the Lincoln Memorial with the Washington Monument and the
Capitol in the distance) and King’s gestures —are part of the persuasive
rhetoric of the speech.
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heart or mind is evident even in smaller things, such as the cloth-
ing that the lawyers wear and the clothing that they advise their
clients to wear. To take the most obvious, classic example: The
mugger who normally wears jeans, a T-shirt, and a leather jacket
appears in court in a three-piece suit, dress shirt, and necktie.
Lawyers know that in arguing a case, visuals make statements—
perhaps not logical arguments but nevertheless meaningful state-
ments that will attract or repel jurors.
Another sort of visual appeal connected with some arguments
should be mentioned briefly—the visual appeal of the specific set-
ting in which the argument occurs. Martin Luther King Jr.’s great
speech of August 28, 1963, “I Have a Dream,” still reads very well
on the page, but part of its immense appeal when it was first given
was due to its setting: King spoke to some 200,000 people in
Washington, D.C., as he stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
That setting was part of King’s argument.
APPEALS TO THE EYE 99
(Edvard Munch, The
Scream. © 2007 The
Munch Museum/The
Munch-Ellingsen
Group/Artists Rights
Society (ARS), NY.
Digital Image ©/The
Museum of Modern
Art, NY. Licensed by
SCALA/Art
Resource.)
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Pictures—and here we get to our chief subject—are also
sometimes used as parts of arguments because pictures make state-
ments. Some pictures, like Edvard Munch’s The Scream (p. 99),
make obvious statements: The swiftly receding diagonal lines of the
fence and the walkway, the wavy sky, and the vibrating vertical
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Images played an important role in the activities of the antislavery movement
in the nineteenth century. On the top left is a diagram that shows how human
cargo was packed into a slave ship; it was distributed with Thomas Clarkson’s
Essay on the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species (1804). On the top right is
Frederick W. Mercer’s photograph (April 2, 1863) of Gordon, a “badly lacerated”
runaway slave. Images such as the slave ship and Gordon were used against the
claims of slaveowners that slavery was a humane institution—claims that also
were supported by illustrations, such as the woodcut at the bottom, titled
Attention Paid to a Poor Sick Negro, from Josiah Priest’s In Defense of Slavery.
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lines to the right of the figure all convey the great agitation experi-
enced by the figure in the woodcut. Some pictures, like the photo-
graphs shown to members of Congress during the debate over
whether permission should be given to drill in the Arctic National
Wildlife Refuge are a bit less obvious:
• Opponents of drilling showed beautiful pictures of polar
bears frolicking, wildflowers in bloom, and caribou on the
move.
• Proponents of drilling showed bleak pictures of what they
called “barren land” and “a frozen wasteland.”
Both sides knew very well that images are powerful persuaders,
and they did not hesitate to use images as supplements to words.
We again invite you to think about the appropriateness of
using images in arguments. Should argument be entirely a matter
of reason, of logic, without appeals to the emotions? Or can
images of the sort that we have already mentioned provide visual
(and emotional) support for reasons that are offered? The state-
ment that “the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is a home for abun-
dant wildlife, notably polar bears, caribou, and wildflowers” may
not mean much until it is reinforced with breathtaking images.
(And, similarly, the statement that “most of the ANWR land is bar-
ren” may not mean much until it is corroborated by images of the
vast bleakness.)
ARE SOME IMAGES NOT FIT TO BE SHOWN? 101
A RULE FOR WRITERS: If you think that pictures will help you to
make the point you are arguing, include them with captions
explaining sources and relevance.
ARE SOME IMAGES NOT FIT TO BE SHOWN?
Images of suffering—human or, as animal rights activists have
made us see, animal—can be immensely persuasive. In the nine-
teenth century, for instance, the antislavery movement made
extremely effective use of images in its campaign. We reproduce
two antislavery images here, as well as a counterimage that sought
to assure viewers that slavery is a beneficent system. But are there
some images not fit to print?
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Huynh Cong (Nick) Ut, The Terror of War: Children on Route 1 near Trang Bang
Until recently, many newspapers did not print pictures of
lynched African Americans, hanged and burned and maimed. The
reasons for not printing such images probably differed in the South
and North: Southern papers may have considered the images to be
discreditable to whites, while Northern papers may have deemed
the images too revolting. Even today, when it is commonplace to
see in newspapers and on television screens pictures of dead victims
of war, or famine, or traffic accidents, one rarely sees bodies that are
horribly maimed. (For traffic accidents, the body is usually covered,
and we see only the smashed car.) The U.S. government has refused
to release photographs showing the bodies of American soldiers
killed in the war in Iraq, and it has been most reluctant to show pic-
tures of dead Iraqi soldiers and civilians. Only after many Iraqis
refused to believe that Saddam Hussein’s two sons had been killed
did the U.S. government reluctantly release pictures showing the
blood-spattered faces of the two men—and some American news-
papers and television programs refused to use the images.
There have been notable exceptions to this practice, such as
Huynh Cong (Nick) Ut’s 1972 photograph of children fleeing a
napalm attack in Vietnam (above), which was widely reproduced
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in the United States and won the photographer a Pulitzer Prize in
1973. The influence of this particular photograph cannot be meas-
ured, but it is widely felt to have played a substantial role in
increasing public pressure to end the Vietnam War. Another widely
reproduced picture of horrifying violence is Eddie Adams’s picture
(above) (1968) of a South Vietnamese chief of police firing a pistol
into the head of a Viet Cong prisoner.
The issue remains: Are some images unacceptable? For instance,
although capital punishment is legal in parts of the United States—
by methods including lethal injection, hanging, shooting, and
electrocution —every state in the Union prohibits the publication of
pictures showing a criminal being executed. (On this topic, see
Wendy Lesser, Pictures at an Execution [1993].)
The most famous recent example of an image widely thought
to be unprintable concerns the murder of Daniel Pearl, a Jewish
reporter for the Wall Street Journal. Pearl was captured and mur-
dered in June 2002 by Islamic terrorists in Pakistan. His killers
videotaped Pearl reading a statement denouncing American pol-
icy, and being decapitated. The video also shows a man’s arm
holding Pearl’s head. The video ends with the killers making sev-
eral demands (such as the release of the Muslim prisoners being
held by the United States in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba) and asserting
ARE SOME IMAGES NOT FIT TO BE SHOWN? 103
Eddie Adams, Execution of Viet Cong prisoner, Saigon, 196
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that “if our demands are not met, this scene will be repeated
again and again.”
The chief arguments against reproducing in newspapers mate-
rial from this video were that
• The video and even still images from it are unbearably grue-
some;
• Showing the video would traumatize the Pearl family; and
• The video is propaganda by an enemy.
Those who favored broadcasting the video on television and print-
ing still images from it in newspapers tended to argue that
• The photo will show the world what sort of enemy the
United States is fighting;
• Newspapers have published pictures of other terrifying sights
(notably, people leaping out of windows of New York’s twin
towers and endless pictures of the space shuttle Challenger
exploding); and
• No one was worried about protecting the families of these
other victims from seeing painful images.
But ask yourself if the comparison of the Daniel Pearl video to the
photos of the twin towers and of the Challenger is valid. You may
respond that the individuals in the twin towers pictures are not
specifically identifiable and that the images of the Challenger,
though horrifying, are not as visually revolting as the picture of a
severed head held up for view.
The Boston Phoenix, a weekly newspaper, published some
images from the Daniel Pearl video and also put a link to the video
(with a warning that the footage is “extremely graphic”) on its Web
site. The editor of the Phoenix justified publication on the three
grounds we list. Pearl’s wife, Mariane Pearl, was quoted in various
newspapers as condemning the “heartless decision to air this despi-
cable video,” and a spokeswoman for the Pearl family, when asked
for comment, referred reporters to a statement issued earlier, which
said that broadcasters who show the video
fall without shame into the terrorists’ plan. . . . Danny believed
that journalism was a tool to report the truth and foster
understanding — not perpetuate propaganda and sensationalize
tragedy. We had hoped that no part of this tape would ever see
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the light of day. . . . We urge all networks and news outlets to
exercise responsibility and not aid the terrorists in spreading their
message of hate and murder.1
Although some journalists expressed regret that Pearl’s family was
distressed, they insisted that journalists have a right to reproduce
such material and that the images can serve the valuable purpose
of shocking viewers into awareness.
Politics and Pictures
Consider, too, the controversy that erupted in 1991, during the
Persian Gulf War, our government decided that newspapers would
not be allowed to photograph the coffins returning with the bodies
of military personnel killed during the war. In later years the policy
was sometimes ignored, but in 2003 the George W. Bush adminis-
tration decreed that there would be “no arrival ceremony for, or
media coverage of, deceased military personnel returning [from
Iraq or Afghanistan ] . . . to the Dover (Delaware) base.” The gov-
ernment enforced the policy strictly.
Members of the news media strongly protested, as did many
others, chiefly arguing that
• The administration was trying to sanitize the war, i.e. was
depriving the public of important information—images—
that showed the real cost of the war. Additional arguments
against the ban were
• Grief for the deaths of military personnel is not a matter only
for the families of the deceased. The sacrifices were made for
the nation, and the nation should be allowed to grieve.
Canada and Britain have no such ban, and when the coffins
are transported the public lines the streets to pay honor to
the fallen warriors. In fact, in Canada a portion of the high-
way near the Canadian base has been renamed, “Highway of
Heroes.” Further,
• The coffins at Dover Air Force base are not identified by
name, so there is no issue about intruding on the privacy of
grieving families.
ARE SOME IMAGES NOT FIT TO BE SHOWN? 10
5
1Quoted in the Hartford Courant, June 5, 2002, and reproduced on the Internet by
the Freedom of Information Center, under the heading “Boston Paper Creates
Controversy.”
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The chief arguments in defense of the ban are
• Photographs violate the privacy of the families
• If the arrival of the coffins at Dover is given publicity, some
grieving families will think they should go to Dover to be
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Coffins at Dover Air Force Base, Delaware
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present when the bodies arrive, and this may cause a finan-
cial hardship on the families. Finally,
• If the families give their consent, the press is not barred from
individual graveside ceremonies at home-town burials. The
ban extends only to the arrival of the coffins at Dover Air
Force Base.
In February 2009, President Obama changed the policy and
permitted coverage of the transfer of bodily remains. In his
Address to the Joint Session of Congress, February 24, 2009, he
said, “For seven years we have been a nation at war. No longer
will we hide its price.” On February 27, Defense Secretary Robert
M. Gates announced that the government ban was lifted, and
that families will decide whether to allow photographs and
videos of the “dignified transfer process at Dover.”
EXERCISE
In an argumentative essay of about 250 words — perhaps two or three
paragraphs — give your view of the matter. In an opening paragraph
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you may want to explain the issue, and in this same paragraph you
may want to summarize the arguments that you reject. The second
(and perhaps final) paragraph of a two-paragraph essay may give the
reasons you reject those arguments. Additionally, you may want to
devote a third paragraph to a more general reflection.
TOPIC FOR CRITICAL THINKING AND WRITING
Marvin Kalb, a distinguished journalist, was quoted as saying that
the public has a right to see the tape of Daniel Pearl’s murder but
that “common sense, decency, [and] humanity would encourage
editors . . . to say ‘no, it is not necessary to put this out.’ There is no
urgent demand on the part of the American people to see Daniel
Pearl’s death.” Your view?
Query In June 2006 two American soldiers were captured in
Iraq. Later their bodies were found, dismembered and beheaded.
Should newspapers have shown photographs of the mutilated
bodies? Why, or why not? (In July 2006 insurgents in Iraq posted
images on the Internet, showing a soldier’s severed head beside
his body.)
Another issue concerning the appropriateness or inappropriate-
ness of showing images occurred early in 2006. In September 2005
a Danish newspaper, accused of being afraid to show political car-
toons that were hostile to Muslim terrorists, responded by publish-
ing twelve cartoons. One cartoon, for instance, showed the Prophet
Muhammad wearing a turban that looked like a bomb. The images
at first did not arouse much attention, but when in January 2006
they were reprinted in Norway they attracted worldwide attention
and outraged Muslims, most of whom regard any depiction of the
Prophet as blasphemous. The upshot is that some Muslims in vari-
ous Islamic nations burned Danish embassies and engaged in other
acts of violence. Most non-Muslims agreed that the images were in
bad taste, and apparently in deference to Islamic sensibilities (but
possibly also out of fear of reprisals) very few Western newspapers
reprinted the cartoons when they covered the news events. Most
newspapers (including the New York Times) were content merely to
describe the images. These papers believed that readers had to be
told the news but because the drawings were so offensive to some
persons they should be described rather than reprinted. A contro-
versy then arose: Do readers of a newspaper deserve to see the evi-
dence for themselves, or can a newspaper adequately fulfill its
function by offering only a verbal description?
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Persons who argued that the images should be reproduced gen-
erally made these points:
• Newspapers should yield neither to the delicate sensibilities
of some readers nor to threats of violence.
• Jews for the most part do not believe that God should be
depicted (the prohibition against “graven images” is found
in Exodus 20.3), but they raise no objections to such
Christian images as Michelangelo’s painting of God awaken-
ing Adam, on the roof of the Sistine Chapel. Further, when
Andres Serrano (a Christian) in 1989 exhibited a photograph
of a small plastic crucifix submerged in urine, it outraged a
wider public—several U.S. senators condemned it because
the artist had received federal funds—but virtually all news-
papers showed the image, and many even printed its title,
Piss Christ. That is, the subject was judged to be newsworthy,
and the fact that some viewers would regard the image as
blasphemous was not considered highly relevant.
• We value freedom of speech, and newspapers should not be
intimidated. When certain pictures are a matter of news, the
pictures should be shown to readers.
On the other hand, opposing voices were heard:
• Newspapers should—must—recognize deep-seated religious
beliefs. They should indeed report the news, but there is no
reason to show images that some people regard as blasphe-
mous. The images can be adequately described in words.
• The Jewish response to Christian images of God and even the
tolerant Christian’s response to Serrano’s image of Christ
immersed in urine are simply irrelevant to the issue of whether
images of the Prophet Muhammad should be represented in a
Western newspaper. Virtually all Muslims regard depictions of
the Prophet as blasphemous, and that is what counts.
• Despite all the Western talk about freedom of the press, the
press does not reproduce all images that become matters of
news. For instance, news items about the sale of child pornog-
raphy do not include images of the pornographic photos.
EXERCISES: THINKING ABOUT IMAGES
1. Does the display of the cartoons constitute an argument? If so,
what is the conclusion, and what are the premises? If not, then
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what sort of statement, if any, does publishing these cartoons con-
stitute?
2. Hugh Hewitt, an evangelical Christian, offered a comparison to the
cartoon of Muhammad with a bomblike turban. Suppose, he
asked, an abortion clinic had been bombed by someone who said
he was an Evangelical Christian. Would newspapers publish “a
cartoon of Christ’s crown of thorns transformed into sticks of
TNT?” Do you think they would? If you were the editor of a paper,
would you? Why, or why not?
3. One American newspaper, the Boston Phoenix, did not publish any
of the cartoons “out of fear of retaliation from the international
brotherhood of radical and bloodthirsty Islamists who seek to
impose their will on those who do not believe as they do. . . . We
could not in good conscience place the men and women who
work at the Phoenix and its related companies in physical jeop-
ardy.” Evaluate this position.
READING ADVERTISEMENTS
Advertising is one of the most common forms of visual persuasion
we encounter in everyday life. None of us is so unsophisticated
these days as to believe everything we see in an ad, yet the influ-
ence of advertising in our culture is pervasive and subtle. Consider,
for example, a much-reproduced poster sponsored by Gatorade and
featuring Michael Jordan. Such an image costs an enormous
amount to produce and disseminate, and nothing in it is left to
chance. The photograph of Jordan is typical, his attitude simultane-
ously strained and graceful, his face exultant, as he performs the
feat for which he is so well known and about which most of us
could only dream. We are aware of a crowd watching him, but the
people in this crowd appear tiny, blurred, and indistinct compared
to the huge image in the foreground; the photograph, like the
crowd, focuses solely on Jordan. He is a legend, an icon of
American culture. He is dressed not in his Chicago Bulls uniform
but in a USA jersey, connecting his act of gravity-defying athleti-
cism with the entire nation and with our sense of patriotism. The
red, white, and blue of the uniform strengthens this impression in
the original color photograph of the advertisement.
What do we make of the verbal message boldly written along
the left-hand margin of the poster, “Be like Mike”? We are cer-
tainly not foolish enough to believe that drinking Gatorade will
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enable us to perform like Michael Jordan on the basketball court.
But who among us wouldn’t like to “Be like Mike” in some small
way, to enjoy even a glancing association with his athletic grace
and power —to say nothing of his fame, wealth, and sex appeal?
Though the makers of Gatorade surely know we will not all rush
out to buy their drink to improve our game, they are banking on
the expectation that the association of their name with Jordan,
and our memory of their logo in association with Jordan’s picture,
will create a positive impression of their product. If Mike drinks
Gatorade — well, why shouldn’t I give it a try? The good feelings
and impressions created by the ad will, the advertisers hope, travel
with us the next time we consider buying a sports drink.
As we discuss the power of advertising, it is appropriate to say a
few words about the corporate logos that appear everywhere these
days—on billboards, in newspapers and magazines, on television,
and on T-shirts. It is useful to think of a logo as a sort of advertise-
ment in shorthand. It is a single, usually simple, image that carries
with it a world of associations and impressions. (The makers of
Gatorade would certainly hope that we will be reminded of Michael
Jordan and his slam dunk when we see their product name super-
imposed over the orange lightning bolt.)
Let’s look at two advertisements — one that combines pictures
with verbal text and another that relies almost entirely on a pic-
ture accompanied by only three words. The first ad has two head
shots, pictures of the sort that show “Ten Most Wanted Men.”
Both faces are widely known — Martin Luther King Jr. and
Charles Manson — and viewers may initially wonder why they
are juxtaposed. Then the large type above the pictures captures
our attention with its size and a bold statement of fact:
The man on the left is 75 times more likely to be stopped by the
police while driving than the man on the right.
We presume that the statement is true—that is, that dark-skinned
people are stopped by police officers seventy-five times more often
than whites—and we probably know why. Almost surely we do not
conclude that dark people are far more likely than white to speed,
go through red lights, or cross lanes. We have heard about racial
profiling and racial prejudice, and we may also have heard about
the wry offense of which all African Americans are guilty, “driving
while black.” The small print on this ad goes on to tell us that, every
day, “Police stop drivers based on their skin color rather than for the
way they are driving,” and it supports this assertion with a fact: “For
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American Civil Liberties Union, The Man on the Left
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example, in Florida 80% of those stopped and searched were black
and Hispanic, while they constituted only 5% of all drivers.” We
assume that these statistics are true and that most readers find the
statement alarming. The poster might have had these very words
without the two pictures, but would we then have read the small
print?
Incidentally, the American Civil Liberties Union did not print
this poster for any reason related to Martin Luther King Jr. or
Charles Manson. The poster’s purpose appears in very small letters at
the end of the caption:
Support the ACLU.
We think that this ad is highly effective, and we invite you to
perform a thought experiment. Suppose that the two pictures were
omitted and that the text of the large type at the top of the ad was
different, something like this:
Persons of color, notably African Americans and non-white
Hispanics, are 75 times more likely than white people to be
stopped by the police when driving.
And then suppose the rest of the text consisted of the words in the
present ad. Do you think this alternate version would make nearly
the impact that the ACLU ad makes? The text is essentially the
same, the statistics are still shocking, but the impact is gone. When
we see the ACLU ad, we are for only a tiny fraction of a second, puz-
zled: What can the two faces—a civil rights leader and a serial
killer—have in common? The large print almost immediately lets
us know why these faces are paired, and we are probably hooked
by (a) the shocking juxtaposition of faces and (b) the astounding
fact that is asserted. So we probably go on to read the small print,
though ordinarily we would not bother to read such tiny writing.
Incidentally, the writing beneath the picture could have been
as large, or almost as large, as the print above the picture, merely
by reducing the blank space at the top and bottom of the page.
Why do you suppose the writing beneath the pictures is small? Do
you think the ad would have been as compelling if the type above
and below were of approximately equal size? Why, or why not?
One other point: The pictures of King and Manson catch the
interest of a wide audience, an audience much wider than the
group that would normally be targeted as persons who might con-
tribute money or energy to an association chiefly concerned with
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civil liberties. That is, this ad speaks to almost anyone who may be
concerned with fairness or decency.
The second ad, as you can easily see, uses far fewer words than
the first. The two lines of text are short and sweet: “Set yourself
free” and “When you’re ready to quit smoking, we’re here to help.”
The first of these lines —with “free” in large letters—is re-enforced
by the image of free-floating balloons, which in this context almost
seem to be giant lungs. The implication is that once the viewer
decides to quit smoking, the air will be purer, lungs will fully distend,
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and there will be a great sense of freedom; one will no longer be
tied down in the way that an addiction to tobacco ties one down or
restrains one’s freedom. The second sentence, beneath the
picture—on ground level, so to speak—assures the reader that
when the addict is “ready to quit smoking, we’re here to help.”
READING ADVERTISEMENTS 1
15
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING IMAGES
(ESPECIALLY ADVERTISEMENTS)
� What is the overall effect of the design? Colorful and busy
(suggesting activity)? Quiet and understated (for instance,
chiefly white and grays, with lots of empty space)? Old
fashioned or cutting edge?
� What about the image immediately gets your attention? Size?
Position on the page? Beauty of the image? Grotesqueness of
the image? Humor?
� Who is the audience for the image? Affluent young men? House-
wives? Retired persons?
� What is the argument?
� Does the text make a rational appeal (logos) (“Tests at a leading
university prove that . . . ,” “If you believe X, you should vote
‘No’ on this referendum”)?
� Does the image appeal to the emotions, to dearly held values
(pathos)? Examples: Images of starving children or maltreated
animals appeal to our sense of pity; images of military valor
may appeal to our patriotism; images of luxury may appeal to
our envy; images of sexually attractive people may appeal to
our desire to be like them; images of violence or of extraordi-
nary ugliness (as, for instance, in some ads showing a human
fetus being destroyed) may seek to shock us.
� Does the image make an ethical appeal— that is, does it
appeal to our character as a good human being (ethos)? Ads
by charitable organizations often appeal to our sense of
decency, fairness, and pity, but ads that appeal to our sense of
prudence (ads for insurance companies or for investment
houses) also essentially are making an ethical appeal.
� What is the relation of print to image? Does the image do most
of the work, or does it serve to attract us and to lead us on to
read the text?
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Who, after all, wouldn’t want to be “set . . . free” (especially into
the wonderful world of the floating balloons that soar in the
tobacco-free air), and who wouldn’t want the assurance that, if the
experience is a bit risky, someone is there to help?
TOPICS FOR CRITICAL THINKING AND WRITING
1. Imagine that you work for a business that advertises in a publica-
tion such as Time or Newsweek, for instance, a vacation resort, a man-
ufacturer of clothes, or an automaker. Design an advertisement:
Describe the picture and write the text, and then, in an essay of
500 words, explain who your target audience is (college students?
young couples about to buy their first home? retired persons?)
and explain why you use the sorts of appeals (for instance, to rea-
son, to the emotions, to a sense of humor) that you do.
2. It is often said that colleges, like businesses, are selling a product.
Examine a brochure or catalog that is sent to prospective appli-
cants at a college, and analyze the kinds of appeals that some of
the images make.
WRITING ABOUT A POLITICAL CARTOON
Most editorial pages print political cartoons as well as editorials. Like
the writers of editorials, cartoonists seek to persuade, but they rarely
use words to argue a point. True, they may use a few words in
speech balloons or in captions, but generally the drawing does most
of the work. Because their aim usually is to convince the viewer
that some person’s action or proposal is ridiculous, cartoonists
almost always caricature their subjects:
• They exaggerate the subject’s distinctive features to the point
where
• The subject becomes grotesque and ridiculous—absurd,
laughable, contemptible.
True, it is scarcely fair to suggest that because, say, the politician
who proposes such-and-such is short, fat, and bald his proposal is
ridiculous, but that is the way cartoonists work. Further, cartoonists
are concerned with producing a striking image, not with exploring
an issue, so they almost always oversimplify, implying that there
really is no other sane view.
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In the course of saying that (a) the figures in the cartoon are
ridiculous and therefore their ideas are contemptible, and (b) there is
only one side to the issue, cartoonists often use symbolism, for
instance:
• Symbolic figures (Uncle Sam),
• Animals (the Democratic donkey and the Republican
elephant),
• Buildings (the White House stands symbolically for the presi-
dent of the United States),
• Things (a bag with a dollar sign on it usually symbolizes a
bribe).
For anyone brought up in our culture, these symbols (like the
human figures who are represented) are obvious, and cartoonists
assume that viewers will instantly recognize the symbols and fig-
ures, will get the joke, will see the absurdity of whatever it is that
the cartoonist is seeking to demolish.
In writing about the argument presented in a cartoon, nor-
mally you will discuss the ways in which the cartoon makes its
point. Caricature, we have said, usually says, “This is ridiculous, as
WRITING ABOUT A POLITICAL CARTOON 117
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING POLITICAL CARTOONS
� Is a lead-in provided?
� Is a brief but accurate description of the drawing provided?
� Is the source of the cartoon cited (and perhaps commented on)?
� Is a brief report of the event or issue that the cartoon is dealing
with, and explanation of all of the symbols included?
� Is there a statement of the cartoonist’s claim (point, thesis)?
� Is there an analysis of the evidence, if any, that the image
offers in support of the claim?
� Is there an analysis of the ways in which the content and style
of the drawing help to convey the message?
� Is there adequate evaluation of the effectiveness of the
drawing?
� Is there adequate evaluation of the effectiveness of the text
(caption or speech balloons) and of the fairness of the cartoon?
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IDEA PROMPT 4.1 ANALYSIS OF A POLITICAL CARTOON
Context Who is the “This cartoon by Walt Handelsman
artist? Where was originally publishing in Newsday
and when was on September 12, 2009. Handelsman,
it published? a Pulitzer-Prize–winning cartoonist,
drew this cartoon in response to
recent breaches of political decorum.”
Description What does “It depicts a group of Washington, D.C.
the cartoon tourists being driven past what the
look like? guide calls ‘The Museum of Modern
American Political Discourse,’ a
building in the shape of a giant toilet.”
Analysis How does the “The toilet as a symbol of the level of
cartoon make political discussion dominates the
its point? Is it cartoon, effectively driving home the
effective? point that as Americans we are
watching our leaders sink to new lows
as they debate the future of our
nation. Seen on a scale similar to
familiar monuments in Washington,
Handelsman may be in fact pointing
out that today’s politicians, rather than
being remembered for the great
achievements of George Washington
or Abraham Lincoln, will instead be
remembered for their rudeness and
aggression.”
you can plainly see by the absurdity of the figures depicted.”
“What X’s proposal adds up to, despite its apparent complexity, is
nothing more than . . .”). As we have already said, this sort of per-
suasion, chiefly by ridicule, probably is unfair: A funny-looking
person can offer a thoughtful political proposal, and almost cer-
tainly the issue is more complicated than the cartoonist indicates.
But this is largely the way cartoons work, by ridicule and by omit-
ting counterarguments, and we should not reject the possibility
that the cartoonist has indeed put his or her finger on the absurd-
ity of the issue.
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Probably your essay will include an evaluation of the cartoon;
indeed, the thesis underlying your analytic/argumentative essay
may be (for instance) that the cartoon is effective (persuasive) for
such-and-such reasons, but it is also unfair for such-and-such
reasons.
In analyzing the cartoon—in grasping the attitude of the
cartoonist—consider such things as
• The relative size of the figures in the image;
• The quality of the lines —thin and spidery, or thick and
seemingly aggressive;
• The amount of empty space in comparison with the amount
of heavily inked space (a drawing with lots of inky areas will
convey a more oppressive sense than a drawing that is
largely open);
• The degree to which text is important, and what the text
says—is it witty? Heavy-handed?
Caution: If your instructor lets you choose a cartoon, be sure to
choose one with sufficient complexity to make the exercise worth-
while. (See also Idea Prompt 4.1.)
Let’s look at an example. Jackson Smith wrote this essay in a
composition course at Tufts University.
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Jackson Smith
Pledging Nothing?
(Student Essay)
Gary Markstein’s cartoon about the Pledge of Allegiance is one
of dozens that can be retrieved by a search engine. It happens that
every one of the cartoons that I retrieved mocked the courts for
ruling that schools cannot require students to recite the Pledge of
Allegiance in its present form, which includes the words “under
God.” I personally object to these words, so the cartoons certainly
do not speak for me, but I’ll try as impartially as possible to ana-
lyze the strength of Markstein’s cartoon.
Markstein shows us, in the cartoon, four school children recit-
ing the Pledge. Coming out of all four mouths is a speech balloon
with the words, “One nation under nothing in particular.” The chil-
dren are facing a furled American flag, and to the right of the flag is
a middle-aged female teacher, whose speech balloon is in the form
of a cloud, indicating that she is thinking rather than saying the
words, “God help us.”
Certainly the image grabs us: Little kids lined up reciting the
Pledge of Allegiance, an American flag, a maternal-looking teacher,
and, in fact, if one examines the cartoon closely, one sees an apple
on the teacher’s desk. It’s almost a Norman Rockwell scene, except,
of course, it is a cartoon, so the figures are all a bit grotesque—but,
still, they are nice folks. What is not nice, Markstein says, is what
these kids must recite, “One nation under nothing in particular.” In
fact the cartoon is far from telling the truth. Children who recite
the Pledge without the words “under God” will still be saying that
they are pledging allegiance to something quite specific—the
United States:
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and
to the Republic for which it stands: one nation indivisible, with
Liberty and Justice for all.
That’s really quite a lot, very far from Markstein’s “under nothing
in particular.” But no one, I suppose, expects fairness in a political
cartoon—and of course this cartoon is political, because the issue
of the Pledge has become a political football, with liberals on the
whole wanting the words “under God” removed and conservatives
on the whole wanting the words retained.
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Let’s now look at some of the subtleties of the cartoon. First,
although, as I have said, cartoons present grotesque caricatures, the
figures here are all affectionately presented. None of these figures is
menacing. The teacher, with her spectacles and her rather dumpy
figure, is clearly a benevolent figure, someone who in the eyes of
the cartoonist rightly is disturbed about the fate of these little kids
who are not allowed to say the words “under God.” (Nothing, of
course, prevents the children from speaking about God when
they are not in the classroom. Those who believe in God can say
grace at mealtime, can go to Sunday School, can go to church
regularly, can pray before they go to bed, etc.) Markstein suggests
that the absence of these words makes the entire Pledge mean-
ingless (“under nothing in particular”), and in a master stroke he
has conveyed this idea of impoverishment by showing a tightly
furled flag, a flag that is presented as minimally as possible. After
all, the flag could have been shown more fully, perhaps hanging
from a pole that extended from a wall into the classroom, or the
flag could have been displayed extended against a wall. Instead we
get the narrowest of flags, something that is not much more than a
furled umbrella, identifiable as the American flag by its stripes and
a few stars in the upper third. Markstein thus cleverly suggests that
with the loss of the words “under God,” the flag itself is reduced to
almost nothing.
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Fair? No. Effective? Yes, and that’s the job of a cartoonist.
Readers probably give cartoons no more than three or four sec-
onds, and Markstein has made the most of those few seconds.
The reader gets his point, and if the reader already holds this
view, he or she probably says, “Hey, here’s a great cartoon.” I
don’t hold that view, but I am willing to grant that it is a pretty
good cartoon, effectively making a point that I think is wrong-
headed.
VISUALS AS AIDS TO CLARITY: MAPS,
GRAPHS, TABLES, AND PIE CHARTS
Maps were obviously part of the argument in the debate over
drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
• Advocates of drilling argued that drilling would take place
only in such a tiny area. Their map showed Alaska, with an
indication (in gray) of the much smaller part of Alaska that
was the Refuge, and a further indication (cross-hatched) of
what these advocates of drilling emphasized was a minuscule
part of the Refuge.
• Opponents, however, showed maps indicating the path of
migrating caribou and the roads that would have to be con-
structed across the refuge to get to the area where the drilling
would take place.
Graphs, tables, and pie charts usually present quantitative
data in visual form, helping writers clarify mind-numbing statis-
tical assertions. For instance, a line graph may tell us how many
immigrants came to the United States in each decade of the last
century.
A bar graph (the bars can run either horizontally or vertically)
offers similar information; we can see at a glance that, say, the sec-
ond bar is almost double the length of the first, indicating that the
number is almost double.
A pie chart is a circle divided into wedges so that we can see—
literally see—how a whole is divided into its parts. We can see, for
instance, that of the entire pie—which may represent registered
voters in a certain state—one-fourth are registered Democrats,
one-fifth are registered Republicans, and the remainder do not give
a party affiliation.
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A NOTE ON USING VISUALS
IN YOUR OWN PAPER
Every paper uses some degree of visual persuasion, merely in its
appearance: perhaps a title page, certainly margins (ample—but not
so wide that they tell the reader that the writer is unable to write a
paper of the assigned length), double-spacing for the convenience of
the reader, paragraphing (again for the convenience of the reader),
and so on. But you may also want to use images—for example, pic-
tures, graphs, or pie charts. Keep a few guidelines in mind as you
begin to work with images, “writing” visuals into your own argu-
ment with at least as much care as you would read them in others’:
• Consider the needs and attitudes of your audience, and
select the type of visuals—graphs, drawings, photographs—
likely to be most persuasive to that audience.
A NOTE ON USING VISUALS IN YOUR OWN PAPER 123
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR CHARTS AND GRAPHS
� Is the source authoritative?
� Is the source cited?
� Will the chart or graph be intelligible to the imagined audience?
� Is the caption, if any, clear and helpful?
35
3
0
25
20
15
10
5
0
MILLION
’60 ’70 ’80 ’90
1850
’10 ’20 ’30 ’40
1900
’60 ’70 ’80 ’90 ’03’50
2000
COMING TO AMERICA . . .
Both the percentage and number of foreign-born people in the United States dropped
during much of the twentieth century, but after 1970, the tide was turning again.
United States foreign-born population,
1850–2003, in millions
16
14
1
2
10
8
6
4
2
0
PERCENT
1850 2003*
Foreign-born
population as
percent of total
’70
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• Consider the effect of color, composition, and placement
within your document. Because images are most effective
when they appear near the text that supplements them, do
not group all of your images at the end of the paper.
Remember especially that images are almost never self-supporting
or self-explanatory. They may be evidence for your argument (Ut’s
photograph of napalm victims is very compelling evidence of suffer-
ing), but they are not arguments themselves.
124 4 / VISUAL RHETORIC: IMAGES AS ARGUMENTS
. . . FROM NEAR AND FAR
Central America, Mexico, and Asia contribute
most to the foreign-born population.
36%
26%
14%
10%
6%
8%
Other
South
America
Caribbean
Europe
Central
America
and
Mexico
Asia
Foreign-born population by
region of birth, 2002
*Most recent estimate
Source: United States Census Bureau
(DILBERT © Scott Adams. Distributed by permission of United Features
Syndicate, Inc.)
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• Be sure to explain each image that you use, integrating it
into the verbal text that provides the logic and principal sup-
port of your thesis.
• Be sure to cite the source of any image, for instance, a graph
or a pie chart, that you paste into your argument.
A NOTE ON FORMATTING YOUR PAPER:
DOCUMENT DESIGN
Even if you do not use pictures or graphs or charts, the format
you use — the margins, the font, the headings and subheadings, if
any, will still give your paper a visual aspect. Noonewantstoreada-
paperthatlookslikethisOR LIKETHISORLIKETHISANDCERTAINLYNOT-
LIKETHISORLIKETHIS. For academic papers, margins (one inch on
each side), spacing (double-spaced), and font and size (Times New
Roman, 12 point) are pretty well standardized, and it is usually
agreed that the text should be justified at the left rather than cen-
tered (to avoid rivers of white down the page), but you are still in
charge of some things, notably headings and bulleted or numbered
lists—as well as, of course, the lengths of your paragraphs.
Headings in a long paper (more than five pages) are functional,
helping to guide the reader from unit to unit, but the extra white
space—a decorative element—is also functional, giving the reader’s
eye a moment of rest. Longish academic papers often use one, two,
or even three levels of headings, normally distinguished by type size,
position, and highlighting (“highlighting” includes the use of CAPI-
TALS, boldface, and italic). Here are examples of three levels:
FIRST-LEVEL HEADING
Second-Level Heading
Third-Level Heading
If you use headings, you must be consistent in the form. For
instance, if you use a noun phrase such as “the present system”
printed in CAPITAL LETTERS for the first of your first-level head-
ings, you must use noun phrases and caps for the rest of your first-
level headings, thus:
A NOTE ON FORMATTING YOUR PAPER: DOCUMENT DESIGN 125
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THE PRESENT SYSTEM
THE NEED TO CHANGE
But you need not use noun phases and you need not use capitals.
You may use, for instance, -ing headings (gerund phrases), and you
may decide to capitalize only the first letter of each word other
than prepositions and articles, thus:
Thinking about Immigration
Reviewing the Past
Thinking about the Future
Reconsidering Legislation
And here are headings that use a single word:
Problems
Answers
Strengths
Weaknesses
Finally, headings that consist of questions can be effective:
What Are We Now Doing?
Why Should We Change?
Caution: Although headings can be useful in a paper of moder-
ate or considerable length, they almost never are useful in a paper
of five or fewer pages.
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Writing an Analysis
of an Argument
This is what we can all do to nourish and strengthen one another:
listen to one another very hard, ask questions, too, send one
another away to work again, and laugh in all the right places.
— NANCY MAIRS
I don’t wait for moods. You accomplish nothing if you do that.
Your mind must know it has got to get down to work.
— PEARL S. BUCK
Fear not those who argue but those who dodge.
— MARIE VON EBNER-ESCHENBACH
ANALYZING AN ARGUMENT
Examining the Author’s Thesis
Most of your writing in other courses will require you to write
an analysis of someone else’s writing. In a course in political sci-
ence you may have to analyze, say, an essay first published in
Foreign Affairs, perhaps reprinted in your textbook, that argues
against raising tariff barriers to foreign trade. Or a course in soci-
ology may require you to analyze a report on the correlation
between fatal accidents and drunk drivers under the age of
twenty-one. Much of your writing, in short, will set forth rea-
soned responses to your reading as preparation for making an
argument of your own.
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Obviously you must understand an essay before you can ana-
lyze it thoughtfully. You must read it several times—not just skim
it—and (the hard part) you must think about it. Again, you’ll find
that your thinking is stimulated if you take notes and if you ask
yourself questions about the material. Notes will help you to keep
track of the writer’s thoughts and also of your own responses to the
writer’s thesis. The writer probably does have a thesis, a claim, a
point, and if so, you must try to locate it. Perhaps the thesis is
explicitly stated in the title or in a sentence or two near the begin-
ning of the essay or in a concluding paragraph, but perhaps you
will have to infer it from the essay as a whole.
Notice that we said the writer probably has a thesis. Much of what
you read will indeed be primarily an argument; the writer explicitly
or implicitly is trying to support some thesis and to convince you to
agree with it. But some of what you read will be relatively neutral,
with the argument just faintly discernible—or even with no argu-
ment at all. A work may, for instance, chiefly be a report: Here are the
data, or here is what X, Y, and Z said; make of it what you will. A
report might simply state how various ethnic groups voted in an elec-
tion. In a report of this sort, of course, the writer hopes to persuade
readers that the facts are correct, but no thesis is advanced, at least not
explicitly or perhaps even consciously; the writer is not evidently
arguing a point and trying to change our minds. Such a document dif-
fers greatly from an essay by a political analyst who presents similar
findings to persuade a candidate to sacrifice the votes of this ethnic
bloc and thereby get more votes from other blocs.
Examining the Author’s Purpose
While reading an argument, try to form a clear idea of the author’s
purpose. Judging from the essay or the book, was the purpose to
persuade, or was it to report? An analysis of a pure report (a work
apparently without a thesis or argumentative angle) on ethnic vot-
ing will deal chiefly with the accuracy of the report. It will, for
example, consider whether the sample poll was representative.
Much material that poses as a report really has a thesis built
into it, consciously or unconsciously. The best evidence that the
prose you are reading is argumentative is the presence of two kinds
of key terms: transitions that imply the drawing of a conclusion
and verbs that imply proof (see Idea Prompt 5.1). Keep your eye
out for such terms, and scrutinize their precise role whenever, or
whatever they appear. If the essay does not advance a thesis, think
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of a thesis (a hypothesis) that it might support or some conven-
tional belief that it might undermine.
Examining the Author’s Methods
If the essay advances a thesis, you will want to analyze the strate-
gies or methods of argument that allegedly support the thesis.
• Does the writer quote authorities? Are these authorities really
competent in this field? Are equally competent authorities who
take a different view ignored?
• Does the writer use statistics? If so, are they appropriate to
the point being argued? Can they be interpreted differently?
• Does the writer build the argument by using examples or
analogies? Are they satisfactory?
• Are the writer’s assumptions acceptable?
• Does the writer consider all relevant factors? Has he or she
omitted some points that you think should be discussed? For
instance, should the author recognize certain opposing posi-
tions and perhaps concede something to them?
• Does the writer seek to persuade by means of ridicule? If so,
is the ridicule fair: Is it supported also by rational argument?
In writing your analysis, you will want to tell your reader some-
thing about the author’s purpose and something about the author’s
methods. It is usually a good idea at the start of your analysis—if
not in the first paragraph then in the second or third—to let the
reader know the purpose (and thesis, if there is one) of the work
you are analyzing and then to summarize the work briefly.
Next you will probably find it useful (your reader will certainly
find it helpful) to write out your thesis (your evaluation or judgment).
ANALYZING AN ARGUMENT 129
IDEA PROMPT 5.1 DRAWING CONCLUSIONS AND
IMPLYING PROOF
Transitions that imply the therefore, because, for the reason that,
drawing of a conclusion consequently
Verbs that imply proof confirms, verifies, accounts for, implies,
proves, disproves, is (in)consistent
with, refutes, it follows that
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You might say, for instance, that the essay is impressive but not con-
clusive, or is undermined by convincing contrary evidence, or relies
too much on unsupported generalizations, or is wholly admirable,
or whatever. Remember, because your paper is itself an argument, it
needs its own thesis.
And then, of course, comes the job of setting forth your analysis
and the support for your thesis. There is no one way of going about
this work. If, say, your author gives four arguments (for example, an
appeal to common sense, the testimony of authorities, the evidence
of comparisons, and an appeal to self-interest), you might want to do
one of the following:
• Take up these four arguments in sequence.
• Discuss the simplest of the four and then go on to the more
difficult ones.
• Discuss the author’s two arguments that you think are sound
and then turn to the two that you think are not sound (or
perhaps the reverse).
• Take one of these approaches and then clinch your case by
constructing a fifth argument that is absent from the work
under scrutiny but in your view highly important.
In short, the organization of your analysis may or may not follow
the organization of the work you are analyzing.
Examining the Author’s Persona
You will probably also want to analyze something a bit more elusive
than the author’s explicit arguments: the author’s self-presentation.
Does the author seek to persuade readers partly by presenting him-
self or herself as conscientious, friendly, self-effacing, authoritative,
tentative, or in some other light? Most writers do two things:
• They present evidence, and
• They present themselves (or, more precisely, they present
the image of themselves that they wish us to behold).
In some persuasive writing this persona or voice or presentation of
the self may be no less important than the presentation of evidence.
In establishing a persona, writers adopt various rhetorical
strategies, ranging from the use of characteristic words to the use of
a particular form of organization. For instance,
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• The writer who speaks of an opponent’s “gimmicks” instead
of “strategy” is trying to downgrade the opponent and also to
convey the self-image of a streetwise person.
• On a larger scale, consider the way in which evidence is
presented and the kind of evidence offered. One writer may
first bombard the reader with facts and then spend rela-
tively little time drawing conclusions. Another may rely
chiefly on generalizations, waiting until the end of the essay
to bring the thesis home with a few details. Another may
begin with a few facts and spend most of the space reflecting
on these. One writer may seem professorial or pedantic,
offering examples of an academic sort; another, whose
examples are drawn from ordinary life, may seem like a reg-
ular guy.
All such devices deserve comment in your analysis.
The writer’s persona, then, may color the thesis and help it
develop in a distinctive way. If we accept the thesis, it is partly
because the writer has won our goodwill by persuading us of his or
her good character (ethos, in Aristotle’s terms). Later we talk more
about the appeal to the character of the speaker—the so-called eth-
ical appeal, but here we may say that wise writers present them-
selves not as wise-guys but as decent people whom the reader
would like to invite to dinner.
The author of an essay may, for example, seem fair minded and
open minded, treating the opposition with great courtesy and
expressing interest in hearing other views. Such a tactic is itself a per-
suasive device. Or take an author who appears to rely on hard evi-
dence such as statistics. This reliance on seemingly objective truths is
itself a way of seeking to persuade—a rational way, to be sure, but
a mode of persuasion nonetheless.
Especially in analyzing a work in which the author’s persona
and ideas are blended, you will want to spend some time comment-
ing on the persona. Whether you discuss it near the beginning of
your analysis or near the end will depend on your own sense of
how you want to construct your essay, and this decision will partly
depend on the work you are analyzing. For example, if the author’s
persona is kept in the background and is thus relatively invisible,
you may want to make that point fairly early to get it out of the way
and then concentrate on more interesting matters. If, however, the
persona is interesting—and perhaps seductive, whether because it
seems so scrupulously objective or so engagingly subjective—you
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may want to hint at this quality early in your essay and then
develop the point while you consider the arguments.
Summary
In the last few pages we have tried to persuade you that, in writing
an analysis of your reading, you must do the following:
• Read and reread thoughtfully. Writing notes will help you to
think about what you are reading.
• Be aware of the purpose of the material to which you are
responding.
We have also tried to point out these facts:
• Most of the nonliterary material that you will read is
designed to argue, to report, or to do both.
• Most of this material also presents the writer’s personality, or
voice, and this voice usually merits attention in an analysis.
An essay on, say, nuclear war, in a journal devoted to political
science, may include a voice that moves from an objective
tone to a mildly ironic tone to a hortatory tone, and this voice
is worth commenting on.
Possibly all this explanation is obvious. There is yet another point,
equally obvious but often neglected by students who begin by writ-
ing an analysis and end up by writing only a summary, a shortened
version of the work they have read: Although your essay is an
analysis of someone else’s writing, and you may have to include a
summary of the work you are writing about, your essay is your
essay. The thesis, the organization, and the tone are yours.
• Your thesis, for example, may be that although the author is
convinced she has presented a strong case, her case is far
from proved.
• Your organization may be deeply indebted to the work you
are analyzing, but it need not be. The author may have
begun with specific examples and then gone on to make
generalizations and to draw conclusions, but you may begin
with the conclusions.
• Your tone, similarly, may resemble your subject’s (let’s say the
voice is courteous academic), but it will nevertheless have its
own ring, its own tone of, say, urgency, caution, or coolness.
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Most of the essays that we have printed thus far are more or less in
an academic style, and indeed several are by students and by pro-
fessors. But argumentative writing is not limited to academicians—
if it were, your college would not be requiring you to take a course
in the subject. The following essay, in a breezy style, comes from a
columnist who writes for the New York Times.
ANALYZING AN ARGUMENT 133
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING A TEXT
Have I considered all of the following matters?
� Who is the author?
� Is the piece aimed at a particular audience? A neutral
audience? Persons who are already sympathetic to the author’s
point of view? A hostile audience?
� What is the author’s thesis (argument, main point, claim)?
� What assumptions does the author make? Do I share them? If
not, why not?
� Does the author ever confuse facts with beliefs or opinions?
� What appeals does the author make? To reason (logos), for
instance, with statistics, the testimony of authorities, and
personal experience? To the emotions (pathos), for instance, by
an appeal to “our better nature,” or to widely shared values?
To our sense that the speaker is trustworthy (ethos)?
� How convincing is the evidence?
� Are significant objections and counterevidence adequately
discussed?
� How is the text organized, and is the organization effective?
Are the title, the opening paragraphs, and the concluding
paragraphs effective? In what ways?
� If visual materials such as graphs, pie charts, or pictures are
used, how persuasive are they? Do they make a logical
appeal? (Charts and graphs presumably make a logical
appeal.) Do they make an emotional appeal?
� What is the author’s tone? Is it appropriate?
� To what extent has the author convinced me? Why?
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AN ARGUMENT, ITS ELEMENTS,
AND A STUDENT’S ANALYSIS
OF THE ARGUMENT
Nicholas D. Kristof
Nicholas D. Kristof (b. 1959) grew up on a farm in Oregon. After graduat-
ing from Harvard, he was awarded a Rhodes scholarship to Oxford, where
he studied law. In 1984 he joined the New York Times as a correspon-
dent, and since 2001 he has written as a columnist. He has won two
Pulitzer Prizes.
For Environmental Balance, Pick Up a Rifle
Here’s a quick quiz: Which large American mammal kills the
most humans each year?
It’s not the bear, which kills about two people a year in North
America. Nor is it the wolf, which in modern times hasn’t killed any-
one in this country. It’s not the cougar, which kills one person every
year or two.
Rather, it’s the deer. Unchecked by predators, deer populations
are exploding in a way that is profoundly unnatural and that is
destroying the ecosystem in many parts of the country. In a wilder-
ness, there might be ten deer per square mile; in parts of New
Jersey, there are up to 200 per square mile.
One result is ticks and Lyme disease, but deer also kill people
more directly. A study for the insurance industry estimated that
deer kill about 150 people a year in car crashes nationwide and
cause $1 billion in damage. Granted, deer aren’t stalking us, and
they come out worse in these collisions—but it’s still true that in a
typical year, an American is less likely to be killed by Osama bin
Laden than by Bambi.
If the symbol of the environment’s being out of whack in the
1960s was the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland catching fire, one such
symbol today is deer congregating around what they think of as
salad bars and what we think of as suburbs.
So what do we do? Let’s bring back hunting.
Now, you’ve probably just spilled your coffee. These days, among
the university-educated crowd in the cities, hunting is viewed as
barbaric.
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The upshot is that towns in New York and New Jersey are talk-
ing about using birth control to keep deer populations down.
(Liberals presumably support free condoms, while conservatives
back abstinence education.) Deer contraception hasn’t been very
successful, though.
Meanwhile, the same population bomb has spread to bears. A
bear hunt has been scheduled for this week in New Jersey—
prompting outrage from some animal rights groups (there’s also
talk of bear contraception: make love, not cubs).
As for deer, partly because hunting is perceived as brutal and
vaguely psychopathic, towns are taking out contracts on deer
through discreet private companies. Greenwich, Connecticut, bud-
geted $47,000 this year to pay a company to shoot eighty deer from
raised platforms over four nights—as well as $8,000 for deer birth
control.
Look, this is ridiculous.
We have an environmental imbalance caused in part by the
decline of hunting. Humans first wiped out certain predators—like
wolves and cougars—but then expanded their own role as predators
to sustain a rough ecological balance. These days, though, hunters
are on the decline.
According to “Families Afield: An Initiative for the Future of
Hunting,” a report by an alliance of shooting organizations, for
every hundred hunters who die or stop hunting, only sixty-nine
hunters take their place.
I was raised on Bambi —but also, as an Oregon farm boy, on
venison and elk meat. But deer are not pets, and dead deer are as
natural as live deer. To wring one’s hands over them, perhaps after
polishing off a hamburger, is soggy sentimentality.
What’s the alternative to hunting? Is it preferable that deer die
of disease and hunger? Or, as the editor of Adirondack Explorer mag-
azine suggested, do we introduce wolves into the burbs?
To their credit, many environmentalists agree that hunting can
be green. The New Jersey Audubon Society this year advocated
deer hunting as an ecological necessity.
There’s another reason to encourage hunting: it connects
people
with the outdoors and creates a broader constituency for
wilderness preservation. At a time when America’s wilderness is
being gobbled away for logging, mining, or oil drilling, that’s a huge
boon.
Granted, hunting isn’t advisable in suburban backyards, and I
don’t expect many soccer moms to install gun racks in their minivans.
But it’s an abdication of environmental responsibility to eliminate
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15
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other predators and then refuse to assume the job ourselves. In
that case, the collisions with humans will simply get worse.
In October, for example, Wayne Goldsberry was sitting in a
home in northwestern Arkansas when he heard glass breaking in
the next room. It was a home invasion—by a buck.
Mr. Goldsberry, who is six feet one inch and weighs two hun-
dred pounds, wrestled with the intruder for forty minutes. Blood
spattered the walls before he managed to break the buck’s neck.
So it’s time to reestablish a balance in the natural world—by
accepting the idea that hunting is as natural as bird-watching.
In a moment we will talk at some length about Kristof’s essay,
but first you may want to think about the following questions.
1. What is Kristof’s chief thesis? (State it in one sentence.)
2. Does Kristof make any assumptions—tacit or explicit—
with which you disagree? With which you agree?
3. Is the slightly humorous tone of Kristof’s essay inappropri-
ate for a discussion of deliberately killing wild animals?
Why, or why not?
4. If you are familiar with Bambi, does the story make any
argument against killing deer, or does the story appeal only to
our emotions?
5. Do you agree that “hunting is as natural as bird-watching”
(para. 21)? In any case, do you think that an appeal to what
is “natural” is a good argument for expanding the use of
hunting?
OK, time’s up. Let’s examine Kristof’s essay with an eye to identify-
ing those elements we mentioned earlier in this chapter (pp.
127–32) that deserve notice when examining any argument: the
author’s thesis, purpose, methods, and persona. And while we’re at it,
let’s also notice some other features of Kristof’s essay that will help
us appreciate its effects and evaluate it. We will thus be in a good
position to write an evaluation or an argument that confirms,
extends, or even rebuts Kristof’s argument.
But first, a caution: Kristof’s essay appeared in a newspaper
where paragraphs are customarily very short, partly to allow for easy
reading and partly because the columns are narrow and even short
paragraphs may extend for an inch or two. If his essay were to
appear in a book, doubtless the author would join many of the para-
graphs, making longer units.
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Title By combining “Environmental Balance” with “Rifle”—
terms that don’t seem to go together—Kristof starts off with a
bang. He gives a hint of his topic (something about the environ-
ment) and of his thesis (some sort of way of introducing ecological
balance). He also conveys something of his persona by introducing
a rifle into the environment. He is, the title suggests, a no-non-
sense, hard-hitting guy.
Opening Paragraphs Kristof immediately grabs hold of us
(“Here’s a quick quiz”) and asks a simple question, but one that we
probably have not thought much about: “Which large American
mammal kills the most humans each year?” In his second paragraph
he tells us it is not the bear—the answer most readers probably
come up with—nor is it the cougar. Not until the third paragraph
does Kristof give us the answer, the deer. But remember, Kristof is
writing in a newspaper, where paragraphs customarily are very
short. It takes us only a few seconds to get to the third paragraph
and the answer.
Thesis What is the basic thesis Kristof is arguing? Somewhat
unusually, Kristof does not announce it in its full form until his
sixth paragraph (“Let’s bring back hunting”), but, again, his para-
graphs are very short, and if the essay were published in a book,
Kristof’s first two paragraphs probably would be combined, as
would the third and fourth.
Purpose Kristof’s purpose is clear: He wants to persuade readers to
adopt his view. This amounts to trying to persuade us that his thesis
(stated above) is true. Kristof, however, does not show that his essay
is argumentative or persuasive by using many of the key terms that
normally mark argumentative prose. He doesn’t call anything his
conclusion, none of his statements is labeled my premises, and he
doesn’t connect clauses or sentences with therefore or because. Almost
the only traces of the language of argument are “Granted” (para.
18) and “So” (that is, therefore) in his final paragraph.
Despite the lack of argumentative language, the argumentative
nature of his essay is clear. He has a thesis—one that will strike
many readers as highly unusual—and he wants readers to accept it,
so he must go on to support it; accordingly, after his introductory
paragraphs, in which he calls attention to a problem and offers a
solution (his thesis), he must offer evidence, and that is what much
of the rest of the essay seeks to do.
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Methods Although Kristof will have to offer evidence, he begins
by recognizing the folks on the other side, “the university-educated
crowd in the cities, [for whom] hunting is viewed as barbaric”
(para. 7). He goes on to spoof this “crowd” when, speaking of
methods of keeping the deer population down, he says in para-
graph 8, “Liberals presumably support free condoms, while conser-
vatives back abstinence education.” Ordinarily it is a bad idea to
make fun of persons who hold views other than your own—after
all, they just may be on to something, they just might know some-
thing you don’t know, and, in any case, impartial readers rarely
want to align themselves with someone who mocks others. In the
essay we are looking at, however, Kristof gets away with this smart-
guy tone because he (a) has loyal readers and (b) has written the
entire essay in a highly informal or playful manner. Think again
about the first paragraph, which begins “Here’s a quick quiz.” The
informality is not only in the contraction (Here’s versus Here is), but
in the very idea of beginning by grabbing the readers and thrusting a
quiz at them. The playfulness is evident throughout: For instance,
immediately after Kristof announces his thesis, “Let’s bring back hunt-
ing,” he begins a new paragraph (7) with, “Now, you’ve probably
just spilled your coffee.”
Kristof’s methods of presenting evidence include providing sta-
tistics (paras. 3, 4, 10, and 13), giving examples (paras. 10, 19–20),
and citing authorities (paras. 13 and 16).
Persona Kristof presents himself as a confident, no-nonsense fel-
low, a persona that not many writers can get away with, but that
probably is acceptable in a journalist who regularly writes a news-
paper column. His readers know what to expect, and they read him
with pleasure. But it probably would be inadvisable for an
unknown writer to adopt this persona, unless perhaps he or she
were writing for an audience that could be counted on to be
friendly (in this instance, an audience of hunters). If this essay
appeared in a hunting magazine, doubtless it would please and
entertain its audience. It would not convert anybody, but conver-
sion would not be its point if it were published in a magazine read
by hunters. In the New York Times, where the essay originally
appeared, Kristof could count on a moderately sympathetic audi-
ence because he has a large number of faithful readers, but one can
guess that many of these readers —chiefly city dwellers—read him
for entertainment rather than for information about how they
should actually behave.
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Closing Paragraphs The first two of the last three paragraphs
report an episode (the two hundred pound buck inside the house)
that Kristof presumably thinks is pretty conclusive evidence. The
final paragraph begins with “So,” strongly implying a logical con-
clusion to the essay.
Let’s now turn to a student’s analysis of Kristof’s essay and then
to our analysis of the student’s analysis. (We should say that the
analysis of Kristof’s essay that you have just read is partly indebted
to the student’s essay that you are about to read.)
KRISTOF / FOR ENVIRONMENTAL BALANCE, PICK UP A RIFLE 139
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Betsy Swinton
Professor Knowles
English 101B
March 12, 2007
Tracking Kristof
Nicholas D. Kristof ’s “For Environmental Balance, Pick
Up a Rifle” is an engaging piece of writing, but whether it is
convincing is something I am not sure about. And I am not
sure about it for two reasons: (1) I don’t know much about the
deer problem, and that’s my fault; (2) I don’t know much about
the deer problem, and that’s Kristof ’s fault. The first point
needs no explanation, but let me explain the second.
Kristof is making an argument, offering a thesis: Deer
are causing destruction, and the best way to reduce the
destruction is to hunt deer. For all that I know, he may be
correct both in his comment about what deer are doing and
also in his comment about what must be done about deer. My
ignorance of the situation is regrettable, but I don’t think that
I am the only reader from Chicago who doesn’t know much
about the deer problems in New Jersey, Connecticut, and
Arkansas, the states that Kristof specifically mentions in
connection with the deer problem. He announces his thesis
early enough, in his sixth paragraph, and he is entertaining
throughout his essay, but does he make a convincing case? To
ask “Does he make a convincing case?” is to ask “Does he offer
adequate evidence?” and “Does he show that his solution is
better than other possible solutions?”
Swinton 1
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To take the first question: In a short essay Kristof can
hardly give overwhelming evidence, but he does convince me
that there is a problem. The most convincing evidence he gives
appears in paragraph 16, where he says that the New Jersey
Audubon Society “advocated deer hunting as an ecological
necessity.” I don’t really know anything about the New Jersey
Audubon Society, but I suppose that they are people with a
deep interest in nature and in conservation, and if even such a
group advocates deer hunting, there must be something to this
solution.
I am even willing to accept his argument that, in this
nation of meat-eaters, “to wring one’s hands over them [dead
deer], perhaps after polishing off a hamburger, is soggy
sentimentality” (para. 14). According to Kristof, the present
alternative to hunting deer is that we leave the deer to “die of
disease and hunger” (para. 15). But what I am not convinced
of is that there is no way to reduce the deer population other
than by hunting. I don’t think Kristof adequately explains why
some sort of birth control is inadequate. In his eighth
paragraph he makes a joke about controlling the birth of deer
(“Liberals presumably support free condoms, while conserva-
tives back abstinence education”), and the joke is funny, but it
isn’t an argument, it’s just a joke. Why can’t food containing
some sort of sterilizing medicine be put out for the starving
deer, food that will nourish them and yet make them
unreproductive? In short, I don’t think he has fairly informed
his readers of alternatives to his own positions, and because
Swinton 2
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he fails to look at counterproposals, he weakens his own
proposal.
Although Kristof occasionally uses a word or phrase that
suggests argument, such as “Granted” (para. 18), “So” (final
paragraph), and “There’s another reason” (para. 17), he relies
chiefly on forceful writing rather than on reasoning. And the
second of his two reasons for hunting seems utterly
unconvincing to me. His first, as we have seen, is that the deer
population (and apparently the bear population) is out of
control. His second (para. 17) is that hunting “connects people
with the outdoors and creates a broader constituency for
wilderness preservation.” I am not a hunter and I have never
been one. Perhaps that’s my misfortune, but I don’t think I am
missing anything. And when I hear Kristof say, in his final
sentence—the climactic place in his essay—that “hunting is as
natural as bird-watching,” I rub my eyes in disbelief. If he had
me at least half-convinced by his statistics and his citation of
the Audubon Society, he now loses me when he argues that
hunting is “natural.” One might as well say that war is natural,
rape is natural, bribery is natural—all these terrible things
occur, but we ought to deplore them and we ought to make
every effort to see that they disappear.
In short, I think that Kristof has written an engaging
essay, and he may well have an important idea, but I think that
in his glib final paragraph, where he tells us that “hunting is as
natural as bird-watching,” he utterly loses the reader’s
confidence.
Swinton 3
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AN ANALYSIS OF THE STUDENT’S ANALYSIS
Swinton’s essay seems to us to be excellent, doubtless the product
of a good deal of thoughtful revision. She does not cover every pos-
sible aspect of Kristof’s essay—she concentrates on his reasoning
and she says very little about his style—but we think that, given
AN ANALYSIS OF THE STUDENT’S ANALYSIS 143
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR WRITING AN ANALYSIS
OF AN ARGUMENT
Have I asked myself the following questions?
� Early in my essay have I fairly stated the writer’s thesis (claim)
and summarized his or her supporting reasons? Have I
explained to my reader any disagreement about definitions of
important terms?
� Have I, again fairly early in my essay, indicated where I will be
taking my reader, i.e., have I indicated my general response to
the essay I am analyzing?
� Have I called attention to the strengths, if any, and the
weaknesses, if any, of the essay?
� Have I commented not only on the logos (logic, reasoning) but
also on the ethos (character of the writer, as presented in the
essay)? For instance, has the author convinced me that he or
she is well-informed and is a person of goodwill? Or, on the
other hand, does the writer seem to be chiefly concerned with
ridiculing those who hold a different view?
� If there is an appeal to pathos (emotion, originally meaning
“pity for suffering,” but now interpreted more broadly to
include appeals to patriotism, humor, or loyalty to family, for
example), is it acceptable? If not, why not?
� Have I used occasional brief quotations to let my reader hear
the author’s tone and to ensure fairness and accuracy?
� Is my analysis effectively organized?
� Does my essay, perhaps in the concluding paragraphs,
indicate my agreement or disagreement with the writer but also
my view of the essay as a piece of argumentative writing?
� Is my tone appropriate?
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the limits of space (about 500 words), she does a good job. What
makes this student’s essay effective?
• The essay has a title (“Tracking Kristof”) that is of at least a
little interest; it picks up Kristof’s point about hunting, and it
gives a hint of what is to come.
• The author promptly identifies her subject (she names the
writer and the title of his essay) early.
• Early in the essay she gives us a hint of where she will be
going (in her first paragraph she tells us that Kristof’s essay is
“engaging . . . but . . .”).
• She uses a few brief quotations, to give us a feel for Kristof’s
essay and to let us hear the evidence for itself, but she does
not pad her essay with long quotations.
• She takes up all of Kristof’s main points.
• She gives her essay a reasonable organization, letting us hear
Kristof’s thesis, letting us know the degree to which she
accepts it, and finally letting us know her specific reserva-
tions about the essay.
• She concludes without the formality of “in conclusion”; “in
short” nicely does the trick.
• Notice, finally, that she sticks closely to Kristof’s essay. She
does not go off on a tangent about the virtues of vegetarian-
ism or the dreadful politics of the New York Times, the news-
paper that published Kristof’s essay. She was asked to
analyze the essay, and she has done so.
EXERCISE
Take one of the essays not yet discussed in class or an essay
assigned now by your instructor, and in an essay of 500 words ana-
lyze and evaluate it.
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Developing an Argument
of Your Own
The difficult part in an argument is not to defend one’s opinion
but to know what it is.
— ANDRÉ MAUROIS
Imagine that you enter a parlor. You come late. When you arrive,
others have long preceded you, and they are engaged in a heated
discussion, a discussion too heated for them to pause and tell you
exactly what it is about. In fact, the discussion had already begun
long before any of them got there, so that no one present is qualified
to retrace for you all the steps that had gone before. You listen for a
while, until you decide that you have caught the tenor of the
argument; then you put in your oar. Someone answers; you answer
him; another comes to your defense; another aligns himself against
you, to either the embarrassment or gratification of your opponent,
depending upon the quality of your ally’s assistance. However, the
discussion is interminable. The hour grows late, you must depart.
And you do depart, with the discussion still vigorously in progress.
— KENNETH BURKE
No greater misfortune could happen to anyone than that of
developing a dislike for argument.
— PLATO
6
145
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PLANNING, DRAFTING, AND
REVISING AN ARGUMENT
First, hear the wisdom of Mark Twain: “When the Lord finished the
world, He pronounced it good. That is what I said about my first
work, too. But Time, I tell you, Time takes the confidence out of
these incautious early opinions.”
All of us, teachers and students, have our moments of confidence,
but for the most part we know that it takes considerable effort to
write clear, thoughtful, seemingly effortless prose. In a conversation
we can cover ourselves with such expressions as “Well, I don’t know,
but I sort of think . . . ,” and we can always revise our position (“Oh,
well, I didn’t mean it that way”), but once we have handed in the
final version of our writing, we are helpless. We are (putting it
strongly) naked to our enemies.
Getting Ideas
In Chapter 1 we quoted Robert Frost, “To learn to write is to learn
to have ideas,” and we offered suggestions about getting ideas, a
process traditionally called invention. A moment ago we said that
we often improve our ideas when we try to explain them to some-
one else. Partly, of course, we are responding to questions or objec-
tions raised by our companion in the conversation. But partly we
are responding to ourselves: Almost as soon as we hear what we
have to say, we may find that it won’t do, and, if we are lucky, we
may find a better idea surfacing. One of the best ways of getting
ideas is to talk things over.
The process of talking things over usually begins with the text
that you are reading: Your marginal notes, your summary, and
your queries parenthetically incorporated within your summary
are a kind of dialogue between you and the author you are read-
ing. More obviously, when you talk with friends about your topic,
you are trying out and developing ideas. Finally, after reading, tak-
ing notes, and talking, you may feel that you now have clear ideas
and need only put them into writing. And so you take a sheet of
blank paper, and perhaps a paralyzing thought suddenly strikes: “I
have ideas but just can’t put them into words.”
Despite what many people believe,
• Writing is not only a matter of putting one’s ideas into
words.
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• Just as talking with others is a way of getting ideas, writing is
a way of getting and developing ideas.
Writing, in short, can be an important part of critical thinking. One
big reason we have trouble writing is our fear of putting ourselves
on record, but another big reason is our fear that we have no ideas
worth putting down. But by jotting down notes — or even free
associations — and by writing a draft, however weak, we can help
ourselves to think our way toward good ideas.
Freewriting Writing for five or six minutes, nonstop, without
censoring what you produce is one way of getting words down on
paper that will help to lead to improved thoughts. Some people
who write on a computer find it useful to dim the screen so they
won’t be tempted to look up and fiddle too soon with what they
have just written. Later they illuminate the screen, scroll back, and
notice some keywords or passages that can be used later in drafting
a paper.
Listing Jotting down items, just as you do when you make a
shopping list, is another way of getting ideas. When you make a
shopping list, you write ketchup, and the act of writing it reminds
you that you also need hamburger rolls — and that in turn reminds
you (who knows how or why?) that you also need a can of tuna
fish. Similarly, when you prepare a list of ideas for a paper, jotting
down one item will generate another. Of course, when you look
over the list, you will probably drop some of these ideas — the dinner
menu will change — but you are making progress.
Diagramming Sketching some sort of visual representation of an
essay is a kind of listing. Three methods of diagramming are espe-
cially common:
• Clustering Write, in the middle of a sheet of paper, a word
or phrase summarizing your topic (for instance, health care;
see diagram, below), circle it, and then write down and circle
a related word (for example, gov’t-provided). Perhaps this
leads you to write higher taxes, and you then circle this phrase
and connect it to gov’t-provided. The next thing that occurs to
you is employer-provided — and so you write this down and
circle it. You will not connect this to higher taxes, but you will
connect it to health care because it is a sort of parallel to gov’t-
provided. The next thing that occurs to you is unemployed
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people. This category does not connect easily with employer-
provided, so you won’t connect these two terms with a line,
but you probably will connect unemployed people with health
care and maybe also with gov’t-provided. Keep going, jotting
down ideas, and making connections where possible, indicat-
ing relationships.
• Branching Some writers find it useful to build a tree,
moving from the central topic to the main branches (chief
ideas) and then to the twigs (aspects of the chief ideas).
• Comparing in columns Draw a line down the middle of
the page, and then set up two columns showing oppositions.
For instance, if you are concerned with health care, you
might head one column gov’t-provided and the other employer-
provided. Under the first column, you might write covers
unemployed, and under the second column, you might write
omits unemployed. You might go on to write, under the first
column, higher taxes, and under the second, higher prices — or
whatever else relevant comes to mind.
All of these methods can, of course, be executed with pen and
paper, but you may also be able to use them on your computer
depending on the capabilities of your software.
Whether you are using a computer or a pen, you put down
some words and almost immediately see that they need improve-
ment, not simply a little polishing but a substantial overhaul. You
write, “Race should be counted in college admissions for two rea-
sons,” and as soon as you write these words, a third reason comes
to mind. Or perhaps one of those “two reasons” no longer seems
very good. As E. M. Forster said, “How can I know what I think till
I see what I say?” We have to see what we say, we have to get
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employer-provided
HEALTH CARE
gov’t-provided
unemployed people
higher taxes
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something down on paper, before we realize that we need to make
it better.
Writing, then, is really rewriting — that is, revising — and a
revision is a re-vision, a second look. The paper that you hand in
should be clear and may even seem effortless to the reader, but in all
likelihood the clarity and apparent ease are the result of a struggle
with yourself, a struggle during which you greatly improved your
first thoughts. You begin by putting down your ideas, such as they
are, perhaps even in the random order in which they occurred, but
sooner or later comes the job of looking at them critically, developing
what is useful in them and chucking out what is not. If you follow
this procedure you will be in the company of Picasso, who said that
he “advanced by means of destruction.”
Whether you advance bit by bit (writing a sentence, revising it,
writing the next, and so on) or whether you write an entire first
draft and then revise it and revise it again and again is chiefly a mat-
ter of temperament. Probably most people combine both approaches,
backing up occasionally but trying to get to the end fairly soon so
that they can see rather quickly what they know, or think they
know, and can then start the real work of thinking, of converting
their initial ideas into something substantial.
Asking Questions Getting ideas, we said when we talked about
topics and invention strategies in Chapter 1 (p. 15) is mostly a
matter of asking (and then thinking about) questions. We append
questions to the end of each argumentative essay in this book, not
to torment you but to help you to think about the arguments — for
instance, to turn your attention to especially important matters. If
your instructor asks you to write an answer to one of these ques-
tions, you are lucky: Examining the question will stimulate your
mind to work in a definite direction.
If a topic is not assigned, and you are asked to write an argu-
ment, you will find that some ideas (possibly poor ones, at this
stage, but that doesn’t matter because you will soon revise) will
come to mind if you ask yourself questions. You can begin finding
where you stand on an issue (stasis) by asking the following five
basic questions:
1. What is X?
2. What is the value of X?
3. What are the causes (or the consequences) of X?
4. What should (or ought or must) we do about X?
5. What is the evidence for my claims about X?
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Let’s spend a moment looking at each of these questions.
1. What is X? We can hardly argue about the number of
people sentenced to death in the United States in 2000 — a glance
at the appropriate government report will give the answer — but
we can argue about whether capital punishment as administered in
the United States is discriminatory. Does the evidence, we can ask,
support the view that in the United States the death penalty is
unfair? Similarly, we can ask whether a human fetus is a human
being (in saying what something is, must we take account of its
potentiality?), and, even if we agree that a fetus is a human being,
we can further ask about whether it is a person. In Roe v. Wade the
U.S. Supreme Court ruled that even the “viable” unborn human
fetus is not a “person” as that term is used in the Fifth and
Fourteenth Amendments. Here the question is this: Is the essential
fact about the fetus that it is a person?
An argument of this sort makes a claim — that is, it takes a
stand, but notice that it does not also have to argue for an action.
Thus, it may argue that the death penalty is administered unfairly —
that’s a big enough issue — but it need not go on to argue that the
death penalty should be abolished. After all, another possibility is
that the death penalty should be administered fairly. The writer of
the essay may be doing enough if he or she establishes the truth of
the claim and leaves to others the possible responses.
2. What is the value of X? College courses often call for lit-
erary judgments. No one can argue with you if you say you prefer
the plays of Tennessee Williams to those of Arthur Miller. But aca-
demic papers are not mere declarations of preferences. As soon as
you say that Williams is a better playwright than Miller, you have
based your preference on implicit standards, and it is incumbent on
you to support your preference by giving evidence about the rela-
tive skill, insight, and accomplishments of Williams and of Miller.
Your argument is an evaluation. The question now at issue is the
merits of the two authors and the standards appropriate for such an
appraisal.
In short, an essay offering an evaluation normally has two
purposes:
• To set forth an assessment, and
• To convince the reader that the assessment is reasonable.
In writing an evaluation, you will have to rely on criteria, and
these will vary depending on your topic. For instance, if you are
comparing the artistic merit of the plays by Williams and by Miller,
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you may want to talk about the quality of the characterization, the
importance of the theme, and so on. But if the topic is “Which
playwright is more suitable to be taught in high school?,” other cri-
teria may be appropriate, such as
• The difficulty of the author’s language,
• The sexual content of some scenes, and
• The presence of obscene words.
Or consider a nonliterary issue: On balance, are college frater-
nities and sororities good or bad? If good, how good? If bad, how
bad? What criteria can we use in making our evaluation? Probably
some or all of the following:
• Testimony of authorities (for instance, persons who can offer
firsthand testimony about the good or bad effects),
• Inductive evidence (we can collect examples of good or bad
effects),
• Appeals to logic (“it follows, therefore, that . . .”), and
• Appeals to emotion (for instance, an appeal to our sense of
fairness).
3. What are the causes (or the consequences) of X? Why
did the rate of auto theft increase during a specific period? If we abol-
ish the death penalty, will that cause the rate of murder to increase?
Notice, by the way, that such problems may be complex. The phe-
nomena that people usually argue about — say, such things as infla-
tion, war, suicide, crime — have many causes, and it is therefore often
a mistake to speak of the cause of X. A writer in Time mentioned that
the life expectancy of an average American male is about sixty-seven
years, a figure that compares unfavorably with the life expectancy of
males in Japan and Israel. The Time writer suggested that an impor-
tant cause of the relatively short life span is “the pressure to perform
well in business.” Perhaps. But the life expectancy of plumbers is no
greater than that of managers and executives. Nutrition authority
Jean Mayer, in an article in Life, attributed the relatively poor
longevity of American males to a diet that is “rich in fat and poor in
nutrients.” Doubtless other authorities propose other causes, and in
all likelihood no one cause accounts for the phenomenon.
Or take a second example of discussions of causality, this one con-
cerning the academic performance of girls in single-sex schools, middle
schools, and high schools. It is pretty much agreed (based on statistical
evidence) that the graduates of these schools do better, as a group,
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than girls who graduate from co-educational schools. Why do girls in
single-sex schools tend, as a group, to do better? What is the cause? The
administrators of girls’ schools usually attribute the success to the fact
(we are admittedly putting the matter bluntly) that young women
flourish better in an atmosphere free from male intimidation: They
allegedly gain confidence and become more expressive when they are
not threatened by males. And this may be the answer, but skeptics
have attributed the success to two other causes:
• Most single-sex schools require parents to pay tuition and it
is a documented fact that the children of well-to-do parents
do better, academically, than the children of poor parents.
• Further, most single-sex schools are private schools, and
they select their students from a pool of candidates.
Admissions officers naturally select those candidates who
seem to be academically promising — that is, they select stu-
dents who have already done well academically.1
In short, the girls who graduate from single-sex schools may owe
their later academic success not to the atmosphere inside the schools,
but to the fact that even at the time they were admitted to these
schools they were academically stronger — we are, again, speaking of
a cohort, not of individuals — than the girls who attend co-ed schools.
The lesson? Be cautious in attributing a cause. There may be
several causes.
What kinds of support usually accompany claims of cause?
• Factual data, especially statistics;
• Analogies (“The Roman Empire declined because of X and
Y,” “Our society exhibits X and Y, and therefore . . .”);
• Inductive evidence.
4. What should (or ought or must) we do about X? Must
we always obey the law? Should the law allow eighteen-year-olds to
drink alcohol? Should eighteen-year-olds be drafted to do one year
of social service? Should pornography be censored? Should steroid
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1Until 2004 federal regulations discouraged public schools from separating boys from
girls. As of the time of this comment [2009] there are only ninety-five single-sex
public schools, twelve of which are in New York City. An article in the New York
Times, 11 March 2009, page A20, suggests that there is little evidence that girls do
better than boys in these schools. Indeed, in California a much-touted program in
which six public middle schools and high schools were turned into single-sex acade-
mies has been abandoned.
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use by athletes be banned? Ought there to be Good Samaritan laws,
making it a legal duty for a stranger to intervene to save a person
from death or great bodily harm, when one might do so with little or
no risk to oneself? These questions involve conduct and policy; how
we answer them will reveal our values and principles.
An essay answering questions of this sort usually
• Begins by explaining what the issue (the problem) is, then
• States why the reader should care about it, then
• Offers the proposed solution, then
• Considers alternative solutions, and finally
• Reaffirms the merit of the proposed solution, especially in
the light of the audience’s interests and needs.
You will recall that throughout this book we have spoken about
devices that help a writer to get ideas. If in drafting an essay con-
cerned with policy you begin by jotting down your thoughts on the
five bulleted items we have just given, you will almost surely
uncover ideas that you didn’t know you had.
Support for claims of policy usually include
• Statistics,
• Appeals to common sense and to the reader’s moral sense,
and
• Testimony of authorities.
5. What is the evidence for my claims about X? In com-
menting on the four previous topics, we have talked about the
kinds of support that are commonly offered, but a few additional
points can be made.
Critical reading, writing, and thinking depend essentially on
identifying and evaluating the evidence for and against the claims
one makes and encounters in the writings of others. It is not
enough to have an opinion or belief one way or the other; you need
to be able to support your opinions — the bare fact of your sincere
belief in what you say or write is not itself any evidence that what
you believe is true.
So what are good reasons for opinions, adequate evidence for
one’s beliefs? The answer, of course, depends on what kind of belief
or opinion, assertion or hypothesis, claim or principle, you want to
assert. For example, there is good evidence that President John F.
Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, because this is
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the date for his death reported in standard almanacs. You could
further substantiate the date by checking the back issues of the New
York Times. But a different kind of evidence is needed to support the
proposition that the chemical composition of water is H
2
O. And
you will need still other kinds of evidence to support your beliefs
about the likelihood of rain tomorrow, the probability that the Red
Sox will win the pennant this year, the twelfth digit in the decimal
expansion of pi, the average cumulative grades of the graduating
seniors over the past three years in your college, the relative merits
of Hamlet and Death of a Salesman, and the moral dimensions of sex-
ual harassment. None of these issues is merely a matter of opinion;
yet on some of them, educated and informed people may disagree
over the reasons and the evidence and what they show. Your job as
a critical thinker is to be alert to the relevant reasons and evidence
and to make the most of them as you present your views.
Again, an argument may take in two or more of these five issues.
Someone who argues that pornography should (or should not) be
censored
• Will have to mark out the territory of the discussion by
defining pornography (our first issue: What is X?). The argu-
ment probably
• Will also need to examine the consequences of adopting the
preferred policy (our third issue) and
• May even have to argue about its value (our second issue).
Some people maintain that pornography produces crime, but
others main-tain that it provides a harmless outlet for
impulses that otherwise might vent themselves in criminal
behavior.
• Further, someone arguing about the wisdom of censoring
pornography might have to face the objection that censorship,
however desirable on account of some of its consequences,
may be unconstitutional and that even if censorship were con-
stitutional, it would (or might) have undesirable side effects,
such as repressing freedom of political opinion.
• And one will always have to keep asking oneself our fifth
question, What is the evidence for my claims?
Thinking about one or more of these questions may get you
going. For instance, thinking about the first question, What is X ?,
will require you to produce a definition, and as you work at pro-
ducing a satisfactory definition, you may find new ideas arising. If a
question seems relevant, start writing, even if you write only a
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fragmentary sentence. You’ll probably find that one word leads to
another and that ideas begin to appear. Even if these ideas seem
weak as you write them, don’t be discouraged; you have put some-
thing on paper, and returning to these words, perhaps in five min-
utes or perhaps the next day, you will probably find that some are
not at all bad and that others will stimulate you to better ones.
It may be useful to record your ideas in a special notebook
reserved for the purpose. Such a journal can be a valuable
resource when it comes time to write your paper. Many students
find it easier to focus their thoughts on writing if during the period
of gestation they have been jotting down relevant ideas on some-
thing more substantial than slips of paper or loose sheets. The very
act of designating a notebook as your journal for a course can be
the first step in focusing your attention on the eventual need to
write a paper.
If what we have just said does not sound convincing, and you
know from experience that you often have trouble getting started
with your writing, don’t despair; first aid is at hand in a sure-fire
method that we will now explain.
The Thesis
Let’s assume that you are writing an argumentative essay — perhaps
an evaluation of an argument in this book — and you have what
seems to be a pretty good draft or at least a bunch of notes that are
the result of hard thinking. You really do have ideas now, and you
want to present them effectively. How will you organize your essay?
No one formula works best for every essayist and for every essay, but
it is usually advisable to formulate a basic thesis (a claim, a central
point, a chief position) and to state it early. Every essay that is any
good, even a book-length one, has a thesis (a main point), which can
be stated briefly, usually in a sentence. Remember Coolidge’s remark
on the preacher’s sermon on sin: “He was against it.” Don’t confuse
the topic (sin) with the thesis (sin is bad). The thesis is the argumen-
tative theme, the author’s primary claim or contention, the proposi-
tion that the rest of the essay will explain and defend. Of course, the
thesis may sound commonplace, but the book or essay or sermon
ought to develop it interestingly and convincingly.
Here are some sample theses:
• Smoking should be prohibited in all enclosed public places.
• Smoking should be limited to specific parts of enclosed public
places and entirely prohibited in small spaces, such as elevators.
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• Proprietors of public places such as restaurants and sports
arenas should be free to determine whether they wish to
prohibit, limit, or impose no limitations on smokers.
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Imagining an Audience
Of course, the questions that you ask yourself to stimulate your
thoughts will depend primarily on what you are writing about, but
additional questions are always relevant:
• Who are my readers?
• What do they believe?
• What common ground do we share?
• What do I want my readers to believe?
• What do they need to know?
• Why should they care?
These questions require a little comment. The literal answer to
the first probably is “my teacher,” but (unless you are given
instructions to the contrary) you should not write specifically for
your teacher. Instead, you should write for an audience that is,
generally speaking, like your classmates. In short, your imagined
audience is literate, intelligent, and moderately well informed, but
it does not know everything that you know, and it does not know
your response to the problem that you are addressing.
The essays in this book are from many different sources, each
with its own audience. An essay from the New York Times is
addressed to the educated general reader; an essay from Ms. maga-
zine is addressed to readers sympathetic to feminism. An essay
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR A THESIS STATEMENT
Consider the following questions:
� Does the statement make an arguable assertion rather than (a)
merely assert an unarguable fact, (b) merely announce a topic,
or (c) declare an unarguable opinion or belief?
� Is the statement broad enough to cover the entire argument that
I will be presenting, and is it narrow enough for me to be able
to cover the topic in the space allotted?
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from Commonweal, a Roman Catholic publication addressed to the
nonspecialist, is likely to differ in point of view or tone from one in
Time, even though both articles may advance approximately the
same position. The writer of the article in Commonweal may, for
example, effectively cite church fathers and distinguished Roman
Catholic writers as authorities, whereas the writer of the Time
article would probably cite few or even none of these figures
because a non-Catholic audience might be unfamiliar with them or,
even if familiar, might be unimpressed by their views.
The tone as well as the gist of the argument is in some degree
shaped by the audience. For instance, popular journals, such as the
National Review and Ms. magazine, are more likely to use ridicule
than are journals chiefly addressed to, say, an academic audience.
The Audience as Collaborator
If you imagine an audience and keep asking yourself what this
audience needs to be told and what it doesn’t need to be told, you
will find that material comes to mind, just as it comes to mind
when a friend asks you what a film you saw was about, who was in
it, and how you liked it.
Your readers do not have to be told that Thomas Jefferson was
an American statesman in the early years of this country’s history,
but they do have to be told that Elizabeth Cady Stanton was a late-
nineteenth-century American feminist. Why? You need to identify
Stanton because it’s your hunch that your classmates never heard
of her, or even if they may have heard the name, they can’t quite
identify it. But what if your class has been assigned an essay by
Stanton? In that case your imagined reader knows Stanton’s name
and knows at least a little about her, so you don’t have to identify
Stanton as an American of the nineteenth century. But you do still
have to remind your reader about relevant aspects of her essay, and
you do have to tell your reader about your responses to them.
After all, even if the instructor has assigned an essay by Stanton,
you cannot assume that your classmates know the essay inside out.
Obviously, you can’t say, “Stanton’s third reason is also unconvincing,”
without reminding the reader, by means of a brief summary, of her
third reason. Again,
• Think of your classmates — people like you — as your imag-
ined readers; and
• Be sure that your essay does not make unreasonable demands.
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If you ask yourself,
• “What do my readers need to know?” and
• “What do I want them to believe?,”
you will find some answers arising, and you will start writing.
We have said that you should imagine your audience as your
classmates. But this is not the whole truth. In a sense, your argu-
ment is addressed not simply to your classmates but to the world
interested in ideas. Even if you can reasonably assume that your
classmates have read only one work by Stanton, you will not begin
your essay by writing “Stanton’s essay is deceptively easy.” You will
have to name the work; it is possible that a reader has read some
other work by Stanton. And by precisely identifying your subject,
you help to ease the reader into your essay.
Similarly, you won’t begin by writing,
The majority opinion in Walker v. City of Birmingham held that . . .
Rather, you’ll write something like this:
In Walker v. City of Birmingham, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in
1966 that city authorities acted lawfully when they jailed Martin
Luther King Jr. and other clergymen in 1963 for marching in
Birmingham without a permit. Justice Potter Stewart delivered the
majority opinion, which held that . . .
By the way, if you think you suffer from a writing block, the
mere act of writing out such readily available facts will help you to
get started. You will find that putting a few words down on paper,
perhaps merely copying the essay’s title or an interesting quotation
from the essay, will stimulate you to jot down thoughts that you
didn’t know you had in you.
Here, again, are the questions about audience. If you write
with a word processor, consider putting these questions into a file.
For each assignment, copy (with the Copy command) the questions
into the file you are currently working on, and then, as a way of
generating ideas, enter your responses, indented, under each question.
• Who are my readers?
• What do they believe?
• What common ground do we share?
• What do I want my readers to believe?
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• What do they need to know?
• Why should they care?
Thinking about your audience can help you to put some words
on paper; even more important, it can help you to get ideas. Our
second and third questions about the audience (“What do they
believe?” and “How much common ground do we share?”) will
usually help you get ideas flowing.
• Presumably your imagined audience does not share your
views, or at least does not fully share them. But why?
• How can these readers hold a position that to you seems
unreasonable?
If you try to put yourself into your readers’ shoes — and in your
essay you will almost surely summarize the views that you are
going to speak against — and if you think about what your audi-
ence knows or thinks it knows, you will find yourself getting
ideas.
You do not believe (let’s assume) that people should be allowed
to smoke in enclosed public places, but you know that some people
hold a different view. Why do they hold it? Try to state their view
in a way that would be satisfactory to them. Having done so, you may
come to perceive that your conclusions and theirs differ because
they are based on different premises, perhaps different ideas about
human rights. Examine the opposition’s premises carefully, and
explain, first to yourself and ultimately to your readers, why you
find some premises unacceptable.
Possibly some facts are in dispute, such as whether nonsmokers
may be harmed by exposure to tobacco. The thing to do, then, is to
check the facts. If you find that harm to nonsmokers has not been
proved, but you nevertheless believe that smoking should be pro-
hibited in enclosed public places, of course you can’t premise your
argument on the wrongfulness of harming the innocent (in this
case, the nonsmokers). You will have to develop arguments that
take account of the facts, whatever they are.
Among the relevant facts there surely are some that your audi-
ence or your opponent will not dispute. The same is true of the val-
ues relevant to the discussion; the two of you are very likely to
agree, if you stop to think about it, that you share belief in some of
the same values (such as the principle mentioned above, that it is
wrong to harm the innocent). These areas of shared agreement are
crucial to effective persuasion in argument.
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There are two good reasons why you should identify and iso-
late the areas of agreement:
• There is no point in disputing facts or values on which you
and your readers really agree.
• It usually helps to establish goodwill between you and your
opponent when you can point to beliefs, assumptions, facts,
and values that the two of you share.
In a few moments we will return to the need to share some of the
opposition’s ideas.
Recall that in writing college papers it is usually best to write for
a general audience, an audience rather like your classmates but
without the specific knowledge that they all share as students
enrolled in one course. If the topic is smoking in public places, the
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A RULE FOR WRITERS: If you wish to persuade, you’ll have to begin
by finding premises you can share with your audience.
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR IMAGINING AN AUDIENCE
Have I asked myself the following questions?
� Who are my readers?
� How much about the topic do they know?
� Have I provided necessary background (including definitions of
special terms) if the imagined readers probably are not
especially familiar with the topic?
� Are these imagined readers likely to be neutral? Sympathetic?
Hostile?
� If they are neutral, have I offered good reasons to persuade
them? If they are sympathetic, have I done more than merely
reaffirm their present beliefs? That is, have I perhaps enriched
their views or encouraged them to act? If they are hostile, have I
taken account of their positions, recognized their strengths but
also called attention to their limitations, and offered a position
that may persuade these hostile readers to modify their position?
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audience presumably consists of smokers and nonsmokers. Thinking
about our first question on page 159 — “What do [readers] need to
know?” — may prompt you to give statistics about the harmful
effects of smoking. Or if you are arguing on behalf of smokers, it
may prompt you to cite studies claiming that no evidence conclu-
sively demonstrates that cigarette smoking is harmful to nonsmok-
ers. If indeed you are writing for a general audience and you are not
advancing a highly unfamiliar view, our second question (“What
does the audience believe?”) is less important here, but if the audi-
ence is specialized, such as an antismoking group, a group of restau-
rant owners who fear that antismoking regulations will interfere
with their business, or a group of civil libertarians, an effective essay
will have to address their special beliefs.
In addressing their beliefs (let’s assume that you do not share
them or do not share them fully), you must try to establish some
common ground. If you advocate requiring restaurants to provide
nonsmoking areas, you should at least recognize the possibility
that this arrangement will result in inconvenience for the propri-
etor. But perhaps (the good news) the restaurant will regain some
lost customers or will attract some new customers. This thought
should prompt you to think of kinds of evidence, perhaps testi-
mony or statistics.
When you formulate a thesis and ask questions about it, such
as who the readers are, what do they believe, what do they know,
and what do they need to know, you begin to get ideas about how
to organize the material or at least to see that some sort of organi-
zation will have to be worked out. The thesis may be clear and
simple, but the reasons (the argument) may take many pages. The
thesis is the point; the argument sets forth the evidence that is
offered to support the thesis.
The Title
It’s not a bad idea to announce your thesis in your title. If you scan
the table of contents of this book, you will notice that a fair number
of essayists use the title to let the readers know, at least in a very
general way, what position will be advocated. Here are a few exam-
ples of titles that take a position:
Gay Marriages: Make Them Legal
“Diversity” Is a Smoke Screen for Discrimination
Why Handguns Must Be Outlawed
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True, these titles are not especially engaging, but the reader welcomes
them because they give some information about the writer’s thesis.
Some titles do not announce the thesis, but they at least
announce the topic:
Is All Discrimination Unfair?
On Racist Speech
Why Make Divorce Easy?
Although not clever or witty, these titles are informative.
Some titles seek to attract attention or to stimulate the imag-
ination:
A First Amendment Junkie
A Crime of Compassion
Addicted to Health
All of these are effective, but a word of caution is appropriate here.
In your effort to engage your reader’s attention, be careful not to
sound like a wise guy. You want to engage your readers, not turn
them off.
Finally, be prepared to rethink your title after you have finished
the last draft of your paper. A title somewhat different from your
working title may be an improvement because the emphasis of your
finished paper may have turned out to be rather different from
what you expected when you first thought of a title.
The Opening Paragraphs
Opening paragraphs are difficult to write, so don’t worry about
writing an effective opening when you are drafting. Just get some
words down on paper, and keep going. But when you revise your
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CALVIN AND HOBBES. © 1993 Bill Watterson. Reprinted with permission of
Universal Press Syndicate. All rights reserved.
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first draft — really a zero draft — you probably should begin to
think seriously about the effect of your opening.
A good introduction arouses the reader’s interest and helps
prepare the reader for the rest of the paper. How? Opening para-
graphs usually do at least one (and often all) of the following:
• Attract the reader’s interest (often with a bold statement of the
thesis or with an interesting statistic, quotation, or anecdote),
• Prepare the reader’s mind by giving some idea of the topic
and often of the thesis,
• Give the reader an idea of how the essay is organized, and
• Define a key term.
You may not wish to announce your thesis in your title, but if
you don’t announce it there, you should set it forth early in the
argument, in your introductory paragraph or paragraphs. In her title
“Human Rights and Foreign Policy,” Jeanne J. Kirkpatrick merely
announces her topic (subject) as opposed to her thesis (point), but
she begins to hint at the thesis in her first paragraph, by deprecating
President Jimmy Carter’s policy:
In this paper I deal with three broad subjects: first, the content
and consequences of the Carter administration’s human rights
policy; second, the prerequisites of a more adequate theory of
human rights; and third, some characteristics of a more successful
human rights policy.
Or consider this opening paragraph from Peter Singer’s “Animal
Liberation”:
We are familiar with Black Liberation, Gay Liberation, and a
variety of other movements. With Women’s Liberation some
thought we had come to the end of the road. Discrimination on
the basis of sex, it has been said, is the last form of discrimina-
tion that is universally accepted and practiced without pretense,
even in those liberal circles which have long prided themselves
on their freedom from racial discrimination. But one should
always be wary of talking of “the last remaining form of discrim-
ination.” If we have learned anything from the liberation
movements, we should have learned how difficult it is to be
aware of the ways in which we discriminate until they are
forcefully pointed out to us. A liberation movement demands an
expansion of our moral horizons, so that practices that were
previously regarded as natural and inevitable are now seen as
intolerable.
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Although Singer’s introductory paragraph nowhere mentions ani-
mal liberation, in conjunction with its title it gives us a good idea of
what Singer is up to and where he is going. Singer knows that his
audience will be skeptical, so he reminds them that many of us in
previous years were skeptical of reforms that we now take for
granted. He adopts a strategy used fairly often by writers who
advance unconventional theses: Rather than beginning with a bold
announcement of a thesis that may turn off some of his readers
because it sounds offensive or absurd, Singer warms up his audi-
ence, gaining their interest by cautioning them politely that although
they may at first be skeptical of animal liberation, if they stay with
his essay they may come to feel that they have expanded their
horizons.
Notice, too, that Singer begins by establishing common ground
with his readers; he assumes, probably correctly, that they share his
view that other forms of discrimination (now seen to be unjust)
were once widely practiced and were assumed to be acceptable and
natural. In this paragraph, then, Singer is not only showing himself
to be fair-minded but is also letting us know that he will advance a
daring idea. His opening wins our attention and our goodwill. A
writer can hardly hope to do more. (In a few pages we will talk a
little more about winning the audience.)
In your introductory paragraphs,
• You may have to give some background information that
your readers will need to keep in mind if they are to follow
your essay.
• You may wish to define some terms that are unfamiliar or
that you use in an unusual sense.
After announcing the topic, giving the necessary background,
and stating your position (and perhaps the opposition’s) in as
engaging a manner as possible, it is usually a good idea to give the
reader an idea of how you will proceed — that is, what the organiza-
tion will be. Look on page 163 at Kirkpatrick’s opening paragraph
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A RULE FOR WRITERS: In writing or at least in revising these
paragraphs, keep in mind this question: What do my readers need
to know? Remember, your aim throughout is to write reader-friendly
prose, and keeping the needs and interests of your audience
constantly in mind will help you achieve this goal.
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for an obvious illustration. She tells us she will deal with three sub-
jects, and she names them. Her approach in the paragraph is con-
cise, obvious, and effective.
Similarly, you may, for instance, want to announce fairly early
that there are four common objections to your thesis and that you
will take them up one by one, beginning with the weakest (or most
widely held, or whatever) and moving to the strongest (or least
familiar), after which you will advance your own view in greater
detail. Not every argument begins with refuting the other side,
though many arguments do. The point to remember is that you
usually ought to tell your readers where you will be taking them
and by what route.
Organizing and Revising the Body of the Essay
We begin with a wise remark by a newspaper columnist, Robert
Cromier: “The beautiful part of writing is that you don’t have to get
it right the first time — unlike, say, a brain surgeon.”
In drafting your essay you will of course begin with an organi-
zation that seems to you to make sense, but you may well find, in
rereading the draft, that some other organization is better. Here, for
a start, is an organization that is common in argumentative essays.
1. Statement of the problem
2. Statement of the structure of the essay
3. Statement of alternative solutions
4. Arguments in support of the proposed solution
5. Arguments answering possible objections
6. A summary, resolution, or conclusion
Let’s look at each of these six steps.
1. Statement of the problem Whether the problem is
stated briefly or at length depends on the nature of the
problem and the writer’s audience. If you haven’t already
defined unfamiliar terms or terms you use in a special way,
probably now is the time to do so. In any case, it is advisable
here to state the problem objectively (thereby gaining the
trust of the reader) and to indicate why the reader should
care about the issue.
2. Statement of the structure of the essay After stating
the problem at the appropriate length, the writer often
briefly indicates the structure of the rest of the essay. The
commonest structure is suggested below, in points 3 and 4.
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3. Statement of alternative (but less adequate) solutions
In addition to stating the alternatives fairly, the writer probably
conveys willingness to recognize not only the integrity of the
proposals but also the (partial) merit of at least some of the
alternative solutions.
The point made in the previous sentence is important and
worth amplifying. Because it is important to convey your
goodwill — your sense of fairness — to the reader, it is advisable to
let your reader see that you are familiar with the opposition and
that you recognize the integrity of those who hold that view. This
you do by granting its merits as far as you can. (For more about this
approach, see the essay by Carl R. Rogers on p. 343.)
The next stage, which constitutes most of the body of the essay,
usually is this:
4. Arguments in support of the proposed solution The
evidence offered will, of course, depend on the nature of the
problem. Relevant statistics, authorities, examples, or analo-
gies may come to mind or be available. This is usually the
longest part of the essay.
5. Arguments answering possible objections These argu-
ments may suggest that
a. The proposal won’t work (perhaps it is alleged to be too
expensive, to make unrealistic demands on human
nature, or to fail to get to the heart of the problem).
b. The proposed solution will create problems greater than
the difficulty to be resolved. (A good example of a pro-
posal that produced dreadful unexpected results is the law
mandating a prison term for anyone over eighteen in pos-
session of an illegal drug. Heroin dealers then began to use
children as runners, and cocaine importers followed the
practice. And while we are on the subject of children, con-
sider this: Five states have statutes that allow the death
penalty for adults who molest children. A chief argument
against this penalty is that the molesters, having nothing
further to lose, may kill their victims. A second argument
is that victims of sex crimes by family members may be
less likely to report the crimes. In your view, how valid are
these arguments about unintended consequences?
6. A summary, resolution, or conclusion Here the writer
may seek to accommodate the views of the opposition as far
as possible but clearly suggest that the writer’s own position
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makes good sense. A conclusion — the word comes from the
Latin claudere, “to shut” — ought to provide a sense of clo-
sure, but it can be much more than a restatement of the
writer’s thesis. It can, for instance, make a quiet emotional
appeal by suggesting that the issue is important and that the
ball is now in the reader’s court.
Of course not every essay will follow this six-step pattern, but
let’s assume that in the introductory paragraphs you have sketched
the topic (and have shown or nicely said, or implied, that the
reader doubtless is interested in it) and have fairly and courteously
set forth the opposition’s view, recognizing its merits (“I grant
that,” “admittedly,” “it is true that”) and indicating the degree to
which you can share part of that view. You now want to set forth
your arguments explaining why you differ on some essentials.
In setting forth your own position, you can begin either with
your strongest reasons or your weakest. Each method of organiza-
tion has advantages and disadvantages.
• If you begin with your strongest, the essay may seem to
peter out.
• If you begin with the weakest, you build to a climax, but
your readers may not still be with you because they may
have felt at the start that the essay was frivolous.
The solution to this last possibility is to make sure that even your
weakest argument is an argument of some strength. You can,
moreover, assure your readers that stronger points will soon be
offered and you offer this point first only because you want to
show that you are aware of it and that, slight though it is, it
deserves some attention. The body of the essay, then, is devoted to
arguing a position, which means offering not only supporting rea-
sons but also refutations of possible objections to these reasons.
Doubtless you will sometimes be uncertain, as you draft your
essay, whether to present a given point before or after another
point. When you write, and certainly when you revise, try to put
yourself into your reader’s shoes: Which point do you think the
reader needs to know first? Which point leads to which further
point? Your argument should not be a mere list of points, of course;
rather, it should clearly integrate one point with another in order
to develop an idea. But in all likelihood you won’t have a strong
sense of the best organization until you have written a draft and
have reread it.
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Checking Paragraphs When you revise your draft, watch out also
for short paragraphs. Although a paragraph of only two or three
sentences (like some in this chapter) may occasionally be helpful as
a transition between complicated points, most short paragraphs are
undeveloped paragraphs. (Newspaper editors favor very short para-
graphs because they can be read rapidly when printed in the nar-
row columns typical of newspapers. Many of the essays reprinted
in this book originally were published in newspapers, hence they
consist of very short paragraphs. There is no reason for you to imi-
tate this style in the argumentative essays you will be writing.)
In revising, when you find a paragraph of only a sentence or
two or three, check first to see if it should be joined to the para-
graph that precedes or follows. Second, if on rereading you are cer-
tain that a given paragraph should not be tied to what comes
before or after, think about amplifying the paragraph with support-
ing detail (this is not the same as mere padding).
Checking Transitions Make sure, too, in revising, that the reader
can move easily from the beginning of a paragraph to the end and
from one paragraph to the next. Transitions help the reader to per-
ceive the connections between the units of the argument. For
example (“For example” is a transition, of course, indicating that an
illustration will follow), they may illustrate, establish a sequence,
connect logically, amplify, compare, contrast, summarize, or con-
cede (see Idea Prompt 6.1). Transitions serve as guideposts that
enable your reader to move easily through your essay.
When writers revise an early draft, they chiefly
• Unify the essay by eliminating irrelevancies;
• Organize the essay by keeping in mind an imagined audience;
• Clarify the essay by fleshing out thin paragraphs, by making
certain that the transitions are adequate, and by making cer-
tain that generalizations are adequately supported by con-
crete details and examples.
We are not talking about polish or elegance; we are talking
about fundamental matters. Be especially careful not to abuse the
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A RULE FOR WRITERS: When you revise, make sure that your
organization is clear to your readers.
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logical connectives (thus, as a result, and so on). If you write several
sentences followed by therefore or a similar word or phrase, be sure
that what you write after the therefore really does follow from what
has gone before. Logical connectives are not mere transitional
devices used to link disconnected bits of prose. They are supposed
to mark a real movement of thought — the essence of an argument.
PLANNING, DRAFTING, AND REVISING AN ARGUMENT 169
IDEA PROMPT 6.1 USING TRANSITIONS IN ARGUMENT
Illustrate for example, for “Many television crime dramas
instance, consider contain scenes of graphic
this case violence. For example, in the
episode of Law and Order
titled . . .”
Establish a a more important “A stronger example of the ways
sequence objection, a stronger that TV violence is susceptible
example, the best to being mimicked is . . .”
reason
Connect thus, as a result, “Therefore, the Federal
logically therefore, so, it Communications Commission
follows ought to consider more carefully
regulating what types of
violence they allow on the air.”
Amplify further, in addition “Further, fines for networks that
to, moreover violate these regulations should
be steeper because . . .”
Compare similarly, in a like “Just as the FCC regulates
manner, just as, language and sexuality on
analogously broadcast TV . . .”
Contrast on the other hand, “On the other hand, studies
in contrast, have shown that violent
however, but television . . .”
Summarize in short, briefly “In short, the basic premise of
his argument is . . .”
Concede admittedly, granted, “Admittedly, there are many
to be sure points on which the author is
correct.”
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170 6 / DEVELOPING AN ARGUMENT OF YOUR OWN
A RULE FOR WRITERS: Emulate John Kenneth Galbraith, a distin-
guished writer on economics. Galbraith said that in his fifth draft he
introduced the note of spontaneity for which his writing was famous.
The Ending
What about concluding paragraphs, in which you try to summarize
the main points and reaffirm your position?
If you can look back over your essay and can add something
that enriches it and at the same time wraps it up, fine, but don’t
feel compelled to say, “Thus, in conclusion, I have argued X, Y, and
Z, and I have refuted Jones.” After all, conclusion can have two
meanings: (1) ending, or finish, as the ending of a joke or a novel;
or (2) judgment or decision reached after deliberation. Your essay
should finish effectively (the first sense), but it need not announce
a judgment (the second).
If the essay is fairly short, so that a reader can more or less keep
the whole thing in mind, you may not need to restate your view.
Just make sure that you have covered the ground and that your
last sentence is a good one. Notice that the student essay printed
later in this chapter (p. 183) does not end with a formal conclusion,
though it ends conclusively, with a note of finality.
By a note of finality we do not mean a triumphant crowing. It’s
usually far better to end with the suggestion that you hope you
have by now indicated why those who hold a different view may
want to modify it and accept yours.
If you study the essays in this book, or, for that matter, the edi-
torials and op-ed pieces in a newspaper, you will notice that writers
often provide a sense of closure by using one of the following
devices:
• A return to something in the introduction,
• A glance at the wider implications of the issue (for example,
if smoking is restricted, other liberties are threatened),
• An anecdote that engagingly illustrates the thesis, or
• A brief summary (but this sort of ending may seem unneces-
sary and even tedious, especially if the paper is short and if
the summary merely repeats what has already been said).
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Two Uses of an Outline
The Outline as a Preliminary Guide Some writers find it useful to
sketch an outline as soon as they think they know what they want
to say, even before they write a first draft. This procedure can be
helpful in planning a tentative organization, but remember that in
revising a draft new ideas will arise, and the outline may have to be
modified. A preliminary outline is chiefly useful as a means of getting
going, not as a guide to the final essay.
The Outline as a Way of Checking a Draft Whether or not you use a
preliminary outline, we strongly suggest that after you have written
what you hope is your last draft, you make an outline of it; there is
no better way of finding out whether the essay is well organized.
Go through the draft and jot down the chief points in the order
in which you make them. That is, prepare a table of contents —
perhaps a phrase for each paragraph. Next, examine your jottings
to see what kind of sequence they reveal in your paper:
• Is the sequence reasonable? Can it be improved?
• Are any passages irrelevant?
• Does something important seem to be missing?
If no coherent structure or reasonable sequence clearly appears in
the outline, then the full prose version of your argument probably
doesn’t have any either. Therefore, produce another draft, moving
things around, adding or subtracting paragraphs — cutting and past-
ing into a new sequence, with transitions as needed — and then
make another outline to see if the sequence now is satisfactory.
You are probably familiar with the structure known as a for-
mal outline. Major points are indicated by I, II, III; points within
major points are indicated by A, B, C; divisions within A, B, C are
indicated by 1, 2, 3; and so on. Thus,
I. Arguments for opening all Olympic sports to professionals
A. Fairness
1. Some Olympic sports are already open to professionals.
2. Some athletes who really are not professionals are
classified as professionals.
B. Quality (achievements would be higher)
You may want to outline your draft according to this principle, or it
may be enough if you simply jot down a phrase for each paragraph
and indent the subdivisions. But keep these points in mind:
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• It is not enough for the parts to be ordered reasonably.
• The order must be made clear to the reader, probably by
means of transitions such as for instance, on the other hand, we
can now turn to an opposing view, and so on.
Here is another way of thinking about an outline. For each
paragraph, jot down
• What the paragraph says, and
• What the paragraph does.
An opening paragraph might be outlined thus:
• What the paragraph says is that the words “under God” in the
Pledge of Allegiance should be omitted.
• What the paragraph does is, first, it informs the reader of the
thesis, and second, it provides some necessary background, for
instance, that the words were not in the original wording of
the Pledge.
A dual outline of this sort will help you to see whether you have a
final draft or a draft that needs refinement.
Tone and the Writer’s Persona
Although this book is chiefly about argument in the sense of
rational discourse — the presentation of reasons in support of a the-
sis or conclusion — the appeal to reason is only one form of persua-
sion. Another form is the appeal to emotion — to pity, for example.
Aristotle saw, in addition to the appeal to reason and the appeal to
emotion, a third form of persuasion, the appeal to the character of
the speaker. He called it the ethical appeal (the Greek word for
this kind of appeal is ethos, “character”). The idea is that effective
speakers convey the suggestion that they are
• Informed,
• Intelligent,
• Benevolent, and
• Honest.
Because they are perceived as trustworthy, their words inspire con-
fidence in their listeners. It is, of course, a fact that when we read
an argument we are often aware of the person or voice behind the
words, and our assent to the argument depends partly on the
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extent to which we can share the speaker’s assumptions, look at
the matter from the speaker’s point of view — in short, identify with
this speaker.
How can a writer inspire the confidence that lets readers iden-
tify themselves with the writer? To begin with, the writer should
possess the virtues Aristotle specified: intelligence or good sense,
honesty, and benevolence or goodwill. As the Roman proverb puts
it, “No one gives what he does not have.” Still, possession of these
qualities is not a guarantee that you will convey them in your writ-
ing. Like all other writers, you will have to revise your drafts so
that these qualities become apparent, or, stated more moderately,
you will have to revise so that nothing in the essay causes a reader
to doubt your intelligence, honesty, and goodwill. A blunder in
logic, a misleading quotation, a snide remark, even an error in
spelling — all such slips can cause readers to withdraw their sympa-
thy from the writer.
But of course all good argumentative essays do not sound
exactly alike; they do not all reveal the same speaker. Each writer
develops his or her own voice or (as literary critics and teachers
call it) persona. In fact, one writer will have several voices or
personae, depending on the topic and the audience. The president
of the United States delivering an address on the State of the
Union has one persona; chatting with a reporter at his summer
home he has another. This change is not a matter of hypocrisy.
Different circumstances call for different language. As a French
writer put it, there is a time to speak of “Paris” and a time to
speak of “the capital of the nation.” When Lincoln spoke at
Gettysburg, he didn’t say “Eighty-seven years ago,” but “Four
score and seven years ago.” We might say that just as some occa-
sions required him to be the folksy Honest Abe, the occasion of
the dedication of hallowed ground required him to be formal and
solemn, and so the president of the United States appropriately
used biblical language. The election campaigns called for one per-
sona, and the dedication of a military cemetery called for a differ-
ent persona.
PLANNING, DRAFTING, AND REVISING AN ARGUMENT 173
A RULE FOR WRITERS: Present yourself so that your readers see you
as knowledgeable, honest, open-minded, and interested in helping
them to think about an issue of significance.
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When we talk about a writer’s persona, we mean the way in
which the writer presents his or her attitudes
• Toward the self,
• Toward the audience, and
• Toward the subject.
Thus, if a writer says,
I have thought long and hard about this subject, and I can say
with assurance that . . .
we may feel that we are listening to a self-satisfied ass who proba-
bly is simply mouthing other people’s opinions. Certainly he is
mouthing clichés: “long and hard,” “say with assurance.”
Let’s look at a slightly subtler example of an utterance that
reveals an attitude. When we read that
President Nixon was hounded out of office by journalists,
we hear a respectful attitude toward Nixon (“President Nixon”) and
a hostile attitude toward the press (they are beasts, curs who
“hounded” our elected leader). If the writer’s attitudes were
reversed, she might have said something like this:
The press turned the searchlight on Tricky Dick’s criminal
shenanigans.
“Tricky Dick” and “criminal” are obvious enough, but notice that
“shenanigans” also implies the writer’s contempt for Nixon, and of
course, “turned the searchlight” suggests that the press is a source of
illumination, a source of truth. The original version and the opposite
version both say that the press was responsible for Nixon’s resigna-
tion, but the original version (“President Nixon was hounded”) con-
veys indignation toward journalists, whereas the revision conveys
contempt for Nixon.
These two versions suggest two speakers who differ not only in
their view of Nixon but also in their manner, including the serious-
ness with which they take themselves. Although the passage is very
short, it seems to us that the first speaker conveys righteous indigna-
tion (“hounded”), whereas the second conveys amused contempt
(“shenanigans”). To our ears the tone, as well as the point, differs in
the two versions.
We are talking about loaded words, words that convey the
writer’s attitude and that by their connotations are meant to win
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the reader to the writer’s side. Compare the words in the left-hand
column with those in the right:
freedom fighter terrorist
pro-choice pro-abortion
pro-life antichoice
economic refugee illegal alien
terrorist-surveillance domestic spying
The words in the left-hand column sound like good things; speak-
ers who use these words are seeking to establish themselves as
virtuous people who are supporting worthy causes. The conno-
tations (associations, overtones) of these pairs of words differ,
even though the denotations (explicit meanings, dictionary def-
initions) are the same, just as the connotations of mother and
female parent differ, although the denotations are the same.
Similarly, although Lincoln’s “four score and seven” and “eighty-
seven” both denote “thirteen less than one hundred,” they differ
in connotation.
Tone is not only a matter of connotations (hounded out of office
versus, let’s say, compelled to resign, or pro-choice versus pro-abortion);
it is also a matter of such things as the selection and type of exam-
ples. A writer who offers many examples, especially ones drawn
from ordinary life, conveys a persona different from that of a writer
who offers no examples or only an occasional invented instance.
The first of these probably is, one might say, friendlier, more down-
to-earth.
Last Words on Tone On the whole, when writing an argument, it is
advisable to be courteous and respectful of your topic, of your audi-
ence, and of people who hold views you are arguing against. It is
rarely good for one’s own intellectual development to regard as vil-
lains or fools persons who hold views different from one’s own, espe-
cially if some of them are in the audience. Keep in mind the story of
the two strangers on a train who, striking up a conversation, found
that both were clergymen, though of different faiths. Then one said
to the other, “Well, why shouldn’t we be friends? After all, we both
serve God, you in your way and I in His.”
Complacency is all right when telling a joke but not when
offering an argument:
• Recognize opposing views.
• Assume they are held in good faith.
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• State them fairly (if you don’t, you do a disservice not only
to the opposition but also to your own position because the
perceptive reader will not take you seriously).
• Be temperate in arguing your own position: “If I understand
their view correctly . . .”; “It seems reasonable to conclude
that . . .”; “Perhaps, then, we can agree that . . .”
We, One, or I ?
The use of we in the last sentence brings us to another point: May
the first-person pronouns I and we be used? In this book, because
two of us are writing, we often use we to mean the two authors.
And we sometimes use we to mean the authors and the readers, as
in phrases like the one that ends the previous paragraph. This shift-
ing use of one word can be troublesome, but we hope (clearly the
we here refers only to the authors) that we have avoided any ambi-
guity. But can, or should, or must, an individual use we instead of
I? The short answer is no.
If you are simply speaking for yourself, use I. Attempts to avoid
the first-person singular by saying things like “This writer
thinks . . . ,” and “It is thought that . . . ,” and “One thinks that . . . ,”
are far more irritating (and wordy) than the use of I. The so-called
editorial we is as odd-sounding in a student’s argument as is the
royal we. Mark Twain said that the only ones who can appropri-
ately say we are kings, editors, and people with a tapeworm. And
because one one leads to another, making the sentence sound
(James Thurber’s words) “like a trombone solo,” it’s best to admit
that you are the author, and to use I. But there is no need to pref-
ace every sentence with “I think.” The reader knows that the essay
is yours; just write it, using I when you must, but not needlessly.
Avoiding Sexist Language
Courtesy as well as common sense requires that you respect the
feelings of your readers. Many people today find offensive the
implicit sexism in the use of male pronouns to denote not only
men but also women (“As the reader follows the argument, he will
find . . .”). And sometimes the use of the male pronoun to denote all
people is ridiculous: “An individual, no matter what his sex, . . .”
In most contexts there is no need to use gender-specific nouns
or pronouns. One way to avoid using he when you mean any per-
son is to use he or she (or she or he) instead of he, but the result is
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sometimes a bit cumbersome — although it is superior to the overly
conspicuous he/she and to s/he.
Here are two simple ways to solve the problem:
• Use the plural (“As readers follow the argument, they will
find . . .”), or
• Recast the sentence so that no pronoun is required (“Readers
following the argument will find . . .”).
Because man and mankind strike many readers as sexist when
used in such expressions as “Man is a rational animal” and “Mankind
has not yet solved this problem,” consider using such words as
human being, person, people, humanity, and we. (Examples: “Human
beings are rational animals”; “We have not yet solved this problem.”)
PLANNING, DRAFTING, AND REVISING AN ARGUMENT 177
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR ATTENDING TO THE NEEDS
OF THE AUDIENCE
� Do I have a sense of what the audience probably knows about
the issue?
� Do I have a sense of what the audience probably thinks about
the issue?
� Have I stated the thesis clearly and sufficiently early in the
essay?
� How much common ground do we probably share?
� Have I, in the paper, tried to establish common ground and
then moved on to advance my position?
� Have I supported my arguments with sufficient details?
� Have I used the appropriate language (for instance, defined
terms that are likely to be unfamiliar)?
� Have I indicated why my readers should care about the issue
and should accept or at least take seriously my views?
� Is the organization clear?
� Have I used transitions where they are needed?
� If visual material (charts, graphs, pictures) will enhance my
arguments, have I used them?
� Have I presented myself as a person who is (a) fair, (b)
informed, and (c) worth listening to?
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PEER REVIEW
Your instructor may suggest — or may even require — that you sub-
mit an early draft of your essay to a fellow student or small group
of students for comment. Such a procedure benefits both author
and readers: You get the responses of a reader and the student-
reader gets experience in thinking about the problems of develop-
ing an argument, especially in thinking about such matters as the
degree of detail that a writer needs to offer to a reader and the
importance of keeping the organization evident to a reader.
Oral peer reviews allow for the give and take of discussion, but
probably most students and most instructors find written peer
reviews more helpful because reviewers think more carefully
about their responses to the draft, and they help essayists to get
beyond a knee-jerk response to criticism. Online reviews on a
class Web site or through e-mail are especially helpful precisely
because they are not face to face; the peer reviewer gets practice
writing, and the essayist is not directly challenged.
A STUDENT’S ESSAY, FROM
ROUGH NOTES TO FINAL VERSION
While we were revising this textbook, we asked the students in one
of our classes to write a short essay (500–750 words) on some ethical
problem that concerned them. Because this assignment was the first
writing assignment in the course, we explained that a good way to
get ideas is to ask oneself some questions, jot down responses, ques-
tion those responses, and write freely for ten minutes or so, not wor-
rying about contradictions. We invited our students to hand in their
initial jottings along with the finished essay, so that we could get a
sense of how they proceeded as writers. Not all of them chose to
hand in their jottings, but we were greatly encouraged by those who
did. What was encouraging was the confirmation of an old belief, the
belief — we call it a fact — that students will hand in a thoughtful
essay if before they prepare a final version they nag themselves, ask
themselves why they think this or that, jot down their responses, and
are not afraid to change their minds as they proceed.
Here are the first jottings of a student, Emily Andrews, who
elected to write about whether to give money to street beggars. She
simply put down ideas, one after the other.
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A STUDENT’S ESSAY, FROM ROUGH NOTES TO FINAL VERSION 179
✓ A PEER REVIEW CHECKLIST FOR A DRAFT
OF AN ARGUMENT
Read the draft through quickly. Then read it again, with the
following questions in mind. Remember: You are reading a draft,
a work in progress. You are expected to offer suggestions, and it
is also expected that you will offer them courteously.
� Does the draft show promise of fulfilling the assignment?
� Is the writer’s tone appropriate?
� Looking at the essay as a whole, what thesis (main idea) is
advanced?
� Are the needs of the audience kept in mind? For instance, do
some words need to be defined? Is the evidence (for instance,
the examples and the testimony of authorities) clear and
effective?
� Can I accept the assumptions? If not, why not?
� Is any obvious evidence (or counterevidence) overlooked?
� Is the writer proposing a solution? If so,
� Are other equally attractive solutions adequately examined?
� Has the writer overlooked some unattractive effects of the
proposed solution?
� Looking at each paragraph separately,
� What is the basic point?
� How does each paragraph relate to the essay’s main idea
or to the previous paragraph?
� Should some paragraphs be deleted? Be divided into two or
more paragraphs? Be combined? Be put elsewhere? (If you
outline the essay by jotting down the gist of each paragraph,
you will get help in answering these questions.)
� Is each sentence clearly related to the sentence that precedes
and to the sentence that follows?
� Is each paragraph adequately developed? Are there sufficient
details, perhaps brief supporting quotations from the text?
� Are the introductory and concluding paragraphs effective?
� What are the paper’s chief strengths?
� Make at least two specific suggestions that you think will assist
the author to improve the paper.
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Help the poor? Why do I (sometimes) do it?
I feel guilty, and think I should help them: poor, cold, hungry (but
also some of them are thirsty for liquor, and will spend the money
on liquor, not on food).
I also feel annoyed by them — most of them.
Where does the expression “the deserving poor” come from?
And “poor but honest”? Actually, that sounds a bit odd. Wouldn’t
“rich but honest” make more sense?
Why don’t they work? Fellow with red beard, always by bus stop in
front of florist’s shop, always wants a handout. He is a regular,
there all day every day, so I guess he is in a way “reliable,” so why
doesn’t he put the same time in on a job?
Or why don’t they get help? Don’t they know they need it? They
must know they need it.
Maybe that guy with the beard is just a con artist. Maybe he makes
more money by panhandling than he would by working, and it’s a
lot easier!
Kinds of poor — how to classify??
drunks, druggies, etc.
mentally ill (maybe drunks belong here too)
decent people who have had terrible luck
Why private charity?
Doesn’t it make sense to say we (fortunate individuals) should give
something — an occasional handout — to people who have had
terrible luck? (I suppose some people might say that there is no
need for any of us to give anything — the government takes care of
the truly needy — but I do believe in giving charity. A month ago a
friend of the family passed away, and the woman’s children sug-
gested that people might want to make a donation in her name, to
a shelter for battered women. I know my parents made a donation.)
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BUT how can I tell who is who, which are which? Which of these
people asking for “spare change” really need (deserve???) help, and
which are phonies? Impossible to tell.
Possibilities:
Give to no one
Give to no one but make an annual donation, maybe to
United Way
Give a dollar to each person who asks. This would probably
not cost me even a dollar a day
Occasionally do without something — maybe a CD — or a meal
in a restaurant — and give the money I save to people who
seem worthy.
WORTHY? What am I saying? How can I, or anyone, tell? The neat-
looking guy who says he just lost his job may be a phony, and the
dirty bum — probably a drunk — may desperately need food. (OK,
so what if he spends the money on liquor instead of food? At least
he’ll get a little pleasure in life. No! It’s not all right if he spends it
on drink.)
Other possibilities:
Do some volunteer work?
To tell the truth, I don’t want to put in the time. I don’t feel
that guilty.
So what’s the problem?
Is it, How I can help the very poor (handouts, or through an orga-
nization)? or
How I can feel less guilty about being lucky enough to be able to
go to college, and to have a supportive family?
I can’t quite bring myself to believe I should help every beggar
who approaches, but I also can’t bring myself to believe that I
should do nothing, on the grounds that:
a. it’s probably their fault
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b. if they are deserving, they can get gov’t help. No, I just
can’t believe that. Maybe some are too proud to look for
government help, or don’t know that they are entitled to it.
What to do?
On balance, it seems best to
a. give to United Way
b. maybe also give to an occasional individual, if I happen to
be moved, without worrying about whether he or she is
“deserving” (since it’s probably impossible to know).
A day after making these notes Emily reviewed them, added a
few points, and then made a very brief selection from them to
serve as an outline for her first draft:
Opening para.: “poor but honest”? Deserve “spare change”?
Charity: private or through organizations?
pros and cons
guy at bus
it wouldn’t cost me much, but . . . better to give through
organizations
Concluding para.: still feel guilty?
maybe mention guy at bus again?
After writing and revising a draft, Emily Andrews submitted
her essay to a fellow student for peer review. She then revised her
work in light of the suggestions she received and in light of her
own further thinking.
On the next page we give the final essay. If after reading the
final version you reread the early jottings, you will notice that some
of the jottings never made it into the final version. But without the
jottings, the essay probably could not have been as interesting as it
is. When the writer made the jottings, she was not so much putting
down her ideas as finding ideas by the process of writing.
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Emily Andrews
Professor Barnet
English 102
January 15, 2010
Why I Don’t Spare “Spare Change”
“Poor but honest.” “The deserving poor.” I don’t know
the origin of these quotations, but they always come to mind
when I think of “the poor.” But I also think of people who,
perhaps through alcohol or drugs, have ruined not only their
own lives but also the lives of others in order to indulge in
their own pleasure. Perhaps alcoholism and drug addiction
really are “diseases,” as many people say, but my own
feeling — based, of course, not on any serious study — is that
most alcoholics and drug addicts can be classified with the
“undeserving poor.” And that is largely why I don’t distribute
spare change to panhandlers.
But surely among the street people there are also some
who can rightly be called “deserving.” Deserving what? My
spare change? Or simply the government’s assistance? It
happens that I have been brought up to believe that it is
appropriate to make contributions to charity — let’s say a
shelter for battered women — but if I give some change to a
panhandler, am I making a contribution to charity and thereby
helping someone, or, on the contrary, am I perhaps simply
encouraging someone not to get help? Or maybe even worse,
am I supporting a con artist?
If one believes in the value of private charity, one can
give either to needy individuals or to charitable organizations.
Andrews 1
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In giving to a panhandler one may indeed be helping a person
who badly needs help, but one cannot be certain that one is
giving to a needy individual. In giving to an organization such
as the United Way, on the other hand, one can feel that one’s
money is likely to be used wisely. True, confronted by a beggar
one may feel that this particular unfortunate individual needs
help at this moment — a cup of coffee or a sandwich — and the
need will not be met unless I put my hand in my pocket right
now. But I have come to think that the beggars whom
I encounter can get along without my spare change, and indeed
perhaps they are actually better off for not having money to
buy liquor or drugs.
It happens that in my neighborhood I encounter few
panhandlers. There is one fellow who is always by the bus stop
where I catch the bus to the college, and I never give him
anything precisely because he is always there. He is such a
regular that, I think, he ought to be able to hold a regular job.
Putting him aside, I probably don’t encounter more than three
or four beggars in a week. (I’m not counting street musicians.
These people seem quite able to work for a living. If they see
their “work” as playing or singing, let persons who enjoy their
performances pay them. I do not consider myself among their
audience.) The truth of the matter is that, since I meet so few
beggars, I could give each one a dollar and hardly feel the loss.
At most, I might go without seeing a movie some week. But I
know nothing about these people, and it’s my impression —
admittedly based on almost no evidence — that they simply
prefer begging to working. I am not generalizing about street
Andrews 2
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people, and certainly I am not talking about street people in the
big urban centers. I am talking only about the people whom I
actually encounter.
That’s why I usually do not give “spare change,” and I
don’t think I will in the future. These people will get along
without me. Someone else will come up with money for their
coffee or their liquor, or, at worst, they will just have to do
without. I will continue to contribute occasionally to a charitable
organization, not simply (I hope) to salve my conscience but
because I believe that these organizations actually do good work.
But I will not attempt to be a mini-charitable organization,
distributing (probably to the unworthy) spare change.
Andrews 3
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THE ESSAY ANALYZED
Finally, here are a few comments about the essay:
The title is informative, alerting the reader to the topic and the
author’s position. (By the way, the student told us that in her next-
to-last draft the title was “Is It Right to Spare ‘Spare Change’?” This
title, like the revision, introduces the topic but not the author’s posi-
tion. The revised version seems to us to be more striking.)
The opening paragraph holds a reader’s interest, partly by allud-
ing to the familiar phrase “the deserving poor” and partly by intro-
ducing the unfamiliar phrase “the undeserving poor.” Notice, too,
that this opening paragraph ends by clearly asserting the author’s
thesis. Of course, writers need not always announce their thesis
early, but it is usually advisable to do so. Readers like to know
where they are going.
Paragraph two begins by voicing what probably is the reader’s
somewhat uneasy — perhaps even negative — response to the first
paragraph. That is, the writer has a sense of her audience; she knows
how her reader feels, and she takes account of the feeling.
Paragraph three clearly sets forth the alternatives. A reader may
disagree with the writer’s attitude, but the alternatives seem to be
stated fairly.
Paragraphs four and five are more personal than the earlier para-
graphs. The writer, more or less having stated what she takes to be
the facts, now is entitled to offer a highly personal response to them.
The final paragraph nicely wraps things up by means of the
words “spare change,” which go back to the title and to the end of
the first paragraph. The reader thus experiences a sensation of com-
pleteness. The essayist, of course, has not solved the problem for all
of us for all time, but she presents a thoughtful argument and ends
the essay effectively.
EXERCISE
In an essay of 500 words, state a claim and support it with evi-
dence. Choose an issue in which you are genuinely interested and
about which you already know something. You may want to inter-
view a few experts and do some reading, but don’t try to write a
highly researched paper. Sample topics:
1. Students in laboratory courses should not be required to participate
in the dissection of animals.
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2. Washington, D.C., should be granted statehood.
3. Puerto Rico should be granted statehood.
4. Women should, in wartime, be exempted from serving in combat.
5. The annual Miss America contest is an insult to women.
6. The government should not offer financial support to the arts.
7. The chief fault of the curriculum in high school was . . .
8. Grades should be abolished in college and university courses.
9. No specific courses should be required in colleges or universities.
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Using Sources
Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a
purpose.
— ZORA NEALE HURSTON
There is no way of exchanging information that does not involve
an act of judgment.
— JACOB BRONOWSKI
For God’s sake, stop researching for a while and begin to think.
— WALTER HAMILTON MOBERLY
A problem adequately stated is a problem on its way to being
solved.
— R. BUCKMINSTER FULLER
I have yet to see any problem, however complicated, which, when
you looked at it in the right way, did not become still more
complicated.
— POUL ANDERSON
WHY USE SOURCES?
We have pointed out that one gets ideas by writing. In the exercise of
writing a draft, ideas begin to form, and these ideas stimulate further
ideas, especially when one questions—when one thinks about—
what one has written. But of course in writing about complex, seri-
ous questions, nobody is expected to invent all the answers. On the
contrary, a writer is expected to be familiar with the chief answers
already produced by others and to make use of them through selec-
tive incorporation and criticism. In short, writers are not expected to
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reinvent the wheel; rather, they are expected to make good use of it
and perhaps round it off a bit or replace a defective spoke. In order to
think out your own views in writing, you are expected to do some
preliminary research into the views of others.
When you are trying to understand an issue, high-quality
sources will inform you of the various approaches others have
taken and will help you establish what the facts are. Once you are
informed enough to take a position, the sources you present to
your readers will inform and persuade them, just as expert wit-
nesses are sometimes brought in to inform and persuade a jury.
Research isn’t limited to the world of professors and scientists.
In one way or another, everyone does research at some point. If
you want to persuade your city council to increase the number of
bicycle lanes on city streets, you could bolster your argument with
statistics on how much money the city could save if more people
rode their bikes to work. If you decide to open your own business,
you would do plenty of market research to persuade your bank
that you could repay a loan. Sources (whether published informa-
tion or data you gather yourself through interviews, surveys,
or
observation) are not only useful for background information; well-
chosen and carefully analyzed sources are evidence for your read-
ers that you know what you’re talking about and that your
interpretation is sound.
Research is often misconstrued as the practice of transcribing
information. In fact, it’s a process of asking questions and gathering
information that helps you come to conclusions about an issue.
By
using the information you find as evidence, you can develop an
effective argument. But don’t spend too much time searching, and
then waiting until the last minute to start writing. As you begin
your search, jot down observations and questions. When you find a
useful source, take notes on what you think it means in your own
words. This way, you won’t find yourself with a pile of printouts
and books and no idea what to say about them. What you have to
say will flow naturally out of the pre-writing you’ve already done—
and that pre-writing will help guide your search.
The process of research isn’t always straightforward and
neat. It involves scanning what other people have said about a
topic and seeing what kinds of questions have been raised. As you
poke and pry, you will learn more about the issue, and that, in turn,
will help you develop a question to focus your efforts. Once you have
a central idea—a thesis—you can sharpen your search to seek out
the evidence that will make your readers sit up and take notice.
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Consider arguments about whether athletes should be permit-
ted to take anabolic steroids, drugs that supposedly build up mus-
cle, restore energy, and enhance aggressiveness. A thoughtful
argument on this subject will have to take account of information
that the writer can gather only by doing some research.
• Do steroids really have the effects commonly attributed to
them?
• And are they dangerous?
• If they are dangerous, how dangerous are they?
After all, competitive sports are inherently dangerous, some of them
highly so. Many boxers, jockeys, and football players have suffered
severe injury, even death, from competing. Does anyone believe
that anabolic steroids are more dangerous than the contests them-
selves? Obviously, again, a respectable argument about steroids will
have to show awareness of what is known about them.
Or take this question:
Why did President Truman order that atomic bombs be dropped
on Hiroshima and Nagasaki?
The most obvious answer is to end the war, but some historians
believe he had a very different purpose. In their view, Japan’s defeat
was ensured before the bombs were dropped, and the Japanese were
ready to surrender; the bombs were dropped not to save American
(or Japanese) lives but to show Russia that the United States would
not be pushed around. Scholars who hold this view, such as Gar
Alperovitz in Atomic Diplomacy (1965), argue that Japanese civilians
in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were incinerated not to save the lives of
American soldiers who otherwise would have died in an invasion
of Japan but to teach Stalin a lesson. Dropping the bombs, it is
argued, marked not the end of the Pacific War but the beginning of
the cold war.
One must ask: What evidence supports this argument or claim
or thesis, which assumes that Truman could not have thought the
bomb was needed to defeat the Japanese because the Japanese
knew they were defeated and would soon surrender without a
hard-fought defense that would cost hundreds of thousands of
lives? What about the momentum that had built up to use the
bomb? After all, years of effort and $2 billion had been expended
to produce a weapon with the intention of using it to end the war
against Germany. But Germany had been defeated without the use
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of the bomb. Meanwhile, the war in the Pacific continued unabated.
If the argument we are considering is correct, all this background
counted for little or nothing in Truman’s decision, a decision purely
diplomatic and coolly indifferent to human life. The task for the
writer is to evaluate the evidence available and then to argue for or
against the view that Truman’s purpose in dropping the bomb was
to impress the Soviet government.
A student writing on the topic will certainly want to consult
the chief books on the subject (Alperovitz’s, cited above, Martin
Sherwin’s A World Destroyed [1975], and John Toland’s The Rising
Sun [1970]) and perhaps reviews of them, especially the reviews
in journals devoted to political science. (Reading a searching review
of a serious scholarly book is a good way to identify quickly some
of the book’s main contributions and controversial claims.) Truman’s
letters and statements and books and articles about Truman are
also clearly relevant, and doubtless important articles are to be
found in recent issues of scholarly journals and electronic sources.
In fact, even an essay on such a topic as whether Truman was
morally justified in using the atomic bomb for any purpose will be
a stronger essay if it is well informed about such matters as the
estimated loss of life that an invasion would have cost, the inter-
national rules governing weapons, and Truman’s own statements
about the issue.
How does one go about finding the material needed to write a
well-informed argument? We will provide help, but first we want
to offer a few words about choosing a topic.
CHOOSING A TOPIC
We will be brief. If a topic is not assigned, choose one that
• Interests you and
• Can be researched with reasonable thoroughness in the
allotted time.
Topics such as censorship, the environment, and sexual harassment
obviously impinge on our lives, and it may well be that one such
topic is of especial interest to you. But the scope of these topics
makes researching them potentially overwhelming. Type the word
censorship into an Internet search engine, and you will be referred
to millions of information sources.
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This brings us to our second point—a manageable topic. Any
of the previous topics would need to be narrowed substantially
before you could begin searching in earnest. Similarly, a topic such
as the causes of World War II can hardly be mastered in a few
weeks or argued in a ten-page paper. It is simply too big.
You can, however, write a solid paper analyzing, evaluating,
and arguing for or against General Eisenhower’s views on atomic
warfare. What were they, and when did he hold them? (In his
books of 1948 and 1963 Eisenhower says that he opposed the use
of the bomb before Hiroshima and that he argued with Secretary
of War Henry Stimson against dropping it, but what evidence sup-
ports these claims? Was Eisenhower attempting to rewrite history
in his books?) Eisenhower’s own writings and books and other
information sources on Eisenhower will, of course, be the major
sources for a paper on this topic, but you will also want to look at
books and articles about Stimson and at publications that contain
information about the views of other generals, so that, for
instance, you can compare Eisenhower’s view with Marshall’s or
MacArthur’s.
Spend a little time exploring a topic to see if it will be interest-
ing and manageable by taking one or more of these approaches.
• Do a Web search on the topic. Though you may not use any
of the sites that turn up, you can quickly put your finger on
the pulse of popular approaches to the issue by scanning the
first page or two of results to see what issues are getting the
most attention.
• Plug the topic into one of the library’s article databases. Again,
just by scanning titles you can get a sense of what questions
are being raised.
• Browse the library shelves where books on the topic are
kept. A quick check of the tables of contents of recently
published books may give you ideas of how to narrow the
topic.
• Ask a librarian to show you where specialized reference
books on your topic are found. Instead of general encyclope-
dias, try sources like these:
CQ Researcher
Encyclopedia of Applied Ethics
Encyclopedia of Bioethics
Encyclopedia of Crime and Justice
Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Ethics
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• Talk to an expert. Members of the faculty who specialize in
the area of your topic might be able to spell out some of the
most significant controversies around a topic and may point
you toward key sources.
FINDING MATERIAL
What strategy you use for finding good sources will depend on
your topic. Researching a current issue in politics or popular cul-
ture may involve reading recent newspaper articles, scanning infor-
mation on government Web sites, and locating current statistics.
Other topics may be best tackled by seeking out books and schol-
arly journal articles that are less timely, but more in-depth and ana-
lytical. You may want to supplement library and Web sources with
your own field work by conducting surveys or interviews.
Critical thinking is crucial to every step of the research process.
Whatever strategy you use, remember that you will want to find
material that is authoritative, represents a balanced approach to the
issues, and is persuasive. As you choose your sources, bear in mind
they will be serving as your “expert witnesses” as you make a case
to your audience. Their quality and credibility are crucial to your
argument.
Finding Quality Information on the Web
The Web is a valuable source of information for many topics and less
helpful for others. In general, if you’re looking for information on
public policy, popular culture, current events, legal affairs, or for any
subject of interest to agencies of the federal or state government, the
Web is likely to have useful material. If you’re looking for literary
criticism or scholarly analysis of historical or social issues, you will
be better off using library databases, described later in this chapter.
To make good use of the Web, try these strategies.
• Use the most specific terms possible when using a general
search engine; put phrases in quotes.
• Use the advanced search option to limit a search to a domain
(e.g. .gov for government sites) or by date (such as Web sites
updated in the past week or month).
• If you’re not sure which sites might be good ones for research,
try starting with one of the selective directories listed below
instead of a general search engine.
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• Consider which government agencies and organizations might
be interested in your topic and go directly to their Web sites.
• Follow “about” links to see who is behind a Web site and why
they put the information on the Web. If there is no “about”
link, delete everything after the first slash in the URL to go to
the parent site to see if it provides information.
• Use clues in URLs to see where sites originate. For example,
URLs containing .k12 are hosted at elementary and second-
ary schools, so may be intended for a young audience; those
ending in .gov are government agencies, so they tend to pro-
vide official information.
• Always bear in mind that the sources you choose must be
persuasive to your audience. Avoid sites that may be dis-
missed as unreliable or biased.
Some useful Web sites include the following:
Selective Web Site Directories
Infomine
Intute
Librarian’s Internet Index
Current News Sources
Google News
Kidon Media-Link
Digital Primary Sources
American Memory
Avalon Project
American Rhetoric
Government Information
GPO Access
Thomas (federal legislation)
University of Michigan Documents Center
Scholarly or Scientific Information
Google Scholar
Scirus
Statistical Information
American FactFinder
Fedstats
Pew Global Attitudes Project
U.S. Census Bureau
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Finding Articles Using Library Databases
Your library has a wide range of general and specialized databases
available through its Web site. Some databases provide references to
articles (and perhaps abstracts or summaries) or may provide direct
links to the entire text of articles. General and interdisciplinary data-
bases include Academic Search Premier (produced by the EBSCOhost
company) and Expanded Academic Index (from InfoTrac).
More specialized databases include PsycINFO (for psychology
research) and ERIC (focused on topics in education). Others, such as
JSTOR, are full-text digital archives of scholarly journals. You will
likely have access to newspaper articles through LexisNexis or
Proquest Newsstand, particularly useful for articles that are not
available for free on the Web. Look at your library’s Web site to see
what your options are, or stop by the reference desk for a quick per-
sonalized tutorial.
When using databases, first think through your topic using the
listing and diagramming techniques described on pages 147–48.
List synonyms for your key search terms. As you search, look at
words used in titles and descriptors for alternative ideas and make
use of the “advanced search” option so that you can easily combine
multiple terms. Rarely will you find exactly what you’re looking
for right away. Try different search terms and different ways to nar-
row your topic.
FINDING MATERIAL 19
5
A WORD ABOUT WIKIPEDIA
Links to Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.org) often rise to the top of
Web search results. This vast and decentralized site provides over a
million articles on a wide variety of topics. However, anyone can
contribute to the online encyclopedia, so the accuracy of articles
varies, and, in some cases the coverage of a controversial issue is
one-sided or disputed. Even when the articles are accurate, they
provide only basic information. Wikipedia’s founder, Jimmy Wales,
cautions students against using it as a source, except for obtaining
general background knowledge: “You’re in college; don’t cite the
encyclopedia.”1
1”Wikipedia Founder Discourages Academic Use of His Creation,” Chronicle of Higher
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Most databases have an advanced search option that offers
forms for combining multiple terms. In Figure 7.1, a search on
“anabolic steroids” retrieved far too many articles. In this advanced
search, three concepts are being combined in a search: anabolic
steroids, legal aspects of their use, and use of them by athletes.
Related terms are combined with the word “or”: law or legal. The
last letters of a word have been replaced with an asterisk so that
any ending will be included in the search. Athlet* will search for
athlete, athletes, or athletics. Options on both sides of the list of
articles retrieved offer opportunities to refine a search by date of
publication or to restrict the results to only academic journals, mag-
azines, or newspapers.
As with a Web search, you’ll need to make critical choices about
which articles are worth pursuing. In this example, the first article
may not be useful because it concerns German law. The second and
third look fairly current and potentially useful. Only the third has a
full text link, but the others may be available in another database.
Many libraries have a program that will check other databases for
you at the push of a button; in this case it’s indicated by the “Find
full text” button.
As you choose sources, keep track of them by selecting choice
ones in the list. Then you can print off, save, or e-mail yourself the
references you have selected. You may also have an option to export
references to citation management program such as RefWorks or
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EndNote. These programs allow you to create your own personal
database of sources in which you can store your references and take
notes. Later, when you’re ready to create a bibliography, these pro-
grams will automatically format your references in MLA, APA, or
another style. Ask a librarian if one of these programs is available to
students on your campus.
Locating Books
The books that your library owns can be found through its online
catalog. Typically, you can search by author or title or, if you don’t
have a specific book in mind, by keyword or subject. As with data-
bases, think about different search terms to use, keeping an eye out
for subject headings used for books that appear relevant. Take advan-
tage of an “advanced search” option. You may, for example, be able
to limit a search to books on a particular topic in English published
within recent years. In addition to books, the catalog will also list
DVDs, sound recordings, and other formats.
Unlike articles, books tend to cover broad topics, so be prepared
to broaden your search terms. It may be that a book has a chapter
or ten pages that are precisely what you need, but the catalog typi-
cally doesn’t index the contents of books in detail. Think instead of
what kind of book might contain the information you need.
Once you’ve found some promising books in the catalog, note
down the call numbers, find them on the shelves, and then browse.
Since books on the same topic are shelved together, you can
quickly see what additional books are available by scanning the
shelves. As you browse, be sure to look for books that have been
published recently enough for your purposes. You do not have to
read a book cover-to-cover to use it in your research. Instead, skim
the introduction to see if it will be useful, then use its table of con-
tents and index to pinpoint the sections of the book that are the
most relevant.
If you have a very specific name or phrase you are searching
for, you might try typing it into Google Book Search
scanned books. Though it tends to retrieve too many results for
most topics, and you may only be able to see a snippet of context, it
can help you locate a particular quote or identify which books
might include an unusual name or phrase. There is a “find in a
library” link that will help you determine whether the books are
available in your library.
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INTERVIEWING PEERS AND LOCAL AUTHORITIES
You ought to try to consult experts—for instance, members of the
faculty or other local authorities on art, business, law, and so forth.
You can also consult interested laypersons. Remember, however, that
experts have their biases and that “ordinary” people may have knowl-
edge that experts lack. When interviewing experts, keep in mind
Picasso’s comment: “You mustn’t always believe what I say. Questions
tempt you to tell lies, particularly when there is no answer.”
If you are interviewing your peers, you will probably want to
make an effort to get a representative sample. Of course, even within
a group not all members share a single view—many African
Americans favor affirmative action but not all do, and many gays
favor legalizing gay marriage but, again, some don’t. Make an effort to
talk to a range of people who might be expected to offer varied opin-
ions. You may learn some unexpected things.
Here we will concentrate, however, on interviews with experts.
1. Finding subjects for interviews If you are looking for
expert opinions, you may want to start with a faculty member on
your campus. You may already know the instructor, or you may
have to scan the catalog to see who teaches courses relevant to
your topic. Department secretaries and college Web sites are good
sources of information about the special interests of the faculty
and also about lecturers who will be visiting the campus.
2. Doing preliminary homework (1) In requesting the
interview, make evident your interest in the topic and in the person.
(If you know something about the person, you will be able to indi-
cate why you are asking him or her.) (2) Request the interview,
preferably in writing, a week in advance, and ask for ample time—
probably half an hour to an hour. Indicate whether the material will
be confidential, and (if you want to use a recorder) ask if you may
record the interview. (3) If the person accepts the invitation, ask if
he or she recommends any preliminary reading, and establish a time
and a suitable place, preferably not the cafeteria during lunchtime.
3. Preparing thoroughly (1) If your interviewee recom-
mended any reading or has written on the topic, read the material. (2)
Tentatively formulate some questions, keeping in mind that (unless
you are simply gathering material for a survey of opinions) you want
more than yes or no answers. Questions beginning with Why and How
will usually require the interviewee to go beyond yes and no.
Even if your subject has consented to let you bring a recorder,
be prepared to take notes on points that strike you as especially
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significant; without written notes, you will have nothing if the
recorder has malfunctioned. Further, by taking occasional notes
you will give the interviewee some time to think and perhaps to
rephrase or to amplify a remark.
4. Conducting the interview (1) Begin by engaging in brief
conversation, without taking notes. If the interviewee has agreed to
let you use a recorder, settle on the place where you will put it. (2)
Come prepared with an opening question or two, but as the interview
proceeds, don’t hesitate to ask questions that you had not anticipated
asking. (3) Near the end (you and your subject have probably agreed
on the length of the interview) ask the subject if he or she wishes to
add anything, perhaps by way of clarifying some earlier comment. (4)
Conclude by thanking the interviewee and by offering to provide a
copy of the final version of your paper.
5. Writing up the interview (1) As soon as possible —
certainly within twenty-four hours after the interview—review
your notes and clarify them. At this stage, you can still remember
the meaning of your abbreviated notes and shorthand devices
(maybe you have been using n to stand for nurses in clinics where
abortions are performed), but if you wait even a whole day you
may be puzzled by your own notes. If you have recorded the inter-
view, you may want to transcribe all of it—the laboriousness of
this task is one good reason why many interviewers do not use
recorders—and you may then want to scan the whole and mark
the parts that now strike you as especially significant. If you have
taken notes by hand, type them up, along with your own observa-
tions, for example, “Jones was very tentative on this matter, but
she said she was inclined to believe that . . .” (2) Be especially care-
ful to indicate which words are direct quotations. If in doubt, check
with the interviewee.
EVALUATING YOUR SOURCES
Each step of the way, you will be making choices about your
sources. As your research proceeds, from selecting promising items
in a database search to browsing the book collection, you will want
to use the techniques for previewing and skimming detailed on
pages 000–00 in order to make your first selection. Ask yourself
some basic questions.
• Is this source relevant?
• Is it current enough?
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• Does the title and/or abstract suggest it will address an impor-
tant aspect of my topic?
• Am I choosing sources that represent a range of ideas, not
simply ones that support my opinion?
Once you have collected a number of likely sources, you will
want to do further filtering. Examine each one with these ques-
tions in mind.
• Is this source credible? Does it include information about the author
and his or her credentials that can help me decide whether to rely on
it? In the case of books, you might check a database for book
reviews for a second opinion. In the case of Web sites, find
out where the site came from and why it has been posted on
the Web. Don’t use a Web source if you can’t determine its
authorship or purpose.
• Will my audience find this source credible and persuasive? Some
publishers are more selective about which books they pub-
lish than others. University presses, for instance, have sev-
eral experts read and comment on manuscripts before they
decide which to publish. A story about U.S. politics from the
Washington Post, whose writers conduct first-hand reporting
in the nation’s capital, carries more clout than a story from a
small-circulation newspaper that is drawing its information
from a wire service. A scholarly source may be more impres-
sive than a magazine article.
• Am I using the best evidence available? Quoting directly from a
government report may be more effective than quoting a
news story that summarizes the report. Finding evidence that
supports your claims in a president’s speeches or letters is
more persuasive than drawing your conclusions from a page
or two of a history textbook.
• Am I being fair to all sides? Make sure you are prepared to
address alternate perspectives, even if you ultimately take a
position. Avoid sources that clearly promote an agenda in
favor of ones that your audience will consider balanced and
reliable.
• Can I corroborate my key claims in more than one source? Compare
your sources to ensure that you aren’t relying on facts that
can’t be confirmed. If you’re having trouble confirming a
source, check with a librarian.
• Do I really need this source? It’s tempting to use all the books
and articles you have found, but if two sources say essentially
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the same thing, choose the one that is likely to carry the
most weight with your audience.
The information you will look for as you evaluate a Web source is
often the same as what you need to record in a citation. You can
streamline the process of creating a list of works cited by identifying
these elements as you evaluate a source.
In Figure 7.2, the URL includes the ending .gov—meaning it is a
government Web site, an official document that has been vetted.
EVALUATING YOUR SOURCES 201
FIGURE 7.2 A HOMEPAGE FROM A GOVERNMENT
WEB SITE
URL—Site has a .gov domain.
Sponsor
Author
Link will explain that this institute is a government agency.
Corporate author
Web site name
Title of page
Table of contents
Scanning list will give an idea of whether source is reliable and useful.9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
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There is an “about” link that will explain the government agency’s
mission. The date is found at the bottom of the page: “revised
2006.” This appears to be a high-quality source of basic information
on the issue.
The information you need to cite this report is also on the page;
make sure you keep track of where you found the source and
when, since Web sites can change. One way to do this is by creating
an account at a social bookmarking site such as Delicious
and annotate Web sites.
Figure 7.3 shows how the information on a Web page might lead
you to reject it as a source. Clearly, though this site purports to pro-
vide educational information, its primary purpose is to sell products.
202 7 / USING SOURCES
Table of contents looks useful,
but . . .
Disclaimers seem defensive.
Images seem to promote steriod
use.
Steroids are for sale.
FIGURE 7.3 A HOMEPAGE FROM A COMMERCIAL
WEB SITE
This is a .com (commercial) site.
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The graphics emphasize the supposed benefits of these performance-
enhancing drugs, a visual incentive to promote their use. The dis-
claimers about legal liability and age requirements send up a red flag.
TAKING NOTES
When it comes to taking notes, all researchers have their own
habits that they swear by, and they can’t imagine any other way of
working. We still prefer to take notes on four- by six-inch index
cards, while others use a notebook or a computer for note taking. If
you use a citation management program, such as RefWorks or
EndNote, you can store your personal notes and commentary with
TAKING NOTES 203
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR EVALUATING PRINT SOURCES
For Books:
� Is the book recent? If not, is the information I will be using from
it likely or unlikely to change over time?
� What are the author’s credentials?
� Is the book titled toward entertainment, or is it in-depth and
even- handed?
� Is the book broad enough in its focus and written in a style I
can understand?
� Does the book relate directly to my tentative thesis, or is it of
only tangential interest?
� Do the arguments in the book seem sound, based on what I
have learned about skillful critical reading and writing?
For Articles from Periodicals:
� Is the periodical recent?
� Is the author’s name given? Does he or she seem a credible
source?
� Does the article treat the topic superficially or in-depth? Does it
take sides, or does it offer enough context so that you can
make up your own mind?
� How directly does the article speak to my topic and tentative
thesis?
� If the article is from a scholarly journal, am I sure I understand it?
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the citations you have saved. Using the program’s search function,
you can easily pull together related notes and citations, or you can
create project folders for your references so that you can easily
review what you’ve collected.
Whatever method you use, the following techniques should help
you maintain consistency and keep organized during the research
process:
1. If you use a notebook or cards, write in ink (pencil gets
smudgy), and write on only one side of the card or paper.
(Notes on the backs of cards tend to get lost, and writing on
the back of paper will prevent you from later cutting up and
rearranging your notes.)
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✓ A CHECKLIST FOR EVALUATING ELECTRONIC SOURCES
An enormous amount of valuable material is available on the
World Wide Web—but so is an enormous amount of junk. True,
there is also plenty of junk in books and journals, but most printed
material has been subjected to a review process: Book publishers
and editors of journals send manuscripts to specialized readers
who evaluate them and recommend whether the material should or
should not be published. Publishing on the Web is quite different.
Anyone can publish on the Web with no review process: All that is
needed is the right software. Ask yourself:
� What person or organization produced the site (a commercial
entity, a nonprofit entity, a student, an expert)? Check the
electronic address to get a clue about the authorship. If there is
a link to the author’s homepage, check it out to learn about the
author. Does the author have an affiliation with a respectable
institution?
� What is the purpose of the site? Is the site in effect an infomer-
cial, or is it an attempt to contribute to a thoughtful discussion?
� Are the sources of information indicated and verifiable? If
possible, check the sources.
� Is the site authoritative enough to use? (If it seems to contain
review materials or class handouts, you probably don’t want to
take it too seriously.)
� When was the page made available? Is it out of date?
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2. Put only one idea in each notebook or computer entry or on
each card (though an idea may include several facts).
3. Put a brief heading on each entry or card, such as “Truman’s
last words on A-bomb.”
4. Summarize, for the most part, rather than quote at length.
5. Quote only passages in which the writing is especially effec-
tive, or passages that are in some way crucial.
6. Make sure that all quotations are exact. Enclose quoted
words within quotation marks, indicate omissions by ellipses
(three spaced periods: . . .), and enclose within square brack-
ets ([]) any insertions or other additions you make.
7. Never copy a passage, changing an occasional word. Either
copy it word for word, with punctuation intact, and enclose
it within quotation marks, or summarize it drastically. If you
copy a passage but change a word here and there, you may
later make the mistake of using your note verbatim in your
essay, and you will be guilty of plagiarism.
8. Give the page number of your source, whether you summa-
rize or quote. If a quotation you have copied runs in the
original from the bottom of page 210 to the top of page 211,
in your notes put a diagonal line (/) after the last word on
page 210, so that later, if in your paper you quote only the
material from page 210, you will know that you must cite
210 and not 210–11.
9. Indicate the source. The author’s last name is enough if you
have consulted only one work by the author; but if you
consult more than one work by an author, you need further
identification, such as the author’s name and a short title.
10. Add your own comments about the substance of what you
are recording. Such comments as “but contrast with
Sherwin” or “seems illogical” or “evidence?” will ensure
that you are thinking as well as writing and will be of value
when you come to transform your notes into a draft. Be
sure, however, to enclose such notes within double diago-
nals (//), or to mark them in some other way, so that later
you will know they are yours and not your source’s. If you
use a computer for note taking, you may wish to write your
comments in italics or in a different font.
11. In a separate computer file or notebook page or on separate
index cards, write a bibliographic entry for each source. The
information in each entry will vary, depending on whether
the source is a book, a periodical, an electronic document,
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and so forth. The kind of information (for example, author
and title) needed for each type of source can be found in the
sections on MLA Format: The List of Works Cited (p. 227) or
APA Format: The List of References (p. 241).
A NOTE ON PLAGIARIZING, PARAPHRASING,
AND USING COMMON KNOWLEDGE
Plagiarism is the unacknowledged use of someone else’s work. The
word comes from a Latin word for “kidnapping,” and plagiarism is
indeed the stealing of something engendered by someone else. We
won’t deliver a sermon on the dishonesty (and folly) of plagiarism;
we intend only to help you understand exactly what plagiarism is.
The first thing to say is that plagiarism is not limited to the unac-
knowledged quotation of words.
A paraphrase is a sort of word-by-word or phrase-by-phrase
translation of the author’s language into your own language. Unlike
a summary, then, a paraphrase is approximately as long as the origi-
nal. Why would anyone paraphrase something? There are two good
reasons:
• You may, as a reader, want to paraphrase a passage in order
to make certain that you are thinking carefully about each
word in the original;
• You may, as a writer, want to paraphrase a difficult passage
in order to help your reader.
Paraphrase thus has its uses, but it is often unnecessarily used, and
students who overuse it may find themselves crossing the border
into plagiarism. True, if you paraphrase you are using your own
words, but
• You are also using someone else’s ideas, and, equally important,
• You are using this other person’s sequence of thoughts.
Even if you change every third word in your source, you are
plagiarizing.
Here is an example of this sort of plagiarism, based on the pre-
vious sentence:
Even if you alter every second or third word that your source
gives, you still are plagiarizing.
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Further, even if the writer of this paraphrase had cited a source
after the paraphrase, he or she would still have been guilty of pla-
giarism. How, you may ask, can a writer who cites a source be
guilty of plagiarism? Easy. Readers assume that only the gist of the
idea is the source’s, and that the development of the idea—the
way it is set forth—is the present writer’s work. A paraphrase that
runs to several sentences is in no significant way the writer’s work:
the writer is borrowing not only the idea but the shape of the pres-
entation, the sentence structure. What the writer needs to do is to
write something like this:
Changing an occasional word does not free the writer from the
obligation to cite a source.
And the source would still need to be cited, if the central idea were
not a commonplace one.
The point that even if you cite a source for your paraphrase
you are nevertheless plagiarizing—unless you clearly indicate that
the entire passage is a paraphrase of the source—cannot be
overemphasized.
You are plagiarizing if, without giving credit, you use someone
else’s ideas —even if you put these ideas entirely into your own
words. When you use another’s ideas, you must indicate your
indebtedness by saying something like “Alperovitz points out
that . . .” or “Secretary of War Stimson, as Martin Sherwin notes,
never expressed himself on this point.” Alperovitz and Sherwin
pointed out something that you had not thought of, and so you
must give them credit if you want to use their findings.
Again, even if after a paraphrase you cite your source, you are
plagiarizing. How, you may wonder, can you be guilty of plagiarism
if you cite a source? Easy. A reader assumes that the citation refers
to information or an opinion, not to the presentation or develop-
ment of the idea; and of course, in a paraphrase you are not pre-
senting or developing the material in your own way.
Now consider this question: Why paraphrase? Often there is no
good answer. Since a paraphrase is as long as the original, you may
as well quote the original, if you think that a passage of that length
is worth quoting. Probably it is not worth quoting in full; probably
you should not paraphrase but rather should drastically summarize
most of it, and perhaps quote a particularly effective phrase or two.
As we explained on pages 36–39, the chief reason to paraphrase a
passage is to clarify it—that is, to make certain that you and your
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readers understand a passage that—perhaps because it is badly
written—is obscure.
Generally, what you should do is
• Take the idea and put it entirely into your own words, per-
haps reducing a paragraph of a hundred words to a sentence
of ten words, but you must still give credit for the idea.
• If you believe that the original hundred words are so per-
fectly put that they cannot be transformed without great
loss, you’ll have to quote them in full and cite your source.
You may in this case want to tell the reader why you are
quoting at such great length.
In short, chiefly you will quote or you will summarize, and only
rarely will you paraphrase, but in all cases you will cite your source.
208 7 / USING SOURCES
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR AVOIDING PLAGIARISM
� In my notes did I always put quoted material within quotation
marks?
� In my notes did I summarize in my own words and give credit
to the source for the idea?
� In my notes did I avoid paraphrasing, that is, did I avoid
copying, keeping the structure of the source’s sentences but
using some of my own words? (Paraphrases of this sort, even
with a footnote citing the source, are not acceptable, since the
reader incorrectly assumes that the writing is essentially yours.)
� If in my paper I set forth a borrowed idea, do I give credit,
even though the words and the shape of the sentences are
entirely my own?
� If in my paper I quote directly, do I put the words within
quotation marks and cite the source?
� Do I not cite material that can be considered common
knowledge (material that can be found in numerous reference
works, such as the date of a public figure’s birth or the
population of San Francisco or the fact that Hamlet is regarded
as a great tragedy)?
� If I have the slightest doubt about whether I should or should not
cite a source, have I taken the safe course and cited the source?
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There is no point in paraphrasing an author’s hundred words into a
hundred of your own. Either quote or summarize, but cite the source.
Keep in mind, too, that almost all generalizations about human
nature, no matter how common and familiar (for instance, “males
are innately more aggressive than females”) are not indisputable
facts; they are at best hypotheses on which people differ and there-
fore should either not be asserted at all or should be supported by
some cited source or authority. Similarly, because nearly all statis-
tics (whether on the intelligence of criminals or the accuracy of lie
detectors) are the result of some particular research and may well
have been superseded or challenged by other investigators, it is
advisable to cite a source for any statistics you use unless you are
convinced they are indisputable, such as the number of registered
voters in Memphis in 1988.
On the other hand, there is something called common
knowledge, and the sources for such information need not be
cited. The term does not, however, mean exactly what it seems to.
It is common knowledge, of course, that Ronald Reagan was an
American president (so you don’t cite a source when you make
that statement), and under the conventional interpretation of this
doctrine, it is also common knowledge that he was born in 1911. In
fact, of course, few people other than Reagan’s wife and children
know this date. Still, information that can be found in many places
and that is indisputable belongs to all of us; therefore, a writer need
not cite her source when she says that Reagan was born in 1911.
Probably she checked a dictionary or an encyclopedia for the date,
but the source doesn’t matter. Dozens of sources will give exactly
the same information, and in fact, no reader wants to be bothered
with a citation on such a point.
Some students have a little trouble developing a sense of what
is and what is not common knowledge. Although, as we have just
said, readers don’t want to hear about the sources for information
that is indisputable and can be documented in many places, if you
are in doubt about whether to cite a source, cite it. Better risk bor-
ing the reader a bit than risk being accused of plagiarism.
COMPILING AN ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY
When several sources have been identified and gathered, many
researchers prepare an annotated bibliography. This is a list provid-
ing all relevant bibliographic information (just as it will appear in
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your Works Cited list or References list) as well as a brief descrip-
tive and evaluative summary of each source—perhaps one to three
sentences. Your instructor may ask you to provide an annotated
bibliography for your research project.
An annotated bibliography serves four main purposes:
• First, constructing such a document helps you to master the
material contained in any given source. To find the heart of
the argument presented in an article or book, phrase it
briefly, and comment on it, you must understand it fully.
• Second, creating an annotated bibliography helps you to think
about how each portion of your research fits into the whole of
your project, how you will use it, and how it relates to your
topic and thesis.
• Third, an annotated bibliography helps your readers: They
can quickly see which items may be especially helpful in
their own research.
• Fourth, in constructing an annotated bibliography at this
early stage, you will get some hands-on practice at biblio-
graphic format, thereby easing the job of creating your final
bibliography (the Works Cited list or References list for your
paper).
Following are two examples of entries for an annotated bibliog-
raphy in MLA (Modern Language Association) format for a project
on the effect of violence in the media. The first is for a book, the
second for an article from a periodical. Notice that each
• Begins with a bibliographic entry—author (last name first),
title, and so forth—and then
• Provides information about the content of the work under con-
sideration, suggesting how each may be of use to the final
research paper.
Clover, Carol J. Men, Women, and Chain Saws: Gender in the Modern
Horror Film. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1992. The author focuses on
Hollywood horror movies of the 1970s and 1980s. She studies rep-
resentations of women and girls in these movies and the responses
of male viewers to female characters, suggesting that this relation-
ship is more complex and less exploitative than the common wis-
dom claims.
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Winerip, Michael. “Looking for an Eleven O’Clock Fix.” New York
Times Magazine 11 Jan. 1998: 30-40. The article focuses on the ris-
ing levels of violence on local television news and highlights a sta-
tion in Orlando, Florida, that tried to reduce its depictions of
violence and lost viewers as a result. Winerip suggests that people
only claim to be against media violence, while their actions prove
otherwise.
WRITING THE PAPER
Organizing Your
Notes
If you have read thoughtfully, taken careful (and, again, thoughtful)
notes on your reading, and then (yet again) thought about these
notes, you are well on the way to writing a good paper. You have, in
fact, already written some of it, in your notes. By now you should
clearly have in mind the thesis you intend to argue. But you still
have to organize the material, and, doubtless, even as you set about
organizing it, you will find points that will require you to do some
additional research and much additional thinking.
Divide your notes into clusters, each devoted to one theme or
point (for instance, one cluster on the extent of use of steroids,
another on evidence that steroids are harmful, yet another on
arguments that even if harmful they should be permitted). If your
notes are in a computer file, use your word processor’s Cut and
Paste features to rearrange the notes into appropriate clusters. If
you use index cards, simply sort them into packets. If you take
notes in a notebook, either mark each note with a number or
name indicating the cluster to which it belongs, or cut the notes
apart and arrange them as you would cards. Put aside all notes
that — however interesting — you now see are irrelevant to your
paper.
Next, arrange the clusters or packets into a tentative sequence.
In effect, you are preparing a working outline. At its simplest,
say, you will give three arguments on behalf of X and then three
counterarguments. (Or you might decide that it is better to alter-
nate material from the two sets of three clusters each, following
each argument with an objection. At this stage, you can’t be sure of
the organization you will finally use, but you can make a tentative
decision.)
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The First Draft
Draft the essay, without worrying much about an elegant opening
paragraph. Just write some sort of adequate opening that states the
topic and your thesis. When you revise the whole later, you can put
some effort into developing an effective opening. (Most experienced
writers find that the opening paragraph in the final version is almost
the last thing they write.)
If your notes are on cards or notebook paper, carefully copy
into the draft all quotations that you plan to use. If your notes are
in a computer, you may simply cut and paste them from one file to
another. Do keep in mind, however, that rewriting or retyping
quotations will make you think carefully about them and may
result in a more focused and thoughtful paper. (In the next section
of this chapter we will talk briefly about leading into quotations
and about the form of quotations.) Be sure to include citations in
your drafts so that if you must check a reference later it will be easy
to do so.
Later Drafts
Give the draft, and yourself, a rest — perhaps for a day or two —
and then go back to it. Read it over, make necessary revisions, and
then outline it. That is, on a sheet of paper chart the organization
and development, perhaps by jotting down a sentence summariz-
ing each paragraph or each group of closely related paragraphs.
Your outline or map may now show you that the paper obviously
suffers from poor organization. For instance, it may reveal that
you neglected to respond to one argument or that one point is
needlessly treated in two places. It may also help you to see that if
you gave three arguments and then three counterarguments, you
probably should instead have followed each argument with its
rebuttal. On the other hand, if you alternated arguments and
objections, it may now seem better to use two main groups, all the
arguments and then all the criticisms.
No one formula is always right. Much will depend on the
complexity of the material. If the arguments are highly complex,
it is better to respond to them one by one than to expect a reader
to hold three complex arguments in mind before you get around
to responding. If, however, the arguments can be stated briefly
and clearly, it is effective to state all three and then to go on to
the responses. If you write on a word processor, you will find it
easy, even fun, to move passages of text around. Even so, you will
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probably want to print out a hard copy from time to time to
review the structure of your paper. Allow enough time to pro-
duce several drafts.
A Few More Words about Organization
There is a difference between
• A paper that has an organization and
• A paper that helpfully lets the reader know what the orga-
nization is.
Write papers of the second sort, but (there is always a “but”) take
care not to belabor the obvious. Inexperienced writers sometimes
either hide the organization so thoroughly that a reader cannot
find it, or they so ploddingly lay out the structure (“Eighth, I will
show . . .”) that the reader becomes impatient. Yet it is better to be
overly explicit than to be obscure.
The ideal, of course, is the middle route. Make the overall strat-
egy of your organization evident by occasional explicit signs at the
beginning of a paragraph (“We have seen . . . ,” “It is time to consider
the objections . . . ,” “By far the most important . . .”); elsewhere
make certain that the implicit structure is evident to the reader.
When you reread your draft, if you try to imagine that you are one
of your classmates, you will probably be able to sense exactly
where explicit signs are needed and where they are not needed.
Better still, exchange drafts with a classmate in order to exchange
(tactful) advice.
Choosing a Tentative Title
By now a couple of tentative titles for your essay should have
crossed your mind. If possible, choose a title that is both interesting
and informative. Consider these three titles:
Are Steroids Harmful?
The Fuss over Steroids
Steroids: A Dangerous Game
“Are Steroids Harmful?” is faintly interesting, and it lets the reader
know the gist of the subject, but it gives no clue about the writer’s
thesis, the writer’s contention or argument. “The Fuss over Steroids”
is somewhat better, for it gives information about the writer’s posi-
tion. “Steroids: A Dangerous Game” is still better; it announces the
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subject (“steroids”) and the thesis (“dangerous”), and it also displays
a touch of wit because “game” glances at the world of athletics.
Don’t try too hard, however; better a simple, direct, informative
title than a strained, puzzling, or overly cute one. And remember to
make sure that everything in your essay is relevant to your title. In
fact, your title should help you to organize the essay and to delete
irrelevant material.
The Final Draft
When at last you have a draft that is for the most part satisfactory,
check to make sure that transitions from sentence to sentence
and from paragraph to paragraph are clear (“Further evidence,”
“On the other hand,” “A weakness, however, is apparent”), and
then worry about your opening and your closing paragraphs. Your
opening paragraph should be clear, interesting, and focused; if
neither the title nor the first paragraph announces your thesis, the
second paragraph probably should do so.
The final paragraph need not say, “In conclusion, I have
shown that . . .” It should effectively end the essay, but it need
not summarize your conclusions. We have already offered a
few words about final paragraphs (p. 170), but the best way to
learn how to write such paragraphs is to study the endings of
some of the essays in this book and to adopt the strategies that
appeal to you.
Be sure that all indebtedness is properly acknowledged. We
have talked about plagiarism; now we will turn to the business of
introducing quotations effectively.
QUOTING FROM SOURCES
Incorporating Your Reading into Your Thinking:
The Art and Science of Synthesis
A much-quoted passage—at least it is much-quoted by teachers of
composition and especially by teachers of courses in argument—is
by Kenneth Burke (1887–1993), a college dropout who became one
of America’s most important twentieth-century students of rhetoric.
Burke wrote:
Imagine that you enter a parlor. You come late. When you arrive,
others have long preceded you, and they are engaged in a heated
discussion, a discussion too heated for them to pause and tell you
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exactly what it is about. In fact, the discussion had already begun
long before any of them got there, so that no one present is
qualified to retrace for you all the steps that had gone before. You
listen for a while, until you decide that you have caught the tenor
of the argument; then you put in your oar. Someone answers; you
answer him; another comes to your defense; another aligns
himself against you, to either the embarrassment or gratification
of your opponent, depending upon the quality of your ally’s
assistance. However, the discussion is interminable. The hour
grows late, you must depart. And you do depart, with the
discussion still vigorously in progress.
—The Philosophy of Literary Form (Baton Rouge:
Louisiana State University Press, 1941), 110–11.
Why do we quote this passage? Because it is your turn to join the
unending conversation.
Notice that Burke says, in this metaphoric discussion of the life
of a thoughtful person, “You listen for a while, until you decide that
you have caught the tenor of the argument; then you put in your
oar.” There may be times in your daily life when it is acceptable to
make use of Twitter and to shoot off 140 characters, but for serious
matters you will want to think about what you are saying before
you give it to the world, and you will want to convey your thoughts
in more than 140 characters. (We admit that quite a lot can be said
in 140 characters, for instance the forceful words in Brown v. Board of
Education of Topeka that “Separate educational facilities are inher-
ently unequal,” or the anonymous insight that “There is no such
thing as a free lunch,” but most of us lack the genius that will enable
us to produce such compressed wisdom.)
During the process of reading, and afterwards, you will want to
listen, think, say to yourself something like
• “No, no, I see things very differently; it seems to me that . . . “ or
• “Yes, of course, but on one large issue I think I differ,” or
• “Yes, sure, I agree, but I would go further and add . . .” or
• “Yes, I agree with your conclusion, but I hold this conclusion
for reasons very different from the ones that you offer.”
During your composition courses, at least (and we think during
your entire life), you will be reading or listening, and will sometimes
want to put in your oar—you will sometimes want to respond in
writing, for example in the form of a Letter to the Editor, or in a
memo at your place of employment. In the course of your response
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you almost surely will have to summarize very briefly the idea or
ideas you are responding to, so that your readers will understand the
context of your remarks. These ideas may not come from a single
source; you may be responding to several sources. For instance, you
may be responding to a report and also to some comments that the
report evoked. In any case, you will state these ideas briefly and
fairly, and will then set forth your thoughtful responses, thereby giv-
ing the reader a statement that you hope represents an advance in
the argument, even if only a tiny one. That is, you will synthesize
sources, combining existing material into something new, drawing
nourishment from what has already been said (giving credit, of
course), and converting it into something new—a view that you
think is worth considering.
Let’s pause for a moment and consider this word synthesis. You
probably are familiar with photosynthesis, the chemical process in
green plants that produces carbohydrates from carbon dioxide and
hydrogen. Synthesis, again, combines pre-existing elements and pro-
duces something new. In our use of the word synthesis, even a view
that you utterly reject becomes a part of your new creation because it
helped to stimulate you to formulate your view; without the idea that you
reject, you might not have developed the view that you now hold.
Consider the words of Francis Bacon, Shakespeare’s contemporary:
Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some
few to be chewed and digested.
Your instructor will expect you to digest the readings—this
does not mean you need to accept them, but only that you need to
read them thoughtfully—and that, so to speak, you make them
your own thoughts by refining them. Your readers will expect you
to tell them what you make out of the assigned readings, which means
that you will go beyond writing a summary and will synthesize the
material into your own contribution. Your view is what is wanted,
and readers expect this view to be thoughtful—not mere summary
and not mere tweeting.
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A RULE FOR WRITERS: In your final draft you must give credit to all
of your sources. Let your reader know whether you are quoting (in this
case, you will use quotation marks around all material directly quoted),
or whether you are summarizing (you will explicitly say so), or
whether you are paraphrasing (again, you will explicitly say so).
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The Use and Abuse of Quotations
When is it necessary, or appropriate, to quote? Sometimes the
reader must see the exact words of your source; the gist won’t do.
If you are arguing that Z’s definition of rights is too inclusive, your
readers have to know exactly how Z defined rights. Your brief sum-
mary of the definition may be unfair to Z; in fact, you want to con-
vince your readers that you are being fair, and so you quote Z’s
definition, word for word. Moreover, if the passage is only a sen-
tence or two long, or even if it runs to a paragraph, it may be so
compactly stated that it defies summary. And to attempt to para-
phrase it—substituting natural for inalienable, and so forth—saves
no space and only introduces imprecision. There is nothing to do
but to quote it, word for word.
Second, you may want to quote a passage that could be sum-
marized but that is so effectively stated that you want your readers
to have the pleasure of reading the original. Of course, readers will
not give you credit for writing these words, but they will give you
credit for your taste and for your effort to make especially pleasant
the business of reading your paper.
In short, use (but don’t overuse) quotations. Speaking roughly,
quotations
• Should occupy no more than 10 to 15 percent of your paper,
and
• They may occupy much less.
Most of your paper should set forth your ideas, not other people’s
ideas.
How to Quote
Long and Short Quotations Long quotations (five or more lines of
typed prose or three or more lines of poetry) are set off from your
text. To set off material, start on a new line, indent one inch from the
left margin, and type the quotation double-spaced. Do not enclose
quotations within quotation marks if you are setting them off.
Short quotations are treated differently. They are embedded
within the text; they are enclosed within quotation marks, but oth-
erwise they do not stand out.
All quotations, whether set off or embedded, must be exact. If
you omit any words, you must indicate the ellipsis by substituting
three spaced periods for the omission; if you insert any words or
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punctuation, you must indicate the addition by enclosing it within
square brackets, not to be confused with parentheses.
Leading into a Quotation Now for a less mechanical matter, the
way in which a quotation is introduced. To say that it is “intro-
duced” implies that one leads into it, though on rare occasions a
quotation appears without an introduction, perhaps immediately
after the title. Normally one leads into a quotation by giving
• The name of the author and (no less important)
• Clues signaling the content of the quotation and the purpose it
serves in the present essay. For example:
William James provides a clear answer to Huxley when he says
that “. . .”
The writer has been writing about Huxley and now is signaling read-
ers that they will be getting James’s reply. The writer is also signaling
(in “a clear answer”) that the reply is satisfactory. If the writer
believed that James’s answer was not really acceptable, the lead-in
might have run thus:
William James attempts to answer Huxley, but his response does
not really meet the difficulty Huxley calls attention to. James
writes, “. . .”
or thus:
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✓ A CHECKLIST FOR USING QUOTATIONS
RATHER THAN SUMMARIES
Ask yourself the following questions. If you cannot answer yes to
at least one of the questions, consider summarizing the material
rather than quoting it in full.
� Is the quotation given because it is necessary for the reader to
see the exact wording of the original?
� Is the quotation given because the language is especially
engaging?
� Is the quotation given because the author is a respected
authority and the passage lends weight to my argument?
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William James provided what he took to be an answer to Huxley
when he said that “. . .”
In this last example, clearly the words “what he took to be an
answer” imply that the essayist will show, after the quotation from
James, that the answer is in some degree inadequate. Or the essay-
ist may wish to suggest the inadequacy even more strongly:
William James provided what he took to be an answer to Huxley,
but he used the word religion in a way that Huxley would not have
allowed. James argues that “. . .”
QUOTING FROM SOURCES 219
IDEA PROMPT 7.1 SIGNAL PHRASES
Think of your writing as a conversation between you and your
sources. As in conversation, you want to be able to move smoothly
between different, sometimes contrary, points of view. You also
want to be able to set your thoughts apart from those of yours
sources. Signal phrases make it easy for your readers to know
where your information came from and why it’s trustworthy by
including key facts about the source.
According to psychologist Stephen Ceci . . .
A report published by the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics
concludes . . .
Feminist philosopher Sandra Harding argues . . .
To avoid repetitiveness, vary your sentence structure.
. . . claims Stephen Ceci.
. . . according to a report published by the U.S. Bureau of
Statistics.
Useful verbs to introduce sources:
acknowledges contends points out
argues denies recommends
believes disputes reports
claims observes suggests
Note that papers written using MLA style refer to sources in the
present tense. Papers written in APA style use the past tense
(acknowledged, argued, believed ).
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If after reading something by Huxley the writer had merely given
us “William James says . . . ,” we wouldn’t know whether we
were getting confirmation, refutation, or something else. The
essayist would have put a needless burden on the readers.
Generally speaking, the more difficult the quotation, the more
important is the introductory or explanatory lead-in, but even
the simplest quotation profits from some sort of brief lead-in,
such as “James reaffirms this point when he says . . .”
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DOCUMENTATION
In the course of your essay, you will probably quote or summarize
material derived from a source. You must give credit, and although
there is no one form of documentation to which all scholarly fields
subscribe, you will probably be asked to use one of two. One, estab-
lished by the Modern Language Association (MLA), is used chiefly in
the humanities; the other, established by the American Psychological
Association (APA), is used chiefly in the social sciences.
We include two papers that use sources. “Why Trials Should
Not Be Televised” (p. 247) uses the MLA format. “The Role of
Spirituality and Religion in Mental Health” (p. 264) follows the
APA format. (You may notice that various styles are illustrated in
other selections we have included.)
A Note on Footnotes (and Endnotes)
Before we discuss these two formats, a few words about footnotes
are in order. Before the MLA and the APA developed their rules of
style, citations commonly were given in footnotes. Although today
footnotes are not so frequently used to give citations, they still may
be useful for another purpose. (The MLA suggests endnotes rather
than footnotes, but all readers know that, in fact, footnotes are
preferable to endnotes. After all, who wants to keep shifting from a
A RULE FOR WRITERS: In introducing a quotation, it is usually
advisable to signal the reader why you are using the quotation, by
means of a lead-in consisting of a verb or a verb and adverb, such
as claims, or convincingly shows, or admits. (See Idea Prompt 7.1.)
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page of text to a page of notes at the rear?) If you want to include
some material that may seem intrusive in the body of the paper,
you may relegate it to a footnote. For example, in a footnote you
might translate a quotation given in a foreign language, or you
might demote from text to footnote a paragraph explaining why
you are not taking account of such-and-such a point. By putting
the matter in a footnote you are signaling the reader that it is dis-
pensable; it is something relevant but not essential, something
extra that you are, so to speak, tossing in. Don’t make a habit of
writing this sort of note, but there are times when it is appropriate.
MLA Format: Citations within the Text
Brief citations within the body of the essay give credit, in a highly
abbreviated way, to the sources for material you quote, summarize,
or make use of in any other way. These in-text citations are made
clear by a list of sources, titled Works Cited, appended to the essay.
Thus, in your essay you may say something like this:
Commenting on the relative costs of capital punishment and life
imprisonment, Ernest van den Haag says that he doubts “that capi-
tal punishment really is more expensive” (33).
The citation, the number 33 in parentheses, means that the
quoted words come from page 33 of a source (listed in the Works
Cited) written by van den Haag. Without a Works Cited, a reader
would have no way of knowing that you are quoting from page 33
of an article that appeared in the February 8, 1985, issue of the
National Review.
Usually the parenthetic citation appears at the end of a sen-
tence, as in the example just given, but it can appear elsewhere; its
position will depend chiefly on your ear, your eye, and the context.
You might, for example, write the sentence thus:
Ernest van den Haag doubts that “capital punishment really is more
expensive” than life imprisonment (33), but other writers have pre-
sented figures that contradict him.
Five points must be made about these examples:
1. Quotation marks The closing quotation mark appears
after the last word of the quotation, not after the parenthetic citation.
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Since the citation is not part of the quotation, the citation is not
included within the quotation marks.
2. Omission of words (ellipsis) If you are quoting a com-
plete sentence or only a phrase, as in the examples given, you do not
need to indicate (by three spaced periods) that you are omitting mate-
rial before or after the quotation. But if for some reason you want to
omit an interior part of the quotation, you must indicate the omis-
sion by inserting an ellipsis, the three spaced dots. To take a simple
example, if you omit the word “really” from van den Haag’s phrase,
you must alert the reader to the omission:
Ernest van den Haag doubts that “capital punishment . . . is more
expensive”
than life imprisonment (33).
Suppose you are quoting a sentence but wish to omit material from
the end of the sentence. Suppose, also, that the quotation forms
the end of your sentence. Write a lead-in phrase, quote what you
need from your source, then type the bracketed ellipses for the
omission, close the quotation, give the parenthetic citation, and
finally type a fourth period to indicate the end of your sentence.
Here’s an example. Suppose you want to quote the first part of a
sentence that runs, “We could insist that the cost of capital punish-
ment be reduced so as to diminish the differences.” Your sentence
would incorporate the desired extract as follows:
Van den Haag says, “We could insist that the cost of capital pun-
ishment be reduced . . .” (33).
3. Punctuation with parenthetic citations In the preced-
ing examples, the punctuation (a period or a comma in the exam-
ples) follows the citation. If, however, the quotation ends with a
question mark, include the question mark within the quotation,
since it is part of the quotation, and put a period after the citation:
Van den Haag asks, “Isn’t it better—more just and more useful—
that criminals, if they do not have the certainty of punishment, at
least run the risk of suffering it?” (33).
But if the question mark is your own and not in the source, put it
after the citation, thus:
What answer can be given to van den Haag’s doubt that “capital
punishment really is more expensive” (33)?
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4. Two or more works by an author If your list of Works
Cited includes two or more works by an author, you cannot, in
your essay, simply cite a page number because the reader will not
know which of the works you are referring to. You must give addi-
tional information. You can give it in your lead-in, thus:
In “New Arguments against Capital Punishment,” van den Haag
expresses doubt “that capital punishment really is more expensive”
than life imprisonment (33).
Or you can give the title, in a shortened form, within the citation:
Van den Haag expresses doubt that “capital punishment really is
more expensive” than life imprisonment (“New Arguments” 33).
5. Citing even when you do not quote Even if you don’t
quote a source directly, but use its point in a paraphrase or a sum-
mary, you will give a citation:
Van den Haag thinks that life imprisonment costs more than capi-
tal punishment (33).
Note that in all of the previous examples, the author’s name is
given in the text (rather than within the parenthetic citation). But
there are several other ways of giving the citation, and we shall
look at them now. (We have already seen, in the example given
under paragraph 4, that the title and the page number can be given
within the citation.)
AUTHOR AND PAGE NUMBER IN PARENTHESES
It has been argued that life imprisonment is more costly than capi-
tal punishment (van den Haag 33).
AUTHOR, TITLE, AND PAGE NUMBER IN PARENTHESES
We have seen that if the Works Cited list includes two or more
works by an author, you will have to give the title of the work on
which you are drawing, either in your lead-in phrase or within the
parenthetic citation. Similarly, if you are citing someone who is
listed more than once in the Works Cited, and for some reason you
do not mention the name of the author or the work in your lead-
in, you must add the information in your citation:
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Doubt has been expressed that capital punishment is as costly as
life imprisonment (van den Haag, “New Arguments” 33).
A GOVERNMENT DOCUMENT OR A WORK
OF CORPORATE AUTHORSHIP
Treat the issuing body as the author. Thus, you will write some-
thing like this:
The Commission on Food Control, in Food Resources Today, con-
cludes that there is no danger (37-38).
A WORK BY TWO OR MORE AUTHORS
If a work is by two or three authors, give the names of all authors,
either in the parenthetic citation (the first example below) or in a
lead-in (the second example below):
There is not a single example of the phenomenon (Smith, Dale, and
Jones 182-83).
Smith, Dale, and Jones insist there is not a single example of the
phenomenon (182-83).
If there are more than three authors, give the last name of the first
author, followed by et al. (an abbreviation for et alii, Latin for “and
others”), thus:
Gittleman et al. argue (43) that . . .
or
On average, the cost is even higher (Gittleman et al. 43).
PARENTHETIC CITATION OF AN INDIRECT SOURCE
(CITATION OF MATERIAL THAT ITSELF WAS QUOTED
OR SUMMARIZED IN YOUR SOURCE)
Suppose you are reading a book by Jones in which she quotes
Smith and you wish to use Smith’s material. Your citation must
refer the reader to Jones — the source you are using — but of
course, you cannot attribute the words to Jones. You will have to
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make it clear that you are quoting Smith, and so after a lead-in
phrase like “Smith says,” followed by the quotation, you will give
a parenthetic citation along these lines:
(qtd. in Jones 324-25).
PARENTHETIC CITATION OF TWO OR MORE WORKS
The costs are simply too high (Smith 301; Jones 28).
Notice that a semicolon, followed by a space, separates the two
sources.
A WORK IN MORE THAN ONE VOLUME
This is a bit tricky. If you have used only one volume, in the
Works Cited you will specify the volume, and so in the parenthetic
in-text citation you will not need to specify the volume. All that
you need to include in the citation is a page number, as illustrated
by most of the examples that we have given.
If you have used more than one volume, your parenthetic cita-
tion will have to specify the volume as well as the page, thus:
Jackson points out that fewer than one hundred fifty people fit this
description (2: 351).
The reference is to page 351 in volume 2 of a work by Jackson.
If, however, you are citing not a page but an entire volume—
let’s say volume 2—your parenthetic citation will look like this:
Jackson exhaustively studies this problem (vol. 2).
or
Jackson (vol. 2) exhaustively studies this problem.
Notice the following points:
• In citing a volume and page, the volume number, like the
page number, is given in arabic (not roman) numerals, even
if the original used roman numerals to indicate the volume
number.
• The volume number is followed by a colon, then a space,
then the page number.
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• If you cite a volume number without a page number, as in
the last example quoted, the abbreviation is vol. Otherwise
do not use such abbreviations as vol. and p. and pg.
AN ANONYMOUS WORK
For an anonymous work, give the title in your lead-in, or give
it in a shortened form in your parenthetic citation:
A Prisoner’s View of Killing includes a poll taken of the inmates on
death row (32).
or
A poll is available (Prisoner’s View 32).
AN INTERVIEW
Probably you won’t need a parenthetic citation because you’ll
say something like
Vivian Berger, in an interview, said . . .
or
According to Vivian Berger, in an interview . . .
and when your reader turns to the Works Cited, he or she will see
that Berger is listed, along with the date of the interview. But if you
do not mention the source’s name in the lead-in, you will have to
give it in the parentheses, thus:
Contrary to popular belief, the death penalty is not reserved for
serial killers and depraved murderers (Berger).
AN ELECTRONIC SOURCE
Electronic sources, such as those found on CD-ROMs or the
Internet, are generally not divided into pages. Therefore, the in-
text citation for such sources cite only the author’s name (or, if a
work is anonymous, the title):
According to the World Wide Web site for the American Civil
Liberties Union . . .
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If the source does use pages or breaks down further into paragraphs
or screens, insert the appropriate identifier or abbreviation (p. or
pp. for page or pages; par. or pars. for paragraph or paragraphs;
screen or screens) before the relevant number:
The growth of day care has been called “a crime against poster-
ity” by a spokesman for the Institute for the American Family
(Terwilliger, screens 1-2).
MLA Format: The List of
Works Cited
As the previous pages explain, parenthetic documentation consists
of references that become clear when the reader consults the list
titled Works Cited given at the end of an essay.
The list of Works Cited continues the pagination of the essay; if
the last page of text is 10, then the Works Cited begins on its own
page, in this case page 11. Type the page number in the upper right
corner, a half inch from the top of the sheet and flush with the
right margin. Next, type the heading Works Cited (not enclosed
within quotation marks and not italic), centered, one inch from the
top, and then double-space and type the first entry.
An Overview Here are some general guidelines.
FORM ON THE PAGE
• Begin each entry flush with the left margin, but if an entry
runs to more than one line, indent a half inch for each suc-
ceeding line of the entry. This is known as a hanging indent,
and most word processing programs can achieve this effect
easily.
• Double-space each entry, and double-space between entries.
• Italicize titles of works published independently—for
instance, books, pamphlets, and journals. Enclose within
quotation marks a work not published independently—for
instance, an article in a journal or a short story.
• If you are citing a book that includes the title of another
book, italicize the main title, but do not italicize the title
mentioned. Example:
A Study of Mill’s On Liberty
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• In the sample entries below, pay attention to the use of com-
mas, colons, and the space after punctuation.
ALPHABETIC ORDER
• Arrange the list alphabetically by author, with the author’s
last name first.
• For information about anonymous works, works with more
than one author, and two or more works by one author, see
below.
A Closer Look Here is more detailed advice.
THE AUTHOR’S NAME
Notice that the last name is given first, but otherwise the name
is given as on the title page. Do not substitute initials for names
written out on the title page.
If your list includes two or more works by an author, do not
repeat the author’s name for the second title but represent it by
three hyphens followed by a period. The sequence of the works is
determined by the alphabetic order of the titles. Thus, Smith’s book
titled Poverty would be listed ahead of her book Welfare. See the
example on page 298, listing two works by Roger Brown.
Anonymous works are listed under the first word of the title or
the second word if the first is A, An, or The or a foreign equivalent.
We discuss books by more than one author, government docu-
ments, and works of corporate authorship on pages 230–31.
THE TITLE
After the period following the author’s name, allow one space
and then give the title. Take the title from the title page, not from
the cover or the spine, but disregard any unusual typography
such as the use of all capital letters or the use of the ampersand
(&) for and. Italicize the title and subtitle (separate them by a
colon) but do not italicize the period that concludes this part of
the entry.
• Capitalize the first word and the last word.
• Capitalize all nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs,
and subordinating conjunctions (for example, although, if,
because).
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• Do not capitalize (unless it’s the first or last word of the
title or the first word of the subtitle) articles (a, an, the),
prepositions (for instance, in, on, toward, under), coordinat-
ing conjunctions (for instance, and, but, or, for), or the to in
infinitives.
Examples:
The Death Penalty: A New View
On the Death Penalty: Toward a New View
On the Penalty of Death in a Democracy
PLACE OF PUBLICATION, PUBLISHER, DATE,
AND MEDIUM OF PUBLICATION
For the place of publication, provide the name of the city; you
can usually find it either on the title page or on the reverse of the
title page. If a number of cities are listed, provide only the first. If
the city is not likely to be known, or if it may be confused with
another city of the same name (as is Oxford, Mississippi, with
Oxford, England), add the name of the state, abbreviated using the
two-letter postal code.
The name of the publisher is abbreviated. Usually the first word
is enough (Random House becomes Random), but if the first word is a
first name, such as in Alfred A. Knopf, the surname (Knopf ) is used
instead. University presses are abbreviated thus: Yale UP, U of Chicago P,
State U of New York P.
The date of publication of a book is given when known; if no
date appears on the book, write n.d. to indicate “no date.”
Because you may find your sources in any number of places,
each entry should end by indicating the medium of publication for
each source (“Print” for books or periodicals, “Web,” for sources
found on the Internet, and so on).
SAMPLE ENTRIES Here are some examples, illustrating the
points we have covered thus far:
Brown, Roger. Social Psychology. New York: Free, 1965.
Print.
– – – . Words and Things. Glencoe, IL: Free, 1958. Print.
Douglas, Ann. The Feminization of American Culture. New York:
Knopf, 1977. Print.
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Hartman, Chester. The Transformation of San Francisco. Totowa, NJ:
Rowman, 1984. Print.
Kellerman, Barbara. The Political Presidency: Practice of Leadership
from Kennedy through Reagan. New York: Oxford U
P, 1984. Print.
Notice that a period follows the author’s name and another period
follows the title. If a subtitle is given, as it is for Kellerman’s book,
it is separated from the title by a colon and a space. A colon fol-
lows the place of publication, a comma follows the publisher, and
a period follows the date.
A BOOK BY MORE THAN ONE AUTHOR
The book is alphabetized under the last name of the first author
named on the title page. If there are two or three authors, the names of
these are given (after the first author’s name) in the normal order,
first name first:
Gilbert, Sandra M., and Susan Gubar. The Madwoman in the Attic: The
Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination.
New Haven: Yale UP, 1979. Print.
Notice, again, that although the first author’s name is given last name
first, the second author’s name is given in the normal order, first
name first. Notice, too, that a comma is put after the first name of the
first author, separating the authors.
If there are more than three authors, give the name only of the
first and then add (but not enclosed within quotation marks and
not italic) et al. (Latin for “and others”).
Altshuler, Alan, et al. The Future of the Automobile. Cambridge: MIT
P, 1984. Print.
GOVERNMENT DOCUMENTS
If the writer is not known, treat the government and the agency
as the author. Most federal documents are issued by the Government
Printing Office (abbreviated to GPO) in Washington, D.C.
United States. Office of Technology Assessment. Computerized
Manufacturing Automation: Employment, Education, and the
Workplace. Washington: GPO, 1984. Print.
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WORKS OF CORPORATE AUTHORSHIP
Begin the citation with the corporate author, even if the same
body is also the publisher, as in the first example:
American Psychiatric Association. Psychiatric Glossary. Washington:
American Psychiatric Association, 1984. Print.
Carnegie Council on Policy Studies in Higher Education. Giving Youth
a Better Chance: Options for Education, Work, and Service. San
Francisco: Jossey, 1980. Print.
A REPRINT (FOR INSTANCE, A PAPERBACK VERSION
OF AN OLDER CLOTHBOUND BOOK)
After the title, give the date of original publication (it can usu-
ally be found on the reverse of the title page of the reprint you are
using), then a period, and then the place, publisher, and date of the
edition you are using. The example indicates that Gray’s book was
originally published in 1970 and that the student is using the
Vintage reprint of 1971.
Gray, Francine du Plessix. Divine Disobedience: Profiles in Catholic
Radicalism. 1970. New York: Vintage, 1971. Print.
A BOOK IN SEVERAL VOLUMES
If you have used more than one volume, in a citation within your
essay you will (as explained on p. 225) indicate a reference to, say,
page 250 of volume 3 thus: (3: 250).
If, however, you have used only one volume of the set—let’s
say volume 3—in your entry in the Works Cited, specify which
volume you used, as in the next example:
Friedel, Frank. Franklin D. Roosevelt. Vol. 3. Boston: Little, 1973. Print.
4 vols.
With such an entry in the Works Cited, the parenthetic citation
within your essay would be to the page only, not to the volume
and page, because a reader who consults the Works Cited will
understand that you used only volume 3. In the Works Cited, you
may specify volume 3 and not give the total number of volumes, or
you may add the total number of volumes, as in the preceding
example.
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ONE BOOK WITH A SEPARATE TITLE IN A SET OF VOLUMES
Sometimes a set with a title makes use also of a separate title for
each book in the set. If you are listing such a book, use the following
form:
Churchill, Winston. The Age of Revolution. New York: Dodd, 1957.
Vol. 3 of History of the English-Speaking Peoples. Print. 4 vols.
1956-58.
A BOOK WITH AN AUTHOR AND AN EDITOR
Churchill, Winston, and Franklin D. Roosevelt. The Complete
Correspondence. Ed. Warren F. Kimball. 3 vols. Princeton:
Princeton UP, 1985. Print.
Kant, Immanuel. The Philosophy of Kant: Immanuel Kant’s Moral and
Political Writings. Ed. Carl J. Friedrich. New York: Modern, 1949.
Print.
If you are making use of the editor’s introduction or other edi-
torial material rather than of the author’s work, list the book under
the name of the editor rather than of the author, as shown below
under An Introduction, Foreword, or Afterword.
A REVISED EDITION OF A BOOK
Arendt, Hannah. Eichmann in Jerusalem. Rev. and enlarged ed. New
York: Viking, 1965. Print.
Honour, Hugh, and John Fleming. The Visual Arts: A History. 5th ed.
Englewood Cliffs: Prentice, 1999. Print.
A TRANSLATED BOOK
Franqui, Carlos. Family Portrait with Fidel: A Memoir. Trans. Alfred
MacAdam. New York: Random, 1984. Print.
AN INTRODUCTION, FOREWORD, OR AFTERWORD
Goldberg, Arthur J. Foreword. An Eye for an Eye? The Morality of
Punishing by Death. By Stephen Nathanson. Totowa, NJ:
Rowman, 1987. v-vi. Print.
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Usually an introduction or comparable material is listed under the
name of the author of the book (here Nathanson) rather than
under the name of the writer of the foreword (here Goldberg), but
if you are referring to the apparatus rather than to the book itself,
use the form just given. The words Introduction, Preface, Foreword,
and Afterword are neither enclosed within quotation marks nor
underlined.
A BOOK WITH AN EDITOR BUT NO AUTHOR
Let’s assume that you have used a book of essays written by
various people but collected by an editor (or editors), whose
name(s) appears on the collection.
LaValley, Albert J., ed. Focus on Hitchcock. Englewood Cliffs:
Prentice, 1972. Print.
If the book has one editor, the abbreviation is ed.; if two or more
editors, eds.
A WORK WITHIN A VOLUME OF WORKS BY ONE AUTHOR
The following entry indicates that a short work by Susan Sontag,
an essay called “The Aesthetics of Silence,” appears in a book by
Sontag titled Styles of Radical Will. Notice that the inclusive page num-
bers of the short work are cited, not merely page numbers that you
may happen to refer to but the page numbers of the entire piece.
Sontag, Susan. “The Aesthetics of Silence.” Styles of Radical Will.
New York: Farrar, 1969. 3-34. Print.
A BOOK REVIEW
Here is an example, citing Gerstein’s review of Walker’s book.
Gerstein’s review was published in a journal called Ethics.
Gerstein, Robert S. Rev. of Punishment, Danger and Stigma: The
Morality of Criminal Justice, by Nigel Walker. Ethics 93 (1983):
408-10. Print.
If the review has a title, give the title between the period following
the reviewer’s name and Rev.
If a review is anonymous, list it under the first word of the
title, or under the second word if the first is A, An, or The. If an
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anonymous review has no title, begin the entry with Rev. of , and
then give the title of the work reviewed; alphabetize the entry
under the title of the work reviewed.
AN ARTICLE OR ESSAY (NOT A REPRINT ) IN A COLLECTION
A book may consist of a collection (edited by one or more per-
sons) of new essays by several authors. Here is a reference to one
essay in such a book. (The essay by Balmforth occupies pages 19 to
35 in a collection edited by Bevan.)
Balmforth, Henry. “Science and Religion.” Steps to Christian
Understanding. Ed. R. J. W. Bevan. London: Oxford UP, 1958.
19-35. Print.
AN ARTICLE OR ESSAY REPRINTED IN A COLLECTION
The previous example (Balmforth’s essay in Bevan’s collection)
was for an essay written for a collection. But some collections
reprint earlier material, such as essays from journals or chapters
from books. The following example cites an essay that was origi-
nally printed in a book called The Cinema of Alfred Hitchcock. This
essay has been reprinted in a later collection of essays on
Hitchcock, edited by Albert J. LaValley, and it was LaValley’s collec-
tion that the student used.
Bogdanovich, Peter. “Interviews with Alfred Hitchcock.” The
Cinema of Alfred Hitchcock. New York: Museum of Modern Art,
1963. 15-18. Rpt. in Focus on Hitchcock. Ed. Albert J. LaValley.
Englewood Cliffs: Prentice, 1972. 28-31. Print.
The student has read Bogdanovich’s essay or chapter, but not in
Bogdanovich’s book, where it occupied pages 15 to 18. The material
was actually read on pages 28 to 31 in a collection of writings on
Hitchcock, edited by LaValley. Details of the original publication—
title, date, page numbers, and so forth—were found in LaValley’s
collection. Almost all editors will include this information, either on
the copyright page or at the foot of the reprinted essay, but some-
times they do not give the original page numbers. In such a case,
you need not include the original numbers in your entry.
Notice that the entry begins with the author and the title of
the work you are citing (here, Bogdanovich’s interviews), not
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with the name of the editor of the collection or the title of the
collection.
AN ENCYCLOPEDIA OR OTHER ALPHABETICALLY
ARRANGED REFERENCE WORK
The publisher, place of publication, volume number, and page
number do not have to be given. For such works, list only the edi-
tion (if it is given) and the date.
For a signed article, begin with the author’s last name. (If the
article is signed with initials, check elsewhere in the volume for a
list of abbreviations, which will inform you who the initials stand
for, and use the following form.)
Williams, Donald C. “Free Will and Determinism.” Encyclopedia
Americana. 1987 ed. Print.
For an unsigned article, begin with the title of the article:
“Automation.” The Business Reference Book. 1977 ed. Print.
“Tobacco.” Encyclopaedia Britannica: Macropaedia. 1988 ed. Print.
A TELEVISION OR RADIO PROGRAM
Be sure to include the title of the episode or segment (in quota-
tion marks), the title of the show (italicized), the network, the call
letters and city of the station, and the date of broadcast. Other
information, such as performers, narrator, and so forth, may be
included if pertinent.
“Back to My Lai.” 60 Minutes. Narr. Mike Wallace. CBS. 29 Mar.
1998.
Television.
“Juvenile Justice.” Talk of the Nation. Narr. Ray Suarez. Natl. Public
Radio. WBUR, Boston. 15 Apr. 1998. Radio.
AN ARTICLE IN A SCHOLARLY JOURNAL The title of the article
is enclosed within quotation marks, and the title of the journal is
italicized.
Some journals are paginated consecutively; the pagination of
the second issue begins where the first issue leaves off. Other jour-
nals begin each issue with page 1.
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A JOURNAL THAT IS PAGINATED CONSECUTIVELY
Vilas, Carlos M. “Popular Insurgency and Social Revolution in
Central America.” Latin American Perspectives 15.1 (1988):
55-77.
Vilas’s article occupies pages 55 to 77 in volume 15, which was
published in 1988. (Notice that the volume number is followed by
a space, then by the year in parentheses, and then by a colon, a
space, and the page numbers of the entire article.) When available,
give the issue number.
A JOURNAL THAT BEGINS EACH ISSUE WITH PAGE 1
If the journal is, for instance, a quarterly, there will be four
page 1’s each year, so the issue number must be given. After the
volume number, type a period and (without hitting the space bar)
the issue number, as in the next example:
Greenberg, Jack. “Civil Rights Enforcement Activity of the
Department of Justice.” Black Law Journal 8.1 (1983): 60-67.
Greenberg’s article appeared in the first issue of volume 8 of the
Black Law Journal.
AN ARTICLE IN A WEEKLY, BIWEEKLY,
MONTHLY, OR BIMONTHLY PUBLICATION
Do not include volume or issue numbers, even if given.
Lamar, Jacob V. “The Immigration Mess.” Time 27 Feb. 1989: 14-15.
Markowitz, Laura. “A Different Kind of Queer Marriage.” Utne
Reader Sept.-Oct. 2000: 24-26. Print
AN ARTICLE IN A NEWSPAPER
Because a newspaper usually consists of several sections, a sec-
tion number or a capital letter may precede the page number. The
example indicates that an article begins on page 1 of section 2 and
is continued on a later page.
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Chu, Harry. “Art Thief Defends Action.” New York Times 8 Feb. 1989,
sec. 2: 1+. Print
AN UNSIGNED EDITORIAL
“The Religious Tyranny Amendment.” Editorial. New York Times 15
Mar. 1998, sec. 4: 16. Print.
A LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Lasken, Douglas. Letter. New York Times 15 Mar. 1998, sec. 4: 16. Print.
A PUBLISHED OR BROADCAST INTERVIEW
Give the name of the interview subject and the interviewer, fol-
lowed by the relevant publication or broadcast information, in the fol-
lowing format:
Green, Al. Interview with Terry Gross. Fresh Air. Natl. Public Radio.
WFCR, Amherst, MA. 16 Oct. 2000. Radio.
AN INTERVIEW YOU CONDUCT
Jevgrafovs, Alexandre L. Personal [or Telephone] interview. 14 Dec.
2003.
PERSONAL CORRESPONDENCE
Add “TS” for a typed letter, “MS” for a handwritten letter, or
“E-mail” to the end of the citation.
Paso, Robert. Letter [or Message, in the case of E-mail] to the
author. 6 Jan. 2004. TS.
CD-ROM
Books on CD-ROMs are cited very much like their printed
counterparts. Add the medium (CD-ROM) after the publication
information. For articles, to the usual print citation information, add
(1) the title of the database, italicized; (2) the medium (CD-ROM);
(3) the vendor’s name; and (4) the date of electronic publication.
Louisberg, Margaret. Charlie Brown Meets Godzilla: What Are Our
Children Watching? Urbana: ERIC Clearinghouse on Elementary
and Early Childhood Education, 1990. CD-ROM.
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“Pornography.” The Oxford English Dictionary. 2nd ed. CD-ROM.
Oxford: Oxford UP, 1992.
A PERSONAL OR PROFESSIONAL WEB SITE
Include the following elements, separated by periods: the name
of the person who created the site (omit if not given, as in Figure
7.4); site title (italicized); name of any sponsoring institution or
organization; date of electronic publication or of the latest update
(if given); the medium (Web); and the date of access.
Legal Guide for Bloggers. Electronic Frontier Foundation. 11 Feb.
2009. Web. 30 May 2009.
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FIGURE 7.4
Include the URL only if your Instructor requires it.
Sponsor of Web site
No author given; start citation with the title
Title of Web page
Publication date
Include the medium (Web) and the date you retrieved it.6
5
4
3
2
1
1
2
6
3
4
5
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AN ARTICLE IN AN ONLINE PERIODICAL
Give the same information as you would for a print article, plus
the medium (Web) and the date of access. (See Figure 7.5.)
Acocella, Joan. “In the Blood: Why Do Vampires Still Thrill?” New
Yorker. 16 March 2009. Web. 30 May 2009.
AN ONLINE POSTING
The citation includes the author’s name, subject line of posting,
description Online posting, if the posting has no title, name of the forum,
date material was posted, the medium (Web), and date of access.
Ricci, Paul. “Global Warming.” Global Electronic Science Conference,
10 June. 1996. Web. 22 Sept. 1997.
DOCUMENTATION: MLA FORMAT 239
FIGURE 7.5
Include the URL only if your Instructor requires it.
Title of periodical
Title of article
Subtitle of article
Author
Publication date
Include the medium (Web) and the date you retrieved it.7
6
5
4
3
2
1
1
3
4
5
2
6
7
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A DATABASE SOURCE
Treat material obtained from a computer service, such as
Bibliographic Retrieval Service (BRS), like other printed material,
but at the end of the entry add (if available) the title of the database
(italicized), publication medium (Web), name of the computer service
if known, and date of access.
Jackson, Morton. “A Look at Profits.” Harvard Business Review 40
(1962): 106-13. BRS. Web. 23 Dec. 2006.
Caution: Although we have covered the most usual kinds of
sources, it is entirely possible that you will come across a source that
does not fit any of the categories that we have discussed. For approxi-
mately two hundred pages of explanations of these matters, covering
the proper way to cite all sorts of troublesome and unbelievable (but
real) sources, see MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, Seventh
Edition (New York: Modern Language Association of America, 2009).
APA Format: Citations within the Text
Your paper will conclude with a separate page headed References,
in which you list all of your sources. If the last page of your essay is
numbered 10, number the first page of the References 11.
The APA style emphasizes the date of publication; the date
appears not only in the list of references at the end of the paper but
also in the paper itself, when you give a brief parenthetic citation of
a source that you have quoted or summarized or in any other way
used. Here is an example:
Statistics are readily available (Smith, 1989, p. 20).
The title of Smith’s book or article will be given at the end of your
paper, in the list titled References. We discuss the form of the mate-
rial listed in the References after we look at some typical citations
within the text of a student’s essay.
A SUMMARY OF AN ENTIRE WORK
Smith (1988) holds the same view.
or
Similar views are held widely (Smith, 1988; Jones & Metz, 1990).
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A REFERENCE TO A PAGE OR TO PAGES
Smith (1988) argues that “the death penalty is a lottery, and
blacks usually are the losers” (p. 17).
A REFERENCE TO AN AUTHOR WHO HAS MORE THAN
ONE WORK IN THE LIST OF REFERENCES
If in the References you list two or more works that an
author published in the same year, the works are listed in alpha-
betic order, by the first letter of the title. The first work is labeled
a, the second b, and so on. Here is a reference to the second work
that Smith published in 1989:
Florida presents “a fair example” of how the death penalty is
administered (Smith, 1989b, p. 18).
APA Format: The List of
References
Your brief parenthetic citations are made clear when the reader
consults the list you give in the References. Type this list on a sepa-
rate page, continuing the pagination of your essay.
An Overview Here are some general guidelines.
FORM ON THE PAGE
• Begin each entry flush with the left margin, but if an entry
runs to more than one line, indent five spaces for each suc-
ceeding line of the entry.
• Double-space each entry, and double-space between entries.
ALPHABETIC ORDER
• Arrange the list alphabetically by author.
• Give the author’s last name first and then the initial of the
first name and of the middle name (if any).
• If there is more than one author, name all of the authors up
to seven, again inverting the name (last name first) and giv-
ing only initials for first and middle names. (But do not invert
the editor’s name when the entry begins with the name of an
author who has written an article in an edited book.) When
there are two or more authors, use an ampersand (&) before
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the name of the last author. Example (here, of an article in
the tenth volume of a journal called Developmental Psychology):
Drabman, R. S., & Thomas, M. H. (1974). Does media violence
increase children’s tolerance of real-life aggression? Develop-
mental Psychology, 10, 418-421.
• For eight or more authors, list the first six followed by
three ellipses dots and then the last author. If you list more
than one work by an author, do so in the order of publica-
tion, the earliest first. If two works by an author were pub-
lished in the same year, give them in alphabetic order by
the first letter of the title, disregarding A, An, or The, and
their foreign equivalent. Designate the first work as a, the
second as b. Repeat the author’s name at the start of each
entry.
Donnerstein, E. (1980a). Aggressive erotica and violence against
women. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39,
269-277.
Donnerstein, E. (1980b). Pornography and violence against women.
Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 347, 227-288.
Donnerstein, E. (1983). Erotica and human aggression. In R. Green
and E. Donnerstein (Eds.), Aggression: Theoretical and empiri-
cal reviews (pp. 87-103). New York, NY: Academic Press.
FORM OF TITLE
• In references to books, capitalize only the first letter of the
first word of the title (and of the subtitle, if any) and capital-
ize proper nouns. Italicize the complete title (but not the
period at the end).
• In references to articles in periodicals or in edited books, capi-
talize only the first letter of the first word of the article’s title
(and subtitle, if any) and all proper nouns. Do not put the title
within quotation marks. Type a period after the title of the
article. For the title of the journal and the volume and page
numbers, see the next instruction.
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• In references to periodicals, give the volume number in ara-
bic numerals, and italicize it. Do not use vol. before the num-
ber, and do not use p. or pg. before the page numbers.
Sample References Here are some samples to follow.
A BOOK BY ONE AUTHOR
Pavlov, I. P. (1927). Conditioned reflexes (G. V. Anrep, Trans.). London,
England: Oxford
University Press.
A BOOK BY MORE THAN ONE AUTHOR
Belenky, M. F., Clinchy, B. M., Goldberger, N. R., & Torule, J. M.
(1986). Women’s ways of knowing: The development of self,
voice, and mind. New York, NY: Basic Books.
A COLLECTION OF ESSAYS
Christ, C. P., & Plaskow, J. (Eds.). (1979). Woman-spirit rising: A
feminist reader in religion. New York, NY: Harper & Row.
A WORK IN A COLLECTION OF ESSAYS
Fiorenza, E. (1979). Women in the early Christian movement. In C.
P. Christ & J. Plaskow (Eds.), Woman-spirit rising: A feminist
reader in religion (pp. 84-92). New York, NY: Harper & Row.
GOVERNMENT DOCUMENTS
If the writer is not known, treat the government and the
agency as the author. Most federal documents are issued by the
U.S. Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C. If a docu-
ment number has been assigned, insert that number in parentheses
between the title and the following period.
United States Congress. Office of Technology Assessment. (1984).
Comput-erized manufacturing automation: Employment, educa-
tion, and the workplace. Washington, DC: U.S. Government
Printing Office.
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AN ARTICLE IN A JOURNAL WITH CONTINUOUS PAGINATION
Tversky, A., & Kahneman, D. (1981). The framing of decisions and
the psychology of choice. Science, 211, 453-458.
AN ARTICLE IN A JOURNAL THAT PAGINATES
EACH ISSUE SEPARATELY
Foot, R. J. (1988-89). Nuclear coercion and the ending of the
Korean conflict. International Security, 13(4), 92-112.
The reference informs us that the article appeared in issue number
4 of volume 13.
AN ARTICLE FROM A MONTHLY OR WEEKLY MAGAZINE
Greenwald, J. (1989, February 27). Gimme shelter. Time, 133, 50-51.
Maran, S. P. (1988, April). In our backyard, a star explodes.
Smithsonian, 19, 46-57.
AN ARTICLE IN A NEWSPAPER
Connell, R. (1989, February 6). Career concerns at heart of 1980s’
campus protests. Los Angeles Times, pp. 1, 3.
(Note: If no author is given, simply begin with the title fol-
lowed by the date in parentheses.)
A BOOK REVIEW
Daniels, N. (1984). Understanding physician power [Review of
the book The social transformation of American medicine].
Philosophy and Public Affairs, 13, 347-356.
Daniels is the reviewer, not the author of the book. The book under
review is called The Social Transformation of American Medicine, but
the review, published in volume 13 of Philosophy and Public Affairs,
had its own title, “Understanding Physician Power.”
If the review does not have a title, retain the square brackets,
and use the material within as the title. Proceed as in the example
just given.
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DOCUMENTATION: APA FORMAT 245
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR PAPERS USING SOURCES
Ask yourself the following questions:
� Are all borrowed words and ideas credited, including those
from Internet sources?
� Are all summaries and paraphrases acknowledged as such?
� Are quotations and summaries not too long?
� Are quotations accurate? Are omissions of words indicated by
three spaced periods? Are additions of words enclosed within
square brackets?
� Are quotations provided with helpful lead-ins?
� Is documentation in proper form?
And of course, you will also ask yourself the questions that you
would ask of a paper that did not use sources, such as:
� Is the topic sufficiently narrowed?
� Is the thesis (to be advanced or refuted) stated early and
clearly, perhaps even in the title?
� Is the audience kept in mind? Are opposing views stated fairly
and as sympathetically as possible? Are controversial terms
defined?
� Are assumptions likely to be shared by readers? If not, are they
argued rather than merely asserted?
� Is the focus clear (evaluation, recommendation of policy)?
� Is evidence (examples, testimony, statistics) adequate and sound?
� Are inferences valid?
� Is the organization clear (effective opening, coherent sequence
of arguments, unpretentious ending)?
� Is all worthy opposition faced?
� Is the tone appropriate?
� Has the paper been carefully proofread?
� Is the title effective?
� Is the opening paragraph effective?
� Is the structure reader-friendly?
� Is the closing paragraph effective?
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A WEB SITE
American Psychological Association. (1995). Lesbian and gay par-
enting. Retrieved June 12, 2000, from http://www.apa.org/
pi/parent.html
AN ARTICLE IN AN ONLINE PERIODICAL
Carpenter, S. (2000, October). Biology and social environments
jointly influence gender development. Monitor on Psychology
31. Retrieved September 20, 2000, from http://www.apa.org/
monitor/oct00/maccoby.html
For a full account of the APA method of dealing with all sorts
of unusual citations, see the sixth edition (2009) of the APA man-
ual, Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association.
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH
PAPER IN MLA FORMAT
The following argument makes good use of sources. Early in the
semester the students were asked to choose one topic from a list of
ten, and to write a documented argument of 750 to 1,250 words
(three to five pages of double-spaced typing). The completed paper
was due two weeks after the topics were distributed. The assign-
ment, a prelude to working on a research paper of 2,500 to 3,000
words, was in part designed to give students practice in finding and
in using sources. Citations are given in the MLA form.
246 7 / USING SOURCES
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Why Trials Should Not Be Televised
By
Theresa Washington
Professor Wilson
English 102
10 December 2009
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN MLA FORMAT 247
The MLA
Handbook
does not insist
on a title page
and outline,
but many
instructors
prefer them.
Title one-third
down page
All lines centered
BAR_01611_07_ch07_pp188-272.qxd 6/17/10 12:14 PM Page 247
Outline
Thesis: The televising of trials is a bad idea because it has
several negative effects on the First Amendment: It
gives viewers a deceptive view of particular trials and
of the judicial system in general, and it degrades the
quality of media reporting outside the courtroom.
I. Introduction
A. Trend toward increasing trial coverage
B. First Amendment versus Sixth Amendment
II. Effect of televising trials on First Amendment
A. Provides deceptive version of truth
1. Confidence in verdicts misplaced
a. William Smith trial
b. Rodney King trial
2. Nature of TV as a medium
a. Distortion in sound bites
b. Stereotyping trial participants
c. Misleading camera angles
d. Commentators and commercials
B. Confuses viewers about judicial system
1. Contradicts basic concept “innocent until proven
guilty”
2. Can’t explain legal complexities
C. Contributes to media circus outside of court
1. Blurs truth and fiction
2. Affects print media in negative ways
3. Media makes itself the story
4. Distracts viewers from other issues
III. Conclusion
Washington i
248 7 / USING SOURCES
Small roman
numerals for
page with
outline
Roman numerals
for chief units
(I, II, etc.); capital
letters for chief
units within
these largest
units; for smaller
and smaller
units, arabic
numerals and
lowercase letters
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Why Trials Should Not Be Televised
Although trials have been televised on and off since the
1950s,1 in the last few years the availability of trials for a
national audience has increased dramatically.2 Media critics,
legal scholars, social scientists, and journalists continue to
debate the merits of this trend.
Proponents of cameras in the courtroom argue, falsely, I
believe, that confidence in the fairness of our institutions,
including the judicial system, depends on a free press,
guaranteed by the First Amendment. Keeping trials off
television is a form of censorship, they say. It limits the
public’s ability to understand (1) what is happening in
particular trials and (2) how the judicial system operates, which
is often confusing to laypeople. Opponents claim that
televising trials threatens the defendant’s Sixth Amendment
rights to a fair trial because it can alter the behavior of the
trial participants, including the jury (“Tale”; Thaler).
Regardless of its impact on due process of law,3 TV in
court does not serve the First Amendment well. Consider the
first claim, that particular trials are easier to understand when
televised. But does watching trials on television really allow
the viewer to “see it like it is,” to get the full scope and
breadth of a trial? Steven Brill, founder of Court TV, would like
us to believe so. He points out that most high-profile
defendants in televised trials have been acquitted; he names
William Kennedy Smith, Jimmy Hoffa, John Connally, and John
Delorean as examples (Clark 821). “Imagine if [Smith’s trial]
Washington 1
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN MLA FORMAT 249
Title is focused
and announces
the thesis.
Double-space
between title
and first
paragraph—
and throughout
the essay.
1” margin on
each side and
at bottom
Summary of
opposing
positions
Parenthetic
reference to
an anonymous
source and
also to a
source with a
named author
Superscript
numerals
indicate
endnotes.
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had not been shown and he got off. Millions of people would
have said the Kennedys fixed the case” (Brill qtd. in “Tale”
29). Polls taken after the trial seem to confirm this claim,
since they showed the public by and large agreed with the
jury’s decision to acquit (Quindlen).
However, Thaler points out that the public can just as
easily disagree with the verdict as agree, and when this
happens, the effects can be catastrophic. One example is the
Rodney King case. Four white Los Angeles police officers were
charged in 1991 with severely beating African American Rodney
King, who, according to the officers, had been resisting arrest.
At their first trial, all four officers were acquitted. This verdict
outraged many African Americans throughout the country; they
felt the evidence from watching the trial overwhelmingly
showed the defendants to be guilty. The black community of
south-central Los Angeles expressed its feelings by rioting for
days (Thaler 50-51).
Clearly the black community did not experience the trial
the same way the white community and the white jury did.
Why? Marty Rosenbaum, an attorney with the New York State
Defenders Association, points out that viewers cannot
experience a trial the same way trial participants do. “What you
see at home ‘is not what jurors see’” (qtd. in Thaler 70). The
trial process is slow, linear, and methodical, as the defense and
prosecution each builds its case, one piece of information at a
time (Thaler 11). The process is intended to be thoughtful and
reflective, with the jury weighing all the evidence in light of
Washington 2
250 7 / USING SOURCES
Parenthetic
reference to
author and
page
Parenthetic
reference to an
indirect source
(a borrowed
quotation)
Although no
words are
quoted, the
idea is
borrowed,
and so the
source is
cited.
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the whole trial (Altheide 299-301). And it emphasizes words—
both spoken and written—rather than images (Thaler 11).
In contrast, TV’s general strength is in handling visual
images that entertain or that provoke strong feelings. News
editors and reporters choose footage for its assumed visual and
emotional impact on viewers. Words are made to fit the images,
not the other way around, and they tend to be short catchy
phrases, easy to understand (Thaler 4, 7). As a result, the
fifteen- to thirty-second “sound bites” in nightly newscasts
often present trial events out of context, emphasizing moments
of drama rather than of legal importance (Thaler 7; Zoglin 62).
Furthermore, this emphasis on emotional visuals leads
to stereotyping the participants, making larger-than-life
symbols out of them, especially regarding social issues (Thaler
9): abused children (the Menendez brothers), the battered wife
(Hedda Nussbaum), the abusing husband (Joel Steinberg, O. J.
Simpson), the jealous lover (Amy Fisher), the serial killer
(Jeffrey Dahmer), and date rapist (William Smith). It becomes
difficult for viewers to see defendants as ordinary human
beings.
One can argue, as Brill has done, that gavel-to-gavel
coverage of trials counteracts the distortions in sound-bite
journalism (Clark 821). Yet even here a number of editorial
assumptions and decisions affect what viewers see. Camera
angles and movements reinforce in the viewer differing degrees
of intimacy with the trial participant; close-ups are often used
for sympathetic witnesses, three-quarter shots for lawyers, and
profile shots for defendants (Entner 73-75).4
Washington 3
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN MLA FORMAT 251
Clear
transition (“In
contrast”)
Parenthetic
citation of two
sources
Summary of
an opposing
view
countered
with a clear
transition
(“Yet”)
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On-air commentators also shape the viewers’ experience.
Several media critics have noted how much commentators’
remarks often have the play-by-play tone of sportscasters
informing viewers of what each side (the defense and the
prosecution) needs to win (Cole 245; Thaler 71, 151). Continual
interruptions for commercials add to the impression of
watching a spectacle. “The CNN coverage [of the Smith trial]
isn’t so much gavel-to-gavel, actually, as gavel-to-commercial-
to-gavel, with former CNN Gulf War correspondent Charles Jaco
acting more as ringleader than reporter” (Bianculli 60). This
encourages a sensationalistic tone to the proceedings that the
jury does not experience. In addition, breaking for ads
frequently occurs at important points in the trial (Thaler 48).
In-court proponents also believe that watching
televised trials will help viewers understand the legal aspects of
the judicial system. In June 1991, a month before Court TV
went on the air, Vincent Blasi, a law professor at Columbia
University, told Time magazine, “Today most of us learn about
judicial proceedings from lawyers’ sound bites and artists’
sketches. . . . Televised proceedings [such as Court TV] ought to
dispel some of the myth and mystery that shroud our legal
system” (qtd. in Zoglin 62).
But after several years of Court TV and CNN, we can now
see this is not so. As a medium, TV is not good at educating
the general public, either about concepts fundamental to our
judicial system or about the complexities in particular cases.
For example, one basic concept—”innocent until proven
guilty”—is contradicted in televised trials in numerous subtle
Washington 4
252 7 / USING SOURCES
Author lets
reader hear the
opposition by
means of a brief
quotation
Omitted material
indicated by
three periods,
with a fourth
to mark the end
of a sentence
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ways: Commentators sometimes make remarks about (or omit
comment on) actions of the defense or prosecution that show a
bias against the defendant.
Media critic Lewis Cole, watching the trial of Lorena
Bobbitt on Court TV in 1994, observed:
Court TV commentators rarely challenged the
state’s characterization of what it was doing,
repeating with-out comment, for instance, the
prosecution’s claims about protecting the
reputation of Lorena Bobbitt and concentrating
on the prosecution decision to pursue both
cases as a tactical matter, rather than inquiring
how the prosecution’s view of the incident as a
“barroom brawl” had limited its approach to and
understanding of the case. (245)
Camera angles play a role also: Watching the defendant
day after day in profile, which makes him or her seem either
vulnerable or remote, tends to reinforce his or her guilt
(Entner 158).
Thaler points out that these editorial effects arise
because the goals of the media (print as well as electronic)
differ from the goals of the judicial system. His argument runs
as follows: The court is interested in determining only whether
the defendant broke the law. The media (especially TV) focus on
acts to reinforce social values, whether they’re codified into law
or not. This can lead viewers to conclude that a defendant is
guilty because pretrial publicity or courtroom testimony reveals
he or she has transgressed against the community’s moral code,
Washington 5
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN MLA FORMAT 253
Quotation of
more than
four lines,
indented 1”
(ten spaces)
from left
margin,
double-
spaced,
parenthetic
reference set
off from
quotation
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even when the legal system later acquits. This happened in the
case of Claus von Bulow, who between 1982 and 1985 was tried
and acquitted twice for attempting to murder his wife and who
clearly had behaved in reprehensible ways in the eyes of the
public (35). It also happened in the case of Joel Steinberg,
who was charged with murdering his daughter. Extended
televised testimony by his former partner, Hedda Nussbaum,
helped paint a portrait of “a monster” in the eyes of the public
(140-42). Yet the jury chose to convict him on the lesser
charge of manslaughter. When many viewers wrote to the
prosecutor, Peter Casolaro, asking why the verdict was not first-
degree murder, he had to conclude that TV does not effectively
teach about due process of law (176).
In addition to being poor at handling basic judicial
concepts, television has difficulty conveying more complex and
technical aspects of the law. Sometimes the legal nature of the
case makes for a poor translation to the screen. Brill admitted
that, despite attempts at hourly summaries, Court TV was
unable to convey to its viewers any meaningful understanding
of the case of Manuel Noriega (Thaler 61), the Panamanian
leader who was convicted by the United States in 1992 of drug
trafficking and money laundering (“Former”). In other cases,
like the Smith trial, the “civics lesson” gets swamped by its
sensational aspects (Thaler 45). In most cases print media are
better at exploring and explaining legal issues than is TV
(Thaler 4).
In addition to shaping the viewer’s perceptions of trial
reality directly, in-court TV also negatively affects the quality
Washington 6
254 7 / USING SOURCES
Argument
supported by
specific
examples
Transition
briefly
summarizes
and then
moves to a
new point.
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of trial coverage outside of court, which in turn limits the
public’s “right to know.” Brill likes to claim that Court TV helps
to counteract the sensationalism of such tabloid TV shows as A
Current Affair and Hard Copy, which pay trial participants to tell
their stories and publish leaks from the prosecution and
defense. “I think cameras in the courtroom is [sic] the best
antidote to that garbage” (Brill qtd. in Clark 821). However, as
founder and editor of Court TV, he obviously has a vested
interest in affirming his network’s social and legal worth. There
are several ways that in-court TV, rather than supplying a
sobering contrast, helps to feed the media circus surrounding
high-profile trials (Thaler 43).
One way is by helping to blur the line between reality
and fiction. This is an increasing trend among all media but is
especially true of TV, whose footage can be combined and
recombined in so many ways. An excellent example of this is
the trial of Amy Fisher, who pleaded guilty in September 1992
to shooting her lover’s wife and whose sentencing was televised
by Court TV (Thaler 83). Three TV movies about this love
triangle appeared on network TV in the same week, just one
month after she had been sentenced to five to fifteen years of
jail (Thaler 82). Then Geraldo Rivera, the syndicated TV talk-
show host, held a mock grand jury trial of her lover, Joey
Buttafuoco; even though Buttafuoco had not at that point
been charged with a crime, Geraldo felt many viewers thought
he ought to have been (Thaler 83). Then A Current Affair had a
series that “tried” Fisher for events and behaviors that never
got resolved in the actual trial. The announcer on the program
Washington 7
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN MLA FORMAT 255
The author
uses “[sic]”
(Latin for
“thus”) to
indicate that
the oddity is
in the source
and is not by
the author of
the paper.
BAR_01611_07_ch07_pp188-272.qxd 6/17/10 12:14 PM Page 255
said, “When Ms. Fisher copped a plea and went to jail, she
robbed the public of a trial, leaving behind many unanswered
questions. Tonight we will try to . . . complete the unwritten
chapter” (“Trial”). Buttafuoco’s lawyer from the trial served as a
consultant on this program (Thaler 84). This is also a good
example of how tabloid TV reinforces people’s beliefs and plays
on people’s feelings. Had her trial not been televised, the
excitement surrounding her case would not have been so high.
Tabloid TV played off the audience’s expectation for what a
televised trial should and could reveal. Thus in-court television
becomes one more ingredient in the mix of docudramas, mock
trials, talk shows, and tabloid journalism. This limits the
public’s “right to know” by making it difficult to keep fact
separate from storytelling.
In-court TV also affects the quality of print journalism.
Proponents like to claim that “[f]rom the standpoint of the
public’s right to know, there is no good reason why TV
journalists should be barred from trials while print reporters are
not” (Zoglin 62). But when TV is present, there is no level
playing field among the media. Because it provides images,
sound, movement, and a greater sense of speed and immediacy,
TV can easily outcompete other media for audience attention
and thus for advertising dollars. In attempts to keep pace,
newspapers and magazines offer more and more of the kinds of
stories that once were beneath their standards, such as
elaborate focus both on sensational aspects of the case and on
“personalities, analysis, and prediction” rather than news
(Thaler 45). While these attributes have always been part of TV
Washington 8
256 7 / USING SOURCES
Useful
analysis of
effect of TV
Square
brackets
indicate that
the author
has altered
text from a
capital to a
lowercase
letter.
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and the tabloid print press, this trend is increasingly apparent
in supposedly reputable papers like the New York Times. During
the Smith trial, for example, the Times violated previously
accepted boundaries of propriety by not only identifying the
rape victim but also giving lots of intimate details about her
past (Thaler 45).
Because the media are, for the most part, commercial,
slow periods—and all trials have them—must always be filled
with some “story.” One such story is increasingly the media
self-consciously watching and analyzing itself, to see how it is
handling (or mishandling) coverage of the trial (Thaler 43). At
the Smith trial, for example, one group of reporters was
covering the trial while another group covered the other
reporters (Thaler 44).5 As bizarre as this “media watching” is,
there would be no “story” if the trial itself had not been
televised.
Last but not least, televising trials distracts viewers
from other important issues. Some of these are abstract and
thus hard to understand (like the savings-and-loan scandal in
the mid-1980s or the causes of lingering unemployment in the
1990s), while others are painful to contemplate (like overseas
wars and famines). Yet we have to stay aware of these issues if
we are to function as active citizens in a democracy.
Altogether, televising trials is a bad idea. Not only does
it provide deceptive impressions about what’s happening in
particular trials; it also doesn’t reveal much about our judicial
system. In addition, televising trials helps to lower the quality
of trial coverage outside of court, thus increasingly depriving
Washington 9
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN MLA FORMAT 257
No citation is
needed for a
point that can
be considered
common
knowledge,
but the second
sentence is
documented.
Useful
summary of
main points
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the public of neutral, fact-based reporting. A healthy free press
depends on balance and knowing when to accept limits.
Saturating viewers with extended media coverage of sensational
trials oversteps those limits. In this case, more is not better.
Yet it is unlikely that TV coverage will be legally
removed from the courtroom, now that it is here. Only one
state (New York) has ever legislated a return to nontelevised
trials (in 1991), and even it changed its mind in 1992 (Thaler
78). Perhaps the best we can do is to educate ourselves about
the pitfalls of televising the judicial system, as we struggle to
do so with the televised electoral process.
Washington 10
258 7 / USING SOURCES
Realistic
appraisal of
the current
situation and
a suggestion
of what the
reader can do
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Notes
1. Useful discussions of this history can be found in
Clark (829-32) and Thaler (19-31).
2. Cable networks have been showing trial footage to
national audiences since at least 1982, when Cable News
Network (CNN) covered the trial of Claus von Bulow (Thaler 33).
It continues to show trials. In the first week of February 1995,
four to five million homes accounted for the top fifteen most-
watched shows on cable TV; all were CNN segments of the O. J.
Simpson trial (“Cable TV”). In July 1991, Steven Brill founded
the Courtroom Television Network, or “Court TV” (Clark 821).
Like CNN, it broadcasts around the clock, showing gavel-to-
gavel coverage. It now claims over fourteen million cable
subscribers (Clark 821) and, as of January 1994, had televised
over 280 trials (“In Camera” 27).
3. Thaler’s study The Watchful Eye is a thoughtful
examination of the subtle ways in which TV in court can affect
trial participants, inhibiting witnesses from coming forward,
provoking grandstanding in attorneys and judges, and
pressuring juries to come up with verdicts acceptable to a
national audience.
4. Sometimes legal restrictions determine camera
angles. For example, in the Steinberg trial (1988), the audience
and the jury were not allowed to be televised by New York state
law. This required placing the camera so that the judge and
witnesses were seen in “full frontal view” (generally a more
neutral or positive stance). The lawyers could be seen only from
the rear when questioning witnesses, and the defendant was
Washington 11
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN MLA FORMAT 259
1”
1⁄2”
Double-space
between
heading and
notes and
throughout
notes.
Superscript
number
followed by
one space
Each note
begins with
1/2” indent
(five
typewriter
spaces), but
subsequent
lines of each
note are
flush left.
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shot in profile (Thaler 110-11). These camera angles, though
not chosen for dramatic effect, still resulted in emotionally
laden viewpoints not experienced by the jury. George W.
Trammell, a Los Angeles Superior Court Judge, has written on
how technology can interfere with the fairness of the trial
system. He claims that “[t]echnology, well managed, can be a
great benefit. Technology poorly managed benefits no one.”
5. At the Smith trial a journalist from one German
newspaper inadvertently filmed another German reporter from a
competing newspaper watching the Smith trial in the pressroom
outside the courtroom (Thaler 44).
Washington 12
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Works Cited
Altheide, David. “TV News and the Social Construction of Justice.”
Justice and the Media: Issues and Research. Ed. Ray
Surette. Springfield, IL: Thomas, 1984. 292-304 Print.
Bianculli, David. “Shame on You, CNN.” New York Post 11 Dec.
1992: 60. Print.
“Cable TV Squeezes High Numbers and Aces Competition.” All
Things Considered. Natl. Public Radio. 9 Feb. 1994.
Unedited transcript. Segment 12. NPR Audience Services.
Washington. Print.
Clark, Charles S. “Courts and the Media.” CQ Researcher 23 Sept.
1994: 817-40. Print.
Cole, Lewis. “Court TV.” Nation 21 Feb. 1994: 243-45. Print.
Entner, Roberta. “Encoding the Image of the American Judiciary
Institution: A Semiotic Analysis of Broadcast Trials to
Ascertain Its Definition of the Court System.” Diss. New
York U, 1993. Print.
“Former Panamanian Leader Noriega Sentenced.” Facts on File
16 July 1992: 526. CD-ROM. InfoTrac: Magazine Index
Plus 1992-Feb. 1995. Information Access. Feb. 1995.
“In Camera with Court TV.” New Yorker 24 Jan. 1994: 27-28.
Print.
Quindlen, Anna. “The Glass Eye.” New York Times 18 Dec. 1991:
A29. Print.
“A Tale of a Rug.” Economist 15 Jan. 1994: 28-29. Print.
Thaler, Paul. The Watchful Eye: American Justice in the Age of
the Television Trial. Westport, CT: Praeger, 1994. Print.
Washington 13
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN APA FORMAT 261
1”
1⁄2”
Alphabetical
by author’s
last name
Hanging
indent 1/2”
Transcript of
radio program
The title of an
unpublished
work is not
italicized but is
enclosed within
quotation
marks.
CD-ROM
source
Anonymous
source
alphabetized
under first
word (or
second if first
is A, An, or The)
No page
reference for
this in-text
Internet
citation
BAR_01611_07_ch07_pp188-272.qxd 6/17/10 12:14 PM Page 261
Trammell, George W. “Cirque du O. J.” Court Technology Bulletin.
National Center for State Courts, July-Aug. 1995. Web. 12
Sept. 1996.
“The Trial That Had to Happen: The People versus Amy Fisher.”
A Current Affair. Fox. WFXT, Boston. 1-4 Feb. 1993.
Television.
Zoglin, Richard. “Justice Faces a Screen Test.” Time 17 June
1991: 62. Print.
Washington 14
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Television
program
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AN ANNOTATED STUDENT
RESEARCH PAPER IN APA FORMAT
The following paper is an example of a student paper that uses
APA format.
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN APA FORMAT 263
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The Role of Spirituality and Religion
in Mental Health
Laura DeVeau
English 102
Professor Gardner
April 12, 2010
264 7 / USING SOURCES
The APA-style
cover page
gives title,
author, and
course
information.
BAR_01611_07_ch07_pp188-272.qxd 6/17/10 12:14 PM Page 264
The Role of Spirituality and Religion
in Mental Health
It has been called “a vestige of the childhood of
mankind,” “the feeling of something true, total and absolute,”
“an otherworldly answer as regards the meaning of life” (Jones,
1991, p. 1; Amaro, 2000; Kristeva, 1987, p. 27). It has been
compared to medicine, described as a psychological cure for
mental illness, and also referred to as the cause of a dangerous
fanaticism. With so many differing opinions on the impact of
religion in people’s lives, where would one begin a search for
the truth? Who has the answer: Christians, humanists,
objectivists, atheists, psychoanalysts, Buddhists, philosophers,
cults? This was my dilemma at the advent of my research into
how religion and spirituality affect the mental health of society
as a whole.
In this paper, I explore the claims, widely accepted by
professionals in the field of psychology, that religious and
spiritual practices have a negative impact on mental health. In
addition, though, I cannot help but reflect on how this
exploration has changed my beliefs as well. Religion is such a
personal experience that one cannot be dispassionate in
reporting it. One can, however, subject the evidence provided
by those who have studied the issue to critical scrutiny. Having
done so, I find myself in disagreement with those who claim
religious feelings are incompatible with sound
mental health.
There is a nearly limitless number of beliefs regarding
spirituality. Some are organized and involve rituals like mass or
worship. Many are centered around the existence of a higher
Religion in Mental Health 1
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN APA FORMAT 265
Short form
of title and
page
number as
running
head
Citation of
multiple
works from
references
Acknowledg-
ment of
opposing
viewpoints
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being, while others focus on the self. I have attempted to
uncover the perfect set of values that lead to a better lifestyle,
but my research has pointed me in an entirely different
direction, where no single belief seems to be adequate but
where spiritual belief in general should be valued more highly
than it is currently in mental health circles.
I grew up in a moderately devout Catholic family. Like
many young people raised in a household where one religion is
practiced by both parents, it never occurred to me to question
those beliefs. I went through a spiritual cycle, which I believe
much of Western society also experiences. I attended religious
services because I had to. I possessed a blind, unquestioning
acceptance of what I was being taught because the adults I
trusted said it was so. Like many adolescents and young adults,
though, I stopped going to church when I was old enough to
decide because I thought I had better things to do. At this
stage, we reach a point when we begin searching for a meaning
to our existence. For some, this search is brought on by a major
crisis or a feeling of emptiness in their daily lives, while for
others it is simply a part of growing up. This is where we begin
to make personal choices, but with the barrage of options,
where do we turn?
Beginning with the holistic health movement in the
eighties, there has been a mass shift from traditional religions
to less structured spiritual practices such as meditation, yoga,
the Cabala, and mysticism (Beyerman, 1989). They venture
beyond the realm of conventional dogmatism and into the new
wave of spirituality. Many of these practices are based on the
Religion in Mental Health 2
266 7 / USING SOURCES
Thesis
explicitly
introduced
Author and
date cited for
summary or
paraphrase
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notion that health of the mind and spirit equals health of the
body. Associated with this movement is a proliferation of
retreats offering a chance to get in touch with the beauty and
silence of nature and seminars where we can take “a break from
our everyday environment where our brains are bustling and our
bodies are exhausting themselves” (“Psychological benefits,”
1999). A major concept of the spiritual new wave is that it
focuses inward toward the individual psyche, rather than
outward toward another being like a god. Practitioners do not
deny the existence of this being, but they believe that to fully
love another, we must first understand ourselves. Many find this
a preferable alternative to religions where the individual is seen
as a walking dispenser of sin who is very fortunate to have a
forgiving creator. It is also a relief from the scare tactics like
damnation used by traditional religions to make people behave.
Many, therefore, praise the potential psychological benefits of
such spirituality.
While I believe strongly in the benefits of the new wave,
I am not willing to do away with structured religion, for I find
that it also has its benefits. Without the existence of churches
and temples, it would be harder to expose the public to values
beneficial to mental stability. It is much more difficult to hand
a child a copy of the Cabala and say “Read this, and then get
back to me on it” than it is to bring a child to a service where
the ideas are represented with concrete examples. My religious
upbringing presented me with a set of useful morals and values,
and it does the same for millions of others who are brought up
in this manner. Many people, including some followers of the
Religion in Mental Health 3
AN ANNOTATED STUDENT RESEARCH PAPER IN APA FORMAT 267
Anonymous
source cited
by title and
date
Clear
transition
refers to
previous
paragraph
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new wave, are bitter toward Christianity because of events in
history like the Crusades, the Inquisition, the Salem witch
trials, and countless other horrific acts supposedly committed
in the name of God. But these events were based not on
biblical teachings but on pure human greed and lust for power.
We should not reject the benevolent possibilities of organized
religion on the basis of historical atrocities any more than we
should abandon public education because a few teachers are
known to mistreat children.
Another factor contributing to the reluctance
concerning religion is the existence of cults that seduce people
into following their extreme teachings. The victims are often at
vulnerable times in their lives, and the leaders are usually very
charming, charismatic, and sometimes also psychotic or
otherwise mentally unstable. Many argue that if we
acknowledge these groups as dangerous cults, then we must do
the same for traditional religions such as Christianity and
Islam, which are likewise founded on the teachings of
charismatic leaders. Again, though, critics are too quick to
conflate all religious and spiritual practice; we must distinguish
between those who pray and attend services and those who
commit group suicide because they think that aliens are coming
to take over the world. Cults have provided many psychologists,
who are eager to discount religion as a factor in improving
mental health, with an easy target. Ellis (1993), the founder of
rational-emotive therapy, cites many extreme examples of
religious commitment, such as cults and antiabortion killings,
to show that commitment is hazardous to one’s sanity.
Religion in Mental Health 4
268 7 / USING SOURCES
When the
author’s
name appears
in text, only
the date is
cited in
parentheses.
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Anomalies like these should not be used to speak of religion as
a whole, though. Religion is clearly the least of these people’s
mental problems.
Besides Ellis, there are many others in the field of
psychology who do not recognize religion as a potential aid for
improving the condition of the psyche. Actually, fewer than 45
percent of the members of the American Psychiatric Association
even believe in God. The general American public has more than
twice that percentage of religious devotees (Larson, 1998).
Going back to the days of Freud, many psychologists have held
atheist views. The father of psychoanalysis himself called
religion a “universal obsessional neurosis.” Psychologists have
long rejected research that demonstrates the benefits of
spirituality by saying that this research is biased. They claim
that such studies are out to prove that religion helps because
the conductors are religious people who need to justify their
beliefs.
While this may be true in some instances, there is also
some quite empirical research available to support the claims of
those who promote religion and spirituality. The Journal for the
Scientific Study of Religion has conducted many studies
examining the effects of religion on individuals and groups. In
one example, the relationship between religious coping
methods and positive recovery after major stressful events was
observed. The results indicated not only that spirituality was
not harmful to the mind but that “the positive religious coping
pattern was tied to benevolent outcomes, including fewer
symptoms of psychological distress, [and] reports of
Religion in Mental Health 5
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Bracketed
word in
quotation not
in original
source
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psychological and spiritual growth as a result of the stressor”
(Pargament et al., 1998, p. 721). Clearly, the benefits of piety
can, in fact, be examined empirically, and in some cases the
results point to a positive correlation between religion and
mental health.
But let us get away from statistics and studies. If
religion is both useless and dangerous, as so many psycholo-
gists claim, we must ask why has it remained so vital a part of
humanity for so long. Even if it can be reduced to a mere
coping method that humans use to justify their existence and
explain incomprehensible events, is it futile? I would suggest
that this alone represents a clear benefit to society. Should
religion, if it cannot be proven as “true,” be eliminated and life
based on scientific fact alone? Surely many would find this a
pointless existence. With all the conflicting knowledge I have
gained about spirituality during my personal journey and my
research, one idea is clear. It is not the depth of devotion, the
time of life when one turns to religion, or even the particular
combination of beliefs one chooses to adopt that will improve
the quality of life. There is no right or wrong answer when it
comes to self-fulfillment. It is whatever works for the
individual, even if that means holding no religious or spiritual
beliefs at all. But clearly there are benefits to be gained, at
least for some individuals, and mental health professionals need
to begin acknowledging this fact in their daily practice.
Religion in Mental Health 6
270 7 / USING SOURCES
Conclusion
restates and
strengthens
thesis
Author, date,
and page
number are
cited for a
direct
quotation.
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References
Amaro, J. (2000). Psychology, psychoanalysis and religious
faith. Nielsen’s psychology of religion pages. Retrieved
March 6, 2000, from http://www.psy www.com/
psyrelig/amaro.html
Beyerman A. K. (1989). The holistic health movement.
Tuscaloosa: Alabama University Press.
Ellis, A. (1993). Dogmatic devotion doesn’t help, it hurts. In
B. Slife (Ed.), Taking sides: Clashing views on controversial
psychological issues (pp. 297-301). New
York, NY: Scribner.
Jones, J. W. (1991). Contemporary psychoanalysis and religion:
Transference and transcendence. New Haven, CT: Yale
University Press.
Kristeva, J. (1987). In the beginning was love: Psychoanalysis
and faith. New York, NY: Columbia University Press.
Larson, D. (1998). Does religious commitment improve mental
health? In B. Slife (Ed.), Taking sides: Clashing views on
controversial psychological issues (pp. 292-296). New
York, NY: Scribner.
Pargament, K. I., Smith, B. W., Koening, H. G., & Perez, L.
(1998). Patterns of positive and negative religious
coping with major life stressors. Journal for the Scientific
Study of Religion, 37, 710-724.
“Psychological benefits.” (1999). Walking the labyrinth. Retrieved
April 3, 2000, from http://www.labyrinthway.com/
html/benefits.html
Religion in Mental Health 7
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References
begin on a
new page.
A World Wide
Web source
A book
An article or a
chapter in a
book
An article in a
journal
Anonymous
source alpha-
betized by title
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FURTHER VIEWS
on ARGUMENT
PART TWO
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A Philosopher’s View:
The Toulmin Model
All my ideas hold together, but I cannot elaborate them all at once.
— JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU
Clarity has been said to be not enough. But perhaps it will be time
to go into that when we are within measurable distance of
achieving clarity on some matter.
— J. L. AUSTIN
[Philosophy is] a peculiarly stubborn effort to think clearly.
— WILLIAM JAMES
Philosophy is like trying to open a safe with a combination lock:
Each little adjustment of the dials seems to achieve nothing, only
when everything is in place does the door open.
— LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN
In Chapter 3, we explained the contrast between deductive and
inductive arguments to focus on the two main ways in which we
reason, either
• Making explicit something concealed in what we already
accept (deduction) or
• Using what we have observed as a basis for asserting or pro-
posing something new (induction).
Both types of reasoning share some structural features, as we also
noticed. Thus, all reasoning is aimed at establishing some thesis (or
8
27
5
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conclusion) and does so by means of some reasons. These are two
basic characteristics that any argument contains.
After a little scrutiny we can in fact point to several features
shared by all arguments, deductive and inductive, good and bad
alike. We use the vocabulary popularized by Stephen Toulmin,
Richard Rieke, and Allan Janik in their book An Introduction to
Reasoning (1979; second edition 1984) to explore the various ele-
ments of argument.
THE CLAIM
Every argument has a purpose, goal, or aim — namely, to establish
a claim (conclusion or thesis). Suppose you were arguing in favor of
equal rights for women. You might state your thesis or claim as
follows:
Men and women ought to have equal rights.
A more precise formulation of the claim might be
Men and women ought to have equal legal rights.
A still more precise formulation might be
Equal legal rights for men and women ought to be protected by
our Constitution.
The third version of this claim states what the controversy in the
1970s over the Equal Rights Amendment was all about.
Consequently, in reading or analyzing someone else’s argu-
ment, your first question should naturally be: What is the argu-
ment intended to prove or establish? What claim is it making? Has
this claim been clearly and precisely formulated, so that it unam-
biguously asserts what its advocate wants to assert?
GROUNDS
Once we have the argument’s purpose or point clearly in mind and
thus know what the arguer is claiming to establish, then we can
ask for the evidence, reasons, support — in short, for the
grounds — on which that claim is based. In a deductive argument
these grounds are the premises from which the claim is deduced; in
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an inductive argument the grounds are the evidence — a sample,
an observation, or an experiment — that makes the claim plausible
or probable.
Not every kind of claim can be supported by every kind of
ground, and conversely, not every kind of ground gives equally
good support for every kind of claim. Suppose I claim that half the
students in the classroom are women. I can ground this claim in
any of several ways.
1. I can count all the women and all the men. Suppose the total
equals fifty. If the number of women is twenty-five and the
number of men is twenty-five, I have vindicated my claim.
2. I can count a sample of, say, ten students and find that in the
sample five of the students are women. I thus have induc-
tive — plausible but not conclusive — grounds for my claim.
3. I can point out that the students in the college divide equally
into men and women and claim that this class is a represen-
tative sample of the whole college.
Obviously, ground 1 is stronger than ground 2, and 2 is far stronger
than ground 3.
So far we have merely restated points about premises and con-
clusions covered in Chapter 3. But now we want to consider four
additional features of arguments.
WARRANTS
Once we have the claim or the point of an argument fixed in mind
and the evidence or reasons offered in its support, the next question
to ask is why these reasons support this conclusion. What is the
warrant, or guarantee, that the reasons proffered do support the
claim or lead to the conclusion? In simple deductive arguments, the
warrant takes different forms, as we shall see. In the simplest cases,
we can point to the way in which the meanings of the key terms are
really equivalent. Thus, if John is taller than Bill, then Bill must be
shorter than John because of the meaning in English of “is shorter
than” and “is taller than.” In this case, the warrant is something we
can state quite literally and explicitly.
In other cases, we may need to be more resourceful. A reliable
tactic is to think up a simple parallel argument — that is, an argument
exactly parallel in form and structure to the argument we are trying
to defend. We then point out that if we are ready to accept the
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simpler argument, then we must accept the more complex argu-
ment because both arguments have exactly the same structure. For
example, in her much-discussed 1972 essay on the abortion contro-
versy, “A Defense of Abortion,” philosopher Judith Thomson argues
that a pregnant woman has the right to an abortion to save her life,
even if it involves the death of her unborn child. She anticipates
that some readers may balk at her reasoning, and so she offers this
parallel argument: Suppose you are locked in a tiny room with
another human being, which through no fault of its own is growing
uncontrollably, with the result that it is slowly crushing you to
death. Of course, it would be morally permissible to kill the other
person to save your own life. With the reader’s presumed agreement
on that conclusion, the parallel argument concerning the abortion
situation — so Thomson hopes — is obvious and convincing.
In simple inductive arguments, we are likely to point to the
way in which observations or sets of data constitute a representative
sample of a whole (unexamined) population. Here, the warrant is
the representativeness of the sample. For instance, in projecting a
line on a graph through a set of points, we defend one projection
over alternatives on the grounds that it makes the smoothest fit
through most of the points. In this case, the warrant is simplicity
and inclusiveness. Or in defending one explanation against compet-
ing explanations of a phenomenon, we appeal to the way in which
the preferred explanation can be seen as a special case of generally
accepted physical laws. Examples of such warrants for inductive
reasoning will be offered in following pages (see Chapter 9, A
Logician’s View: Deduction, Induction, Fallacies, pp. 289–339).
Establishing the warrants for our reasoning — that is, explain-
ing why our grounds really support our claims — can quickly
become a highly technical and exacting procedure that goes far
beyond what we can hope to explain in this book. Only a solid
course or two in formal deductive logic and statistical methods can
do justice to our current state of knowledge about these warrants.
Developing a “feel” for why reasons or grounds are or are not rele-
vant to what they are alleged to support is the most we can hope to
do here without recourse to more rigorous techniques.
Even without formal training, however, one can sense that some-
thing is wrong with many bad arguments. Here is an example. British
professor C. E. M. Joad found himself standing on a station platform,
annoyed because he had just missed his train, when another train,
making an unscheduled stop, pulled up to the platform in front of
him. He decided to jump aboard, only to hear the porter say “I’m
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afraid you’ll have to get off, sir. This train doesn’t stop here.” “In that
case,” replied Joad, “don’t worry. I’m not on it.”
BACKING
The kinds of reasons appropriate to support an amendment to the
Constitution are completely different from the kinds appropriate to
settle the question of what caused the defeat of Napoleon’s inva-
sion of Russia. Arguments for the amendment might be rooted in
an appeal to fairness, whereas arguments about the military defeat
might be rooted in letters and other documents in the French and
Russian archives. The canons of good argument in each case derive
from the ways in which the scholarly communities in law and his-
tory, respectively, have developed over the years to support,
defend, challenge, and undermine a given kind of argument. Thus,
the support or backing appropriate for one kind of argument
might be quite inappropriate for another kind of argument.
Another way of stating this point is to recognize that once you
have given reasons for a claim, you are then likely to be challenged
to explain why these reasons are good reasons — why, that is, one
should believe these reasons rather than regard them skeptically.
Why (a simple example) should we accept the testimony of Dr. X
when Dr. Y, equally renowned, supports the opposite side? Or why
is it safe to rest a prediction on a small though admittedly carefully
selected sample? Or why is it legitimate to argue that (1) if I dream
I am the King of France, then I must exist, whereas it is illegitimate
to argue that (2) if I dream I am the King of France, then the King
of France must exist? To answer these kinds of challenges is to back
up one’s reasoning, and no argument is any better than its backing.
MODAL QUALIFIERS
As we have seen, all arguments are made up of assertions or propo-
sitions, which can be sorted into four categories:
• The claim (conclusion, thesis to be established),
• The grounds (explicit reasons advanced),
• The warrant (the principle that connects the ground to the
claim), and
• The backing (implicit assumptions).
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All these kinds of propositions have an explicit or tacit modality in
which they are asserted, indicating the scope and character with
which they are believed to hold true. Is the claim, for instance,
believed to be necessary — or only probable? Is the claim believed to
be plausible — or only possible? Of two reasons for a claim, both may
be good, but one may be better than the other. Indicating the modal-
ity with which an assertion is advanced is crucial to any argument
for or against it.
Empirical generalizations are typically contingent on various fac-
tors, and it is important to indicate such contingencies to protect
the generalization against obvious counterexamples. Thus, consider
this empirical generalization:
Students do best on final examinations if they study hard for
them.
Are we really to believe that students who study regularly through-
out the whole course and so do not need to cram for the final will
do less well than students who neglect regular work in favor of sev-
eral all-nighters at the last minute? Probably not; what is really
meant is that all other things being equal (in Latin, ceteris paribus),
concentrated study just before an exam will yield good results.
Alluding to the contingencies in this way shows that the writer is
aware of possible exceptions and that they are conceded right from
the start.
Assertions also have varying scope, and indicating their scope is
equally crucial to the role that an assertion plays in argument.
Thus, suppose you are arguing against smoking, and the ground
for your claim is this:
Heavy smokers cut short their life span.
Such an assertion will be clearer, as well as more likely to be true,
if it is explicitly quantified. Here, there are three obvious alterna-
tive quantifications to choose among: all smokers cut short their
life span, most do, or only some do. Until the assertion is quantified
in one of these ways, we really do not know what is being
asserted — and so we do not know what degree and kind of evi-
dence and counterevidence is relevant. Other quantifiers include
few, rarely, many, often, sometimes, perhaps, usually, more or less, regu-
larly, occasionally.
In sum, sensitivity to the quantifiers and qualifiers appropriate
for each of our assertions, whatever their role in an argument, will
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help prevent you from asserting exaggerations and other misguided
generalizations.
REBUTTALS
Very few arguments of any interest are beyond dispute, conclu-
sively knockdown affairs in which the claim of the argument is so
rigidly tied to its grounds, warrants, and backing and its quantifiers
and qualifiers so precisely orchestrated that it really proves its con-
clusion beyond any possibility of doubt. On the contrary, most
arguments have many counterarguments, and sometimes one of
these counterarguments is the most convincing.
Suppose one has taken a sample that appears to be random: An
interviewer on your campus accosts the first ten students she
encounters, and seven of them happen to be fraternity or sorority
members. She is now ready to argue that seven-tenths of enrolled
students belong to Greek organizations.
You believe, however, that the Greeks are in the minority and
point out that she happens to have conducted her interview around
the corner from the Panhellenic Society’s office just off Sorority
Row. Her random sample is anything but. The ball is now back in
her court as you await her response to your rebuttal.
As this example illustrates, it is safe to say that we do not under-
stand our own arguments very well until we have tried to get a grip
on the places in which they are vulnerable to criticism, counterat-
tack, or refutation. Edmund Burke (quoted in Chapter 3 but worth
repeating) said, “He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves,
and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper.” Therefore, cul-
tivating alertness to such weak spots, girding one’s loins to defend at
these places, always helps strengthen one’s position.
A MODEL ANALYSIS USING
THE TOULMIN METHOD
To see how the Toulmin method can be used, let’s apply it to an
argument in this book, Susan Jacoby’s “A First Amendment
Junkie” (p. 43).
The Claim Jacoby’s central thesis or claim is this: Any form of
censorship — including feminist censorship of pornography in
particular — is wrong.
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Grounds Jacoby offers six main reasons or grounds for her
claim, roughly in this sequence (but arguably not in this order of
importance).
First, feminists exaggerate the harm caused by pornography
because they confuse expression of offensive ideas with harmful
conduct.
Second, letting the government censor the expression of ideas
and attitudes is the wrong response to the failure of parents to con-
trol the printed materials that get into the hands of their children.
Third, there is no unanimity even among feminists over what
is pornography and what isn’t.
Fourth, permitting censorship of pornography to please feminists
could well lead to censorship on many issues of concern to feminists
(“rape, abortion, menstruation, contraception, lesbianism”).
Fifth, censorship under law shows a lack of confidence in the
democratic process.
Finally, censorship of words and pictures is suppression of self-
expression, and that violates the First Amendment.
Warrants Each of these six grounds needs its own warrant, and
the warrants vary considerably in their complexity. Jacoby (like
most writers) is not so didactic as to make these warrants explicit.
Taking them in order, this is what they look like.
First, since the First Amendment protects speech in the broad-
est sense, the censorship that the feminist attack on pornography
advocates is inconsistent with the First Amendment.
Second, if feminists want to be consistent, then they must
advocate censorship of all offensive self-expression, but such a radi-
cal interference with free speech (amounting virtually to repeal of
the First Amendment) is indefensible.
Third, if feminists can’t agree over what is pornographic, the cen-
sorship of pornography they propose is bound to be arbitrary.
Fourth, feminists ought to see that they risk losing more than they
can hope to gain if they succeed in censoring pornography.
Fifth, the democratic process can be trusted to weed out harm-
ful utterances.
Sixth, if feminists have a legal right to censor pornography,
antifeminists will claim the same right on other issues.
Backing Why should the reader agree with Jacoby’s grounds?
She does not appeal to expert authority, the results of experimental
tests or other statistical data, or the support of popular opinion.
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Instead, she relies principally on two things — but without saying
so explicitly.
First, she assumes that the reader accepts the propositions that
freedom of self-expression is valuable and that censoring self-expression
requires the strongest of reasons. If there is no fundamental agreement on
these propositions, several of her reasons cease to support her claim.
Second, she relies on the reader’s open-mindedness and will-
ingness to evaluate common sense (untechnical, ordinary, familiar)
considerations at each step of the way. She relies also on the reader
having had some personal experience with erotica, pornography,
and art. Without that open-mindedness and experience, a reader is
not likely to be persuaded by her rejection of the feminist demand
for censorship.
Modal Qualifiers Jacoby defends what she calls an “absolute
interpretation” of the First Amendment — that is, the view that all
censorship of words, pictures, and ideas is not only inconsistent
with the First Amendment but is also politically unwise and
morally objectionable. She allows that some pornography is highly
offensive (it offends her, she insists); she allows that some pornogra-
phy (“kiddie porn”) may even be harmful to some viewers. But she
also insists that more harm than good would result from the censor-
ship of pornography. She points out that some paintings of nude
women are art, not pornography; she implies that it is impossible to
draw a sharp line between permissible erotic pornography and
impermissible offensive pornography. She clearly believes that all
Americans ought to understand and defend the First Amendment
under the “absolute interpretation” she favors.
Rebuttals Jacoby mentions several objections to her views, and
perhaps the most effective aspect of her entire argument is her skill
in identifying possible objections and meeting them effectively.
(Notice the diversity of the objections and the various ways in
which she replies.)
Objection: Some of her women friends tell her she is wrong.
Rebuttal: She admits she’s a “First Amendment junkie,” and she
doesn’t apologize for it.
Objection: “Kiddie porn” is harmful and deserves censorship.
Rebuttal: Such material is not protected by the First Amendment
because it is an “abuse of power” of adults over children.
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Objection: Pornography is a form of violence against women,
and therefore it is especially harmful.
Rebuttal: (1) No, it really isn’t harmful, but it is disgusting
and offensive. (2) In any case, it’s surely not as harmful as
allowing American neo-Nazis to parade in Jewish neighbor-
hoods. (Jacoby is referring to the march in Skokie, Illinois, in
1977, upheld by the courts as permissible political expression
under the First Amendment despite its offensiveness to sur-
vivors of the Nazi concentration camps.)
Objection: Censoring pornography advances public respect for
women.
Rebuttal: Censoring Ms. magazine, which antifeminists have
already done, undermines women’s freedom and self-
expression.
Objection: Reasonable people can tell pornography when they
see it, so censoring it poses no problems.
Rebuttal: Yes, there are clear cases of gross pornography; but
there are lots of borderline cases, as women themselves prove
when they disagree over whether a photo in Penthouse is offen-
sively erotic or “lovely” and “sensuous.”
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✓ A CHECKLIST FOR USING THE TOULMIN METHOD
Have I asked the following questions?
� What claim does the argument make?
� What grounds are offered for the claim?
� What warrants the inferences from the grounds to the claim?
� What backing supports the claim?
� With what modalities are the claim and grounds asserted?
� To what rebuttals are the claim, grounds, and backing vulnerable?
See the companion Web site
bedfordstmartins.com/barnetbedau
for links related to the Toulmin model.
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PUTTING THE TOULMIN METHOD TO WORK:
Responding to an Argument
Let’s look at an argument — it happens to be a proposal concerning
illegal immigration — and see how the Toulmin method can be
applied.
Michael S. Dukakis and
Daniel J. B. Mitchell
Michael S. Dukakis, a professor of political science at Northeastern
University, served as the governor of Massachusetts from 1975 to 1979 and
from 1983 to 1991. Daniel J. B. Mitchell is a professor of management and
public policy at the University of California at Los Angeles. The essay that
follows originally appeared in the New York Times (July 25, 2006).
Raise Wages, Not Walls
There are two approaches to illegal immigration currently
being debated in Congress. One, supported by the House, empha-
sizes border control and law enforcement, including a wall along
the Mexican border and increased border patrols. The other, which
is supported by the Bush administration and has been passed by
the Senate, relies on employers to police the workplace. Both pro-
posals have serious flaws.
As opponents of the House plan have rightly pointed out, walls
rarely work; illegal immigrants will get around them one way or
another. Unless we erect something akin to the Berlin Wall, which
would cost billions to build and police, a barrier on the border
would be monitored by largely symbolic patrols and easily evaded.
The Senate approach is more realistic but it, too, has problems.
It creates a temporary worker program but requires employers first
to attempt to recruit American workers to fill job openings. It
allows for more border fencing, but makes no effort to disguise the
basic futility of the enterprise. Instead, it calls on employers to
enforce immigration laws in the workplace, a plan that can only
succeed through the creation and distribution of a costly national
identification card.
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A national ID card raises serious questions about civil liberties,
but they are not the sole concern. The cost estimates for producing
and distributing a counterfeit-proof card for the roughly 150 mil-
lion people currently in the labor force — and the millions more
who will seek work in the near future — extend into the billions of
dollars. Employers would have to verify the identity of every
American worker, otherwise the program would be as unreliable as
the one in place now. Anyone erroneously denied a card in this
bureaucratic labyrinth would be unemployable.
There is a simpler alternative. If we are really serious about
turning back the tide of illegal immigration, we should start by rais-
ing the minimum wage from $5.15 per hour to something closer to
$8. The Massachusetts legislature recently voted to raise the state
minimum to $8 and California may soon set its minimum even
higher. Once the minimum wage has been significantly increased,
we can begin vigorously enforcing the wage law and other basic
labor standards.
Millions of illegal immigrants work for minimum and even
sub-minimum wages in workplaces that don’t come close to meet-
ing health and safety standards. It is nonsense to say, as President
Bush did recently, that these jobs are filled by illegal immigrants
because Americans won’t do them. Before we had mass illegal
immigration in this country, hotel beds were made, office floors
were cleaned, restaurant dishes were washed and crops were
picked — by Americans.
Americans will work at jobs that are risky, dirty, or unpleasant
so long as they provide decent wages and working conditions,
especially if employers also provide health insurance. Plenty of
Americans now work in such jobs, from mining coal to picking up
garbage. The difference is they are paid a decent wage and provided
benefits for their labor.
However, Americans won’t work for peanuts, and these days the
national minimum wage is less than peanuts. For full-time work, it
doesn’t even come close to the poverty line for an individual, let
alone provide a family with a living wage. It hasn’t been raised since
1997 and isn’t enforced even at its currently ridiculous level.
Yet enforcing the minimum wage doesn’t require walling off a
porous border or trying to distinguish yesterday’s illegal immigrant
from tomorrow’s “guest worker.” All it takes is a willingness by the
federal government to inspect workplaces to determine which
employers obey the law.
Curiously, most members of Congress who take a hard line on
immigration also strongly oppose increasing the minimum wage,
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claiming it will hurt businesses and reduce jobs. For some reason,
they don’t seem eager to acknowledge that many of the jobs they
claim to hold dear are held by the same illegal immigrants they are
trying to deport.
But if we want to reduce illegal immigration, it makes sense to
reduce the abundance of extremely low-paying jobs that fuels it. If
we raise the minimum wage, it’s possible some low-end jobs may
be lost; but more Americans would also be willing to work in such
jobs, thereby denying them to people who aren’t supposed to be
here in the first place. And tough enforcement of wage rules would
curtail the growth of an underground economy in which both illegal
immigration and employer abuses thrive.
Raising the minimum wage and increasing enforcement would
prove far more effective and less costly than either proposal cur-
rently under consideration in Congress. If Congress would only
remove its blinders about the minimum wage, it may see a plan to
deal effectively with illegal immigration, too.
THINKING WITH TOULMIN’S METHOD
At first blush, what we have in this essay is a twelve-paragraph
argument divided into two unequal parts. Paragraphs 1–4 offer
some proposals for dealing with illegal immigration and reasons
why these proposals won’t work. This preliminary material is fol-
lowed by paragraphs 5–12 in which the proposal favored by the
authors is introduced, explained, and justified. So much for first
impressions.
Let’s now deconstruct this essay by identifying each of the six
elements that constitute the Toulmin method.
• First and foremost, what is the claim being made, the main
thesis of the essay? Is it in the title? Is it in paragraph 5? Or is
it elsewhere? What kind of claim is it — a claim of fact? A
claim of value? In any case, write down the claim for further
reference.
• Second, what are the grounds, the evidence or reasons
advanced in support of the claim? Partly they can be found
in what the authors regard as ineffective alternative efforts in
paragraphs 1–4. What are these alternatives? Why are they
said to be ineffective? Look also at paragraph 5 and later
paragraphs. Write down the sentences you have discovered
that are playing this role.
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• Third, what are the warrants that Dukakis and Mitchell rely
on to carry the burden of their argument? In paragraph 5, for
example, the authors rely on examples from Massachusetts
and California. The evidence they offer amounts to a minimal
inductive argument. Could their argument of this sort be
stronger? Paragraphs 6 and 7 rely on general knowledge, as do
most of the rest of their argument. Is that the best one can do
with this issue? Can you think of ways in which the authors’
argument can be strengthened? Carefully look through the
whole essay for whatever evidence you can find of the men-
tion of and reliance on this or that warrant.
The essence of the Toulmin method lies in these three ele-
ments: the claim(s), the ground(s), and the warrant(s). If you have
extracted these from the Dukakis-Mitchell essay, you will have
identified most of what will suffice for a good grasp of the argu-
ment in question.
Of lesser importance are the three other elements of the Toulmin
method: the backing, the modal qualifiers, and the rebuttal.
• Fourth, consider the backing — the reasons for one’s reasons.
The authors set out to argue for a claim, which they support
on empirical or factual grounds, using warrants appropriate
to an argument of that sort. But suppose Dukakis and
Mitchell are challenged. How might they back up their rea-
sons with further reasons? They are in effect answering the
tacit questions “How do you know . . . ?” and “Why do you
believe . . . ?” What might the authors offer in support of
their views when confronted with such queries?
• Fifth, there are the modal qualifiers — or are there? Can
you find any passages in which the authors qualify their
assertions (“Perhaps if we tried . . .”) (“Most, although not
all, illegal immigration . . .”)? Look at paragraph 11. There’s
at least one modal qualifier here — can you spot it?
• Finally, there are the rebuttals, the reasons advanced by
someone who rejects the authors’ claim, or who concedes
their claim but rejects the grounds offered in its support, and
so forth. Paragraphs 1–4 mention alternatives to the propos-
als favored by the authors, and the authors reply to these
objections. Is their rebuttal convincing? Why, or why not?
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A Logician’s View:
Deduction, Induction,
Fallacies
Logic is the anatomy of thought.
— JOHN LOCKE
Logic takes care of itself; all we have to do is to look and see how it
does it.
— LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN
In Chapter 3 we introduced the terms deduction, induction, and fal-
lacy. Here we discuss them in greater detail.
DEDUCTION
The basic aim of deductive reasoning is to start with some assump-
tion or premise and extract from it a conclusion—a logical conse-
quence—that is concealed but implicit in it. Thus, taking the
simplest case, if I assert as a premise
1a. Nuclear power poses more risks of harm to the environment
than fossil fuels.
then it is a matter of simple deduction to infer the conclusion that
1b. Fossil fuels pose fewer risks of harm to the environment
than nuclear power.
9
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Anyone who understands English would grant that 1b follows
1a—or equivalently, that 1b can be validly deduced from 1a—
because whatever two objects, A and B, you choose, if A does more
things than B, then B must do fewer things than A.
Thus, in this and all other cases of valid deductive reasoning, we
can say not only that we are entitled to infer the conclusion from the
premise—in this case, infer 1b from 1a—but that the premise
implies the conclusion. Remember, too, the conclusion (1b) that fos-
sil fuels pose fewer risks than nuclear power—inferred or deduced
from the statement (1a) that nuclear power poses more risks—does
not depend on the truth of the statement that nuclear power poses
more risks. If the speaker (falsely) asserts that nuclear power poses
more risks—does not depend on the truth of the statement that
nuclear power poses more risks. If the speaker (falsely) asserts that
nuclear power poses more risks, then the hearer validly (that is to
say, logically) concludes that fossil fuels pose fewer risks. Thus, 1b
follows from 1a whether or not 1a is true; consequently, if 1a is
true, then so is 1b; but if 1a is false, then 1b must be false also.
Let’s take another example—more interesting but comparably
simple:
2a. President Truman was underrated by his critics.
Given 2a, a claim amply verified by events of the 1950s, one is
entitled to infer
2b. His critics underrated President Truman.
On what basis can we argue that 2a implies 2b? The two proposi-
tions are equivalent because a rule of English grammar assures us
that we can convert the position of subject and predicate phrases in
a sentence by shifting from the passive to the active voice (or vice
versa) without any change in the conditions that make the proposi-
tion true (or false).
Both pairs of examples illustrate that in deductive reasoning,
our aim is to transform, reformulate, or restate in our conclusion
some (or, as in the two examples above, all) of the information
contained in our premises.
Remember, even though a proposition or statement follows from a pre-
vious proposition or statement, the statements need not be true. We can see
why if we consider another example. Suppose someone asserts or
claims that
3a. The Gettysburg Address is longer than the Declaration of
Independence.
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As every student of American history knows, 3a is false. But false
or not, we can validly deduce from it that
3b. The Declaration of Independence is shorter than the
Gettysburg Address.
This inference is valid (even though the conclusion is untrue)
because the conclusion follows logically (more precisely, deduc-
tively) from 3a: In English, as we know, the meaning of “A is
shorter than B,” which appears in 3b, is simply the converse of “B is
longer than A,” which appears in 3a.
The deductive relation between 3a and 3b reminds us again
that the idea of validity, which is so crucial to deduction, is not the
same as the idea of truth. False propositions have implications—
logical consequences—too, just as true propositions do.
In the three pairs of examples so far, what can we point to as
the warrant for our claims? Well, look at the reasoning in each
case; the arguments rely on rules of ordinary English, on the
accepted meanings of words like on, under, and underrated.
In many cases, of course, the deductive inference or pattern of
reasoning is much more complex than that which we have seen in
the examples so far. When we introduced the idea of deduction in
Chapter 3, we gave as our primary example the syllogism. Here is
another example:
4. Texas is larger than California; California is larger than
Arizona; therefore, Texas is larger than Arizona.
The conclusion in this syllogism is derivable from the two premises;
that is, anyone who asserts the two premises is committed to accept-
ing the conclusion as well, whether or not one thinks of it.
Notice again that the truth of the conclusion is not established
merely by validity of the inference. The conclusion in this syllogism
happens to be true. And the premises of this syllogism imply the
conclusion. But the argument establishes the conclusion only
because both of the premises on which the conclusion depends are
true. Even a Californian admits that Texas is larger than California,
which in turn is larger than Arizona. In other words, argument 4 is
a sound argument because (as we explained in Chapter 3) it is valid
and all its premises are true. All —and only—arguments that prove
their conclusions have these two traits.
How might we present the warrant for the argument in 4?
Short of a crash course in formal logic, either of two strategies
might suffice. One is to argue from the fact that the validity of the
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inference depends on the meaning of a key concept, being larger
than. This concept has the property of transitivity, a property that
many concepts share (for example, is equal to, is to the right of, is
smarter than —all are transitive concepts). Consequently, whatever
A, B, and C are, if A is larger than B, and B is larger than C, then A
will be larger than C. The final step is to substitute “Texas,”
“California,” and “Arizona” for A, B, and C, respectively.
A second strategy, less abstract and more graphic, is to think of
representing Texas, California, and Arizona by nested circles. Thus,
the first premise in argument 4 would look like this:
The second premise would look like this:
The conclusion would look like this:
We can see that this conclusion follows from the premises because
it amounts to nothing more than what one gets by superimposing
the two premises on each other. Thus, the whole argument can be
represented like this:
The so-called middle term in the argument—California—disappears
from the conclusion; its role is confined to be the link between the
other two terms, Texas and Arizona, in the premises. (This is an
adaptation of the technique used in elementary formal logic known
as Venn diagrams.) In this manner one can give graphic display to
the important fact that the conclusion follows from the premises
because one can literally see the conclusion represented by nothing
more than a representation of the premises.
CATX AZCA AZTX+
AZ
TX
AZ
CA
CA
TX
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Both of these strategies bring out the fact that validity of
deductive inference is a purely formal property of argument. Each
strategy abstracts the form from the content of the propositions
involved to show how the concepts in the premises are related to
the concepts in the conclusion.
For the sake of illustration, here is another syllogistic argument
with the same logical features as argument 4. (A nice exercise is to
restate argument 5 using diagrams in the manner of argument 4.)
5. African American slaves were treated worse than white
indentured servants. Indentured white servants were treated
worse than free white labor. Therefore, African American
slaves were treated worse than free white labor.
Not all deductive reasoning occurs in syllogisms, however, or at
least not in syllogisms like the ones in 4 and 5. (The term syllogism
is sometimes used to refer to any deductive argument of whatever
form, provided only that it has two premises.) In fact, syllogisms
such as 4 are not the commonest form of our deductive reasoning
at all. Nor are they the simplest (and of course, not the most com-
plex). For an argument that is even simpler, consider this:
6. If a youth is an African American slave, he is probably
treated worse than a youth in indentured service. This youth
is an African American slave. Therefore, he is probably
treated worse than if he had been an indentured servant.
Here the pattern of reasoning has the form: If A, then B; A;
therefore, B. Notice that the content of the assertions represented
by A and B do not matter; any set of expressions having the same
form or structure will do equally well, including assertions built out
of meaningless terms, as in this example:
7. If the slithy toves, then the gyres gimble. The slithy toves.
Therefore, the gyres gimble.
Argument 7 has the form: If A, then B; A; therefore B. As a piece of
deductive inference it is every bit as good. Unlike 6, however, 7 is
of no interest to us because none of its assertions make any sense
(unless you are a reader of Lewis Carroll’s “Jabberwocky,” and
even then the sense of 7 is doubtful). You cannot, in short, use a
valid deductive argument to prove anything unless the premises
and the conclusion are true, but they can’t be true unless they mean
something in the first place.
This parallel between arguments 6 and 7 shows once again that
deductive validity in an argument rests on the form or structure of
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the argument, and not on its content or meaning. If all one can say
about an argument is that it is valid—that is, its conclusion follows
from the premises —one has not given a sufficient reason for
accepting the argument’s conclusion. It has been said that the Devil
can quote Scripture; similarly, an argument can be deductively
valid and of no further interest or value whatever because valid
(but false) conclusions can be drawn from false or even meaning-
less assumptions. For example,
8. New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art has the finest col-
lection of abstract impressionist painting in the world. The
finest collection of abstract impressionist paintings includes
dozens of canvases by Winslow Homer. Therefore, the
Metropolitan Museum of Art has dozens of paintings by
Winslow Homer.
Here, the conclusion follows validly from the premises, even though
all three propositions are false. Nevertheless, although validity by
itself is not enough, it is a necessary condition of any deductive
argument that purports to establish its conclusion.
Now let us consider another argument with the same form as
8, only more interesting.
9. If President Truman knew the Japanese were about to sur-
render, then it was immoral of him to order that atom
bombs be dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Truman
knew the Japanese were about to surrender. Therefore, it
was immoral of him to order dropping those bombs.
As in the two previous examples, anyone who assents to the
premises in argument 9 must assent to the conclusion; the form of
arguments 8 and 9 is identical. But do the premises of argument 9
prove the conclusion? That depends on whether both premises are
true. Well, are they? This turns on a number of considerations,
and it is worthwhile pausing to examine this argument closely to
illustrate the kinds of things that are involved in answering this
question.
Let us begin by examining the second (minor) premise. Its
truth is controversial even to this day. Autobiography, memoranda,
other documentary evidence—all are needed to assemble the evi-
dence to back up the grounds for the thesis or claim made in the
conclusion of this valid argument. Evaluating this material effec-
tively will probably involve not only further deductions, but induc-
tive reasoning as well.
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Now consider the first (major) premise in argument 9. Its truth
doesn’t depend on what history shows but on the moral principles
one accepts. The major premise has the form of a hypothetical
proposition (“if . . . then . . .”) and asserts a connection between
two very different kinds of things. The antecedent of the hypotheti-
cal (the clause following “if”) mentions facts about Truman’s knowl-
edge, and the consequent of the hypothetical (the clause following
“then”) mentions facts about the morality of his conduct in light of
such knowledge. The major premise as a whole can thus be seen as
expressing a principle of moral responsibility.
Such principles can, of course, be controversial. In this case, for
instance, is the principle peculiarly relevant to the knowledge and
conduct of a president of the United States? Probably not; it is far
more likely that this principle is merely a special case of a more
general proposition about anyone’s moral responsibility. (After all,
we know a great deal more about the conditions of our own moral
responsibility than we do about those of high government offi-
cials.) We might express this more general principle in this way: If
we have knowledge that would make our violent conduct unnec-
essary, then we are immoral if we deliberately act violently any-
way. Thus, accepting this general principle can serve as a basis for
defending the major premise of argument 9.
We have examined this argument in some detail because it
illustrates the kinds of considerations needed to test whether a
given argument is not only valid but whether its premises are
true— that is, whether its premises really prove the conclusion.
The great value of the form of argument known as hypothet-
ical syllogism, exemplified by arguments 6 and 7, is that the
structure of the argument is so simple and so universally applica-
ble in reasoning that it is often both easy and worthwhile to for-
mulate one’s claims so that they can be grounded by an argument
of this sort.
Before leaving the subject of deductive inference, consider
three other forms of argument, each of which can be found in
actual use elsewhere in the readings in this volume. The simplest of
these is disjunctive syllogism, so called because its major premise
is a disjunction. For example,
10. Either censorship of television shows is overdue, or our soci-
ety is indifferent to the education of its youth. Our society is
not indifferent to the education of its youth. Therefore, cen-
sorship of television is overdue.
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Notice, by the way, that the validity of an argument, as in this case,
does not turn on pedantic repetition of every word or phrase as the
argument moves along; nonessential elements can be dropped, or
equivalent expressions substituted for variety without adverse
effect on the reasoning. Thus, in conversation or in writing, the
argument in 10 might actually be presented like this:
11. Either censorship of television is overdue, or our society is
indifferent to the education of its youth. But, of course, we
aren’t indifferent; it’s censorship that’s overdue.
The key feature of disjunctive syllogism, as example 11 suggests, is
that the conclusion is whichever of the disjuncts is left over after the
others have been negated in the minor premise. Thus, we could eas-
ily have a very complex disjunctive syllogism, with a dozen dis-
juncts in the major premise, and seven of them denied in the minor
premise, leaving a conclusion of the remaining five. Usually, how-
ever, a disjunctive argument is formulated in this manner: Assert a
disjunction with two or more disjuncts in the major premise; then
deny all but one in the minor premise; and infer validly the remaining
disjunct as the conclusion. That was the form of argument 11.
Another type of argument, especially favored by orators and
rhetoricians, is the dilemma. Ordinarily we use the term dilemma
in the sense of an awkward predicament, as when we say, “His
dilemma was that he didn’t have enough money to pay the
waiter.” But when logicians refer to a dilemma, they mean a forced
choice between two or more equally unattractive alternatives. For
example, the predicament of the U.S. government during the mid-
1980s as it faced the crisis brought on by terrorist attacks on
American civilian targets, which were believed, during that time, to
be inspired and supported by the Libyan government, can be for-
mulated in a dilemma:
12. If the United States bombs targets in Libya, innocent
people will be killed, and the Arab world will be angered.
If the United States doesn’t bomb Libyan targets, then ter-
rorists will go unpunished, and the United States will lose
respect among other governments. Either the United
States bombs Libyan targets, or it doesn’t. Therefore, in
either case unattractive consequences will follow: The
innocent will be killed, or terrorists will go unpunished.
Notice first the structure of the argument: two conditional proposi-
tions asserted as premises, followed by another premise that states
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a necessary truth. (The premise, “Either we bomb the Libyans, or
we don’t,” is a disjunction; since its two alternatives are exhaustive,
one of the two alternatives must be true. Such a statement is often
called analytically true, or a tautology.) No doubt the conclusion of
this dilemma follows from its premises.
But does the argument prove, as it purports to do, that what-
ever the U.S. government does, it will suffer “unattractive conse-
quences”? It is customary to speak of “the horns of the dilemma,”
as though the challenge posed by the dilemma were like a bull
ready to gore you whichever direction you turn. But if the two
conditional premises failed to exhaust the possibilities, then one
can escape from the dilemma by going “between the horns”; that
is, by finding a third alternative. If (as in this case) that is not pos-
sible, one can still ask whether both of the main premises are true.
(In this argument, it should be clear that neither of these main
premises spells out all or even most of the consequences that could
be foreseen.) Even so, in cases where both these conditional prem-
ises are true, it may be that the consequences of one alternative are
nowhere nearly so bad as those of the other. If that is true, but our
reasoning stops before evaluating that fact, we may be guilty of fail-
ing to distinguish between the greater and the lesser of two admit-
ted evils. The logic of the dilemma itself cannot decide this choice
for us. Instead, we must bring to bear empirical inquiry and imagi-
nation to the evaluation of the grounds of the dilemma itself.
Writers commonly use the term dilemma without explicitly for-
mulating the dilemma to which they refer, leaving it for the readers
to do. And sometimes, what is called a dilemma really isn’t one.
(Remember the dog’s tail? Calling it a leg doesn’t make it a leg.) As
an example, consider the plight of Sophie in William Styron’s novel,
Sophie’s Choice. The scene is Birkenau, the main Nazi extermination
camp during World War II. Among the thousands arriving at the
prison gates are Sophie and her two children, Jan and Eva. On the
train platform they are confronted by a Nazi SS medical officer. He will
decide which are the lucky ones; they will live to work in the camp.
The rest will go to their death in the gas chambers. When Sophie
insists she is Polish but not Jewish, the officer says she may choose
one of her children to be saved. Which of the two ought to be saved?
On what basis ought Sophie resolve her dilemma? It looks as if she
has only two alternatives, each of which presents her with an ago-
nizing outcome. Or is there a third way out?
Finally, one of the most powerful and dramatic forms of argu-
ment is reductio ad absurdum (from the Latin, meaning “reduction
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to absurdity”). The idea of a reductio argument is to disprove a
proposition by showing the absurdity of its inevitable conclusion. It
is used, of course, to refute your opponent’s position and prove
your own. For example, in Plato’s Republic, Socrates asks an old
gentleman, Cephalus, to define what right conduct is. Cephalus
says that it consists of paying your debts and keeping your word.
Socrates rejects this answer by showing that it leads to a contradic-
tion. He argues that Cephalus cannot have given the correct answer
because if we believe that he did, we will be quickly led into con-
tradictions; in some cases when you keep your word you will
nonetheless be doing the wrong thing. For suppose, says Socrates,
that you borrowed a weapon from a man, promising to return it
when he asks for it. One day he comes to your door, demanding his
weapon and swearing angrily that he intends to murder a neigh-
bor. Keeping your word under those circumstances is absurd,
Socrates implies, and the reader of the dialogue is left to infer that
Cephalus’s definition, which led to this result, is refuted.
Let’s take a closer look at another example. Suppose you are
opposed to any form of gun control, whereas I am in favor of gun
control. I might try to refute your position by attacking it with a
reductio argument. To do that, I start out by assuming the very
opposite of what I believe or favor and try to establish a contradic-
tion that results from following out the consequences of this initial
assumption. My argument might look like this:
13. Let’s assume your position—namely, that there ought to be
no legal restrictions whatever on the sale and ownership of
guns. That means that you’d permit having every neighbor-
hood hardware store sell pistols and rifles to whoever walks
in the door. But that’s not all. You apparently also would per-
mit selling machine guns to children, antitank weapons to
lunatics, small-bore cannons to the nearsighted, as well as
guns and the ammunition to go with them to anyone with a
criminal record. But this is utterly preposterous. No one could
favor such a dangerous policy. So the only question worth
debating is what kind of gun control is necessary.
Now in this example, my reductio of your position on gun
control is not based on claiming to show that you have strictly
contradicted yourself, for there is no purely logical contradiction
in opposing all forms of gun control. Instead, what I have tried to
do is to show that there is a contradiction between what you pro-
fess — no gun controls whatever — and what you probably really
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believe, if only you will stop to think about it — no lunatic should
be allowed to buy a loaded machine gun.
My refutation of your position rests on whether I succeed in
establishing an inconsistency among your own beliefs. If it turns
out that you really believe lunatics should be free to purchase guns
and ammunition, then my attempted refutation fails.
In explaining reductio ad absurdum, we have had to rely on
another idea fundamental to logic, that of contradiction, or
inconsistency. (We used this idea, remember, to define validity in
Chapter 3. A deductive argument is valid if and only if affirming
the premises and denying the conclusion results in a contradiction.)
The opposite of contradiction is consistency, a notion of hardly
less importance to good reasoning than validity. These concepts
deserve a few words of further explanation and illustration.
Consider this pair of assertions:
14. Abortion is homicide.
15. Racism is unfair.
No one would plausibly claim that we can infer or deduce 15 from
14, or, for that matter, 14 from 15. This almost goes without saying,
because there is no evident connection between these two asser-
tions. They are unrelated assertions; logically speaking, they are
independent of each other. In such cases the two assertions are
mutually consistent; that is, both could be true—or both could be
false. But now consider another proposition:
16. Euthanasia is not murder.
Could a person assert 14 (Abortion is homicide) and also assert 16
(Euthanasia is not murder) and be consistent? This question is equiva-
lent to asking whether one could assert the conjunction of these
two propositions—namely,
17. Abortion is homicide, and euthanasia is not murder.
It is not so easy to say whether 17 is consistent or inconsistent.
The kinds of moral scruples that might lead a person to assert one
of these conjuncts (that is, one of the two initial propositions,
Abortion is homicide and Euthanasia is not murder) might lead to the
belief that the other one must be false and thus to the conclusion
that 17 is inconsistent. (Notice that if 14 were the assertion that
Abortion is murder, instead of Abortion is homicide, the problem of
asserting consistently both 14 and 15 would be more acute.) Yet if
we think again, we might imagine someone being convinced that
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there is no inconsistency in asserting that Abortion is homicide, say,
and that Euthanasia is not murder, or even the reverse. (For instance,
suppose you believed that the unborn deserve a chance to live and
that putting elderly persons to death in a painless manner and with
their consent confers a benefit on them.)
Let us generalize: We can say of any set of propositions that
they are consistent if and only if all could be true together. (Notice that
it follows from this definition that propositions that mutually
imply each other, as do Seabiscuit was America’s fastest racehorse and
America’s fastest racehorse was Seabiscuit. Remember that, once again,
the truth of the assertions in question does not matter. Two propo-
sitions can be consistent or not, quite apart from whether they are
true. Not so with falsehood: It follows from our definition of con-
sistency that an inconsistent proposition must be false. (We have
relied on this idea in explaining how a reductio ad absurdum
works.)
Assertions or claims that are not consistent can take either of
two forms. Suppose you assert proposition 14, that abortion is
homicide, early in an essay you are writing, but later you assert that
18. Abortion is harmless.
You have now asserted a position on abortion that is strictly con-
trary to the one with which you began; contrary in the sense that
both assertions 14 and 18 cannot be true. It is simply not true that
if an abortion involves killing a human being (which is what homi-
cide strictly means), then it causes no one any harm (killing a per-
son always causes harm—even if it is excusable, justifiable, not
wrong, the best thing to do in the circumstances, and so on). Notice
that although 14 and 18 cannot both be true, they can both be
false. In fact, many people who are perplexed about the morality of
abortion believe precisely this. They concede that abortion does
harm the fetus, so 18 must be false; but they also believe that abor-
tion doesn’t kill a person, so 14 must also be false.
Or consider another, simpler case. If you describe the glass as
half empty and I describe it as half full, both of us can be right; the
two assertions are consistent, even though they sound vaguely
incompatible. (This is the reason that disputing over whether the
glass is half full or half empty has become the popular paradigm of a
futile, purely verbal disagreement.) But if I describe the glass as half
empty whereas you insist that it is two-thirds empty, then we have
a real disagreement; your description and mine are strictly contrary,
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in that both cannot be true—although both can be false. (Both are
false if the glass is only one-quarter full.)
This, by the way, enables us to define the difference between a
pair of contradictory propositions and a pair of contrary proposi-
tions. Two propositions are contrary if and only if both cannot be
true (though both can be false); two propositions are contradictory
if and only if they are such that if one is true the other must be
false, and vice versa. Thus, if Jack says that Alice Walker’s The Color
Purple is a better novel than Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn, and Jill
says, “No, Huckleberry Finn is better than The Color Purple,” she is
contradicting Jack. If what either one of them says is true, then
what the other says must be false.
A more subtle case of contradiction arises when two or more of
one’s own beliefs implicitly contradict each other. We may find
ourselves saying “Travel is broadening,” and saying an hour later,
“People don’t really change.” Just beneath the surface of these two
beliefs lies a self-contradiction: How can travel broaden us unless it
influences —and changes —our beliefs, values, and outlook? But if
we can’t really change ourselves, then traveling to new places
won’t change us, either. (Indeed, there is a Roman saying to the
effect that travelers change the skies above them, not their hearts.)
“Travel is broadening” and “People don’t change” collide with each
other; something has to give.
Our point, of course, is not that you must never say today some-
thing that contradicts something you said yesterday. Far from it; if
you think you were mistaken yesterday, of course you will take a dif-
ferent position today. But what you want to avoid is what George
Orwell called doublethink in his novel 1984: “Doublethink means the
power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultane-
ously, and accepting them both.”
Genuine contradiction, and not merely contrary assertion, is
the situation we should expect to find in some disputes. Someone
advances a thesis—such as the assertion in 14, Abortion is homicide—
and someone else flatly contradicts it by the simple expedient of
negating it, thus:
19. Abortion is not homicide.
If we can trust public opinion polls, many of us are not sure
whether to agree with 14 or with 19. But we should agree that
whichever is true, both cannot be true, and both cannot be false. The
two assertions, between them, exclude all other possibilities; they
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pose a forced choice for our belief. (Again, we have met this idea,
too, in a reductio ad absurdum.)
Now it is one thing for Jack and Jill in a dispute or argument to
contradict each other. It is quite another matter for Jack to contra-
dict himself. One wants (or should want) to avoid self-contradic-
tion because of the embarrassing position in which one then finds
oneself. Once I have contradicted myself, what are others to believe
I really believe? What, indeed, do I believe, for that matter?
It may be, as Emerson observed, that a “foolish consistency is
the hobgoblin of little minds”—that is, it may be shortsighted to
purchase a consistency in one’s beliefs at the expense of flying in
the face of common sense. But making an effort to avoid a foolish
inconsistency is the hallmark of serious thinking.
While we are speaking of inconsistency, we should spend a
moment on paradox. The word refers to two different things:
• An assertion that is essentially self-contradictory and there-
fore cannot be true and
• A seemingly contradictory assertion that nevertheless may be
true.
An example of the first might be, “Evaluations concerning quality
in literature are all a matter of personal judgment, but Shakespeare
is the world’s greatest writer.” It is hard to make any sense out of
this assertion. Contrast it with a paradox of the second sort, a seem-
ing contradiction that may make sense, such as “The longest way
round is the shortest way home,” or “Work is more fun than fun,”
or “The best way to find happiness is not to look for it.” Here we
have assertions that are striking because as soon as we hear them
we realize that although they seem inconsistent and self-defeating,
they contain (or may contain) profound truths. Paradoxes of this
second sort are especially common in religious texts, where they
may imply a mysterious reality concealed by a world of contradic-
tory appearances. Examples are “Some who are last shall be first,
and some who are first shall be last” (Jesus, quoted in Luke 13:30),
and “Death, thou shalt die” (the poet John Donne, alluding to the
idea that the person who has faith in Jesus dies to this world but
lives eternally). If you use the word paradox in your own writing—
for instance, to characterize an argument that you are reading—be
sure that your reader will understand in which sense you are using
the word. (And, of course, you will not want to write paradoxes of
the first, self-contradictory sort.)
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INDUCTION
Deduction involves logical thinking that applies to any assertion or
claim whatever —because every possible statement, true or false,
has its deductive logical consequences. Induction is relevant to one
kind of assertion only; namely, to empirical or factual claims.
Other kinds of assertions (such as definitions, mathematical equa-
tions, and moral or legal norms) simply are not the product of
inductive reasoning and cannot serve as a basis for further induc-
tive thinking.
And so, in studying the methods of induction, we are exploring
tactics and strategies useful in gathering and then using evidence—
empirical, observational, experimental—in support of a belief as its
ground. Modern scientific knowledge is the product of these meth-
ods, and they differ somewhat from one science to another because
they depend on the theories and technology appropriate to each of
the sciences. Here, all we can do is discuss generally the more
abstract features common to inductive inquiry generally. For fuller
details, you must eventually consult your local physicist, chemist,
geologist, or their colleagues and counterparts in other scientific
fields.
Observation and Inference
Let us begin with a simple example. Suppose we have evidence
(actually we don’t, but that will not matter for our purposes) in
support of the claim that
1. In a sample of 500 smokers, 230 persons observed have
cardiovascular disease.
The basis for asserting 1—the evidence or ground—would be, pre-
sumably, straightforward physical examination of the 500 persons
in the sample, one by one.
With this claim in hand, we can think of the purpose and meth-
ods of induction as being pointed in both of two opposite directions:
toward establishing the basis or ground of the very empirical proposi-
tion with which we start (in this example the observation stated in 1)
or toward understanding what that observation indicates or suggests
as a more general, inclusive, or fundamental fact of nature.
In each case, we start from something we do know (or take for
granted and treat as a sound starting point)—some fact of nature,
perhaps a striking or commonplace event that we have observed and
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recorded—and then go on to something we do not fully know and
perhaps cannot directly observe. In example 1, only the second of
these two orientations is of any interest, and so let us concentrate
exclusively on it. Let us also generously treat as a method of induction
any regular pattern or style of nondeductive reasoning that we could
use to support a claim such as that in 1.
Anyone truly interested in the observed fact that 230 of 500 smok-
ers have cardiovascular disease is likely to start speculating about, and
thus be interested in finding out, whether any or all of several other
propositions are also true. For example, one might wonder whether
2. All smokers have cardiovascular disease or will develop it
during their lifetimes.
This claim is a straightforward generalization of the original obser-
vation as reported in claim 1. When we think inductively about the
linkage between 1 and 2, we are reasoning from an observed
sample (some smokers —that is, 230 of the 500 observed) to the
entire membership of a more inclusive class (all smokers, whether
observed or not). The fundamental question raised by reasoning
from the narrower claim 1 to the broader claim 2 is whether we
have any ground for believing that what is true of some members of
a class is true of them all. So the difference between 1 and 2 is that
of quantity or scope.
We can also think inductively about the relation between the
factors mentioned in 1. Having observed data as reported in 1, we
may be tempted to assert a different and profounder kind of claim:
3. Smoking causes cardiovascular disease.
Here our interest is not merely in generalizing from a sample to a
whole class; it is the far more important one of explaining the obser-
vation with which we began in claim 1. Certainly the preferred,
even if not the only, mode of explanation for a natural phenome-
non is a causal explanation. In proposition 3, we propose to explain
the presence of one phenomenon (cardiovascular disease) by the
prior occurrence of an independent phenomenon (smoking). The
observation reported in 1 is now being used as evidence or support
for this new conjecture stated in 3.
Our original claim in 1 asserted no causal relation between any-
thing and anything else; whatever the cause of cardiovascular disease
may be, that cause is not observed, mentioned, or assumed in asser-
tion 1. Similarly, the observation asserted in claim 1 is consistent
with many explanations. For example, the explanation of 1 might
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not be 3, but some other, undetected, carcinogenic factor unrelated
to smoking—for instance, exposure to high levels of radon. The
question one now faces is what can be added to 1, or teased out of
it, to produce an adequate ground for claiming 3. (We shall return
to this example for closer scrutiny.)
But there is a third way to go beyond 1. Instead of a straight-
forward generalization, as we had in 2, or a pronouncement on the
cause of a phenomenon, as in 3, we might have a somewhat more
complex and cautious further claim in mind, such as this:
4. Smoking is a factor in the causation of cardiovascular dis-
ease in some persons.
This proposition, like 3, advances a claim about causation. But 4 is
obviously a weaker claim than 3. That is, other observations, theo-
ries, or evidence that would require us to reject 3 might be consis-
tent with 4; evidence that would support 4 could easily fail to be
enough to support 3. Consequently, it is even possible that 4 is true
although 3 is false, because 4 allows for other (unmentioned) fac-
tors in the causation of cardiovascular disease (genetic or dietary
factors, for example) which may not be found in all smokers.
Propositions 2, 3, and 4 differ from proposition 1 in an important
respect. We began by assuming that 1 states an empirical fact based on
direct observation, whereas these others do not. Instead, they state
empirical hypotheses or conjectures—tentative generalizations not
fully confirmed—each of which goes beyond the observed facts
asserted in 1. Each of 2, 3, and 4 can be regarded as an inductive
inference from 1. We can also say that 2, 3, and 4 are hypotheses rel-
ative to 1, even if relative to some other starting point (such as all
the information that scientists today really have about smoking and
cardiovascular disease) they are not.
Probability
Another way of formulating the last point is to say that whereas
proposition 1, a statement of observed fact (230 out of 500 smokers
have cardiovascular disease), has a probability of 1.0—that is, it is
absolutely certain—the probability of each of the hypotheses
stated in 2, 3, and 4, relative to 1 is smaller than 1.0. (We need not
worry here about how much smaller than 1.0 the probabilities are,
nor about how to calculate these probabilities precisely.) Relative to
some starting point other than 1, however, the probability of these
same three hypotheses might be quite different. Of course, it still
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would not be 1.0, absolute certainty. But it takes only a moment’s
reflection to realize that, whatever may be the probability of 2 or 3
or 4 relative to 1, those probabilities in each case will be quite dif-
ferent relative to different information, such as this:
5. Ten persons observed in a sample of 500 smokers have car-
diovascular disease.
The idea that a given proposition can have different probabilities rel-
ative to different bases is fundamental to all inductive reasoning. It
can be convincingly illustrated by the following example. Suppose
we want to consider the probability of this proposition being true:
6. Susanne Smith will live to be eighty.
Taken as an abstract question of fact, we cannot even guess what
the probability is with any assurance. But we can do better than
guess; we can in fact even calculate the answer, if we are given
some further information. Thus, suppose we are told that
7. Susanne Smith is seventy-nine.
Our original question then becomes one of determining the proba-
bility that 6 is true given 7; that is, relative to the evidence con-
tained in proposition 7. No doubt, if Susanne Smith really is
seventy-nine, then the probability that she will live to be eighty is
greater than if we know only that
8. Susanne Smith is more than nine years old.
Obviously, a lot can happen to Susanne in the seventy years
between nine and seventy-nine that is not very likely to happen to
her in the one year between seventy-nine and eighty. And so,
proposition 6 is more probable relative to proposition 7 than it is
relative to proposition 8.
Let us disregard 7 and instead further suppose for the sake of
the argument that the following is true:
9. Ninety percent of the women alive at seventy-nine live to
be eighty.
Given this additional information, we now have a basis for answer-
ing our original question about proposition 6 with some precision.
But suppose, in addition to 8, we are also told that
10. Susanne Smith is suffering from inoperable cancer.
and also that
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11. The survival rate for women suffering from inoperable cancer
is 0.6 years (that is, the average life span for women after a
diagnosis of inoperable cancer is about seven months).
With this new information, the probability that 6 will be true has
dropped significantly, all because we can now estimate the proba-
bility in relation to a new body of evidence.
The probability of an event, thus, is not a fixed number but one
that varies because it is always relative to some evidence—and
given different evidence, one and the same event can have differ-
ent probabilities. In other words, the probability of any event is
always relative to how much is known (assumed, believed), and
because different persons may know different things about a given
event, or the same person may know different things at different
times, one and the same event can have two or more probabilities.
This conclusion is not a paradox but a logical consequence of the
concept of what it is for an event to have (that is, to be assigned) a
probability.
If we shift to the calculation of probabilities, we find that gener-
ally we have two ways to calculate them. One way to proceed is by
the method of a priori or equal probabilities —that is, by refer-
ence to the relevant possibilities taken abstractly and apart from
any other information. Thus, in an election contest with only two
candidates, Smith and Jones, each of the candidates has a fifty-fifty
chance of winning (whereas in a three-candidate race, each candi-
date would have one chance in three of winning). Therefore, the
probability that Smith will win is 0.5, and the probability that Jones
will win is also 0.5. (The sum of the probabilities of all possible
independent outcomes must always equal 1.0, which is obvious
enough if you think about it.)
But in politics the probabilities are not reasonably calculated so
abstractly. We know that many empirical factors affect the outcome
of an election and that a calculation of probabilities in ignorance of
those factors is likely to be drastically misleading. In our example of the
two-candidate election, suppose Smith has strong party support and is
the incumbent, whereas Jones represents a party long out of power
and is further handicapped by being relatively unknown. No one who
knows anything about electoral politics would give Jones the same
chance of winning as Smith. The two events are not equiprobable in
relation to all the information available.
Not only that, a given event can have more than one probabil-
ity. This happens whenever we calculate a probability by relying on
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different bodies of data that report how often the event in question
has been observed to happen. Probabilities calculated in this way
are relative frequencies. Our earlier hypothetical example of
Susanne Smith provides an illustration. If she is a smoker and we
have observed that 100 out of a random set of 500 smokers are
observed to have cardiovascular disease, we have a basis for claim-
ing that she has a probability of 100 in 500, or 0.2 (one-fifth), of
having this disease. However, if we had other data showing that
250 out of 500 women smokers aged eighty or older have cardio-
vascular disease, we have a basis for believing that there is a proba-
bility of 250 in 500, or 0.5 (one-half), that she has this disease.
Notice, of course, that in both calculations we assume that Susanne
Smith is not among the persons we have examined. In both cases
we infer the probability with which she has this disease from
observing its frequency in populations that exclude her.
Both methods of calculating probabilities are legitimate; in each
case the calculation is relative to observed circumstances. But as
the examples show, it is most reasonable to have recourse to the
method of equiprobabilities only when few or no other factors
affecting possible outcomes are known.
Mill’s Methods
Let us return to our earlier discussion of smoking and cardiovascu-
lar disease and consider in greater detail the question of a causal
connection between the two phenomena. We began thus:
1. In a sample of 500 smokers, 230 persons observed have car-
diovascular disease.
We regarded 1 as an observed fact, though in truth, of course, it is
mere supposition. Our question now is, how might we augment
this information so as to strengthen our confidence that
3. Smoking causes cardiovascular disease.
or at least
4. Smoking is a factor in the causation of cardiovascular dis-
ease in some persons.
Suppose further examination showed that
12. In the sample of 230 smokers with cardiovascular disease,
no other suspected factor (such as genetic predisposition,
lack of physical exercise, age over fifty) was also observed.
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Such an observation would encourage us to believe 3 or 4 is true.
Why? We are encouraged to believe it because we are inclined to
believe also that whatever the cause of a phenomenon is, it must
always be present when its effect is present. Thus, the inference
from 1 to 3 or 4 is supported by 12, using Mill’s Method of
Agreement, named after the British philosopher, John Stuart Mill
(1806–1873), who first formulated it. It is called a method of agree-
ment because of the way in which the inference relies on agreement
among the observed phenomena where a presumed cause is
thought to be present.
Let us now suppose that in our search for evidence to support 3
or 4 we conduct additional research and discover that
13. In a sample of 500 nonsmokers, selected to be representa-
tive of both sexes, different ages, dietary habits, exercise
patterns, and so on, none is observed to have cardiovascular
disease.
This observation would further encourage us to believe that we
had obtained significant additional confirmation of 3 or 4. Why?
Because we now know that factors present (such as male sex, lack
of exercise, family history of cardiovascular disease) in cases where
the effect is absent (no cardiovascular disease observed) cannot be
the cause. This is an example of Mill’s Method of Difference, so
called because the cause or causal factor of an effect must be differ-
ent from whatever the factors are that are present when the effect is
absent.
Suppose now that, increasingly confident we have found the
cause of cardiovascular disease, we study our first sample of 2
30
smokers ill with the disease, and discover this:
14. Those who smoke two or more packs of cigarettes daily
for ten or more years have cardiovascular disease either
much younger or much more severely than those who
smoke less.
This is an application of Mill’s Method of Concomitant
Variation, perhaps the most convincing of the three methods.
Here we deal not merely with the presence of the conjectured cause
(smoking) or the absence of the effect we are studying (cardiovascu-
lar disease), as we were previously, but with the more interesting
and subtler matter of the degree and regularity of the correlation of the
supposed cause and effect. According to the observations reported
in 14, it strongly appears that the more we have of the “cause”
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(smoking), the sooner or the more intense the onset of the “effect”
(cardiovascular disease).
Notice, however, what happens to our confirmation of 3 and 4
if, instead of the observation reported in 14, we had observed
15. In a representative sample of 500 nonsmokers, cardiovascu-
lar disease was observed in 34 cases.
(Let us not pause here to explain what makes a sample more or less
representative of a population, although the representativeness of
samples is vital to all statistical reasoning.) Such an observation
would lead us almost immediately to suspect some other or addi-
tional causal factor: Smoking might indeed be a factor in causing
cardiovascular disease, but it can hardly be the cause because (using
Mill’s Method of Difference) we cannot have the effect, as we do in
the observed sample reported in 15, unless we also have the cause.
An observation such as the one in 15, however, is likely to lead
us to think our hypothesis that smoking causes cardiovascular disease
has been disconfirmed. But we have a fallback position ready; we
can still defend a weaker hypothesis, namely 4, Smoking is a factor in
the causation of cardiovascular disease in some persons. Even if 3
stumbles over the evidence in 15, 4 does not. It is still quite possible
that smoking is a factor in causing this disease, even if it is not the
only factor—and if it is, then 4 is true.
Confirmation, Mechanism, and Theory
Notice that in the discussion so far, we have spoken of the confirma-
tion of a hypothesis, such as our causal claim in 4, but not of its ver-
ification. (Similarly, we have imagined very different evidence, such
as that stated in 15, leading us to speak of the disconfirmation of 3,
though not of its falsification.) Confirmation (getting some evi-
dence for) is weaker than verification (getting sufficient evidence to
regard as true); and our (imaginary) evidence so far in favor of 4
falls well short of conclusive support. Further research—the study
of more representative or much larger samples, for example—
might yield very different observations. It might lead us to con-
clude that although initial research had confirmed our hypothesis
about smoking as the cause of cardiovascular disease, the additional
information obtained subsequently disconfirmed the hypothesis.
For most interesting hypotheses, both in detective stories and in
modern science, there is both confirming and disconfirming evi-
dence simultaneously. The challenge is to evaluate the hypothesis
by considering such conflicting evidence.
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As long as we confine our observations to correlations of the
sort reported in our several (imaginary) observations, such as
proposition 1, 230 smokers in a group of 500 have cardiovascular dis-
ease, or 12, 230 smokers with the disease share no other suspected factors,
such as lack of exercise, any defense of a causal hypothesis such as
claim 3, Smoking causes cardiovascular disease, or claim 4, Smoking is a
factor in causing the disease, is not likely to convince the skeptic or
lead those with beliefs alternative to 3 and 4 to abandon them and
agree with us. Why is that? It is because a causal hypothesis with-
out any account of the underlying mechanism by means of which
the (alleged) cause produces the effect will seem superficial. Only
when we can specify in detail how the (alleged) cause produces the
effect will the causal hypothesis be convincing.
In other cases, in which no mechanism can be found, we seek
instead to embed the causal hypothesis in a larger theory, one that
rules out as incompatible any causal hypothesis except the favored
one. (That is, we appeal to the test of consistency and thereby bring
deductive reasoning to bear on our problem.) Thus, perhaps we
cannot specify any mechanism—any underlying structure that gen-
erates a regular sequence of events, one of which is the effect we
are studying—to explain why, for example, the gravitational mass
of a body causes it to attract other bodies. But we can embed this
claim in a larger body of physical theory that rules out as inconsis-
tent any alternative causal explanation. To do that convincingly in
regard to any given causal hypothesis, as this example suggests,
requires detailed knowledge of the current state of the relevant body
of scientific theory, something far beyond our aim or need to con-
sider in further detail here.
FALLACIES
The straight road on which sound reasoning proceeds gives little
latitude for cruising about. Irrationality, carelessness, passionate
attachment to one’s unexamined beliefs, and the sheer complexity
of some issues, not to mention original sin, occasionally spoil the
reasoning of even the best of us. Although in this book we reprint
many varied voices and arguments, we hope we have reprinted no
readings that exhibit the most flagrant errors or commit the graver
abuses against the canons of good reasoning. Nevertheless, an inven-
tory of those abuses and their close examination can be an instruc-
tive (as well as an amusing) exercise — instructive because the
diagnosis and repair of error helps to fix more clearly the principles
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of sound reasoning on which such remedial labors depend; amus-
ing because we are so constituted that our perception of the non-
sense of others can stimulate our mind, warm our heart, and give
us comforting feelings of superiority.
The discussion that follows, then, is a quick tour through the
twisting lanes, mudflats, forests, and quicksands of the faults that
one sometimes encounters in reading arguments that stray from the
highway of clear thinking.
We can and do apply the term fallacy to many types of errors, mis-
takes, and confusions in oral and written discourse, in which our rea-
soning has gone awry. For convenience, we can group the fallacies by
referring to the six aspects of reasoning identified in the Toulmin
Method, described earlier (p. 275). Or, following the suggestion of S.
Morris Engel in his book, Without Good Reason (2000), we can group
fallacies according to whether they involve a crucial ambiguity, an erro-
neous presumption, or an irrelevance.
We ought not, however, take these categories too rigidly because
it is often the case that a piece of fallacious thinking involves two or
more fallacies. That is, it is possible (as we shall see) to find traces
of faulty reasoning of several varieties, in which case we classify it
under one rather than another of the headings above because we
have chosen what in our judgment amounts to the dominant or
most prominent of the fallacious features on display. Thus, most of
the fallacies exhibit an irrelevant consideration. (Red herring is a
good example. Is it best described as a fallacy of false presumption
or as a fallacy of irrelevance? Same with erroneous presupposi-
tion.) In the end, classifying the fallacies under this or that system
of headings is not very important. What is important is being able
to spot the fallacious thinking no matter what it is called.
Fallacies of Ambiguity
Ambiguity Near the center of the town of Concord, Massachusetts,
is an empty field with a sign reading “Old Calf Pasture.” Hmm. A
pasture in former times in which calves grazed? A pasture now in
use for old calves? An erstwhile pasture for old calves? These alter-
native readings arise because of ambiguity; brevity in the sign has
produced a group of words that give rise to more than one possible
interpretation, confusing the reader and (presumably) frustrating
the sign writer’s intentions.
Consider a more complex example. Suppose someone asserts
People have equal rights and also Everyone has a right to property. Many
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people believe both these claims, but their combination involves an
ambiguity. On one interpretation, the two claims entail that every-
one has an equal right to property. (That is, you and I each have an
equal right to whatever property we have.) But the two claims can
also be interpreted to mean that everyone has a right to equal prop-
erty. (That is, whatever property you have a right to, I have a right
to the same, or at least equivalent, property.) The latter interpreta-
tion is radically revolutionary, whereas the former is not. Arguments
over equal rights often involve this ambiguity.
Division In the Bible, we are told that the apostles of Jesus were
twelve and that Matthew was an apostle. Does it follow that
Matthew was twelve? No. To argue in this way from a property of a
group to a property of a member of that group is to commit the fal-
lacy of division. The example of the apostles may not be a very
tempting instance of this error; here is a classic version that is a bit
more interesting. If it is true that the average American family has
1.8 children, does it follow that your brother and sister-in-law are
likely to have 1.8 children? If you think it does, you have commit-
ted the fallacy of division.
Composition Could an all-star team of professional basketball
players beat the Boston Celtics in their heyday—say, the team of
1985 to 1986? Perhaps in one game or two, but probably not in
seven out of a dozen games in a row. As students of the game
know, teamwork is an indispensable part of outstanding perfor-
mance, and the 1985 to 1986 Celtics were famous for their self-sac-
rificing style of play.
The fallacy of composition can be convincingly illustrated,
therefore, in this argument: A team of five NBA all-stars is the best team
in basketball if each of the five players is the best at his position. The fal-
lacy is called composition because the reasoning commits the error
of arguing from the true premise that each member of a group has a
certain property to the not necessarily true conclusion that the
group (the composition) itself has the property. (That is, because A is
the best player at forward, B is the best center, and so on, therefore,
the team of A, B, . . . is the best team.)
Equivocation In a delightful passage in Lewis Carroll’s Through the
Looking-Glass, the king asks his messenger, “Who did you pass on the
road?” and the messenger replies, “Nobody.” This prompts the king
to observe, “Of course, Nobody walks slower than you,” provoking
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the messenger’s sullen response: “I do my best. I’m sure nobody
walks much faster than I do.” At this the king remarks with sur-
prise, “He can’t do that or else he’d have been here first!” (This, by
the way, is the classic predecessor of the famous comic dialogue
“Who’s on First?” between the comedians Bud Abbott and Lou
Costello.) The king and the messenger are equivocating on the
term nobody. The messenger uses it in the normal way as an indefi-
nite pronoun equivalent to “not anyone.” But the king uses the
word as though it were a proper noun, Nobody, the rather odd
name of some person. No wonder the king and the messenger talk
right past each other.
Equivocation (from the Latin for “equal voice” — that is,
giving utterance to two meanings at the same time in one word
or phrase) can ruin otherwise good reasoning, as in this example:
Euthanasia is a good death; one dies a good death when one dies peace-
fully in old age; therefore, euthanasia is dying peacefully in old age. The
etymology of euthanasia is literally “a good death,” and so the first
premise is true. And the second premise is certainly plausible. But
the conclusion of this syllogism is false. Euthanasia cannot be
defined as a peaceful death in one’s old age, for two reasons. First,
euthanasia requires the intervention of another person who kills
someone (or lets the person die); second, even a very young per-
son can be euthanized. The problem arises because “a good
death” is used in the second premise in a manner that does not
apply to euthanasia. Both meanings of “a good death” are legiti-
mate, but when used together, they constitute an equivocation
that spoils the argument.
The fallacy of equivocation takes us from the discussion of con-
fusions in individual claims or grounds to the more troublesome
fallacies that infect the linkages between the claims we make and
the grounds (or reasons) for them. These are the fallacies that occur
in statements that, following the vocabulary of the Toulmin
Method, are called the warrant of reasoning. Each fallacy is an
example of reasoning that involves a non sequitur (Latin for “It
does not follow”). That is, the claim (the conclusion) does not fol-
low from the grounds (the premises).
For a start, here is an obvious non sequitur: “He went to the
movies on three consecutive nights, so he must love movies.” Why
doesn’t the claim (“He must love movies”) follow from the grounds
(“He went to the movies on three consecutive nights”)? Perhaps
the person was just fulfilling an assignment in a film course (maybe
he even hated movies so much that he had postponed three
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assignments to see films and now had to see them all in quick suc-
cession), or maybe he went with a girlfriend who was a movie
buff, or maybe . . . — well, one can think of any number of other
possible reasons.
Fallacies of Presumption
Distorting the Facts Facts can be distorted either intentionally (to
deceive or mislead) or unintentionally, and in either case usually
(but not invariably) to the benefit of whoever is doing the distor-
tion. Consider this not entirely hypothetical case. A pharmaceutical
company spends millions of dollars to develop a new drug that will
help pregnant women avoid spontaneous abortion. The company
reports its findings, but it does not also report that it has learned
from its researchers of a serious downside for this drug in many
cases, resulting in deformed limbs in the neonate. Had the com-
pany informed the public of this fact, the drug would not have
been certified for use.
Here is another case. Half a century ago the surgeon general
reported that smoking cigarettes increased the likelihood that smok-
ers would eventually suffer from lung cancer. The cigarette manu-
facturers vigorously protested that the surgeon general relied on
inconclusive research and was badly misleading the public about the
health risks of smoking. It later turned out that the tobacco compa-
nies knew that smoking increased the risk of lung cancer—a fact
established by the company’s own laboratories but concealed from
the public. Today, thanks to public access to all the facts, it is com-
monplace knowledge that inhaled smoke—including secondhand
smoke—is a risk factor for many illnesses.
Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc One of the most tempting errors in
reasoning is to ground a claim about causation on an observed tem-
poral sequence; that is, to argue “after this, therefore because of
this” (which is what the phrase post hoc, ergo propter hoc
means in Latin). Nearly forty years ago, when the medical commu-
nity first announced that smoking tobacco caused lung cancer,
advocates for the tobacco industry replied that doctors were guilty
of this fallacy.
These industry advocates argued that medical researchers had
merely noticed that in some people, lung cancer developed after
considerable smoking, indeed, years after; but (they insisted) this
correlation was not at all the same as a causal relation between
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smoking and lung cancer. True enough. The claim that A causes B is
not the same as the claim that B comes after A. After all, it was pos-
sible that smokers as a group had some other common trait and
that this factor was the true cause of their cancer.
As the long controversy over the truth about the causation of
lung cancer shows, to avoid the appearance of fallacious post hoc rea-
soning one needs to find some way to link the observed phenomena
(the correlation of smoking and the onset of lung cancer). This step
requires some further theory and preferably some experimental evi-
dence for the exact sequence or physical mechanism, in full detail,
of how ingestion of tobacco smoke is a crucial factor—and is not
merely an accidental or happenstance prior event—in the subse-
quent development of the cancer.
Many Questions The old saw, “When did you stop beating your
wife?” illustrates the fallacy of many questions. This question, as
one can readily see, is unanswerable unless all three of its implicit
presuppositions are true. The questioner presupposes that (1) the
addressee has or had a wife, (2) he has beaten her, and (3) he has
stopped beating her. If any of these presuppositions is false, then
the question is pointless; it cannot be answered strictly and simply
with a date.
Hasty Generalization From a logical point of view, hasty general-
ization is the precipitous move from true assertions about one or a
few instances to dubious or even false assertions about all. For
example, while it may be true, based on your personal experience,
that the only native Hungarians you personally know do not speak
English very well, that is no basis for asserting that Hungarians do
not speak English very well. Or if the clothes you recently ordered
online turn out not to fit very well, it doesn’t follow that all online
clothes turn out to be too large or too small. A hasty generalization
usually lies behind a stereotype—that is, a person or event treated
as typical of a whole class. Thus, in 1914, after the German invasion
of Belgium, during which some atrocities were committed by the
invaders, the German troops were quickly stereotyped by the Allies
as brutal savages who skewered helpless babies on their bayonets.
The Slippery Slope One of the most familiar arguments against any
type of government regulation is that if it is allowed, then it will be
just the first step down the path that leads to ruinous interference,
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overregulation, and totalitarian control. Fairly often we encounter
this mode of argument in the public debates over handgun control,
the censorship of pornography, and physician-assisted suicide. The
argument is called the slippery slope argument (or the wedge
argument, from the way we use the thin end of a wedge to split
solid things apart; it is also called, rather colorfully, “letting the
camel’s nose under the tent”). The fallacy here is in implying that
the first step necessarily leads to the second, and so on down the
slope to disaster, when in fact there is no necessary slide from the
first step to the second. (Would handgun registration lead to a
police state? Well, it hasn’t in Switzerland.) Sometimes the argu-
ment takes the form of claiming that a seemingly innocent or even
attractive principle that is being applied in a given case (censorship
of pornography, to avoid promoting sexual violence) requires one
for the sake of consistency to apply the same principle in other
cases, only with absurd and catastrophic results (censorship of
everything in print, to avoid hurting anyone’s feelings).
Here’s an extreme example of this fallacy in action:
Automobiles cause more deaths than handguns do. If you oppose
handguns on the ground that doing so would save lives of the
innocent, you’ll soon find yourself wanting to outlaw the
automobile.
Does opposition to handguns have this consequence? Not necessar-
ily. Most people accept without dispute the right of society to regu-
late the operation of motor vehicles by requiring drivers to have a
license, a greater restriction than many states impose on gun own-
ership. Besides, a gun is a lethal weapon designed to kill, whereas
an automobile or truck is a vehicle designed for transportation.
Private ownership and use in both cases entail risks of death to the
innocent. But there is no inconsistency in a society’s refusal to tol-
erate this risk in the case of guns and its willingness to do so in the
case of automobiles.
Closely related to the slippery slope is what lawyers call a
parade of horrors, an array of examples of terrible consequences
that will or might follow if we travel down a certain path. A good
example appears in Justice William Brennan’s opinion for the
Supreme Court in Texas v. Johnson (1989), concerned with a Texas
law against burning the American flag in political protest. If this law
is allowed to stand, Brennan suggests, we may next find laws against
burning the presidential seal, state flags, and the Constitution.
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False Analogy Argument by analogy, as we point out in Chapter 3
and as many of the selections in this book show, is a familiar and even
indispensable mode of argument. But it can be treacherous because
it runs the risk of the fallacy of false analogy. Unfortunately, we
have no simple or foolproof way of distinguishing between the use-
ful, legitimate analogies and the others. The key question to ask
yourself is this: Do the two things put into analogy differ in any
essential and relevant respect, or are they different only in unim-
portant and irrelevant aspects?
In a famous example from his discussion in support of suicide,
philosopher David Hume rhetorically asked: “It would be no crime
in me to divert the Nile or Danube from its course, were I able to
effect such purposes. Where then is the crime of turning a few
ounces of blood from their natural channel?” This is a striking anal-
ogy, except that it rests on a false assumption. No one has the right
to divert the Nile or the Danube or any other major international
watercourse; it would be a catastrophic crime to do so without the
full consent of people living in the region, their government, and so
forth. Therefore, arguing by analogy, one might well say that no
one has the right to take his or her own life, either. Thus, Hume’s
own analogy can be used to argue against his thesis that suicide is
no crime. But let us ignore the way in which his example can be
turned against him. The analogy is a terrible one in any case. Isn’t
it obvious that the Nile, whatever its exact course, would continue
to nourish Egypt and the Sudan, whereas the blood flowing out of
someone’s veins will soon leave that person dead? The fact that
the blood is the same blood, whether in one’s body or in a pool on
the floor (just as the water of the Nile is the same body of water
whatever path it follows to the sea) is, of course, irrelevant to the
question of whether one has the right to commit suicide.
Let us look at a more complex example. During the 1960s,
when the United States was convulsed over the purpose and scope
of its military involvement in Southeast Asia, advocates of more vig-
orous U.S. military participation appealed to the so-called domino
effect, supposedly inspired by a passing remark from President
Eisenhower in the 1950s. The analogy refers to the way in which a
row of standing dominoes will collapse, one after the other, if the
first one is pushed. If Vietnam turns Communist, according to this
analogy, so too will its neighbors, Laos and Cambodia, followed by
Thailand and then Burma, until the whole region is as communist
as China to the north. The domino analogy (or metaphor) provided,
no doubt, a vivid illustration and effectively portrayed the worry of
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many anti-Communists. But did it really shed any light on the likely
pattern of political and military developments in the region? The
history of events there during the 1970s and 1980s did not bear out
the domino analogy.
Straw Man It is often tempting to reframe or report your oppo-
nent’s thesis to make it easier to attack and perhaps refute it. If you
do this in the course of an argument, you are creating a straw man,
a thing of no substance and easily blown away. The straw man
you’ve constructed is usually a radically conservative or extremely
liberal thesis, which few if any would want to defend. That is why it
is easier to refute than the view your opponent actually holds. “So
you defend the death penalty—and all the horrible things done in
its name. No one in his right mind would hold such a view.” It’s
highly unlikely that your friend supports everything that has been
done in the name of capital punishment — crucifixion and behead-
ing, for example, or execution of the children of the guilty offender.
Special Pleading We all have our favorites—relatives, friends,
and neighbors—and we are all too likely to show that favoritism in
unacceptable ways. How about this: “Yes, I know Billy hit Sally
first, but he’s my son. He’s a good boy, and I know he must have
had a good reason.” Or this: “True, she’s late for work again—the
third time this week!—but her uncle’s my friend, and it will be
embarrassing to me if she is fired, so we’ll just ignore it.” Special
pleading inevitably leads to unmerited advantages, as illustrated
above.
Begging the Question The argument over whether the death
penalty is a deterrent illustrates another fallacy. From the fact that
you live in a death-penalty state and were not murdered yesterday,
we cannot infer that the death penalty was a deterrent. Yet it is
tempting to make this inference, perhaps because—all unawares—
we are relying on the fallacy of begging the question. If some-
one tacitly assumes from the start that the death penalty is an
effective deterrent, then the fact that you weren’t murdered yester-
day certainly looks like evidence for the truth of that assumption.
But it isn’t, so long as there are competing but unexamined alter-
native explanations, as in this case. (The fallacy is called “begging
the question,” petitio principii in Latin, because the conclusion of the
argument is hidden among its assumptions—and so the conclu-
sion, not surprisingly, follows from the premises.)
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Of course, the fact that you weren’t murdered is consistent with
the claim that the death penalty is an effective deterrent, just as
someone else’s being murdered is also consistent with that claim
(for an effective deterrent need not be a perfect deterrent). In gen-
eral, from the fact that two propositions are consistent with each
other, we cannot infer that either is evidence for the other.
Note: The term “begging the question” is often wrongly used to
mean “raises the question,” as in “His action of burning the flag
begs the question, What drove him to do such a thing?”
False Dichotomy Sometimes oversimplification takes a more com-
plex form, in which contrary possibilities are wrongly presented as
though they were exhaustive and exclusive. “Either we get tough
with drug users, or we must surrender and legalize all drugs.”
Really? What about doing neither and instead offering education
and counseling, detoxification programs, and incentives to “Say
no”? A favorite of debaters, either/or reasoning always runs the risk
of ignoring a third (or fourth) possibility. Some disjunctions are
indeed exhaustive: “Either we get tough with drug users, or we do
not.” This proposition, though vague (what does “get tough” really
mean?), is a tautology; it cannot be false, and there is no third alter-
native. But most disjunctions do not express a pair of contradictory
alternatives: They offer only a pair of contrary alternatives, and mere
contraries do not exhaust the possibilities (recall our discussion of
contraries versus contradictories on p. 301).
Oversimplification “Poverty causes crime,” “Taxation is unfair,”
“Truth is stranger than fiction”—these are examples of generaliza-
tions that exaggerate and therefore oversimplify the truth. Poverty
as such can’t be the sole cause of crime because many poor people
do not break the law. Some taxes may be unfairly high, others
unfairly low—but there is no reason to believe that every tax is
unfair to all those who have to pay it. Some true stories do amaze
us as much or more than some fictional stories, but the reverse is
true, too. (In the language of the Toulmin Method, oversimplifi-
cation is the result of a failure to use suitable modal qualifiers in
formulating one’s claims or grounds or backing.)
Red Herring The fallacy of red herring, less colorfully named
irrelevant thesis, occurs when one tries to distract one’s audience
by invoking a consideration that is irrelevant to the topic under dis-
cussion. (This fallacy probably gets its name from the fact that a
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rotten herring, or a cured herring, which is reddish, will throw pur-
suing hounds off the right track.) Consider this case. Some critics,
seeking to defend our government’s refusal to sign the Kyoto
accords to reduce global warming, argue that signing is supported
mainly by left-leaning scientists. This argument supposedly shows
that global warming—if there is such a thing—is not a serious,
urgent issue. But claiming that the supporters of these accords are
left-inclined is a red herring, an irrelevant thesis. By raising doubts
about the political views of the advocates of signing, it distracts
attention from the scientific question (Is there global warming?)
and also from the separate political question (Ought the United
States sign these accords?). The refusal of a government to sign
these accords does not show there is no such thing as global warm-
ing. And even if all of the advocates of signing were left-leaning
(they aren’t), this fact (if it were a fact, but it isn’t) would not show
that worries about global warming are exaggerated.
Fallacies of Relevance
Tu Quoque The Romans had a word for it: Tu quoque means “you,
too.” Consider this: “You’re a fine one, trying to persuade me to
give up smoking when you indulge yourself with a pipe and a cigar
from time to time. Maybe I should quit, but then so should you. As
things stand now, however, it’s hypocritical of you to complain
about my smoking when you persist in the same habit.” The fallacy
is this: The merit of a person’s argument has nothing to do with the
person’s character or behavior. Here, the assertion that smoking is
bad for one’s health is not weakened by the fact that a smoker
offers the argument.
The Genetic Fallacy A member of the family of fallacies that
includes poisoning the well and ad hominem is the genetic fal-
lacy. Here the error takes the form of arguing against some claim
by pointing out that its origin (genesis) is tainted or that it was
invented by someone deserving our contempt. Thus, one might
attack the ideas of the Declaration of Independence by pointing out
that its principal author, Thomas Jefferson, was a slaveholder.
Assuming that it is not anachronistic and inappropriate to criticize a
public figure of two centuries ago for practicing slavery, and conced-
ing that slavery is morally outrageous, it is nonetheless fallacious to
attack the ideas or even the sincerity of the Declaration by attempt-
ing to impeach the credentials of its author. Jefferson’s moral faults
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do not by themselves falsify, make improbable, or constitute coun-
terevidence to the truth or other merits of the claims made in his
writings. At most, one’s faults cast doubt on one’s integrity or sincer-
ity if one makes claims at odds with one’s practice.
The genetic fallacy can take other forms less closely allied to ad
hominem argument. For example, an opponent of the death penalty
might argue,
Capital punishment arose in barbarous times; but we claim to be
civilized; therefore, we should discard this relic of the past.
Such reasoning shouldn’t be persuasive because the question of the
death penalty for our society must be decided by the degree to
which it serves our purposes —justice and defense against crime,
presumably —to which its historic origins are irrelevant. The prac-
tices of beer- and wine-making are as old as human civilization, but
their origin in antiquity is no reason to outlaw them in our time.
The curious circumstances in which something originates usually
play no role whatever in its validity. Anyone who would argue that
nothing good could possibly come from molds and fungi is refuted
by Sir Alexander Fleming’s discovery of penicillin in 1928.
Poisoning the Well During the 1970s some critics of the Equal
Rights Amendment (ERA) argued against it by pointing out that
Marx and Engels, in their Communist Manifesto, favored equality of
women and men—and therefore the ERA was immoral, undesir-
able, and perhaps even a Communist plot. This kind of reasoning is
an attempt to poison the well; that is, an attempt to shift atten-
tion from the merits of the argument—the validity of the reason-
ing, the truth of the claims —to the source or origin of the
argument. Such criticism deflects attention from the real issue;
namely, whether the view in question is true and what the quality
of evidence is in its support. The mere fact that Marx (or Hitler, for
that matter) believed something does not show that the belief is
false or immoral; just because some scoundrel believes the world is
round, that is no reason for you to believe it is flat.
Appeal to Ignorance In the controversy over the death penalty,
the issues of deterrence and executing the innocent are bound to
be raised. Because no one knows how many innocent persons
have been convicted for murder and wrongfully executed, it is
tempting for abolitionists to argue that the death penalty is too
risky. It is equally tempting for the proponent of the death penalty
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to argue that since no one knows how many people have been
deterred from murder by the threat of execution, we abolish it at
our peril.
Each of these arguments suffers from the same flaw: the fal-
lacy of appeal to ignorance. Each argument invites the audience
to draw an inference from a premise that is unquestionably true—
but what is that premise? It asserts that there is something “we
don’t know.” But what we don’t know cannot be evidence for (or
against) anything. Our ignorance is no reason for believing any-
thing, except perhaps that we ought to try to undertake an appro-
priate investigation in order to reduce our ignorance and replace it
with reliable information.
Ad Hominem Closely allied to poisoning the well is another fal-
lacy, ad hominem argument (from the Latin for “against the per-
son”). A critic can easily yield to the temptation to attack an
argument or theory by trying to impeach or undercut the creden-
tials of its advocates.
Example: Jones is arguing that prayer should not be permitted
in public schools, and Smith responds by pointing out that Jones
has twice been convicted of assaulting members of the clergy.
Jones’s behavior doubtless is reprehensible, but the issue is not
Jones, it is prayer in school, and what must be scrutinized is Jones’s
argument, not his police record or his character.
Appeal to Authority The example of Jefferson given to illustrate
the genetic fallacy can be turned around to illustrate another fal-
lacy. One might easily imagine someone from the South in 18
60
defending the slave-owning society of that day by appealing to the
fact that no less a person than Jefferson—a brilliant public figure,
thinker, and leader by any measure—owned slaves. Or today one
might defend capital punishment on the ground that Abraham
Lincoln, surely one of the nation’s greatest presidents, signed many
death warrants during the Civil War, authorizing the execution of
Union soldiers. No doubt the esteem in which such figures as
Jefferson and Lincoln are deservedly held amounts to impressive
endorsement for whatever acts and practices, policies and institu-
tions, they supported. But the authority of these figures in itself is
not evidence for the truth of their views, and so their authority
cannot be a reason for anyone to agree with them. Obviously,
Jefferson and Lincoln themselves could not support their beliefs by
pointing to the fact that they held them. Because their own authority
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is no reason for them to believe what they believe, it is no reason
for anyone else, either.
Sometimes the appeal to authority is fallacious because the
authoritative person is not an expert on the issue in dispute. The
fact that a high-energy physicist has won the Nobel Prize is no rea-
son for attaching any special weight to her views on the causes of
cancer, the reduction of traffic accidents, or the legalization of mar-
ijuana. On the other hand, one would be well advised to attend to
her views on the advisability of ballistic missile-defense systems, for
there may be a connection between the kind of research for which
she received the prize and the defense research projects.
All of us depend heavily on the knowledge of various experts
and authorities, and so we tend not to ignore their views.
Conversely, we should resist the temptation to accord their views
on diverse subjects the same respect that we grant them in the area
of their expertise.
Appeal to Fear The Romans called this fallacy ad baculum, “resort-
ing to violence” (baculum means “stick,” or “club”). Trying to per-
suade people to agree with you by threatening them with painful
consequences is obviously an appeal that no rational person would
contemplate. The violence need not be physical; if you threaten
someone with the loss of a job, for instance, you are still using a
stick. Violence or the threat of harmful consequences in the course
of an argument is beyond reason and always shows the haste or
impatience of those who appeal to it. It is also an indication that
the argument on its merits would be unpersuasive, inconclusive, or
worse. President Teddy Roosevelt’s epigrammatic doctrine for the
kind of foreign policy he favored—“Speak softly but carry a big
stick”—illustrates an attempt to have it both ways, an appeal to
reason for starters, but a recourse to coercion, or the threat of coer-
cion, as a backup if needed.
Finally, we add two fallacies, not easily embraced by Engel’s
three categories that have served us well thus far (ambiguity, erro-
neous presumption, and irrelevance): death by a thousand qualifi-
cations and protecting the hypothesis.
Death by a Thousand Qualifications In a letter of recommenda-
tion, sent in support of an applicant for a job on your newspaper,
you find this sentence: “Young Smith was the best student I’ve ever
taught in an English course.” Pretty strong endorsement, you
think, except that you do not know, because you have not been
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told, the letter writer is a very junior faculty member, has been
teaching for only two years, is an instructor in the history depart-
ment, taught a section of freshman English as a courtesy for a sick
colleague, and had only eight students enrolled in the course.
Thanks to these implicit qualifications, the letter writer did not lie
or exaggerate in his praise; but the effect of his sentence on you,
the unwitting reader, is quite misleading. The explicit claim in the
letter, and its impact on you, is quite different from the tacitly qual-
ified claim in the mind of the writer.
Death by a thousand qualifications gets its name from the
ancient torture of death by a thousand small cuts. Thus, a bold asser-
tion can be virtually killed, its true content reduced to nothing, bit by
bit, as all the appropriate or necessary qualifications are added to it.
Consider another example. Suppose you hear a politician describing
another country (let’s call it Ruritania so as not to offend anyone) as
a “democracy”—except it turns out that Ruritania doesn’t have reg-
ular elections, lacks a written constitution, has no independent judi-
ciary, prohibits religious worship except of the state-designated
deity, and so forth. So what is left of the original claim that
Ruritania is a democracy is little or nothing. The qualifications have
taken all the content out of the original description.
Protecting the Hypothesis In Chapter 3, we contrasted reasoning
and rationalization (or the finding of bad reasons for what one
intends to believe anyway). Rationalization can take subtle forms,
as the following example indicates. Suppose you’re standing with a
friend on the shore or on a pier, and you watch as a ship heads out
to sea. As it reaches the horizon, it slowly disappears—first the
hull, then the upper decks, and finally the tip of the mast. Because
the ship (you both assume) isn’t sinking, it occurs to you that you
have in this sequence of observations convincing evidence that the
earth’s surface is curved. Nonsense, says your companion. Light
waves sag, or bend down, over distances of a few miles, and so a flat
surface (such as the ocean) can intercept them. Hence the ship,
which appears to be going “over” the horizon, really isn’t: It’s just
moving steadily farther and farther away in a straight line. Your
friend, you discover to your amazement, is a card-carrying member
of the Flat Earth Society (yes, there really is such an organization).
Now most of us would regard the idea that light rays bend down
in the manner required by the Flat Earther’s argument as a
rationalization whose sole purpose is to protect the flat-earth doc-
trine against counterevidence. We would be convinced it was a
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rationalization, and not a very good one at that, if the Flat Earther
held to it despite a patient and thorough explanation from a physi-
cist that showed modern optical theory to be quite incompatible
with the view that light waves sag.
This example illustrates two important points about the backing
of arguments. First, it is always possible to protect a hypothesis by
abandoning adjacent or connected hypotheses; this is the tactic our
Flat Earth friend has used. This maneuver is possible, however,
only because—and this is the second point—whenever we test a
hypothesis, we do so by taking for granted (usually quite uncon-
sciously) many other hypotheses as well. So the evidence for the
hypothesis we think we are confirming is impossible to separate
entirely from the adequacy of the connected hypotheses. As long as
we have no reason to doubt that light rays travel in straight lines
(at least over distances of a few miles), our Flat Earth friend’s argu-
ment is unconvincing. But once that hypothesis is itself put in
doubt, the idea that looked at first to be a pathetic rationalization
takes on an even more troublesome character.
There are, then, not one but two fallacies exposed by this
example. The first and perhaps graver is in rigging your hypothesis
so that no matter what observations are brought against it, you will
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✓ A CHECKLIST FOR EVALUATING AN ARGUMENT
FROM A LOGICAL POINT OF VIEW
� Is the argument purely deductive, purely inductive, or a mixture
of the two?
� If it is deductive, is it valid?
� If it is valid, are all its premises and assumptions true?
� If it is not valid, what fallacy does it commit?
� If it is not valid, are the claims at least consistent with each other?
� If it is not valid, can you think of additional plausible
assumptions that would make it valid?
� If the argument is inductive, on what observations is it based?
� If the argument is inductive, how probable are its premises and
its conclusion?
� In any case, can you think of evidence that would further
confirm the conclusion? Disconfirm the conclusion?
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count nothing as falsifying it. The second and subtler is in thinking
that as you test one hypothesis, all of your other background beliefs
are left safely to one side, immaculate and uninvolved. On the con-
trary, our beliefs form a corporate structure, intertwined and con-
nected to each other with great complexity, and no one of them can
ever be singled out for unique and isolated application, confirmation,
or disconfirmation, to the world around us.
EXERCISE: FALLACIES —OR NOT?
Here, for diversion and practice, are some fallacies in action. Some
of these statements, however, are not fallacies. Can you tell which
is which? Can you detect what has gone wrong in the cases where
something has gone wrong? Please explain your reasoning.
1. Abortion is murder—and it doesn’t matter whether we’re talking
about killing a human embryo or a human fetus.
2. Euthanasia is not a good thing, it’s murder—and it doesn’t matter
how painful one’s dying may be.
3. Never loan a tool to a friend. I did once and never got it back.
4. If the neighbors don’t like our loud music, that’s just too bad. After
all, we have a right to listen to the music we like when and where
we want to play it.
5. The Good Samaritan in the Bible was pretty foolish; he was taking
grave risks with no benefits for him in sight.
6. “Shoot first and ask questions afterward” is a good epigram for the
kind of foreign policy we need.
7. “You can fool some of the people all of the time, and you can fool
all the people some of the time, but you can’t fool all the people all
of the time.” That’s what Abraham Lincoln said, and he was right.
8. It doesn’t matter whether Shakespeare wrote the plays attributed
to him. What matters is whether the plays are any good.
9. The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco ought to be closed down.
After all, just look at all the suicides that have occurred there.
10. Reparations for African Americans are way overdue; it’s just
another version of the reparations eventually paid to the Japanese
Americans who were wrongly interned in 1942 during World
War II.
11. Animals don’t have rights any more than do trees or stones. They
don’t have desires, either. What they have are feelings and needs.
12. The average American family is said to have 2.1 children. This is ab-
surd—did you ever meet 2.1 children?
13. My marriage was a failure, which just proves my point: Don’t ever
get married in the first place.
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14. The Red Queen in Alice in Wonderland was right: Verdict first, evidence
later.
15. Not until astronauts sailed through space around the moon and
could see its back side for themselves did we have adequate reason
to believe that the moon even had a back side.
16. If you start out with a bottle of beer a day and then go on to a glass
or two of wine on the weekends, you’re well on your way to
becoming a hopeless drunk.
17. Two Indians are sitting on a fence. The small Indian is the son of
the big Indian, but the big Indian is not the small Indian’s father.
How is that possible?
18. If you toss a coin five times and each time it come up heads, it is
more likely than not that on the sixth throw you’ll come up heads
again—or is it more likely that you’ll come up tails? Or is neither
more likely?
19. Going to church on a regular basis is bad for your health. Instead of
sitting in a pew for an hour each Sunday you’d be better off taking
an hour’s brisk walk.
20. You can’t trust anything he says. When he was young he was an
avid Communist.
21. Since 9/11 we’ve tried and convicted few terrorists, so our defense
systems must be working.
22. We can trust the White House in its press releases because it’s a
reliable source of information.
23. Intelligent design must be true because the theory of evolution
can’t explain how life began.
24. Andreas Serrano’s notorious photograph called Piss Christ (1989),
showing a small plastic crucifix submerged in a glass of urine,
never should have been put on public display, let alone financed by
public funds.
25. Doubting Thomas was right—you need more than somebody’s
say-so to support a claim of resurrection.
26. You are a professional baseball player and you have a good-luck
charm. When you wear it the team wins. When you don’t wear it
the team loses. What do you infer?
27. Resolve the following dilemma: When it rains you can’t fix the
hole in the roof. When it’s not raining there is no need to mend
the roof. Conclusion: Leave the roof as it is.
28. You are at the beach and you watch a ship steaming toward the
horizon. Bit by bit it disappears from view—first the masts, then
the upper deck, then the main deck, then the stern, and then it’s
gone. Why would it be wrong to infer that the ship is sinking?
29. How can it be true that “it’s the exception that proves the rule”? If
anything, isn’t it the exception that disproves the rule?
30. How come herbivores don’t eat herbs?
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31. In the 1930s it was commonplace to see ads announcing “More
Doctors Smoke Camels.” What do you make of such an ad?
32. Suppose the only way you could save five innocent people was by
killing one of them. Would you do it? Suppose the only way you
could save one innocent person was by killing five others. Would
you do it?
Max Shulman
Having read about proper and improper arguments, you are now well
equipped to read a short story on the topic.
Max Shulman (1919–1988) began his career as a writer when he was
a journalism student at the University of Minnesota. Later he wrote humor-
ous novels, stories, and plays. One of his novels, Barefoot Boy with
Cheek (1943), was made into a musical, and another, Rally Round the
Flag, Boys! (1957), was made into a film starring Paul Newman and
Joanne Woodward. The Tender Trap (1954), a play he wrote with Robert
Paul Smith, still retains its popularity with theater groups.
“Love Is a Fallacy” was first published in 1951, when demeaning
stereotypes about women and minorities were widely accepted in the mar-
ketplace as well as the home. Thus, jokes about domineering mothers-in-
law or about dumb blondes routinely met with no objection.
Love Is a Fallacy
Cool was I and logical. Keen, calculating, perspicacious, acute,
and astute—I was all of these. My brain was as powerful as a
dynamo, as precise as a chemist’s scales, as penetrating as a scalpel.
And—think of it!—I was only eighteen.
It is not often that one so young has such a giant intellect.
Take, for example, Petey Bellows, my roommate at the university.
Same age, same background, but dumb as an ox. A nice enough
fellow, you understand, but nothing upstairs. Emotional type.
Unstable. Impressionable. Worst of all, a faddist. Fads, I submit, are
the very negation of reason. To be swept up in every new craze that
comes along, to surrender yourself to idiocy just because everybody
else is doing it—this, to me, is the acme of mindlessness. Not, how-
ever, to Petey.
One afternoon I found Petey lying on his bed with an expres-
sion of such distress on his face that I immediately diagnosed
appendicitis. “Don’t move,” I said. “Don’t take a laxative. I’ll call a
doctor.”
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“Raccoon,” he mumbled thickly.
“Raccoon?” I said, pausing in my flight.
“I want a raccoon coat,” he wailed.
I perceived that his trouble was not physical, but mental. “Why
do you want a raccoon coat?”
“I should have known it,” he cried, pounding his temples. “I
should have known they’d come back when the Charleston came
back. Like a fool I spent all my money for textbooks, and now I
can’t get a raccoon coat.”
“Can you mean,” I said incredulously, “that people are actually
wearing raccoon coats again?”
“All the Big Men on Campus are wearing them. Where’ve you
been?”
“In the library,” I said, naming a place not frequented by Big
Men on Campus.
He leaped from the bed and paced the room. “I’ve got to have a
raccoon coat,” he said passionately. “I’ve got to!”
“Petey, why? Look at it rationally. Raccoon coats are unsanitary.
They shed. They smell bad. They weigh too much. They’re unsightly.
They——”
“You don’t understand,” he interrupted impatiently. “It’s the
thing to do. Don’t you want to be in the swim?”
“No,” I said truthfully.
“Well, I do,” he declared. “I’d give anything for a raccoon coat.
Anything!”
My brain, that precision instrument, slipped into high gear.
“Anything?” I asked, looking at him narrowly.
“Anything,” he affirmed in ringing tones.
I stroked my chin thoughtfully. It so happened that I knew
where to get my hands on a raccoon coat. My father had had one
in his undergraduate days; it lay now in a trunk in the attic back
home. It also happened that Petey had something I wanted. He
didn’t have it exactly, but at least he had first rights on it. I refer to
his girl, Polly Espy.
I had long coveted Polly Espy. Let me emphasize that my
desire for this young woman was not emotional in nature. She
was, to be sure, a girl who excited the emotions, but I was not
one to let my heart rule my head. I wanted Polly for a shrewdly
calculated, entirely cerebral reason.
I was a freshman in law school. In a few years I would be out
in practice. I was well aware of the importance of the right kind of
wife in furthering a lawyer’s career. The successful lawyers I had
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observed were, almost without exception, married to beautiful,
gracious, intelligent women. With one omission, Polly fitted these
specifications perfectly.
Beautiful she was. She was not yet of pin-up proportions, but I
felt sure that time would supply the lack. She already had the
makings.
Gracious she was. By gracious I mean full of graces. She had an
erectness of carriage, an ease of bearing, a poise that clearly indi-
cated the best of breeding. At table her manners were exquisite. I
had seen her at the Kozy Kampus Korner eating the specialty of the
house—a sandwich that contained scraps of pot roast, gravy,
chopped nuts, and a dipper of sauerkraut—without even getting
her fingers moist.
Intelligent she was not. In fact, she veered in the opposite direc-
tion. But I believed that under my guidance she would smarten up.
At any rate, it was worth a try. It is, after all, easier to make a beau-
tiful dumb girl smart than to make an ugly smart girl beautiful.
“Petey,” I said, “are you in love with Polly Espy?”
“I think she’s a keen kid,” he replied, “but I don’t know if you’d
call it love. Why?”
“Do you,” I asked, “have any kind of formal arrangement with
her? I mean are you going steady or anything like that?”
“No. We see each other quite a bit, but we both have other
dates. Why?”
“Is there,” I asked, “any other man for whom she has a particu-
lar fondness?”
“Not that I know of. Why?”
I nodded with satisfaction. “In other words, if you were out of
the picture, the field would be open. Is that right?”
“I guess so. What are you getting at?”
“Nothing, nothing,” I said innocently, and took my suitcase out
of the closet.
“Where you going?” asked Petey.
“Home for the week end.” I threw a few things into the bag.
“Listen,” he said, clutching my arm eagerly, “while you’re
home, you couldn’t get some money from your old man, could
you, and lend it to me so I can buy a raccoon coat?”
“I may do better than that,” I said with a mysterious wink and
closed my bag and left.
“Look,” I said to Petey when I got back Monday morning. I
threw open the suitcase and revealed the huge, hairy, gamy object
that my father had worn in his Stutz Bearcat in 1925.
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“Holy Toledo!” said Petey reverently. He plunged his hands into
the raccoon coat and then his face. “Holy Toledo!” he repeated fif-
teen or twenty times.
“Would you like it?” I asked.
“Oh yes!” he cried, clutching the greasy pelt to him. Then a
canny look came into his eyes. “What do you want for it?”
“Your girl,” I said, mincing no words.
“Polly?” he said in a horrified whisper. “You want Polly?”
“That’s right.”
He flung the coat from him. “Never,” he said stoutly.
I shrugged. “Okay. If you don’t want to be in the swim, I guess
it’s your business.”
I sat down in a chair and pretended to read a book, but out of
the corner of my eye I kept watching Petey. He was a torn man.
First he looked at the coat with the expression of a waif at a bakery
window. Then he turned away and set his jaw resolutely. Then he
looked back at the coat, with even more longing in his face. Then
he turned away, but with not so much resolution this time. Back
and forth his head swiveled, desire waxing, resolution waning.
Finally he didn’t turn away at all; he just stood and stared with
mad lust at the coat.
“It isn’t as though I was in love with Polly,” he said thickly. “Or
going steady or anything like that.”
“That’s right,” I murmured.
“What’s Polly to me, or me to Polly?”
“Not a thing,” said I.
“It’s just been a casual kick—just a few laughs, that’s all.”
“Try on the coat,” said I.
He complied. The coat bunched high over his ears and dropped
all the way down to his shoe tops. He looked like a mound of dead
raccoons. “Fits fine,” he said happily.
I rose from my chair. “Is it a deal?” I asked, extending my hand.
He swallowed. “It’s a deal,” he said and shook my hand.
I had my first date with Polly the following evening. This was
in the nature of a survey; I wanted to find out just how much work
I had to do to get her mind up to the standard I required. I took her
first to dinner. “Gee, that was a delish dinner,” she said as we left
the restaurant. Then I took her to a movie. “Gee, that was a marvy
movie,” she said as we left the theater. And then I took her home.
“Gee, I had a sensaysh time,” she said as she bade me good night.
I went back to my room with a heavy heart. I had gravely
underestimated the size of my task. This girl’s lack of information
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was terrifying. Nor would it be enough merely to supply her with
information. First she had to be taught to think. This loomed as a
project of no small dimensions, and at first I was tempted to give
her back to Petey. But then I got to thinking about her abundant
physical charms and about the way she entered a room and the
way she handled a knife and fork, and I decided to make an effort.
I went about it, as in all things, systematically. I gave her a
course in logic. It happened that I, as a law student, was taking a
course in logic myself, so I had all the facts at my fingertips. “Polly,”
I said to her when I picked her up on our next date, “tonight we
are going over to the Knoll and talk.”
“Oo, terrif,” she replied. One thing I will say for this girl: You
would go far to find another so agreeable.
We went to the Knoll, the campus trysting place, and we sat
down under an old oak, and she looked at me expectantly: “What
are we going to talk about?” she asked.
“Logic.”
She thought this over for a minute and decided she liked it.
”Magnif,” she said.
“Logic,” I said, clearing my throat, “is the science of thinking.
Before we can think correctly, we must first learn to recognize the
common fallacies of logic. These we will take up tonight.”
“Wow-dow!” she cried, clapping her hands delightedly.
I winced, but went bravely on. “First let us examine the fallacy
called Dicto Simpliciter.”
“By all means,” she urged, batting her lashes eagerly.
“Dicto Simpliciter means an argument based on an unqualified
generalization. For example: Exercise is good. Therefore everybody
should exercise.”
“I agree,” said Polly earnestly. “I mean exercise is wonderful. I
mean it builds the body and everything.”
“Polly,” I said gently, “the argument is a fallacy. Exercise is good is
an unqualified generalization. For instance, if you have heart dis-
ease, exercise is bad, not good. Many people are ordered by their
doctors not to exercise. You must qualify the generalization. You
must say exercise is usually good, or exercise is good for most people.
Otherwise you have committed a Dicto Simpliciter. Do you see?”
“No,” she confessed. “But this is marvy. Do more! Do more!”
“It will be better if you stop tugging at my sleeve,” I told her, and
when she desisted, I continued. “Next we take up a fallacy called
Hasty Generalization. Listen carefully: You can’t speak French. I can’t
speak French. Petey Bellows can’t speak French. I must therefore
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conclude that nobody at the University of Minnesota can speak
French.”
“Really?” said Polly, amazed. “Nobody?”
I hid my exasperation. “Polly, it’s a fallacy. The generalization is
reached too hastily. There are too few instances to support such a con-
clusion.”
“Know any more fallacies?” she asked breathlessly. “This is more
fun than dancing even.”
I fought off a wave of despair. I was getting nowhere with this
girl, absolutely nowhere. Still, I am nothing if not persistent. I con-
tinued. “Next comes Post Hoc. Listen to this: Let’s not take Bill on
our picnic. Every time we take him out with us, it rains.”
“I know somebody just like that,” she exclaimed. “A girl back
home—Eula Becker, her name is. It never fails. Every single time
we take her on a picnic——”
“Polly,” I said sharply, “it’s a fallacy. Eula Becker doesn’t cause
the rain. She has no connection with the rain. You are guilty of
Post Hoc if you blame Eula Becker.”
“I’ll never do it again,” she promised contritely. “Are you mad
at me?”
I sighed. “No, Polly, I’m not mad.”
“Then tell me some more fallacies.”
“All right. Let’s try Contradictory Premises.”
“Yes, let’s,” she chirped, blinking her eyes happily.
I frowned, but plunged ahead. “Here’s an example of
Contradictory Premises: If God can do anything, can He make a
stone so heavy that He won’t be able to lift it?”
“Of course,” she replied promptly.
“But if He can do anything, He can lift the stone,” I pointed out.
“Yeah,” she said thoughtfully. “Well, then I guess He can’t make
the stone.”
“But He can do anything,” I reminded her.
She scratched her pretty, empty head. “I’m all confused,” she ad-
mitted.
“Of course you are. Because when the premises of an argu-
ment contradict each other, there can be no argument. If there is
an irresistible force, there can be no immovable object. If there is
an immovable object, there can be no irresistible force. Get it?”
“Tell me some more of this keen stuff,” she said eagerly.
I consulted my watch. “I think we’d better call it a night. I’ll
take you home now, and you go over all the things you’ve learned.
We’ll have another session tomorrow night.”
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I deposited her at the girls’ dormitory, where she assured me
that she had had a perfectly terrif evening, and I went glumly
home to my room. Petey lay snoring in his bed, the raccoon coat
huddled like a great hairy beast at his feet. For a moment I consid-
ered waking him and telling him that he could have his girl back. It
seemed clear that my project was doomed to failure. The girl simply
had a logic-proof head.
But then I reconsidered. I had wasted one evening; I might as
well waste another. Who knew? Maybe somewhere in the extinct
crater of her mind a few embers still smoldered. Maybe somehow I
could fan them into flame. Admittedly it was not a prospect fraught
with hope, but I decided to give it one more try.
Seated under the oak the next evening I said, “Our first fallacy
tonight is called Ad Misericordiam.”
She quivered with delight.
“Listen closely,” I said. “A man applies for a job. When the boss
asks him what his qualifications are, he replies that he has a wife and
six children at home, the wife is a helpless cripple, the children have
nothing to eat, no clothes to wear, no shoes on their feet, there are
no beds in the house, no coal in the cellar, and winter is coming.”
A tear rolled down each of Polly’s pink cheeks. “Oh, this is
awful, awful,” she sobbed.
“Yes, it’s awful,” I agreed, “but it’s no argument. The man never
answered the boss’s question about his qualifications. Instead he
appealed to the boss’s sympathy. He committed the fallacy of Ad
Misericordiam. Do you understand?”
“Have you got a handkerchief?” she blubbered.
I handed her a handkerchief and tried to keep from screaming
while she wiped her eyes. “Next,” I said in a carefully controlled
tone, “we will discuss False Analogy. Here is an example: Students
should be allowed to look at their textbooks during examinations.
After all, surgeons have X rays to guide them during an operation,
lawyers have briefs to guide them during a trial, carpenters have
blueprints to guide them when they are building a house. Why,
then, shouldn’t students be allowed to look at their textbooks dur-
ing an examination?”
“There now,” she said enthusiastically, “is the most marvy idea
I’ve heard in years.”
“Polly,” I said testily, “the argument is all wrong. Doctors, lawyers,
and carpenters aren’t taking a test to see how much they have
learned, but students are. The situations are altogether different,
and you can’t make an analogy between them.”
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“I still think it’s a good idea,” said Polly.
“Nuts,” I muttered. Doggedly I pressed on. “Next we’ll try
Hypothesis Contrary to Fact.”
“Sounds yummy,” was Polly’s reaction.
“Listen: If Madame Curie had not happened to leave a photo-
graphic plate in a drawer with a chunk of pitchblende, the world
today would not know about radium.”
“True, true,” said Polly, nodding her head. “Did you see the
movie? Oh, it just knocked me out. That Walter Pidgeon is so
dreamy. I mean he fractures me.”
“If you can forget Mr. Pidgeon for a moment,” I said coldly, “I
would like to point out that the statement is a fallacy. Maybe
Madame Curie would have discovered radium at some later date.
Maybe somebody else would have discovered it. Maybe any num-
ber of things would have happened. You can’t start with a hypoth-
esis that is not true and then draw any supportable conclusions
from it.”
“They ought to put Walter Pidgeon in more pictures,” said Polly.
“I hardly ever see him any more.”
One more chance, I decided. But just one more. There is a limit
to what flesh and blood can bear. “The next fallacy is called
Poisoning the Well.”
“How cute!” she gurgled.
“Two men are having a debate. The first one gets up and
says, ‘My opponent is a notorious liar. You can’t believe a word
that he is going to say.’ . . . Now, Polly, think. Think hard. What’s
wrong?”
I watched her closely as she knit her creamy brow in concen-
tration. Suddenly a glimmer of intelligence—the first I had seen—
came into her eyes. “It’s not fair,” she said with indignation. “It’s
not a bit fair. What chance has the second man got if the first man
calls him a liar before he even begins talking?”
“Right!” I cried exultantly. “One hundred percent right. It’s not
fair. The first man has poisoned the well before anybody could drink
from it. He has hamstrung his opponent before he could even
start. . . . Polly, I’m proud of you.”
“Pshaw,” she murmured, blushing with pleasure.
“You see, my dear, these things aren’t so hard. All you have to
do is concentrate. Think —examine—evaluate. Come now, let’s
review everything we have learned.”
“Fire away,” she said with an airy wave of her hand.
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Heartened by the knowledge that Polly was not altogether a
cretin, I began a long, patient review of all I had told her. Over and
over and over again I cited instances, pointed out flaws, kept ham-
mering away without letup. It was like digging a tunnel. At first
everything was work, sweat, and darkness. I had no idea when I
would reach the light, or even if I would. But I persisted. I pounded
and clawed and scraped, and finally I was rewarded. I saw a chink
of light. And then the chink got bigger and the sun came pouring in
and all was bright.
Five grueling nights this took, but it was worth it. I had made a
logician out of Polly; I had taught her to think. My job was done.
She was worthy of me at last. She was a fit wife for me, a proper
hostess for my many mansions, a suitable mother for my well-
heeled children.
It must not be thought that I was without love for this girl.
Quite the contrary. Just as Pygmalion loved the perfect woman he
had fashioned, so I loved mine. I decided to acquaint her with my
feelings at our very next meeting. The time had come to change
our relationship from academic to romantic.
“Polly,” I said when next we sat beneath our oak, “tonight we
will not discuss fallacies.”
“Aw, gee,” she said, disappointed.
“My dear,” I said, favoring her with a smile, “we have now
spent five evenings together. We have gotten along splendidly. It is
clear that we are well matched.”
“Hasty Generalization,” said Polly brightly.
“I beg your pardon,” said I.
“Hasty Generalization,” she repeated. “How can you say that
we are well matched on the basis of only five dates?”
I chuckled with amusement. The dear child had learned her
lessons well. “My dear,” I said, patting her hand in a tolerant man-
ner, “five dates is plenty. After all, you don’t have to eat a whole
cake to know that it’s good.”
“False Analogy,” said Polly promptly. “I’m not a cake. I’m a girl.”
I chuckled with somewhat less amusement. The dear child had
learned her lesson perhaps too well. I decided to change tactics.
Obviously the best approach was a simple, strong, direct declara-
tion of love. I paused for a moment while my massive brain chose
the proper words. Then I began:
“Polly, I love you. You are the whole world to me, and the
moon and the stars and the constellations of outer space. Please,
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my darling, say that you will go steady with me, for if you will not,
life will be meaningless. I will languish. I will refuse my meals. I
will wander the face of the earth, a shambling, hollow-eyed hulk.”
There, I thought, folding my arms, that ought to do it.
“Ad Misericordiam,” said Polly.
I ground my teeth. I was not Pygmalion; I was Frankenstein,
and my monster had me by the throat. Frantically I fought back the
tide of panic surging through me. At all costs I had to keep cool.
“Well, Polly,” I said, forcing a smile, “you certainly have learned
your fallacies.”
“You’re darn right,” she said with a vigorous nod.
“And who taught them to you, Polly?”
“You did.”
“That’s right. So you do owe me something, don’t you, my
dear? If I hadn’t come along you never would have learned about
fallacies.”
“Hypothesis Contrary to Fact,” she said instantly.
I dashed perspiration from my brow. “Polly,” I croaked, “You
mustn’t take all these things so literally. I mean this is just class-
room stuff. You know that the things you learn in school don’t
have anything to do with life.”
“Dicto Simpliciter,” she said, wagging her finger at me playfully.
That did it. I leaped to my feet, bellowing like a bull. “Will you
or will you not go steady with me?”
“I will not,” she replied.
“Why not?” I demanded.
“Because this afternoon I promised Petey Bellows that I would
go steady with him.”
I reeled back, overcome with the infamy of it. After he prom-
ised, after he made a deal, after he shook my hand! “That rat!” I
shrieked, kicking up great chunks of turf. “You can’t go with him,
Polly. He’s a liar. He’s a cheat. He’s a rat.”
“Poisoning the Well,” said Polly, “and stop shouting. I think
shouting must be a fallacy too.”
With an immense effort of will, I modulated my voice. “All
right,” I said. “You’re a logician. Let’s look at this thing logically.
How could you choose Petey Bellows over me? Look at me—a bril-
liant student, a tremendous intellectual, a man with an assured
future. Look at Petey—a knothead, a jitterbug, a guy who’ll never
know where his next meal is coming from. Can you give me one
logical reason why you should go steady with Petey Bellows?”
“I certainly can,” declared Polly. “He’s got a raccoon coat.”
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TOPIC FOR CRITICAL THINKING AND WRITING
After you have finished reading “Love Is a Fallacy,” you may want
to write an argumentative essay of 500 to 750 words on one of the
following topics: (1) the story, rightly understood, is not anti-
woman; (2) if the story is antiwoman, it is equally antiman; (3)
the story is antiwoman but nevertheless belongs in this book; or
(4) the story is antiwoman and does not belong in the book.
SHULMAN / LOVE IS A FALLACY 339
See the companion Web site
bedfordstmartins.com/barnetbedau
for a series of brain teasers and links related to
the logical point of view in argument.
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A Psychologist’s View:
Rogerian Argument
Real communication occurs . . . when we listen with understanding.
— CARL ROGERS
The first duty of a wise advocate is to convince his opponents that
he understands their arguments, and sympathizes with their just
feelings.
— SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE
ROGERIAN ARGUMENT: AN INTRODUCTION
Carl R. Rogers (1902–1987), perhaps best known for his book enti-
tled On Becoming a Person (1961), was a psychotherapist, not a teacher
of writing. This short essay by Rogers has, however, exerted much
influence on instructors who teach argument. Written in the 1950s,
this essay reflects the political climate of the cold war between the
United States and the Soviet Union, which dominated headlines
for more than forty years (1947–1989). Several of Rogers’s exam-
ples of bias and frustrated communication allude to the tensions of
that era.
On the surface, many arguments seem to show A arguing
with B, presumably seeking to change B’s mind; but A’s argument
is really directed not to B but to C. This attempt to persuade a
nonparticipant is evident in the courtroom, where neither the
prosecutor (A) nor the defense lawyer (B) is really trying to con-
vince the opponent. Rather, both are trying to convince a third
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party, the jury (C). Prosecutors do not care whether they con-
vince defense lawyers; they don’t even mind infuriating defense
lawyers because their only real goal is to convince the jury.
Similarly, the writer of a letter to a newspaper, taking issue with
an editorial, does not expect to change the paper’s policy. Rather,
the writer hopes to convince a third party, the reader of the
newspaper.
But suppose A really does want to bring B around to A’s point
of view. Suppose Mary really wants to persuade the teacher to
allow her little lamb to stay in the classroom. Rogers points out that
when we engage in an argument, if we feel our integrity or our
identity is threatened, we will stiffen our position. (The teacher
may feel that his or her dignity is compromised by the presence of
the lamb and will scarcely attend to Mary’s argument.) The sense of
threat may be so great that we are unable to consider the alterna-
tive views being offered, and we therefore remain unpersuaded.
Threatened, we may defend ourselves rather than our argument,
and little communication takes place. Of course, a third party might
say that we or our opponent presented the more convincing case,
but we, and perhaps the opponent, have scarcely listened to each
other, and so the two of us remain apart.
Rogers suggests, therefore, that a writer who wishes to com-
municate with someone (as opposed to convincing a third party)
needs to reduce the threat. In a sense, the participants in the argu-
ment need to become partners rather than adversaries. Rogers
writes, “Mutual communication tends to be pointed toward solv-
ing a problem rather than toward attacking a person or group.”
Thus, an essay on whether schools should test students for use of
drugs, need not — and probably should not — see the issue as black
or white, either/or. Such an essay might indicate that testing is
undesirable because it may have bad effects, but in some circum-
stances it may be acceptable. This qualification does not mean that
one must compromise. Thus, the essayist might argue that the
potential danger to liberty is so great that no circumstances justify
testing students for drugs. But even such an essayist should recog-
nize the merit (however limited) of the opposition and should
grant that the position being advanced itself entails great difficul-
ties and dangers.
A writer who wishes to reduce the psychological threat to the
opposition and thus facilitate the partnership in the study of some
issue can do several things:
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• One can show sympathetic understanding of the opposing
argument,
• One can recognize what is valid in it, and
• One can recognize and demonstrate that those who take the
other side are nonetheless persons of goodwill.
Advocates of Rogerian argument are likely to contrast it with
Aristotelian argument, saying that the style of argument associated
with Aristotle (384–322 B.C., Greek philosopher and rhetorician)
• Is adversarial, seeking to refute other views; and
• Sees the listener as wrong, someone who now must be over-
whelmed by evidence.
In contrast to the confrontational Aristotelian style, which allegedly
seeks to present an airtight case that compels belief, Rogerian argu-
ment (it is said)
• Is nonconfrontational, collegial, and friendly;
• Respects other views and allows for plural truths; and
• Seeks to achieve some degree of assent rather than convince
utterly.
Thus a writer who takes Rogers seriously will, usually, in the
first part of an argumentative essay
1. State the problem,
2. Give the opponent’s position, and
3. Grant whatever validity the writer finds in that position—
for instance, will recognize the circumstances in which the
position would indeed be acceptable.
Next, the writer will, if possible,
4. Attempt to show how the opposing position will be improved
if the writer’s own position is accepted.
Sometimes, of course, the differing positions may be so far
apart that no reconciliation can be proposed, in which case the
writer will probably seek to show how the problem can best be
solved by adopting the writer’s own position. We have discussed
these matters in Chapter 6, but not from the point of view of a psy-
chotherapist, and so we reprint Rogers’s essay here.
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Carl R. Rogers
Communication: Its Blocking
and Its Facilitation
It may seem curious that a person whose whole professional
effort is devoted to psychotherapy should be interested in problems
of communication. What relationship is there between providing
therapeutic help to individuals with emotional maladjustments
and the concern of this conference with obstacles to communica-
tion? Actually the relationship is very close indeed. The whole
task of psychotherapy is the task of dealing with a failure in com-
munication. The emotionally maladjusted person, the “neurotic,”
is in difficulty first because communication within himself has
broken down, and second because as a result of this his com-
munication with others has been damaged. If this sounds some-
what strange, then let me put it in other terms. In the “neurotic”
individual, parts of himself which have been termed unconscious,
or repressed, or denied to awareness, become blocked off so that
they no longer communicate themselves to the conscious or man-
aging part of himself. As long as this is true, there are distortions
in the way he communicates himself to others, and so he suffers
both within himself, and in his interpersonal relations. The task
of psychotherapy is to help the person achieve, through a special
relationship with a therapist, good communication within him-
self. Once this is achieved he can communicate more freely and
more effectively with others. We may say then that psychother-
apy is good communication, within and between men. We may
also turn that statement around and it will still be true. Good
communication, free communication, within or between men, is
always therapeutic.
It is, then, from a background of experience with communica-
tion in counseling and psychotherapy that I want to present here
two ideas. I wish to state what I believe is one of the major factors
in blocking or impeding communication, and then I wish to present
what in our experience has proven to be a very important way to
improving or facilitating communication.
I would like to propose, as an hypothesis for consideration, that
the major barrier to mutual interpersonal communication is our
very natural tendency to judge, to evaluate, to approve or disapprove,
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the statement of the person, or the other group. Let me illustrate my
meaning with some very simple examples. As you leave the meet-
ing tonight, one of the statements you are likely to hear is, “I didn’t
like that man’s talk.” Now what do you respond? Almost invariably
your reply will be either approval or disapproval of the attitude
expressed. Either you respond, “I didn’t either. I thought it was
terrible,” or else you tend to reply, “Oh, I thought it was really
good.” In other words, your primary reaction is to evaluate what
has just been said to you, to evaluate it from your point of view,
your own frame of reference.
Or take another example. Suppose I say with some feeling, “I
think the Republicans are behaving in ways that show a lot of good
sound sense these days,” what is the response that arises in your
mind as you listen? The overwhelming likelihood is that it will be
evaluative. You will find yourself agreeing, or disagreeing, or mak-
ing some judgment about me such as “He must be a conservative,”
or “He seems solid in his thinking.” Or let us take an illustration
from the international scene. Russia says vehemently, “The treaty
with Japan is a war plot on the part of the United States.” We rise
as one person to say “That’s a lie!”
This last illustration brings in another element connected with
my hypothesis. Although the tendency to make evaluations is com-
mon in almost all interchange of language, it is very much height-
ened in those situations where feelings and emotions are deeply
involved. So the stronger our feelings, the more likely it is that
there will be no mutual element in the communication. There will
be just two ideas, two feelings, two judgments, missing each other
in psychological space. I’m sure you recognize this from your own
experience. When you have not been emotionally involved your-
self, and have listened to a heated discussion, you often go away
thinking, “Well, they actually weren’t talking about the same
thing.” And they were not. Each was making a judgment, an evalu-
ation, from his own frame of reference. There was really nothing
which could be called communication in any genuine sense. This
tendency to react to any emotionally meaningful statement by
forming an evaluation of it from our own point of view, is, I repeat,
the major barrier to interpersonal communication.
But is there any way of solving this problem, of avoiding this
barrier? I feel that we are making exciting progress toward this goal
and I would like to present it as simply as I can. Real communica-
tion occurs, and this evaluative tendency is avoided, when we lis-
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ten with understanding. What does that mean? It means to see the
expressed idea and attitude from the other person’s point of view, to sense
how it feels to him, to achieve his frame of reference in regard to the thing
he is talking about.
Stated so briefly, this may sound absurdly simple, but it is not.
It is an approach which we have found extremely potent in the
field of psychotherapy. It is the most effective agent we know for
altering the basic personality structure of an individual, and
improving his relationships and his communications with others. If
I can listen to what he can tell me, if I can understand how it seems
to him, if I can see its personal meaning for him, if I can sense the
emotional flavor which it has for him, then I will be releasing
potent forces of change in him. If I can really understand how he
hates his father, or hates the university, or hates communists—if I
can catch the flavor of his fear of insanity, or his fear of atom
bombs, or of Russia—it will be of the greatest help to him in alter-
ing those very hatreds and fears, and in establishing realistic and
harmonious relationships with the very people and situations
toward which he has felt hatred and fear. We know from our
research that such empathic understanding—understanding with a
person, not about him—is such an effective approach that it can
bring about major changes in personality.
Some of you may be feeling that you listen well to people, and
that you have never seen such results. The chances are very great
indeed that your listening has not been of the type I have
described. Fortunately I can suggest a little laboratory experiment
which you can try to test the quality of your understanding. The
next time you get into an argument with your wife, or your
friend, or with a small group of friends, just stop the discussion for
a moment and for an experiment, institute this rule. “Each person
can speak up for himself only after he has first restated the ideas
and feelings of the previous speaker accurately, and to that
speaker’s satisfaction.” You see what this would mean. It would
simply mean that before presenting your own point of view, it
would be necessary for you to really achieve the other speaker’s
frame of reference — to understand his thoughts and feelings so
well that you could summarize them for him. Sounds simple,
doesn’t it? But if you try it you will discover it one of the most dif-
ficult things you have ever tried to do. However, once you have
been able to see the other’s point of view, your own comments
will have to be drastically revised. You will also find the emotion
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going out of the discussion, the differences being reduced, and
those differences which remain being of a rational and under-
standable sort.
Can you imagine what this kind of an approach would mean
if it were projected into larger areas? What would happen to a
labor-management dispute if it was conducted in such a way that
labor, without necessarily agreeing, could accurately state man-
agement’s point of view in a way that management could accept;
and management, without approving labor’s stand, could state
labor’s case in a way that labor agreed was accurate? It would
mean that real communication was established, and one could
practically guarantee that some reasonable solution would be
reached.
If then this way of approach is an effective avenue to good
communication and good relationships, as I am quite sure you will
agree if you try the experiment I have mentioned, why is it not
more widely tried and used? I will try to list the difficulties which
keep it from being utilized.
In the first place it takes courage, a quality which is not too
widespread. I am indebted to Dr. S. I. Hayakawa, the semanticist,
for pointing out that to carry on psychotherapy in this fashion is to
take a very real risk, and that courage is required. If you really
understand another person in this way, if you are willing to enter
his private world and see the way life appears to him, without any
attempt to make evaluative judgments, you run the risk of being
changed yourself. You might see it his way, you might find yourself
influenced in your attitudes or your personality. This risk of being
changed is one of the most frightening prospects most of us can
face. If I enter, as fully as I am able, into the private world of a neu-
rotic or psychotic individual, isn’t there a risk that I might become
lost in that world? Most of us are afraid to take that risk. Or if we
had a Russian communist speaker here tonight, or Senator Joe
McCarthy, how many of us would dare to try to see the world from
each of these points of view? The great majority of us could not lis-
ten; we would find ourselves compelled to evaluate, because listen-
ing would seem too dangerous. So the first requirement is courage,
and we do not always have it.
But there is a second obstacle. It is just when emotions are
strongest that it is most difficult to achieve the frame of reference
of the other person or group. Yet it is the time the attitude is most
needed, if communication is to be established. We have not found
this to be an insuperable obstacle in our experience in psychotherapy.
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A third party, who is able to lay aside his own feelings and evalua-
tions, can assist greatly by listening with understanding to each
person or group and clarifying the views and attitudes each holds.
We have found this very effective in small groups in which contra-
dictory or antagonistic attitudes exist. When the parties to a dis-
pute realize that they are being understood, that someone sees
how the situation seems to them, the statements grow less exag-
gerated and less defensive, and it is no longer necessary to main-
tain the attitude, “I am 100 percent right and you are 100 percent
wrong.” The influence of such an understanding catalyst in the
group permits the members to come closer and closer to the objec-
tive truth involved in the relationship. In this way mutual com-
munication is established and some type of agreement becomes
much more possible. So we may say that though heightened emo-
tions make it much more difficult to understand with an opponent,
our experience makes it clear that a neutral, understanding, cata-
lyst type of leader or therapist can overcome this obstacle in a
small group.
This last phrase, however, suggests another obstacle to utilizing
the approach I have described. Thus far all our experience has been
with small face-to-face groups —groups exhibiting industrial ten-
sions, religious tensions, racial tensions, and therapy groups in
which many personal tensions are present. In these small groups
our experience, confirmed by a limited amount of research, shows
that this basic approach leads to improved communication, to
greater acceptance of others and by others, and to attitudes which
are more positive and more problem-solving in nature. There is a
decrease in defensiveness, in exaggerated statements, in evaluative
and critical behavior. But these findings are from small groups.
What about trying to achieve understanding between larger groups
that are geographically remote? Or between face-to-face groups
who are not speaking for themselves, but simply as representatives
of others, like the delegates at Kaesong?1 Frankly we do not know
the answers to these questions. I believe the situation might be put
this way. As social scientists we have a tentative test-tube solution
of the problem of breakdown in communication. But to confirm
the validity of this test-tube solution, and to adapt it to the enor-
mous problems of communication breakdown between classes,
ROGERS / COMMUNICATION: ITS BLOCKING AND ITS FACILITATION 347
1the delegates at Kaesong Representatives of North and South Korea met at the
border town of Kaesong to arrange terms for an armistice to hostilities during the
Korean War (1950–1953). [All notes are the editors’.]
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groups, and nations, would involve additional funds, much more
research, and creative thinking of a high order.
Even with our present limited knowledge we can see some steps
which might be taken, even in large groups, to increase the amount
of listening with, and to decrease the amount of evaluation about. To
be imaginative for a moment, let us suppose that a therapeutically
oriented international group went to the Russian leaders and said,
“We want to achieve a genuine understanding of your views and
even more important, of your attitudes and feelings, toward the
United States. We will summarize and resummarize the views and
feelings if necessary, until you agree that our description represents
the situation as it seems to you.” Then suppose they did the same
thing with the leaders in our own country. If they then gave the
widest possible distribution to these two views, with the feelings
clearly described but not expressed in name-calling, might not the
effect be very great? It would not guarantee the type of understand-
ing I have been describing, but it would make it much more possible.
We can understand the feelings of a person who hates us much more
readily when his attitudes are accurately described to us by a neutral
third party, than we can when he is shaking his fist at us.
But even to describe such a first step is to suggest another
obstacle to this approach of understanding. Our civilization does
not yet have enough faith in the social sciences to utilize their find-
ings. The opposite is true of the physical sciences. During the war2
when a test-tube solution was found to the problem of synthetic
rubber, millions of dollars and an army of talent was turned loose
on the problem of using that finding. If synthetic rubber could be
made in milligrams, it could and would be made in the thousands
of tons. And it was. But in the social science realm, if a way is
found of facilitating communication and mutual understanding in
small groups, there is no guarantee that the finding will be utilized.
It may be a generation or more before the money and the brains
will be turned loose to exploit that finding.
In closing, I would like to summarize this small-scale solution
to the problem of barriers in communication, and to point out cer-
tain of its characteristics.
I have said that our research and experience to date would
make it appear that breakdowns in communication, and the evalu-
348 10 / A PSYCHOLOGIST’S VIEW: ROGERIAN ARGUMENT
15
2the war World War II.
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ative tendency which is the major barrier to communication, can
be avoided. The solution is provided by creating a situation in
which each of the different parties come to understand the other
from the other’s point of view. This has been achieved, in practice,
even when feelings run high, by the influence of a person who is
willing to understand each point of view empathically, and who
thus acts as a catalyst to precipitate further understanding.
This procedure has important characteristics. It can be initiated
by one party, without waiting for the other to be ready. It can even
be initiated by a neutral third person, providing he can gain a mini-
mum of cooperation from one of the parties.
This procedure can deal with the insincerities, the defensive
exaggerations, the lies, the “false fronts” which characterize almost
every failure in communication. These defensive distortions drop
away with astonishing speed as people find that the only intent is
to understand, not judge.
This approach leads steadily and rapidly toward the discovery
of the truth, toward a realistic appraisal of the objective barriers to
communication. The dropping of some defensiveness by one party
leads to further dropping of defensiveness by the other party, and
truth is thus approached.
This procedure gradually achieves mutual communication.
Mutual communication tends to be pointed toward solving a prob-
lem rather than toward attacking a person or group. It leads to a
situation in which I see how the problem appears to you, as well as
to me, and you see how it appears to me, as well as to you. Thus
accurately and realistically defined, the problem is almost certain to
yield to intelligent attack, or if it is in part insoluble, it will be com-
fortably accepted as such.
This then appears to be a test-tube solution to the breakdown
of communication as it occurs in small groups. Can we take this
small-scale answer, investigate it further, refine it; develop it and
apply it to the tragic and well-nigh fatal failures of communication
which threaten the very existence of our modern world? It seems
to me that this is a possibility and a challenge which we should
explore.
ROGERS / COMMUNICATION: ITS BLOCKING AND ITS FACILITATION 349
20
See the companion Web site bedfordstmartins.com/
barnetbedau for links related to Rogerian argument.
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350 10 / A PSYCHOLOGIST’S VIEW: ROGERIAN ARGUMENT
Edward O. Wilson
Edward O. Wilson, born in in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1929, is a pro-
fessor emeritus of evolutionary biology at Harvard University. A distin-
guished writer as well as a researcher and teacher, Wilson has twice won
the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction.
Letter to a Southern Baptist Minister
Dear Pastor:
We have not met, yet I feel I know you well enough to call you
friend. First of all, we grew up in the same faith. As a boy I too
answered the altar call; I went under the water. Although I no longer
belong to that faith, I am confident that if we met and spoke pri-
vately of our deepest beliefs, it would be in a spirit of mutual respect
and good will. I know we share many precepts of moral behavior.
Perhaps it also matters that we are both Americans and, insofar as it
might still affect civility and good manners, we are both Southerners.
I write to you now for your counsel and help. Of course, in
doing so, I see no way to avoid the fundamental differences in our
respective worldviews. You are a literalist interpreter of Christian
Holy Scripture. You reject the conclusion of science that mankind
✓ A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING ROGERIAN ARGUMENT
� Have I stated the problem and indicated that a dialogue is
possible?
� Have I stated at least one other point of view in a way that
would satisfy its proponents?
� Have I been courteous to those who hold views other than mine?
� Have I enlarged my own understanding to the extent that I can
grant validity, at least in some circumstances, to at least some
aspects of other positions?
� Have I stated my position and indicated the contexts in which I
believe it is valid?
� Have I pointed out the ground that we share?
� Have I shown how other positions will be strengthened by
accepting some aspects of my position?
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evolved from lower forms. You believe that each person’s soul is
immortal, making this planet a way station to a second, eternal life.
Salvation is assured those who are redeemed in Christ.
I am a secular humanist. I think existence is what we make of it
as individuals. There is no guarantee of life after death, and heaven
and hell are what we create for ourselves, on this planet. There is no
other home. Humanity originated here by evolution from lower
forms over millions of years. And yes, I will speak plain, our ances-
tors were apelike animals. The human species has adapted physi-
cally and mentally to life on Earth and no place else. Ethics is the
code of behavior we share on the basis of reason, law, honor, and an
inborn sense of decency, even as some ascribe it to God’s will.
For you, the glory of an unseen divinity; for me, the glory of
the universe revealed at last. For you, the belief in God made flesh
to save mankind; for me, the belief in Promethean fire seized to set
men free. You have found your final truth; I am still searching. I
may be wrong, you may be wrong. We may both be partly right.
Does this difference in worldview separate us in all things? It
does not. You and I and every other human being strive for the
same imperatives of security, freedom of choice, personal dignity,
and a cause to believe in that is larger than ourselves.
Let us see, then, if we can, and you are willing, to meet on the
near side of metaphysics in order to deal with the real world we
share. I put it this way because you have the power to help solve a
great problem about which I care deeply. I hope you have the same
concern. I suggest that we set aside our differences in order to save
the Creation. The defense of living Nature is a universal value. It
doesn’t rise from, nor does it promote, any religious or ideological
dogma. Rather, it serves without discrimination the interests of all
humanity.
Pastor, we need your help. The Creation—living Nature—is in
deep trouble. Scientists estimate that if habitat conversion and other
destructive human activities continue at their present rates, half the
species of plants and animals on Earth could be either gone or at least
fated for early extinction by the end of the century. A full quarter will
drop to this level during the next half century as a result of climate
change alone. The ongoing extinction rate is calculated in the most
conservative estimates to be about a hundred times above that pre-
vailing before humans appeared on Earth, and it is expected to rise to
at least a thousand times greater or more in the next few decades. If
this rise continues unabated, the cost to humanity, in wealth, environ-
mental security, and quality of life, will be catastrophic.
WILSON / LETTER TO A SOUTHERN BAPTIST MINISTER 351
5
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Surely we can agree that each species, however inconspicuous
and humble it may seem to us at this moment, is a masterpiece of
biology, and well worth saving. Each species possesses a unique
combination of genetic traits that fits it more or less precisely to a
particular part of the environment. Prudence alone dictates that we
act quickly to prevent the extinction of species and, with it, the
pauperization of Earth’s ecosystems —hence of the Creation.
You may well ask at this point, Why me? Because religion and
science are the two most powerful forces in the world today,
including especially the United States. If religion and science could
be united on the common ground of biological conservation, the
problem would soon be solved. If there is any moral precept shared
by people of all beliefs, it is that we owe ourselves and future gen-
erations a beautiful, rich, and healthful environment.
I am puzzled that so many religious leaders, who spiritually rep-
resent a large majority of people around the world, have hesitated to
make protection of the Creation an important part of their magis-
terium. Do they believe that human-centered ethics and preparation
for the afterlife are the only things that matter? Even more perplexing
is the widespread conviction among Christians that the Second
Coming is imminent, and that therefore the condition of the planet is
of little consequence. Sixty percent of Americans, according to a 2004
poll, believe that the prophecies of the book of Revelation are accu-
rate. Many of these, numbering in the millions, think the End of Time
will occur within the life span of those now living. Jesus will return to
Earth, and those redeemed by Christian faith will be transported bod-
ily to heaven, while those left behind will struggle through severe
hard times and, when they die, suffer eternal damnation. The con-
demned will remain in hell, like those already consigned in the gener-
ations before them, for a trillion trillion years, enough for the
universe to expand to its own, entropic death, time enough for count-
less universes like it afterward to be born, expand, and likewise die
away. And that is just the beginning of how long condemned souls
will suffer in hell—all for a mistake they made in choice of religion
during the infinitesimally small time they inhabited Earth.
For those who believe this form of Christianity, the fate of 10
million other life forms indeed does not matter. This and other sim-
ilar doctrines are not gospels of hope and compassion. They are
gospels of cruelty and despair. They were not born of the heart of
Christianity. Pastor, tell me I am wrong!
However you will respond, let me here venture an alternative
ethic. The great challenge of the twenty-first century is to raise
352 10 / A PSYCHOLOGIST’S VIEW: ROGERIAN ARGUMENT
10
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people everywhere to a decent standard of living while preserving
as much of the rest of life as possible. Science has provided this
part of the argument for the ethic: the more we learn about the
biosphere, the more complex and beautiful it turns out to be.
Knowledge of it is a magic well: the more you draw from it, the
more there is to draw. Earth, and especially the razor-thin film of
life enveloping it, is our home, our wellspring, our physical and
much of our spiritual sustenance.
I know that science and environmentalism are linked in the
minds of many with evolution, Darwin, and secularism. Let me
postpone disentangling all this (I will come back to it later) and
stress again: to protect the beauty of Earth and of its prodigious
variety of life forms should be a common goal, regardless of differ-
ences in our metaphysical beliefs.
To make the point in good gospel manner, let me tell the story
of a young man, newly trained for the ministry, and so fixed in his
Christian faith that he referred all questions of morality to read-
ings from the Bible. When he visited the cathedral-like Atlantic
rainforest of Brazil, he saw the manifest hand of God and in his
notebook wrote, “It is not possible to give an adequate idea of the
higher feelings of wonder, admiration, and devotion which fill and
elevate the mind.”
That was Charles Darwin in 1832, early into the voyage of
HMS Beagle, before he had given any thought to evolution.
And here is Darwin, concluding On the Origin of Species in 1859,
having first abandoned Christian dogma and then, with his new-
found intellectual freedom, formulated the theory of evolution by
natural selection: “There is grandeur in this view of life, with its sev-
eral powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into
one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the
fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most
beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.”
Darwin’s reverence for life remained the same as he crossed the
seismic divide that divided his spiritual life. And so it can be for the
divide that today separates scientific humanism from mainstream
religion. And separates you and me.
You are well prepared to present the theological and moral
arguments for saving the Creation. I am heartened by the move-
ment growing within Christian denominations to support global
conservation. The stream of thought has arisen from many sources,
from evangelical to unitarian. Today it is but a rivulet. Tomorrow it
will be a flood.
WILSON / LETTER TO A SOUTHERN BAPTIST MINISTER 353
15
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I already know much of the religious argument on behalf of
the Creation, and would like to learn more. I will now lay before
you and others who may wish to hear it the scientific argument.
You will not agree with all that I say about the origins of life —
science and religion do not easily mix in such matters — but I like
to think that in this one life-and-death issue we have a common
purpose.
TOPICS FOR CRITICAL THINKING AND WRITING
1. Wilson claims to be a “secular humanist” (para. 3). How would
you define that term? Are you a secular humanist? Why, or why
not?
2. What does Wilson mean by “metaphysics” (para. 6)? Which if any
of his views qualify as metaphysical?
3. Wilson obviously seeks to present his views in a fashion that makes
them as palatable as possible. Do you think he succeeds in this
endeavor? Write an essay of 500 words arguing for or against his
achievement in this regard.
354 10 / A PSYCHOLOGIST’S VIEW: ROGERIAN ARGUMENTS
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Text Credits
Patrick Allitt, “Should Undergraduates Specialize?” From the Chronicle of Higher
Education. Copyright © 2006 by Patrick Allitt. Reprinted by permission of the
author.
Derek Bok, “Protecting Freedom of Expression on the Campus” (editor’s title).
Originally titled, “Protecting Freedom of Expression at Harvard.” From the Boston
Globe May 21, 1991 Copyright © 1991. Reprinted by permission of the author.
Susan Brownmiller, “Let’s Put Pornography Back in the Closet.” Originally pub-
lished in Newsday, 1979. Copyright © 1979 by Susan Brownmiller. Reprinted by
permission of the author.
James Carroll, “If Poison Gas Can Go, then Why Not Nukes?” Boston Globe June 23,
2008. Copyright © 2008 Reprinted by permission of the author.
Harlan Coben, “The Undercover Parent” New York Times Week in Review Section,
3/16/2008. Copyright 2008 by the New York Times Company Reprinted by per-
mission. All rights reserved.
Stanley Fish, “When “Identity Politics” is Rational.” New York Times BLOG Section,
2/17/08. Copyright 2008 by the New York Times Company. Reprinted by permis-
sion. All rights reserved.
Jeff Jacoby, “Bring Back Flogging” Boston Globe 2/26/78 Copyright © 1978.
Reprinted by permission of Globe Newspaper Co.
Susan Jacoby, “Her,” New York Times Home Section, 2/26/1978. Copyright 1978 by
the New York Times Company. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Gerard Jones, “Violent Media is Good for Kids.” Mother Jones (Op-Ed) June 20, 2000.
Copyright © 2000. Reprinted by permission of the author.
Anya Kamenetz, “You’re 16, You’re Beautiful and You’re a Voter.” New York Times
Op-Ed page, February 6, 2008. Copyright © 2008 Reprinted by permission of the
author.
Andrew Keen, “Douse the Online Flamers.” Los Angeles Times March 1, 2008.
Copyright © 2008 by Los Angeles Times Syndicate. Reproduced with permission
of Los Angeles Times Syndicate.
Nicholas Kristof, “For Environmental Balance, Pick Up a Rifle.” New York Times
December 4, 2005. Copyright © 2005 by the New York Times. Reprinted by per-
mission. All rights reserved.
Charles R. Lawerence, III, “On Racist Speech,” The Chronicle of Higher Education,
October 25, 1989. Copyright © 1989 by Charles R. Lawrence, III. Reprinted by
permission.
Ursula K. LeGuin, “The Ones Who Walked Away From Omelas.” Copyright © 1973,
2001 by Ursula K. LeGuin; first appeared in New Dimensions 3; from THE
WOND’S TWELVE QUARTERS; reprinted by permission of the author and the
author’s agent, the Virginia Kidd Agency, Inc.
Carl Rogers, “Communication: Its Blocking and Its Facilitation” Copyright © Natalie
Rogers. Reprinted by permission.
Sally Satel, “Death’s Waiting List.” New York Times Editorial Section, 5/15/2006.
Copyright © 2006 by the New York Times Co. Reprinted by permission. All rights
reserved.
Max Schulman, “Love is a Fallacy” © 1951 by Max Schulman, © renewed 1979.
Reprinted by permission of the Harold Matson Co., Inc.
Peter Singer, “Animal Liberation.” New York Review of Books, April 5, 1973. Copyright
© 1973 by Peter Singer. Reprinted by permission of the author.
Ronald Takaki, “The Harmful Myth of Asian Superiority.” The New York Times, June
16, 1990 Copyright © 1990 by Ronald Takaki. Reprinted by permission of the
Rick Balkin Agency.
TEXT CREDITS 355
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Sunaura Taylor and Alexander Taylor, “Is it Possible to be a Conscientious Meat
Eater?” Alternet, February 18, 2009. Copyright © 2009 by Sunaura Taylor and
Alexander Taylor. Reprinted by permission of the authors.
George F. Will, “Being Green at Ben and Jerry’s.” Originally published in Newsweek,
May 6, 2002, p. 72. Copyright © George F. Will. Reprinted by permission of the
author.
Edward O. Wilson, From The Creation: An Appeal To Save Life On Earth by Edward O.
Wilson. Copyright © 2006 by Edward O. Wilson. Used by permission of W.W.
Norton & Company, Inc.
James Q. Wilson, “Against the Legalization of Drugs” from Commentary, February 1990.
Copyright © 1990 by James Q. Wilson. Reprinted by permission of the author.
Art Credits
“Anabolic Steroid Research Report” Web page, Courtesy of National Institute on
Drug Abuse
Attention Paid to a Poor Sick Negro, From Josiah Priest, Biblical Defense of Slavery
“Bloggers’ Legal Guide” screen capture, http://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers/legal
“Calvin and Hobbes,” “I used to hate writing assignments . . .” CALVIN AND HOBBES
© 1993 Watterson. Dist. By UNIVERSAL UCLICK. Reprinted by permission. All
rights reserved.
Coffins at Dover Air Force Base, Getty Images
“Cyberporn,” Reprinted through the courtesy of the Editors of TIME Magazine © 2009
Time Inc.
Department of Logic, © Robert Mankoff/Condé Nast Publications/www.cartoonbank
.com
Diagram of slave ship, The Lundoff Collection
Execution of Viet Cong prisoner, Saigon, 1968, AP Images/Eddie Adams
Home of a Rebel Sharpshooter, Gettysburg, July, 1863 by Alexander Gardner. Courtesy of
the Division of Rare & Manuscript Collections, Cornell University Library.
“In the Blood” screen capture, www.newyorker.com/The New Yorker; Courtesy of
Condé Nast Publications.
The Man on the Left, Courtesy: DeVito/Verdi, New York, NY
Martin Luther King, Jr. delivering a speech, AP Images
“The Museum of Modern Political Discourse,” © Walt Handelsman
“One Nation, Under Nothing in Particular,” By permission of Gary Markstein and
Creators Syndicate, Inc.
The Scream by Edvard Munch, Digital Image © The Museum of Modern Art/Licensed
by Scala/Art Resource, NY © 2007 The Munch Museum/The Munch-Ellingsen
Group/Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY
Screen capture of a database search, Courtesy of EBSCO Publishing
“Set Yourself Free,” Reprinted by permission of the American Cancer Society. All rights
reserved.
A slave’s back with scars, Courtesy of Massachusetts Historical Society
The Terror of War: Children on Route 1 near Trang Bang, AP Images/Nick Ut
“That concludes my two-hour presentation,” DILBERT © Scott Adams/Dist. By United
Feature Syndicate, Inc.
Veiled woman’s eyes, AP Images/Peter Cosgrove
356 ART CREDITS
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Index of Terms
Ad hominem, 323
Advertisements, 110–116
Agreement, Mill’s Method of, 308
Ambiguity, 312
Analogy, 73–75
Analysis, 10
Annotated bibliography, 209–10
Annotation, 32
APA format, 207–12, 220,
240–41, 243
Appeal to authority, 323–24
Appeal to fear, 324
Appeal to ignorance, 322–23
A priori probabilities, 307
Argument
analysis of, 127–133
critical reading for, 51
developing, 145
persuasion vs. 51, 96–97
skimming and, 31
summarizing and, 36
Argumentum ad misericordiam,
82
Argumentum ad populam, 82
Aristotelian argument, 342
Artificial cases, 71–72
Assumptions, 28–29
Audience, 156–161
Author, in previewing, 30
Authority, appeal to, 323
Average, 77
Backing, 279, 281–82,
288
Begging the question, 319
Bibliography, 209–10
Biconditional, 59
Branching, 148
Caricature, 116
Cartoons, political, 116–18
Charts, 77, 122–25
Checklists
analyzing a text, 133
analyzing an argument, 86
analyzing images (especially
advertisements), 115
analyzing political cartoons,
117
analyzing Rogerian argument,
350
attending to the needs of the
audience, 177
357
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avoiding plagiarism, 208
charts and graphs, 123
critical thinking, 19
evaluating an argument from a
logical point of view, 281
evaluating electronic sources,
204
evaluating letters of response,
27
evaluating print sources, 203
evaluating statistical evidence,
80
examining assumptions, 28
getting started, 48
imagining an audience, 160
papers using sources, 245
peer review, 179
thesis statement, 156
using quotations rather than
summaries, 218
using the Toulmin method, 284
writing an analysis of an
argument, 143
Citations, 119
APA style, 240–41
MLA format, 227
Claim, 276, 277, 279
Closing paragraphs, 116, 146–48,
214
Clustering, 5–7, 147
Columns, comparing in, 148–49
Common knowledge, 209
Comparison, 73, 148–49
Composition, fallacy of, 313
Conclusion, 166–67, 170
Concomitant Variation, Mill’s
Method of, 309–10
Conditions, sufficient and
necessary, 59
Confirmation, 310–11
Conjunction, 299
Connotations, 175
Consistency, 299
Contradiction, 299
Contradictory propositions, 301
Contrary propositions, 301
Counterexamples, 68
Critical thinking, 3–18
Databases, 195–97
Death by a thousand qualifica-
tions, 324–25
Deduction, 53–54, 62–64, 275,
289–90
Definition, 24, 55–60
Denotations, 175
Diagramming, 147–48
Differences, Mill’s Method of, 309
Dilemma, 296
Disjunction, 295–96
Disjunctive syllogism, 295–96
Dispute, 52
Distortion of facts, 315
Division, fallacy of, 313
Documentation, 220–46
Drafts, 212–13
Either/or reasoning, 320–21
Emotional appeals, 82–85, 172
Empirical claims, 303
Ending, 170–71
Endnotes, 220
Enthymeme, 63
Equal probabilities, 307
Equivocation, 313–14
Ethical appeal, 131, 172
Ethos, 52, 131, 172
Evidence, 69–80, 150–53,
189–90, 200, 303
Example, 55, 70–75
Experimentation, 69–71
Explicit assumptions, 28
Facts, 315
Factual claims, 303
Fallacies, 67, 84–85, 289, 311–28
Fallacy of appeal to ignorance,
322
358 INDEX OF TERMS
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Fallacy of begging the question,
319
Fallacy of composition, 313
Fallacy of division, 313
Fallacy of false analogy, 318–19
Fallacy of many questions, 316
False analogy, 318–19
False dichotomy, 320
False premises, 66
Fear, appeal to, 324
Final paragraph, 214
First draft, 212
Footnotes, 220
Formal outline, 149
Format, 125–26
Freewriting, 147
Generalization, 68, 280–81, 304,
316
Genetic fallacy, 321
Graphs, 77, 122–23
Grounds, 276–77, 279, 282, 287
Hasty generalization, 316
Headings, 125–26
Heuristic, 14
Highlight, 32–33
Humor, 81
Hypothetical cases, 70–71
Ignorance, appeal to, 322–23
Images, 96–105
Imagination, 9, 10, 17
Induction, 53, 67–69, 275, 289,
303–11
Inference, 303–05
Internet, 191
Interviews, 193, 198–99
Invalid syllogisms, 66–67
Invented instances, 70–71
Invention, 15, 146–47, 149
Irony, 81
Journal, 155
Language, 173, 176
Lead-ins, 47
Library databases, 195–97
Linear thinking, 20
Listing, 147
List of References, 206, 240–41
Loaded words, 174–75
Logos, 51
Long quotations, 217
Main idea, 31
Many questions, fallacy of, 316
Maps, 122–23
Mean, 77
Mechanism, 310
Median, 77
Methods, 129–30, 136
Mill’s Methods, 308–10
of Agreement, 309
of Concomitant Variation,
309–10
of Differences, 309
MLA format, 221–40
Modality, 280
Modal qualifiers, 279–81, 283,
288
Necessary conditions, 59
Necessary truth, 297
Nested circles, 292
Nonrational appeals, 81–83
Non sequitur, 314
Note-taking, 203–06
Observation, 303–05
Opening paragraphs, 137,
162–63, 214
Organization, 165–68, 213
Ostensive definition, 55
Outlines, 171–72, 211–12
Oversimplification, 320
Parade of horrors, 317
Paradox, 302
INDEX OF TERMS 359
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Paraphrase, 36
Paraphrasing, 36–39, 206–08
Pathos, 52, 84
Peer review, 178
Persona, 130–31, 138–39, 172–73
Persuasion, 51
Pie charts, 77, 122, 123
Place of publication, 31
Plagiarism, 39, 206–08
Poisoning the well, 321, 322
Political cartoons, 116–17, 122
Post hoc, ergo propter hoc,
271–72
Premises, 62–63, 66,
Presumption, fallacies of, 315–21
Previewing, 30–31
Probability, 305–07
Protecting the hypothesis, 325
Purpose, 32, 128–29, 137
Quantifications, 280
Questions, 149–55
Quotations, 217–20
Rationalization, 51–54, 325
Real events, 70
Reason, 53–54
Reasons, 53, 276
Rebuttals, 281, 283, 288
Recursive thinking, 20
Red herring, 320–21
Reductio ad absurdum, 297–98
Relationship, 15–16
Relative frequencies, 308
Relevance, fallacies of, 321–27
Representative samples, 68, 278
Research, 20, 189–90
Resolution, 165–67
Revising, 146–49
Rewriting, 149
Rogerian argument, 340–43, 349
Samples, 68, 277
Sarcasm, 81–82
Satire, 81
Scope, 280
Sexist language, 176
Short quotations, 217
Signal phrases, 219
Skimming, 31
Slippery slope argument,
316–17
Sound arguments, 64
Sources
documentation of, 220–48
evaluating, 199–201
summarizing and, 42
using, 188–271
Special pleading, 319
Stasis, 130
Statistics, 69, 76–77, 138
Stereotype, 316
Stipulative definition, 56
Straw man, 319
Sufficient and necessary
conditions, 59
Summarizing, 36–39, 40–42
Summary, 37, 146, 149
Syllogisms, 62, 66, 67, 293
Symbolism, 117
Synonym, 55
Tables, 77, 122
Tacit assumptions, 29
Testimony, 15–16, 69, 75
Theory, 311
Thesis, 31, 46, 155, 275–76
developing, 155–56
examining, 127–28, 137
skimming for, 31
topic vs., 155
Thinking, 3, 4, 9–13. See also
Critical thinking
Title, 31, 137, 161–62, 213–14
Tone, 52, 175–76
Topic, 15, 53, 149, 155, 191–92
Toulmin method, 275–85
Transitions, 168, 214
360 INDEX OF TERMS
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Transitivity, 292
Truth, 64, 66, 294
Tu quoque, 321
Underline, 32–33
Underlying mechanism, 311
Validity, 64
Verbal irony, 82
Visual aids, 122–24
Visual rhetoric, 96–116
Voice (of the author), 130
Warrants, 277–79 281, 282
Web, research on, 193–94
Wedge argument, 317
Wikipedia, 195
Working outline, 211
Works Cited, 201, 227–37
INDEX OF TERMS 361
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■ DIRECTORY TO DOCUMENTATION MODELS
IN MLA FORMAT
IN-TEXT OR PARENTHETICAL CITATIONS, 221
Two or More Works by an Author . . . . . . 223
Author and Page Number in
Parentheses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Author, Title, and Page Number
in Parentheses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Government Document or Work
of Corporate Authorship . . . . . . . . . . . 224
Work by Two or More Authors . . . . . . . . . 224
Indirect Source . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
Two or More Works . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
Work in More Than One Volume . . . . . . . 225
Anonymous Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
Interview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
Electronic Source . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
LIST OF WORKS CITED, 227
Books
One Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
Two or More Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
Government Documents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
Work of Corporate Authorship . . . . . . . . . 231
Reprint of an Older Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Several Volumes, Book in . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Separate Title in a Set of Volumes . . . . . 232
Author and an Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
Revised Edition of a Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
Translated Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
Introduction, Foreword, or Afterword . . 232
Editor but No Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
Work within a Volume of Works
by One Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
Anthologies
Article or Essay —Not a Reprint —
in a Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Reprinted Article or Essay in a
Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Periodical Articles
Scholarly Journal That Is Paginated
by Volume . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Journal That Begins Each Issue with
Page 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
Weekly, Biweekly, Monthly, Bimonthly
Publication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
Newspapers
Newspaper Article . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
Letter to the Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Unsigned Editorial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Interview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Other Sources
Book Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
Encyclopedia or Other Alphabetically
Arranged Reference Work . . . . . . . . . . 235
Television or Radio Program . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Personal Correspondence . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
CD-ROM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Web Site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
Article in an Online Periodical . . . . . . . . . . 239
Online Posting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
Database Source . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
■ IDEA PROMPTS
Below is an index to the Idea Prompts that appear in this book.
Idea Prompts provide models and strategies for:
Visualizing pros and cons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Understanding classical topics . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Giving definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
Analyzing visuals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
Drawing conclusions and
implying proof . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Using transitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
Synthesis and signal phrases . . . . . . . . . . 219
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