Chapter 17 "Fallacies of Argument"

       In Chapter 17 of our textbook, "Everything's an Argument", it talks about the fallacies of an argument.  Fallacies are controversial parts of arguments that are flawed, usually by their nature or structure. They alert the reader because they raise questions about the ethics of the argument.  There are three different fallacies of arguments the chapter discusses; emotional, ethical and logical. Fallacies of emotional arguments involve scare tactics, either-or choices, slippery slopes, sentimental appeals and bandwagon appeals. Fallacies of ethical arguments involve appeals to false authority, dogmatism and ad hominem arguments. Fallacies of logical arguments involve hasty generalizations, faulty causalities, begging the question, equivocation, non sequiturs, the straw man and faulty analogies.
       Dogmatism refers to the style of writing in an argument where the writer assumes that there is no other acceptable opinion than his own and that the truth is self-evident. Dogmatism involves incorporating "everyone" in society to have the same bold opinion about a certain topic. It creates fallacy because it almost seems that the writer is being arrogant to any other opinions but his own. It alerts the reader because it makes them question the writer's argument that there are other possible opinions and the topic could be debatable. An example would be if someone made the argument, "There is no way that anyone could argue that abortion is anything but murder." This is a very bold statement that creates fallacy, specifically dogmatism, for an argument. It is saying there are no other alternatives when considering if abortion is murder, it is always murder and everyone else would rationally agree with that statement. It creates fallacy for the reader because it questions that abortion is always considered murder and in a way creates suspicion because the writer's argument is so bold and closed-minded. It makes them think, "Well wait, abortion isn't always considered murder" and subconsciously makes the reader provide evidence where abortion is not murder to correct the writer. This creates a problem where the reader does not trust the writer and therefore the writer's argument does not serve as much as a purpose than if it was credible and not so closed-mindedly bold. Arguments should be straight-forward but also sensitive to anyone that could read it so it is believable and the writer has an ethical appeal to his arguments.

Chapter 13

Chapter Thirteen of "Everything's an Argument" is about style in arguments.  It discusses different topics like style and word choice, sentence structure and argument, punctuation and argument, special effects like figurative language and argument which include tropes like metaphors, similes, analogies and schemes and gives specific examples of each for better understanding.  All of these characteristics of arguments make a better more through o argument.  The tropes like metaphors, similes and analogies are very useful when trying to build the persuasion of an argument.  They provide a strong comparison between two ideas to better understand an argument and show similarity.  The main difference between the three tropes is similes involve the words "like" or "as" when used for comparison and metaphors and analogies do not.  An example of a a trope, specifically a simile would be "I'm so happy it is like I won the lottery".  Obviously you did not win the lottery but you are exemplifying that you are so happy that you feel like you won the lottery.  This simile uses "like".  Another example of a simile is "That pool was so cold it was like an ice bath".  The use of "like" shows the similarity between the pool and the ice bath to show another example of how cold it was for better understanding.  Similes are used very frequently in every day conversations because they help better understand what you are trying to say.  I know that I use similes a lot in my conversations when trying to explain how significant something was so my audience understands my point.  I plan on using many different tropes in my WP#2 project to better my argument in more detail.

Chapter 9: Arguments Of Definitions

          In Chapter 9 of "Everything's an Argument", the text book discusses how to understand and develop arguments of definition.  It emphasizes on the importance of a word's or phrase's different definitions because it can cause controversy.  The book uses the example of the text from President Obama's speech where he uses the term "patriotism".  He defines "patriotism" as many different things such as loyalty, love, support for his country.  He goes into more detail of the word "patriotism" to show all possible definitions to gain acceptance from the audience.  The book further goes into the example of the definition "human intelligence" which could mean a couple different things.  It could mean that someone's intelligence is strictly determined by their standardized test scores like the SAT or IQ or the ability to perform specific practical tests.  There is controversy between those two meanings for the definition of "human intelligence" in our society.  The book explains that dictionaries are a form of reference for a general knowledge of a word but that there is so much more in depth to the word than just that definition.
          The text also explains the different kinds of definitions and gives examples of each to further the reader's knowledge.  It says that there are two main kinds of definitions; formal and operational definitions.  Formal definitions are the general direct definitions someone would find in a dictionary.  These definitions give the word a general label and place it in a certain category for better understanding.    It gives the example of "hybrid car" and how its formal definition would list that it is a passenger vehicle that operates using two or more sources of power.  The next kind of definition is an operational definition and it defines a word by what it does or what conditions create it.  The example they give in the book is "sexual harassment" and how it is not officially called "sexual harassment" unless three conditions take place.  These definitions are also highly debatable in society because personal opinions differ between what conditions took place to consider it an official serious term like sexual harassment.  The person that sexually harassed the individual might not consider that all the conditions took place but the person harassed would definitely consider the actions taken more seriously.
          It discusses the steps in developing a definitional argument.  The first step is to formulate a tentative claim addressing a specific definition.  If the definitional argument was "volunteer" the writer must write down what is and what is not a volunteer and try to accommodate both sides of the argument of the word.  The writer needs to come up with reasoning behind their claims for each side while being considerate of both sides and they do this by researching their topic very in depth.  Then they would need to match their claim to the definitions.  They would then need to develop their conclusions on the definitional arguments.  
 

WP1

In chapter 3 of our class book, "Everything's an Argument", we learned about arguments based on character, pertaining to ethical appeals; ethos.  Arguments with strong ethical appeal is important because it creates a sense of trust and credibility with the speaker or writer of the argument.  In order to accept the argument we need to respect the writer's authority, integrity and motives. If a writer has a academic or professional title attached to their name, we are more likely to respect their claims. Humor also establishes credibility because it puts the listeners in a state of ease and helps them identify with the speaker.  Reasonable supportive claims also help with establishing credibility.

I finally found a visual argument for my WP1 project.  It is shown above.  Basically the concept of the visual argument is that when you are involved with drugs your social life and extra curricular activities disappear because you value drugs more than anything else.  I really like this visual argument because it is so true and the way they made the ad is so creative and appeals to teenagers because Facebook is so popular these days.  This visual argument establishes the ethos character because it involves humor and shows facts that involving yourself with drugs is not healthy by the picture of the guy's face and the "blank" facebook page.  It gets the "say no to drugs" message out to society in a more appealing way.

Visual Arguments

This week we were to read about inventing arguments.  Arguments have a lot more to them than you would think. By definition, an argument is the act of asserting, supporting and defending a claim.  There are different kinds and styles and each of them can be looked at further in depth.  All arguments have two parts though, a claim and support.  The claim is like a thesis statement of your intended thought and the support is the evidence that proves it is true. An example would be that I think ASU has great weather year-round if you like warm weather.  That would be my claim.  My support would be the actual weather reports of Tempe, Arizona for each day of the year, proving it is a good location for people that like warm weather.  I could also add more supporting claims like evidence of surveys that show people also think ASU has great warm weather year-round.

I have thought a lot about my WP1 potential topics and still have not come up with one I want to follow through with.  The examples in class helped a lot by showing different ideas and I'm excited to come up with one on my own soon. I found this Apple visual argument that I thougth was interesting though.

January 23

I've been thinking a lot about my ideas for my WP1 writing assignment and to be honest nothing in particular has come to my knowledge yet.  I was excited to hear this project is kind of like an advertisement for a product because advertising interests me but I haven't come across any ideas that sound like a good fit yet.  I was thinking about a no smoking ad but that sounded too original so I am going to give it some more thought before I decide on a topic. 

Introduction

My name is Meredith Kristin Barnes and I am currently a sophomore at ASU.  I transferred from Indiana University this spring and am from Carmel, Indiana.  I was born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada and raised in Kingsport, Tennessee.  I moved to Carmel, Indiana when I was eight years old.  I am majoring in Biological Sciences and minoring in Business to hopefully attend Optometry school and become an Optometrist.  If that does not work out I plan to work for a pharmaceutical company and market or sell their products.  I live at Vista Del Sol on campus.