Now that I've gone and aced my English Composition I class I've decided to share some of the selections of writing that I had to do in it. Every Monday morning we had to pull out a sheet of paper and free write an essay over some subject or another for part of the participation grade. Of course I didn't put dates on any of them so I don't know in what order they are, or when some of them were, but here is the fourth one I'm sharing.
Apparently this particular one was about argumentation. Every time I think about the word argumentation, this is the gist of what I think about:
Argumentation has always seemed to mean more than it does
now. Once upon a time it was how
scientific arguments were won. It’s so
strange to think there was a time before experimentation and facts.
Galileo is probably the most prominent example in my mind or
at least his time. Arguments were in
more of a debate format, but people were able to say a good sized audience
through use of spoken rhetoric.
The idea, then, is pretty much the basis of the modern
research paper or debate teams. The idea
that any arguments needs to be well presented, with as many facts that you can
prove to back it up seems timeless, yet so many were able to convince people of
wrong things just by sounding as if they knew what they were talking about.
Today the same things still happen, but we have guidelines
to format a paper into something sounding more academic. Something far more “smart” sounding. It’s a shame there isn’t a more universal
standard but at least we have some form of standard about getting in front of a
crowd and spouting nonsense…. Or do
we? (Fox News)
