Argument, Rhetoric, and Writing

Argument
What comes to mind when you see or hear the word "argument"?
At least some of the time, people think of it as something to be avoided. 
In a more academic sense, though, argument is the crucial process in which two or more people
engage in order to understand one another's ideas.  The term, as used in composition and other
college classes, is a wholly positive operation.  Too often, argument is thought of as a process by
which one person (the good, "right-thinking" arguer) wins and another person (the bad, "wrong-
thinking" arguer) loses.  Argument should not be confused with a shouting match in which the
loudest prevails.  For our purposes, it is important to see argument not as some sort of game in
which one "wins" or "loses" but rather as a natural, rational tool by which people understand an idea
or issue better than they did before the argument was made.  Not "winning," but clarity, is our goal. 
Generally speaking, argument requires two elements:
        1) A claim made on a controversial issue
        2) Support of the claim through reason and evidence 
By "controversial," we do not mean the subject must be the stuff found in the supermarket tabloids
or something earth-shaking, but rather something--an idea, an issue--that is not agreed upon,
something that has at least two competing perspectives. Sometimes we weigh the evidence about
very big things (e.g., whether we should or shouldn't attend a certain college, buy a particular house,
marry a particular person) and sometimes relatively small ones (e.g., whether to buy this or that
toothpaste), but the degree of importance of other arguments usually lies somewhere in between
these extremes.  
Is making a claim the same as making an argument?
Merely making a claim is not in itself an argument; one must give logical reasons as to why the
claim is true. At some time we have all said something like, "I think that so and so is a better
candidate. I can't tell you why; I just know it's true." Argument demands that the claim be supported
with reasons: "So and so is the better candidate because she is stronger on education, the
environment, and in her economic policies than the other candidate is." Where the former statement
is a claim that ends in an unsupported assertion, the second is an argumentative claim supported by
reason. Through argument, we are forced to clarify and justify ideas we may have comfortably
assumed in the past.   
There are some things we do not argue about:
1) We don't argue about facts. A fact is a noncontroversial piece of data that is established
empirically, by the senses ("I am wearing blue jeans") or by agreement of a community of experts
("There is no atmosphere on Pluto"). You cannot, then, argue that Little Rock is the capital of
Arkansas, that the earth is round, or that smoking causes cancer. All of these are established facts,
even if they haven't always been so. Now, we might occasionally argue over what the facts are in a
given case ("The president did/did not commit perjury in his deposition"), but by and large, we
argue about opinions. 
2) We don't argue about things that are impossible or cannot be changed. This one sounds obvious,
but beware.   
3) We don't argue about things that are obvious (e.g., "Nuclear war is undesirable," "Secondhand
cigarette smoke is bad for children").
4) We don't normally argue about matters that are solely matters of personal taste.  Because "taste"
and "opinion" can seem very similar, the distinction between the two can get blurry.  It is a (literal)
matter of taste as to whether you like catsup or mustard on your hotdog (or even like to eat hotdogs
at all); some of us mustard-hotdog types can never be "persuaded" to prefer catsup on our hotdogs,
no matter how many hotdogs with catsup we are forced to eat.  By the dictates of taste, one may
always prefer Beethoven to Mozart and basketball to hockey (though one might gain at least an
appreciation of Mozart and hockey by becoming exposed to and better informed about them). 
Opinions, which (metaphorically speaking) reside not in the taste buds but in the brain, often
change as a person undergoes an examination or reexamination of the facts of a given case.  We do
argue about opinions.     

Rhetoric

rhet·o·ric (rĕt'ər-ĭk)
* The art or study of using language effectively and persuasively.
* Skill in using language effectively and persuasively.
* A style of speaking or writing, especially the language of a particular subject: fiery political
rhetoric.
* Language that is elaborate, pretentious, insincere, or intellectually vacuous: His offers of
compromise were mere rhetoric.
* Verbal communication; discourse.
The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle understood rhetoric (which we can roughly define as
persuasive speaking and writing) so well that his writings on it remain the basis of writing
arguments in the twenty-first century.  Among the many important things he formulated, Aristotle
gave us the concept of the three "modes of persuasion," ethos, pathos, and logos.  These three little
words contain a multitude of ideas, and some understandings of them are crucial for all writers,
from students of Composition to published writers. 
Here is an excerpt from his work Rhetoric. 
Keep in mind that where Aristotle was concerned principally with the spoken word, the concepts
apply just as much to the written word:
Of the modes of persuasion furnished by the spoken word there are three kinds. The first [ethos]
depends on the personal character of the speaker; the second [pathos] on putting the audience into
a certain frame of mind; the third [logos] on the proof, or apparent proof, provided by the words of
the speech itself. Persuasion is achieved by the speaker’s personal character when the speech is so
spoken as to make us think him credible. We believe good men much more fully and more readily
than others: this is true generally whatever the question is, and absolutely true where exact
certainty is impossible and opinions are divided. This kind of persuasion, like the others, should be
achieved by what the speaker says, not by what people think of this character before he begins to
speak. It is not true, as some writers assume in their treatises on rhetoric, that the personal
goodness revealed by the speaker contributes nothing to his powers of persuasion; on the contrary,
his character may almost be called the most effective means of persuasion he possesses. Secondly,
persuasion may come through the hearers, when the speech stirs their emotions. Our judgements
when we are pleased and friendly are not the same as when we are pained and hostile. It is towards
producing these effects, as we maintain, that present-day writers on rhetoric direct the whole of
their efforts. This subject will be treated in detail when we come to speak of the emotions. Thirdly,
persuasion is effected through the speech itself when we have proved a truth or an apparent truth
by means of the persuasive arguments suitable to the case in question.
    
Here there is a brief discussion of the three modes of persuasion under ethos, audience, and logic. 
These concepts are often intermingled and work in tandem in any given argument, yet they have
distinct meanings and purposes.  An understanding of them is only slightly more important for
students enrolled in Composition courses. 

Finally, note that there is a big difference between a report and an argument.    A report is usually
an objective account of something--a text or an event.  An argument, as we have established,
requires a claim on a controversial issue with evidence to back it up.  In many composition papers,
you will be asked to write arguments--to advance your own point of view, your position, in your
paper--not give a report of someone else's.  Use the outside sources first to help you research and
understand your subject and then, in your paper, to help you establish and support your argument.

Ethos
The closest English equivalent to the Greek word ethos is probably "image"--the way the writer
"appears" to the reader within the text itself.  Though history is full of people who have attempted
to hide evil purposes under a good ethos, we by no means suggest that ethos is concerned merely
with a good appearance.  The best way for a writer to show that she is possessed of a good ethos is
for her to actually have a good ethos.  We must keep in mind the idea that the English word "ethics"
is derived from the Greek ethos.

In his Rhetoric, Aristotle states that there are three subsets to ethos: good will, good character, and
good sense. 
If a writer shows that he has good will for his audience, he will indicate indirectly, by the tone and
content of his words, that what he proposes in his argument is beneficial not just to himself and
people like him but to others as well.  A writer who has good character is possessed of what we
might call the commonly-acknowledged virtues (fairness, unselfishness, integrity, honesty, etc.) but
is not moralistic or preachy.  The writer who has good sense is, if not an expert on the matters she
discusses, well informed on her subject matter, capable of making good judgments on the
information at hand, and ever watchful for specious arguments.  In academic and workplace
settings, one's ability to use Standard English well is important in creating an image of good sense. 
In short, the writer who has a good ethos is aware of himself and the image he gives off, is self
critical when she needs to be, and is always aware and (except for extreme cases) is respectful of
opposing viewpoints.  Like all other writers, Composition students cannot choose to have ethos-less
papers.  Since an ethos of some sort is always present in written (and spoken) work, writers are well
advised to show they have good sense, good will, and good character.   
To demonstrate how ethos is a key part of persuasion, let's look at an excerpt from a written speech
delivered several decades ago.  In 1952, Eisenhower chose a young senator from California named
Richard Nixon as his vice presidential running mate.  By late summer, as a number of newspapers
began charging that Nixon had been the recipient of an illegal slush fund, Eisenhower considered
dropping Nixon from the ticket.  Nixon persuaded Eisenhower to let him appear on TV, which in
1952 was fairly new, to explain his financial dealings over his lifetime and in the process exonerate
himself. 
The speech Nixon gave on 23 September 1952 has come to be known as the "Checkers Speech," for
a reason the reader will see:
I was born in 1913. Our family was one of modest circumstances and most of my early life was
spent in a store out in East Whittier. It was a grocery store -- one of those family enterprises. The
only reason we were able to make it go was because my mother and dad had five boys and we all
worked in the store. I worked my way through college and to a great extent through law school.
And then, in 1940, probably the best thing that ever happened to me happened, I married Pat --
who is sitting over here. We had a rather difficult time after we were married, like so many of the
young couples who may be listening to us. I practiced law; she continued to teach school. Then in
1942 I went into the service. Let me say that my service record was not a particularly unusual one.
I went to the South Pacific. I guess I'm entitled to a couple of battle stars. I got a couple of letters of
commendation but I was just there when the bombs were falling and then I returned. I returned to
the United States and in 1946 I ran for the Congress.
[For the next few moments, Nixon gives a detailed account of his financial dealings over the past
several years]
Well, that's about it. That's what we have and that's what we owe. It isn't very much but Pat and I
have the satisfaction that every dime that we've got is honestly ours. I should say this -- that Pat
doesn't have a mink coat. But she does have a respectable Republican cloth coat. And I always tell
her that she'd look good in anything.
One other thing I probably should tell you because if we don't they'll probably be saying this about
me too, we did get something--a gift--after the election. A man down in Texas heard Pat on the
radio mention the fact that our two youngsters would like to have a dog. And, believe it or not, the
day before we left on this campaign trip we got a message from Union Station in Baltimore saying
they had a package for us. We went down to get it. You know what it was. It was a little cocker
spaniel dog in a crate that he'd sent all the way from Texas. Black and white spotted. And our little
girl -- Tricia, the 6-year old -- named it Checkers. And you know, the kids, like all kids, love the dog
and I just want to say this right now, that regardless of what they say about it, we're gonna keep it.

The speech, one of the most famous given by an American politician in the twentieth century, was a
resounding success.  Though Nixon's own presidency would be in serious trouble with the
Watergate scandal by the early 1970s, he went on to serve two terms as vice president under
Eisenhower.  There is much to say about this small excerpt.  The most striking instance of pathos
(emotional appeal) occurs with the last paragraph, as Nixon indignantly (and somewhat speciously)
declares that his family is "gonna keep" their puppy Checkers; his accusers, the "they" of the last
sentence, are certainly very bad people if they don't care about puppies and six-year-olds.  And
Nixon's apparently forthright and complete itemization of his finances is meant to be a logical
dismissal of his critics' charges.      
The ethos of the excerpt is strongest in the first paragraph.  Over and over, Nixon seeks to identify
himself with his imagined audience.  He establishes himself as a family person, as a hard worker, a
committed husband, as someone who (" like so many of the young couples who may be listening to
us") had a hard time financially, and as a patriot ("entitled to a few battle stars") who fought in
World War II.  Since the whole point of the speech is to show the American people (and
Eisenhower) that he is honest and trustworthy, incapable of receiving illegal funds, his chief goal is
to show that he has good character.  The first excerpted paragraph is a list of mainstream, middle-
class values, especially as they were in the 1950s in the U.S.  Perhaps Nixon's speech would not
work so well today, an age that--in part because of trust-busting scandals such as Watergate--is
more skeptical than it was a half century ago.  
Student writers should always be aware of ethos.  The writer who fails to account for his own image
and who may intend to project confidence, a high sense of ethics, and intelligence runs the risk of
coming across as a cocky, overly moralistic know-it-all.  As far as ethos goes, the best advice for
writers is that they be themselves and work toward realizing their "voices" through practice,
reading, careful drafting, and feedback from others. 

Audience and pathos

It is hard to overestimate the importance and the power of the second mode of persuasion, pathos, in
creating arguments. 
Pathos, Greek for "emotion," indicates an appeal to the emotions of an audience, or, as Aristotle
puts it, "Creating a certain disposition in the audience" (Rhetoric 1356a).  If a writer or speaker
attempts to arouse anger, fear, pity, indignation, or other emotion in her audience, she is making an
emotional appeal.  We all see such appeals every day.  For example, on any given night, one might
see the following TV commercials:
* A young man who believes he is beginning to go bald tells the camera he is afraid that, if he loses
his hair, he will also lose his girlfriend.  The girlfriend says to him, "I would love you anyway," but
the young man is not convinced.  The commercial assures us that fortunately there is a product
available to dispel these fears and help people grow new hair. 
* Over a series of shots of starving, fly-covered children in a faraway country, a narrator asks
viewers to send money to a nonprofit organization in order to save these children's lives.
* To counter the bad rap they have received from consumer groups, some in the media, and a few
politicians, pharmaceutical industries and tobacco companies run commercials showing how they
provide a caring, human touch in responding to illnesses such as leukemia and helping communities
survive natural disasters such as floods.                 
Of course, the degrees to which these commercials and the scores of other public texts that use
pathos to persuade, possess or lack moral integrity, tastefulness, and truthfulness are open to
consideration and judgment.  But there is no denying the power of emotions to persuade.  There is
nothing inherently wrong with appealing to the emotions of an audience.  We are, after all, humans,
and not completely objective, Mr. Spock-like beings.  There are a number of issues that seem to be,
by their very nature, emotionally charged (one may think, for starters, of abortion and flag burning
as two examples), and there is no way to completely escape the emotional elements in these and
many other issues.  One should be careful to not overuse pathos in building arguments.  Cicero, the
Roman statesman and rhetorician, stated that nothing dries so quickly as a tear.  Emotion, alone, is
seldom enough to give an idea or argument enough backing.
The following excerpt, from Aldo Leopold's A Sand County Almanac (1949), dramatizes the
author's change of heart on the wisdom of hunting predators, namely wolves, out of existence. 
Throughout the book, Leopold demonstrates an almost unparalleled knowledge of natural history. 
This passage makes use of a strong emotional appeal, but it is balanced with a strong ethos and
sense of ethics:
We were eating lunch on a high rimrock, at the foot of which a turbulent river elbowed its way.  We
saw what we thought was a doe fording the torrent, her breast awash in white water.  When she
climbed the bank toward us and shook out her tail, we realized our error: it was a wolf.  A half-
dozen others, evidently grown pups, sprang from the willows and all joined in a welcoming mêlée
of wagging tales and playful maulings.  What was literally a pile of wolves writhed and tumbled in
the center of an open flat at the foot of our rimrock?
In those days we had never heard of passing up a chance to kill a wolf.  In a second we were
pumping lead into the pack, but with more excitement than accuracy: how to aim a steep downhill
shot is always confusing.  When our rifles were empty, the old wolf was down, and a pup was
dragging a leg into impassable slide-rocks.
We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes.  I realized then, and
have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes--something known only to
her and to the mountain.  I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer
wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters' paradise.  But after seeing the green
fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view.  

Unlike ethos and logos, which are both always present in all arguments, it is perhaps possible to
make an argument that has little or no emotional appeal.  Yet one always writes an argument for a
specific audience or set of audiences.  It is crucial for writers to know that, excepting perhaps
grocery lists and the like, people rarely write in a social vacuum, with no concern for how their
words will be received by their audiences.  Sophisticated writers are always aware of audience. 
Unsophisticated writers rarely take audience into account when they write, assuming that everyone
either already thinks the way they do, or that their readers bloody well will believe as they do after
reading their text.        
Argument calls for a set of shared assumptions between the writer and audience.  There is usually a
large, accommodating "middle ground" on any subject to which writers can appeal.  Everyone, or
practically everyone, agrees with the principle that the environment should be clean and safe, but
the degrees and costs of realizing or maintaining that clean, safe environment are and will continue
to be a matter of disagreement.  (In argument, the devil is always in the details.)  The majority of
any given audience will agree that violent crime in the U.S. is something that needs remedying, but
note that this shared assumption could be the starting point for arguments both in favor of and
against gun control.  Aristotle writes in his treatise Rhetoric, "It is easy to praise Athenians among
Athenians"; but it is quite another thing to praise Athenians among a group of Spartans. Similarly, it
is easy to argue against stricter handgun laws to a group of NRA members and gun enthusiasts, but
the effective  anti-handgun law speaker must change the way he argues those views in, say, a
church in an inner city that has been particularly plagued by handgun violence.   
Sometimes, often in fact, the writer needs to explain why his argument is something worthy of his
audience's consideration, why his argument is an argument, or even what the basics facts are that
comprise the issue.  Establishing a proper relationship with audience is especially important at the
beginning of a text.  In his book Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student, Edward P. J. Corbett
writes that in introductions, "Sometimes writers have to convince an audience that they are qualified
to speak on some subject.  At other times, they must counteract prejudices or misconceptions either
about themselves or about the subject of their discourse.  Or they must rouse hostility toward those
whose point of view they are going to oppose in their discourse."  

Logic and Writing

Traditionally, logic has belonged not to English studies, but to philosophy, but the tie between
writing and logic is a crucial one.  The core of argument (and argument is to be found virtually
everywhere) is in logic.  Unless one supports a claim or conclusion about something through a
logical, or rational, appeal, one is not making a genuine argument.  For example, the claim that "Pit
bulls should be illegal" is not in itself an argument.  By adding to the claim some evidence, "Pit
bulls should be illegal because they are dangerous animals," one makes what could be called an
argumentative claim.  The evidence that pit bulls are dangerous animals’ supports--makes some
headway toward proving--the claim that pit bulls should be illegal.  Of course, the evidential part of
this claim ("they are dangerous animals") requires a good bit of explanation in an extended piece of
writing.  The writer might, for example, cite specific instances in which people have been attacked
by pit bulls, provide a narrative testimony of a personal encounter with a dog, include scientific data
on the strength of a pit bull's jaws vs. those of other domesticated dogs, and so on.  In the academic
world, we are constantly called on to support and thus examine the worth of claims that we may
have unquestioningly presumed to be true.  In fact, the ability to understand and practice this
operation is a large part of what constitutes a well-educated person.   
This site is certainly not the place to go into a lot of detail about formal logic, which can be
complicated.  What follows is a brief rundown.  There are two general ways of reasoning, of
generating a logical appeal: induction and deduction.  Brittanica defines induction as the "method
of reasoning from a part to a whole, from particulars to generals, or from the individual to the
universal."  Deduction, the inverse to induction, is the method of reasoning from generals to
particulars and is the most common form of reasoning in argument.  To return to the earlier
example, the claim that "pit bulls should be illegal because they are dangerous animals" is a
deductive one, because the specific, "pit bulls," is linked to a larger class of things, "dangerous
animals"--a class of things that is, in this case, negative and to be avoided.  The pit bulls claim,
which could function as a thesis sentence in an argumentative paper, is an enthymeme, which is the
chief way that logical arguments are built.  Most of the time an enthymeme is identifiable by words
such as because, since, for, therefore, so, thus, and hence, which signal either the conclusion or the
support for an argument.  One of the ways to test the validity of such a claim, or enthymeme, is to
break it down into what is known as a syllogism, which proceeds from major premise to minor
premise to claim:  
* Dangerous animals should be illegal (major premise)
* Pit bulls are dangerous animals (minor premise)
* Pit bulls should be illegal (claim or conclusion)

Note how this syllogism progresses from general to specific, from dangerous animals to pit bulls. 
Note, too, that our enthymeme (Pit bulls should be illegal because they are dangerous animals)
leaves out the general, major premise.  This enthymeme, then, like all enthymemes, works by
implying a linkage with an unstated idea.  Enthymemes work almost in the same way that
syllogisms do; an enthymeme is a syllogism which is usually cast in a more conversational form
and which is missing either the major or minor premise.  By isolating the major premise on which
the claim is built, the reader may gain a more critical view of the claim's firmness: What does the
claim mean by "dangerous"?  Can't Rottweilers and ferrets sometimes be considered dangerous? 
Wolves and grizzly bears can be dangerous, but they are not, strictly speaking, "illegal."  The writer
who wants to argue that pit bulls should be outlawed may be required to do more work in building
and justifying his basic claim.    
There is, of course, much more to be said about the role of logic in writing, especially in
argumentation.  Any good composition textbook should be able to tell students what they need to
know about logic both as a tool of persuasion and as a way of critiquing texts.  We conclude this
page by looking at one example of an effective use of a logical appeal.  Martin Luther King, Jr.'s
"Letter from Birmingham Jail," written in 1963, is a direct response to a published statement by
eight Alabama clergymen criticizing the civil rights leader for his participation in a nonviolent
protest of Birmingham's segregationist policies.  This eloquent letter makes a full use of not only
logical appeals, but also emotional and ethical appeals (pathos and ethos). 
His fellow clergymen attack King and the other protesters as lawbreakers; King acknowledges the
legitimacy of this concern, and he clarifies the issue by explaining that there are just and unjust
laws. 

Now, what is the difference between the two?  How does one determine whether a law is just or
unjust?  A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God.   An
unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law.  To put it in the terms of St. Thomas
Aquinas: An unjust law is a law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law.  Any law that
uplifts human personality is just.  Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.  All
segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. 
It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. 
Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I-it"
relationship for an "I-thou" relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. 
Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally
wrong and sinful.  Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation.  Is not segregation an existential
expression of man's tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness?  Thus it is
that I can urge men to obey the 1954 decision of the Supreme Court [which outlaws segregation in
the public schools], for it is morally right; and I can urge them to disobey segregation ordinances,
for they are morally wrong.

We note, in conclusion, that this passage works largely through a number of enthymemes which
function as argumentative claims.  The final independent clause, "I can urge them to disobey
segregation ordinances, for they are morally wrong," may be broken down into the following
syllogism:
* Laws that are morally wrong should be disobeyed
* Segregation ordinances are morally wrong
* Segregation ordinances should be disobeyed
The opening, major, premise is strong, moral, and idealistic (and potentially dangerous when
misinterpreted as a license to commit violence).  Those who agree with it and act on it should, like
King, be prepared to bear its (perhaps unjust) consequences and, when needed, be able to provide a
justification for their actions.