"Another line of argument is the assertion that some possible motive for an event or state of things is the real one..." (Aristotle, p. 151)Here Aristotle states this as one of his twenty eight Objections and Refutations. Here he gives credence to the fact that the generally accepted perception of motive for any given act or event is not always the true motive. Thus to object or refute the generalized notion and argue for alternative or underlying motivational factors must be given attention in terms of validity to the overall situation. Motivation behind an act has always played heavily into our personal judgements of that act. In our current judicial system, motivation also legally plays a large role in both proving guilt or innocence as well as dtermining the level of punishment. This why Aristotle pushed one to look past face value and find the real motivation of an act. A perfect example he gave in the book was about God giving one great prosperity, God's motivation behind this act was not of good will (as most would generally perceive it) but the true motivation was to make their ruin more conspicuous. Thus truth is many times found beyond initial perceptions or generalized ideas of acts or events and in relation to this idea we must give credence to any refutation of motive until we can make a judgement through understanding of the whole. This idea of expanding possibilities transcends just the idea of motivations and is fundamental in our individual ability to learn and understand events. The human mind tends to make initial assumptions so to easily categorize and make understanding of an event. These assumptions relieve the uncertainty we feel about an event and thus many don't actively pursue the idea of alternative motives.
“The use of maxims is appropriate only to elderly men, in handling subjects in which the speaker is experienced. For a young man to use them is – like telling stories – unbecoming; to use them in handling things in which one has no experience is silly and ill-bred…(The Rhetorics and Poetics of Aristotle, p137).”
I particularly enjoyed this from Aristotle’s works. What Aristotle is trying to accomplish with this speech is that when one uses maxims in their speech that they should be speaking from experience rather than recital from another’s speech.
It further appears to me that when someone uses a speech in which they lack the life experience in, that there is no way that they could know that this speech is true, since it has not been personally experienced by the orator presenting the speech.
If one does not have experience in the subject for which is presented by oration and maxims are used as recitals of another’s speech, then it sounds to the audience that the orator is just repeating the speech from one of their elders, instead of one’s own original material.
When this occurs, the one whom is utilizing maxims, their speech becomes deluded and losses its potential of holding some sort of validity or truth, therefore rendering it useless and “ill-bred” doctrine.
Aristotle says that a good way to refute an opponent's case is by noting contrasts in it and pointing to his or her conduct, your conduct, or both together (153). This seems to be a popular method in modern politics. By pointing out trends in someone's actions that seem to contradict his or her message takes credibility from that person and boosts your own. I noticed that this happened quite a bit in debates earlier this month. Scenes like “he promises honesty and integrity when dealing with your tax money, yet he speaks poorly of women” or “she wants to change everything for the better, but I am the one with the knowledge and experience to do so” or even “he voted for such-and-such tax break at this occasion while I have never supported any such legislation” were common. In the context of our open political system where public opinion is huge, this is a great strategy because it not only hits the opponent, but his or her supporters as well, (usually) without impeaching one's own character. The problem is that this tactic is somewhat diversionary, only less so than name calling and other such remarks. I think its interesting that this tactic that Aristotle talked about over 2000 years ago is still in use in high-stakes, big time debates. I suppose it is commentary on the effectiveness of such techniques in cultures like Aristotle's and our own.
A quote that really struck me was as follows, “Another line of argument is based on the fact that men do not always make the same choice on a later as on an earlier occasion, but reverse their previous choice.” This, to me, is basically saying that people act on hindsight, or they look at something they’ve done in the past and question whether they would do the same given the same situation. I am reminded of the pick-six in the Packers-Vikings game on the twenty-fourth of October. After the game, the Vikings coach Childress said that Favre should have thrown to the right side of the field instead of the left because he had a man wide open there. Favre said the same basic thing. He would not make the same choice again given the same situation because of hindsight and being able to reflect on the situation.
In a more personal light, I now regret watching the 1933 film Narcotic. It’s just awful, but I did not know it at the time. If I were put in the situation to watch the film again, I would do something differently that wouldn’t case my eyes to melt. In our class discussion over this line of argument, people were saying that it meant more that they were wishy-washy and couldn’t make up their mind as to what they wanted to do. I think it’s more that people will learn from their mistakes and not repeat an action that causes harm to themselves or another party, unless that is their intention, which is never a good thing. Back to the quote, I think Aristotle is basing his idea off of hindsight and that it’s a powerful thing to have because it shows we are learning from our past experiences and know what works and what doesn’t.
In the 1962, Oscar winning film Lawrence of Arabia, Lawrence leads a small army of Arabs through a very difficult desert to cross. On the way, one of the Arabs falls off of his camel, so Lawrence goes back to look for him. Later, after the Arab group that Lawrence leads meets with another tribe of Arabs and they form an alliance to fight the Turkish army. While waiting to attack, the very same Arab who was rescued by Lawrence kills one of the other tribe’s Arabs and is sentenced to death. Lawrence thought that he was doing a good thing by saving Gasim, the Arab who fell off of his camel, in hindsight he realizes he should have left Gasim in the desert to die because he murdered another human being. There is another whole slew of examples, but this one, I think, really helps capture the spirit behind the quote the best.
“For what is improbable does happen, and therefore it is probable that improbable things will happen”. (pg. 159) This quote reminds me of the game clue or a murder mystery. The rich wife is over looked when her husband is murdered. Until we look at it from a different view. The wife has shown a lot of love to her husband in the past but, is that love actually the love of money. Did she kill her husband for the inheritance? We think of a loving wife as a good person that could not commit murder. Yet, if it is improbable then it actually becomes probable. The wife is not likely going to kill her husband. Therefore, she becomes the main suspect. Most people would stick up for the wife. The investigators will try to get as much information as they can for a motive. The person with the most motives is usually the suspect. However, a lot of time it is the person that they never expected it to be. The reason is because most of the time it is the person with the most motives. The improbable happens because most people do not believe that it actually happens.
"Fear may be defined as pain or disturbance due to a mental picture of some destructive or painful evil in the future." (Aristotle, p. 103) People often draw mental pictures in their minds of preconceived notions of what fear may bring to them. In other wise they worry about things that they may be afraid of but their fears are not realistic. It causes them great pain as they emotional get involved in their feelings of fear. For example if a person is worried that when he travels that he may have an accident in the winter. He can draw a mental picture of hitting a patch of ice, going into a spin and hitting something. When realistically if he were to drive carefully with studs on his tires then he may not get into a car accident. Another example is when and elderly parent gets sick. You can imagine the very worst possible outcome of the disease. When in fact if the elderly person gets good medical help he may improve making the fear needless as the person gets well. Worry is borrowed trouble so the saying goes. For fear can cause a person to worry way to much. As for an evil deed a parent may worry that their child might get involved in a gang as they continue onto their education in their teenage years. They might worry that their teen might get involved in theft, hatefulness,crime and drugs. If the teenage person gets the proper attention and guidance he may not have any risk of joining a gang. I disagree with Aristotle when he says that people may not worry about their own deaths. This statement would depend on the person's age. Young people see themselves as indestructible. It might be as a person grows older that they see life differently. Also if someone is terribly ill and they may not be expected to live they may not see death as going on into eternity. They may see death as an unnatural thing to happen to them. They may not believe in life after death. They may not believe in life after death. They may just have a fear of dying instead of seeing the positive side that they are going to heaven or to a higher place to live in eternity.
The quote I liked the most this week was from chapter 14. When mentioning “Men in their Prime.” Starting on page 125, “They have neither that excess of confidence which amounts to rashness, not too much timidity, but the right amount of each. They neither trust everybody nor distrust everybody, but judge people correctly.” I like this quote and this chapter because it reminds me of my dad. Most men always believe they are in their prime until they know only to talk about their prime. My dad is the same way, he is always saying how he is going to lose 20lbs, and my response is, “You said that 20lbs ago.” The same goes along with this chapter. Aristotle pushes that we are in our prime from 30-35 and our minds will continue to be in their prime until 49 or the over the hill party. Which makes me draw my conclusion that Aristotle realized that he was not in his active prime any longer and insisted that his mind was still clear as a hot summer day. To help make my point and pull it all together, my dad still thinks he is in his prime as well and he is now fifty. Leading me to believe once you lose your body you start to lose your mind and believe your still in your prime. I personally feel that everybody is like their each individual snowflake. Some could be big some could be small. Some may quickly melt some may stay all winter. You never know about men in their prime. It becomes a delusional thought towards the end. Yet many men are both physically and mentally fit well into their 50’s 60’s and even 70’s. because you can never judge a book by its cover you can never judge a man that looks near his prime.
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"Another line of argument is the assertion that some possible motive for an event or state of things is the real one..." (Aristotle, p. 151)Here Aristotle states this as one of his twenty eight Objections and Refutations. Here he gives credence to the fact that the generally accepted perception of motive for any given act or event is not always the true motive. Thus to object or refute the generalized notion and argue for alternative or underlying motivational factors must be given attention in terms of validity to the overall situation. Motivation behind an act has always played heavily into our personal judgements of that act. In our current judicial system, motivation also legally plays a large role in both proving guilt or innocence as well as dtermining the level of punishment. This why Aristotle pushed one to look past face value and find the real motivation of an act. A perfect example he gave in the book was about God giving one great prosperity, God's motivation behind this act was not of good will (as most would generally perceive it) but the true motivation was to make their ruin more conspicuous. Thus truth is many times found beyond initial perceptions or generalized ideas of acts or events and in relation to this idea we must give credence to any refutation of motive until we can make a judgement through understanding of the whole. This idea of expanding possibilities transcends just the idea of motivations and is fundamental in our individual ability to learn and understand events. The human mind tends to make initial assumptions so to easily categorize and make understanding of an event. These assumptions relieve the uncertainty we feel about an event and thus many don't actively pursue the idea of alternative motives.
“The use of maxims is appropriate only to elderly men, in handling subjects in which the speaker is experienced. For a young man to use them is – like telling stories – unbecoming; to use them in handling things in which one has no experience is silly and ill-bred…(The Rhetorics and Poetics of Aristotle, p137).”
I particularly enjoyed this from Aristotle’s works. What Aristotle is trying to accomplish with this speech is that when one uses maxims in their speech that they should be speaking from experience rather than recital from another’s speech.
It further appears to me that when someone uses a speech in which they lack the life experience in, that there is no way that they could know that this speech is true, since it has not been personally experienced by the orator presenting the speech.
If one does not have experience in the subject for which is presented by oration and maxims are used as recitals of another’s speech, then it sounds to the audience that the orator is just repeating the speech from one of their elders, instead of one’s own original material.
When this occurs, the one whom is utilizing maxims, their speech becomes deluded and losses its potential of holding some sort of validity or truth, therefore rendering it useless and “ill-bred” doctrine.
Aristotle says that a good way to refute an opponent's case is by noting contrasts in it and pointing to his or her conduct, your conduct, or both together (153). This seems to be a popular method in modern politics. By pointing out trends in someone's actions that seem to contradict his or her message takes credibility from that person and boosts your own. I noticed that this happened quite a bit in debates earlier this month. Scenes like “he promises honesty and integrity when dealing with your tax money, yet he speaks poorly of women” or “she wants to change everything for the better, but I am the one with the knowledge and experience to do so” or even “he voted for such-and-such tax break at this occasion while I have never supported any such legislation” were common. In the context of our open political system where public opinion is huge, this is a great strategy because it not only hits the opponent, but his or her supporters as well, (usually) without impeaching one's own character. The problem is that this tactic is somewhat diversionary, only less so than name calling and other such remarks. I think its interesting that this tactic that Aristotle talked about over 2000 years ago is still in use in high-stakes, big time debates. I suppose it is commentary on the effectiveness of such techniques in cultures like Aristotle's and our own.
A quote that really struck me was as follows, “Another line of argument is based on the fact that men do not always make the same choice on a later as on an earlier occasion, but reverse their previous choice.” This, to me, is basically saying that people act on hindsight, or they look at something they’ve done in the past and question whether they would do the same given the same situation. I am reminded of the pick-six in the Packers-Vikings game on the twenty-fourth of October. After the game, the Vikings coach Childress said that Favre should have thrown to the right side of the field instead of the left because he had a man wide open there. Favre said the same basic thing. He would not make the same choice again given the same situation because of hindsight and being able to reflect on the situation.
In a more personal light, I now regret watching the 1933 film Narcotic. It’s just awful, but I did not know it at the time. If I were put in the situation to watch the film again, I would do something differently that wouldn’t case my eyes to melt. In our class discussion over this line of argument, people were saying that it meant more that they were wishy-washy and couldn’t make up their mind as to what they wanted to do. I think it’s more that people will learn from their mistakes and not repeat an action that causes harm to themselves or another party, unless that is their intention, which is never a good thing. Back to the quote, I think Aristotle is basing his idea off of hindsight and that it’s a powerful thing to have because it shows we are learning from our past experiences and know what works and what doesn’t.
In the 1962, Oscar winning film Lawrence of Arabia, Lawrence leads a small army of Arabs through a very difficult desert to cross. On the way, one of the Arabs falls off of his camel, so Lawrence goes back to look for him. Later, after the Arab group that Lawrence leads meets with another tribe of Arabs and they form an alliance to fight the Turkish army. While waiting to attack, the very same Arab who was rescued by Lawrence kills one of the other tribe’s Arabs and is sentenced to death. Lawrence thought that he was doing a good thing by saving Gasim, the Arab who fell off of his camel, in hindsight he realizes he should have left Gasim in the desert to die because he murdered another human being. There is another whole slew of examples, but this one, I think, really helps capture the spirit behind the quote the best.
“For what is improbable does happen, and therefore it is probable that improbable things will happen”. (pg. 159) This quote reminds me of the game clue or a murder mystery. The rich wife is over looked when her husband is murdered. Until we look at it from a different view. The wife has shown a lot of love to her husband in the past but, is that love actually the love of money. Did she kill her husband for the inheritance? We think of a loving wife as a good person that could not commit murder. Yet, if it is improbable then it actually becomes probable. The wife is not likely going to kill her husband. Therefore, she becomes the main suspect. Most people would stick up for the wife. The investigators will try to get as much information as they can for a motive. The person with the most motives is usually the suspect. However, a lot of time it is the person that they never expected it to be. The reason is because most of the time it is the person with the most motives. The improbable happens because most people do not believe that it actually happens.
Book II Chapter 4
"Fear may be defined as pain or disturbance due to a mental picture of some destructive or painful evil in the future." (Aristotle, p. 103) People often draw mental pictures in their minds of preconceived notions of what fear may bring to them. In other wise they worry about things that they may be afraid of but their fears are not realistic. It causes them great pain as they emotional get involved in their feelings of fear. For example if a person is worried that when he travels that he may have an accident in the winter. He can draw a mental picture of hitting a patch of ice, going into a spin and hitting something. When realistically if he were to drive carefully with studs on his tires then he may not get into a car accident. Another example is when and elderly parent gets sick. You can imagine the very worst possible outcome of the disease. When in fact if the elderly person gets good medical help he may improve making the fear needless as the person gets well. Worry is borrowed trouble so the saying goes. For fear can cause a person to worry way to much. As for an evil deed a parent may worry that their child might get involved in a gang as they continue onto their education in their teenage years. They might worry that their teen might get involved in theft, hatefulness,crime and drugs. If the teenage person gets the proper attention and guidance he may not have any risk of joining a gang. I disagree with Aristotle when he says that people may not worry about their own deaths. This statement would depend on the person's age. Young people see themselves as indestructible. It might be as a person grows older that they see life differently. Also if someone is terribly ill and they may not be expected to live they may not see death as going on into eternity. They may see death as an unnatural thing to happen to them. They may not believe in life after death. They may not believe in life after death. They may just have a fear of dying instead of seeing the positive side that they are going to heaven or to a higher place to live in eternity.
The quote I liked the most this week was from chapter 14. When mentioning “Men in their Prime.” Starting on page 125, “They have neither that excess of confidence which amounts to rashness, not too much timidity, but the right amount of each. They neither trust everybody nor distrust everybody, but judge people correctly.”
I like this quote and this chapter because it reminds me of my dad. Most men always believe they are in their prime until they know only to talk about their prime. My dad is the same way, he is always saying how he is going to lose 20lbs, and my response is, “You said that 20lbs ago.” The same goes along with this chapter. Aristotle pushes that we are in our prime from 30-35 and our minds will continue to be in their prime until 49 or the over the hill party. Which makes me draw my conclusion that Aristotle realized that he was not in his active prime any longer and insisted that his mind was still clear as a hot summer day. To help make my point and pull it all together, my dad still thinks he is in his prime as well and he is now fifty. Leading me to believe once you lose your body you start to lose your mind and believe your still in your prime.
I personally feel that everybody is like their each individual snowflake. Some could be big some could be small. Some may quickly melt some may stay all winter. You never know about men in their prime. It becomes a delusional thought towards the end. Yet many men are both physically and mentally fit well into their 50’s 60’s and even 70’s. because you can never judge a book by its cover you can never judge a man that looks near his prime.
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