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20050829

Wond'ring Aloud 

The philosopher Daniel Dennett considers Darwinian natural selection to be “the single best idea anyone has ever had” and wrote a book-length argument called Darwin’s Dangerous Idea to support the opinion. I’ve read the book and, while reading, find myself agreeing with Dennett throughout, but when I read other people’s arguments, I forget how to suspend the details of each set of ideas so as to consider them on their merits, and on my own terms. I am too easily swayed by rhetoric, and I am not good enough at thinking on my own to separate rhetorical quality from specific ideas.

One reason for me to write out how I think about particular subjects is to lay out the process of the way I think. If I do it well, I will find out weak areas and stronger areas, and I should be able to improve the former and reinforce the latter. Unfortunately, my aesthetic preferences tend to encourage rhetorical rather than analytical writing, and I worry about writing persuasive arguments that lack real merit.

Comments:
Weren't we talking about Dennett at one point? Did he make some arguments about animal rights that you thought might be well applied to youth lib?

Re rhetorical thought: I suspect that if you're comfortable with rhetoric, then it's not that big a leap to analysis. Simply compile multiple rhetorical options, then compare. ...But then, maybe I'm not truly following where you're going with this.
 
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