(Originally written January 4, 2007 in Book 12)
On Rhetoric
Aristotle
pp. 72-79
Ch. 8 Topics About Constitutions Useful in Deliberative Rhetoric
The most important concept to grasp in the art of persuasion is an understanding of all forms of constitutions and the advantages of each form.
All people are persuaded by what is advantageous.
Four forms of Constitution
1) Democracy
2) Oligarchy
3) Aristocracy
4) Monarchy/Tyranny
The end of democracy is freedom. The end of oligarchy is wealth. The end of aristocracy is education and tradition. The end of monarchy/tyranny is self-preservation.
Ch. 9 Epideictic Rhetoric
Kalon - honorable, fine, noble
Airskhron - shameful
Kalon and aiskhron are the focus of Epideictic rhetoric.
Kalon describes whatever is praiseworthy, whatever is pleasing because it is good.
Virtue is necessarily kalon
Virtue [arete] is an ability [dynamis]
Epideictic rhetoric deals with bestowing honor on to what is honorable in appropriate means and manner.
Ch. 10 - 15: Judicial Rhetoric
Cultural difference between Aristotle's Greece and Modern Western Society:
1) Assumption of naturally having personal enemies
2) A right to vengeance
In judicial rhetoric one must grasp:
1) Purpose for wrongdoing
2) Mental dispositions of wrongdoers
3) Who they wronged and why
Wrongdoing [toadikein]: doing harm willingly in contravention of the law
Vice [kakia] and weakness [akrasia] are the reasons why people do wrongdoings.
People act either on their own initiative or not on their own initiative.
Acts not on their own initiative are done by:
1) Chance
2) Nature
3) Compulsion
Acts on their own initiative are done by:
1) Habit
2) Desire
Habit and desire are sometimes rational, sometimes irrational.
Every act is caused by one of these seven causes:
1) Chance
2) Nature
3) Compulsion
4) Reason
5) Anger
6) Longing
7) Habit
Anger and longing are irrational
Actions by chance have no purpose. Actions by nature have a cause that is in the action and ordained. Actions by compulsion are the actor's own doing, but against their will/desire. Actions by habit occur because they do it often. Actions by reason occur because the action seems advantageous on the basis of goods. They are a means to some end. Actions by anger/desire deal with vengeance. Actions by longing are done for pleasure.
Book II - Pisteis, Or the Means of Persuasion in Public Address (Cont'd)
Three Artistic modes of persuasion
1) Presenting the character (ethos) of the speaker as favorable
2) Awakening emotion (pathos) in the audience
3) Showing the content of the speech to be probable by means of logical argument (logos)
Chapter 1 - Introduction
Rhetoric is concerned with making a judgment
Speakers are persuasive for 3 reasons:
1) Practical wisdom [phronesis]
2) Virtue [arete]
3) Goodwill [Eunoia]
The emotions [pathe] are why people differ in their judgments.
Chapters 2-11: propositions about emotions useful to a speaker in all species of rhetoric. These chapters are the earliest systematic discussion of human psychology.
Aristotle sees emotions as temporary states of mind, not attributes of character or natural desires.
Chapter 2: Ogre or Anger
The definitions and causes of anger:
Anger: "desire, accompanied by mental and physical distress, for apparent retaliation because of an apparent slight that was directed, without justification, against oneself or those near to one" (116).
Belittling: "an actualization of opinion about what seems worthless"
3 species of Belittling:
1) Contempt
2) spite
3) Insult
Belittling breeds pleasure in the belittler
The young and rich are prone to insult because it makes them feel superior to who they have insulted.
The state of Mind of those who become angry:
The longing for something, but being frustrated in their efforts becomes angry.
A person is easily angered when the opposite of what he expects to happens, happens.
Introduction to Dialectic From Aristotle Topics 1, 1-3
Rhetoric is a counterpart to dialectic.
Syllogism is a statement (logos)
Apodeixis (logical demonstration) occurs when the syllogism is drawn from things that are true and primary.
A syllogism is dialectic when it is drawn from endoxa (common opinion)
Endoxa seems right to the wise, but is not as certain as apodeixis
Syllogism is eristical (contentious) when it appears to be derived from endoxa, but it is not. Eristical syllogisms appear to syllogize, but do not.
Paralogisms are syllogisms derived from premises concerned with specific sciences.
Dialectical is useful in three ways:
1) Mental training
2) Serious conversation
3) Sciences along philosophical lines
Dialectic is investigative.
Chapters 12-17 (BK II) Topics about Ethos, useful in adapting the character of the speech to the character of the audience.
Socrates maintains that a true art of speech is impossible without knowledge of the soul.
Aristotle uses the term 'ethos' primarily as 'moral character.
Ch. 12 Introduction; the characters of the young.
Young men are pleasure loving, impulsive and optimistic
Ages of life:
1) Youth
2) Prime
3) Old Age
The song are prone to desires and impulsiveness.
Deepest desire for the young; sex, and they are powerless against this
Youth long for superiority, honor and victory.
Youth is not cynical, not lovers of money, trusting and filled with hopes.
Hope is future; memory is past. For the young, future is long and past is short.
Youth is courageous, sensitive to shame, fearless, magnanimous, live by natural character rather than calculation. They are fond of friends. They live in excess. They are witty. They are insolent.
Ch. 18-26: Dialectic features of Rhetoric common to all 3 species
Ch. 18 Introduction
All three speech genres must make use of the common premises [koina]. These are the possible and impossible.
All use diminution and amplification
Ch. 19 The Koina: the possible and the impossible, past and future fact, degree of magnitude or importance
The Possible and Impossible
If one of two things is possible, the other is likewise possible.
The whole of which is possible of which the parts are possible.
If the species is possible, so too is the genus.
If double is possible, so too is half.
Past and Future Fact
It is probable that one who was going to do something has done it.
Ch. 20-22 Koinai Pisteis, or common modes of persuasion
Common Pisteis are of two kinds:
1) paradigm
2) enthyme
Paradigm is similar to an induction; induction is a beginning.
2 Species of Paradigm
1) Comparison [parabole]
2) Fables [logoi]
p.s. I'm so freaking horny its not funny.
Fables are fictional, comparisons are historical.
Enthymemes should be used if available and paradigms as witnesses to enthymemes.
If paradigms are used as the primary then many must be supplied. But, if paradigms are merely used as witnesses to enthymemes, then only a few will suffice.
Specific Topics of Enthymemes
Praise or blame must be based on relevant facts.
Common: those facts the subject shares with other subjects.
Specifics [idia] those facts particular to subject "X".
Two species of enthymeme:
1) Demonstrative
2) Refutative
Ch. 23
Topic 1: From Opposites
- topos of demonstrative
- if the opposite predicate is true of the opposite subject, the argument is refuted.
Topic 2: From grammatical form
- The same predicate ought to be true or not true
Topic 3: From Correlations
Topic 4: From the more and the less
ex. "If not even the gods know everything the humans know even less"
Ch. 24 Real and Apparent, or Fallacious Enthymemes
A rhetorical syllogism may be either an enthymeme or only appear as such.
Fallacious topic 1: From Verbal Style
Fallacious topic 2: From combination/division, fallacy by omission
Fallacious topic 3: From exaggeration
Fallacious topic 4: From an unnecessary sign
Fallacious topic 5: From an accidental result
Fallacious topic 6: Affirming the consequent
Fallacious topic 7: Post-hoc, ergo propter hoc
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