I have a right to think what I want
I watched CNN's "Hardball" for a bit tonight, only to observe the following interaction take place. Chris Matthews (the host) and a Republican spokesman, were discussing John Kerry's comments yesterday, which the Bush administration is doing everything it can to paint as directed towards our troops. Matthews was arguing that once he saw Kerry's comments in context, it became clear that they were criticisms of the President, not our troops. It's hard for me to recount exactly what happened next, but when the Republican continued to insist that Kerry was criticizing the troops, and Matthews responded by arguing that the Republican was wrong about the intention of Kerry's comments, the Republican responded by saying, first, that no one could ever know what Kerry's intentions were, and, second, that he has a right to think what he wants about Kerry's comments.
If philosophy has any practical value at all, it is in getting people to see that these two comments by the Republican are completely confused. But this is isn't the sort of thing that comes up in most philosophy classes, and it certainly isn't going to come up in the intro. class I'm currently teaching. And that reveals something deeply wrong with the way philosophy is usually taught.
If philosophy has any practical value at all, it is in getting people to see that these two comments by the Republican are completely confused. But this is isn't the sort of thing that comes up in most philosophy classes, and it certainly isn't going to come up in the intro. class I'm currently teaching. And that reveals something deeply wrong with the way philosophy is usually taught.
posted by Charles P. Everitt at 8:51 PM
4 Comments:
Is not teaching these skills really a failing of philosophy? It seems that not being able to respond to these kinds of argumentative gambits is more a failure of training in rhetorical technique.
Maybe because no one teaches rhetoric, this becomes philosophy's responsibility by default.
Not teaching these lessons when indeed it can and should, is a failing of the teaching of philosophy (supposing for the moment that CPE is right about the usual way).
English departments sometimes offer a course in rhetoric. But GF is probably right in suggesting that it is not commonly taught. In any case, these gambits are not not solely or primarily a matter of rhetoric. They are, it seems to me, at least as much a matter of argument. I think it is sort of misplaced to talk about the inability to respond as a failure of training in rhetorical technique because the problem is not being unable to respond to remarks like that of the spokesman, but rather to see them for what they are, namely false (or confused). (I assume, of course, that responding to such remarks requires seeing them for what they are.)
Suppose these gambits are primarily a matter of rhetorical technique. They are nonetheless distinctively philosophical gambits.
I don't understand why you would think the problem with this Hardball exchange is a problem in rhetoric. I mean, it isn't as if Chris Matthews resisted the Republican's two claims but didn't have the words (or rhetorical gambits) to respond effectively to them. The problem is that he actually seemed to agree with the Republican's two claims (he nodded his head in response to them) and also seemed to think that they were appropriate things to say. And the normal Hardball viewer (if my parents are any guide) probably agrees with the Republican and Matthews on this point.
It is a philosophical confusion to think that we can never know the intetions of others, just as it is a philosophical confusion to think we have a right to think what we want (or that asserting such a right is an appropriate thing to do in response to evidence that one's thoughts are false).
Of course, it would be nice to have effective rhetorical gambits to counter these philosophical confusions, but the real problem, one that we're best suited to counter, is that most people actually think the Republican's two claims are true!
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