When we conduct our inquiry into an issue, we will often find one or two viewpoints that deserve special attention. Sometimes it will be an article of chapter in a book written by an important advocate for the particular view. Other times it will be the statement that originally prompted our inquiry – a newspaper editorial, for example, or the published comment of an elected official or a public agency on a current issue. In such cases the task confronting us lies beyond inquiry and interpretation of facts. It is to analyze the viewpoint and appraise its reasonableness. (Although the principles and approaches presented in this chapter apply to both spoken and written viewpoints, the focus here is on the latter because the written word is less fleeting than the spoken word and can therefore the analyzed more easily.)
The first step in analyzing is to read the passage carefully, to understand precisely both its explicit and implied message. This task poses little problem in the case of a newspaper editorial or a brief comment. However, in the case of an article or a chapter in a book, with a greater number of ideas and more complex relationships among them, we need a practical, efficient way to achieve that understanding.
UNDERSTANDING COMPLEX MATERIAL
The following approach is designed to help you deal effectively with longer and more complex material:
1.After reading the article or chapter, go back and identify all the assertions. In later steps you will be focusing on these rather than on the various descriptions, examples, and details that support the assertions. (Note: Though there is no absolute rule that every paragraph must contain an important assertion, most paragraphs do contain one. So a good way to start looking for assertions is to examine each paragraph for such a main or topic sentence.) 2.Notice all qualifying words. Is the writer speaking of all people, places, or things? Or is she speaking of most, many, some, several, a few, or certain specified ones? Is she saying always, usually, sometimes, occasionally, seldom, never, or at certain specified times? 3.Notice the connections among the ideas. When a writer is simply adding something to what she has said, she will use words like and, in addition, also, another, similarly, second, third. When she is intensifying – that is, adding something she regards as even more significant – she will use moreover, indeed, more (most) important, more (most) significant. When she is contrasting – that is, taking up the other side of a question or presenting a conflicting idea – she will use but, however, nevertheless, on the other hand, still, or yet. Finally, when she is drawing a conclusion, she will use expressions like for these reasons, thus, consequently, so, and therefore. 4.Notice the conditions she includes. Saying, for example, "Drug pushers should be given long jail terms if they are not themselves drug users and have been previously convicted of drug pushing" is very different from saying, "Drug pushers should be given long jail terms." The "if" clause adds a special set of conditions. Similarly, "The United States should never fire a nuclear missile at another country unless first the victim of nuclear attack by that country" is quite different from saying, "The United States should never fire a nuclear missile at another country." Expressions like if, unless, as long as, until, and before can significantly alter the meaning of an assertion. 5.Decide which assertions are the main ones. Subheadings usually point to the more important assertions. Capitalized, underline, or italicized sentences are usually among the most important, as are assertions that are repeated, exactly or in different words. All these attention-getting devices are an author's way of stressing and reinforcing her message.
Any well-written article or chapter will have one dominant or central assertion that ranks above all the others. This may appear anywhere in the article, but it is often placed right after the introduction (assuming a formal introduction is used) – in other words, at the end of the first paragraph or in the second or third paragraph. Look closely at the end of the article too. In many cases, the conclusion of the article is used to restate, or at least to reinforce, the central assertion.
This approach, used carefully, will ensure a more thorough understanding of any article, chapter, or book. But one more step is necessary before we can achieve a penetrating analysis – to write an accurate summary of our understanding. This will focus our attention and permit the close evaluation of the idea. It needn't be very long. A paragraph or two will be adequate I n the great majority of cases. It should include all important assertions, with the central assertion given prominence. It should also include all the qualifying words, connections among assertions, and conditions found in the original. In short, it should be an accurate capsule version of the original. (Remember that there is no room for carelessness in quoting or paraphrasing the original: If it says something may be a certain way, it is not necessarily saying it is that way; similarly, is does not necessarily mean should be.)
RAISING QUESTIONS
After we have summarized an article or book chapter we next should examine it critically, raising all worthwhile questions. (In the case of a newspaper editorial or letter to the editor or a brief comment by a public figure or agency, we can treat the original as we do a summary.) Here is an example of such a summary, followed by the questions raised about it. For ease of reference, each sentence in the paragraph is numbered, and the questions that apply to it are numbered identically.
THE SUMMARY 1.One of the biggest obstacles to learning – in grade school, high school, and college – is grades. 2.The fear of bad grades hangs over the heads of young people from the time they are six to the time they are twenty or twenty-two. 3.Their anxiety to do well, to succeed, to please their parents so fills their minds that all the natural joy in learning evaporates. 4.As a result, conscientious students are driven to view their school work as oppressive drudgery, and marginal students are tempted to cheat and bluff their way to a degree. 5.For these reasons I say grades should be abolished at all levels of education. THE QUESTIONS Are grades an obstacle to learning? If so, are they at all three levels? Do any young people between these ages fear bad grades? Do all of them? Is the fear a serious one (as "hangs over the head" implies)? Is there any natural joy to begin with? For all subject? Do grades cause anxiety? If so, does the anxiety eliminate the joy? For all student? Do any conscientious students view schoolwork as oppressive drudgery, is it grades that cause them to? Are any marginal students tempted to cheat and bluff? All of them? If some are, is it grades that tempt them to do so? Would abolishing grades solve all these problems? Some of them? Would it create any additional problems? If so, would the resulting situation be more or less desirable? Would the effects differ at different level of education?
As the example demonstrates, taking the time to ask appropriate questions ahs several benefits. First, it gets us beyond judging on the basis of appearances. That is good, because ideas that might seem appealing to us at first glance may not remain so when we examine them more closely. Second, it protects us from our own visceral reactions, and permits us to get beyond a blanket, overall yes or no and consider the position in its various parts. Even the best thinkers, after all, are human and therefore fallible. So on a complex issue, any statement longer than a sentence or two is likely to be neither perfectly reasonable nor perfectly unreasonable but partly each. And the longer the passage, the greater the likelihood that it is flawed and that we can therefore find both things to agree with and things to disagree with, strengths and weaknesses. Finally, it suggests to us a structure around which to arrange our thoughts.
The answers we develop for the questions we raise will comprise our response to the viewpoint. If we write out our response, we may either follow the organization suggested by the order of the questions or use a different organization. The decision will depend on what order of presentation will make our ideas most coherent and provide the emphasis we intend.
Applications
1.Select one of the articles or book chapters you read in doing application 1 in Chapter 19. Reread it. Summarize it, using the approach given at the beginning of this chapter. Then analyze it as it done in the paragraph on abolishing grades. Be sure to get beyond your first impressions and to avoid the errors in thinking discussed in Chapters 6 through 15. Answer all the questions you raise, deciding exactly in what ways you agree with the idea and in what ways you disagree. 2.Analyze two of the following paragraphs in the manner demonstrated in the chapter. Be sure to get beyond your first impressions and to avoid the errors in thinking discussed in Chapters 6 through 15. Answer all the questions you raise. Deciding exactly in what ways you agree with the idea and in what ways you disagree. a.Feeling and intuition are better guides to behavior than reasoning. We need immediate answers to many of our problems today, and feeling and intuition are almost instantaneous, while reasoning is painfully slow. Moreover, feeling and intuition are natural, uncorrupted by artificial values and codes imposed on us by society. Reasoning is a set of programmed responses, tight, mechanical, and unnatural. Thus, if we wish to achieve individuality, to express our real inner selves, the part of us that is unconditioned by others, we should follow our feelings and intuitions instead of our thoughts. b.It is commonly accepted that the best way to improve the world and relations among its people is for everyone to curb his or her own self-interest and think of others. This concern with others is the basic idea in the golden rule and in most religions. It is, of course, questionable whether that goal is realizable. But more important, it is mistaken. It is not selfishness but the pretense of altruism that sets person against person. If everyone looked out for oneself, pursued his or her own interests, there would not only be less hypocrisy in the world; there would be more understanding. Each person would be aware of where everyone else stood in relation to him or her. And no one would be dependent on others. c.The institution of marriage has outlived its usefulness. More and more people today particularly young people, are realizing that it makes more sense to have informal relationships. A couple should live together only as long as both want to. Whenever one want to end the relationship, he or she should be able to do so, neatly, without legal complications. This could be done if marriage were abolished. Everyone would benefit. Individuals would retain their individual freedom and be able to fulfill their own need to develop as a person, responding to their own changing values and interests. d.College instructors should not be permitted to set restrictive attendance policies; they should be made to threat students as responsible adults, leaving each student free to decide his or her attendance behavior. By the time students are eighteen years old, they know their own strengths and weaknesses better than anyone else does and are mature enough to decide which classes they need to attend. Some courses will be new and challenging to them. Others will merely duplicate what they had in high school. Some instructors will ad to the students' store of information and challenge their intellect. Others will read the textbook to students, adding nothing more than they can get by reading it themselves. Left to exercise their own judgment, students can use their time wisely, attending the classes of the good, interesting, dedicated teachers and avoiding those of the dullards and deadbeats. e.Every time parents tell their children how to look at an issue, they close the children's minds to other views. Every time parents present their political views or their philosophy of life (the principles they live by), they narrow their children's perspective. Every time parents take their children to church or make them sit in Sunday school, they shackle the children to one spiritual outlook. In each of these cases parents rob the children of their freedom and independence and individuality. For these reasons wise and loving parents, who wish their children to become free beings and not slaves to the thinking of others, will not teach them their principles and values but will leave them free to develop their own. f.One of the reasons crime is so rampant in our society is that we put too much emphasis on determining why the criminal committed the crime and whether the police treated the criminal fairly. Those are important matters, but there are other equally important ones that seem to be neglected lately – like protecting law-abiding people from dangerous, irresponsible people and making punishments severe enough to deter crime. We cringe at primitive societies' handling of crime – for example, cutting off a thief's hands or a perjurer's tongue. But at last such punishments reflect a recognition that crime is an outrage against society that should not be tolerated. I am not suggesting that we return to such a standard of justice, only that we get tough with criminals. Two steps that would provide a good start would be setting determinate sentences for crimes instead of giving judges the wide latitude they now enjoy and refusing to let legal technicalities set aside a conviction when a person is clearly guilty. g.Every year there is at least one major scandal involving a college athlete illegally accepting money from the coaching staff, alumni or other supporters of the team. In recent years the number of scandals seems to be increasing. The best way to eliminate this problem is to discard the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) prohibition against playing for pay. Athletes get paid for their efforts at the professional level. There is no good reason to make them wait until graduation to be rewarded for their talents. The coaches are paid a salary and the colleges often receive substantial sums of money from television rights to games. Only the athletes, the ones mainly responsible for generating the income, are deprived of financial gain. By continuing its archaic rule, the NCAA is being both unfair and hypocritical. 3.Group discussion exercise: Select one of the issues in application 2 and discuss it with two or three classmates. Be sure to use the approach described at the beginning of this chapter. Try to reach a consensus on the issue. Be prepared to present your idea(s) to the class.