Blog Post Week #1

Thank You for Arguing gave me a new perspective on arguing in general, because it brought to my attention things about winning an argument that I had never thought about before. I didn’t think about the difference between a fight and an argument before, because in my mind they seemed very similar. But Heinrichs does a good job of explaining that a fight leads people nowhere, while an argument allows one party to usually get what they want. I also never realized the role that seduction played in arguing or persuasion, but now that I think about it, it makes sense because it is a way of convincing and manipulating people without them necessarily realizing what is happening. Heinrichs also shows that a large part of winning an argument is using Ethos, Pathos, and Logos as methods of getting people to do what you want them to do. In chapter 4, he describes in great detail how each method of arguing could be used. I always thought that Logos would be the most effective, because it is an argument based in facts, but ultimately it seems as though Pathos would be more effective, if it works, because Pathos plays to people’s emotions and that is always effective when trying to convince someone of something. Ethos should usually work because it shows there is credibility and people usually respect authority and people with merit when they are telling them a piece of information, and therefore will believe what the person is telling them.