Chapter 7

I thought that the sample argument “Abortion Distortions: Senators from both sides make false claims about Roe v. Wade” was a very strong argument. It really showed how important it is to use relevant and correct facts, especially if you are arguing such a controversial topic as abortion. I found it very interesting that senators would use information that was incorrect and expect to get away with it. I thought that the article did a good job addressing the issue. It pointed out that the information used to back a claim must be recent or at least relevant to the claim. Sen. Boxer used statistics from 1936 while Sen. Santorum simply used incorrect information. I understand that both wanted to use this to enhance their view on the issue, but they just went too far. It really brought the credibility of authoritative figures into question. I feel that I should now go over my research to make sure that it is all relevant and up to date. I also want to check were my sources got their statistics so that I do not blindly trust them. I also thought this article outlined their point well so that it was easy to follow. Their presentation of evidence was very good and made it enjoyable to read.
I thought the other article “The Psychological Experience of Security Officers Who Work with Executions” worked well also. It didn’t outline as well as the previous article. I liked how the “abortion distortion” article put bold heading so that its points were clear. It was a very interesting topic and if flowed together well. I liked it because it followed the story of what they did. It was in chronological order. First they talked about what happened in the interview. Then they spoke of how after the interview they classified the subjects and so on. They took us through what they did and I thought that was a good tactic. However at times it got jumpy. Altogether though I thought it was a strong argument.