think/feel
Am I about to sound crusty? Maybe so...but I am going to hazzard a description of how one little thing has changed in the past decade.
Ten years ago when I was lazily chasing a BA in creative writing at Ohio University I remember classroom discussion containing the usual steamy pile of academic poopy, politically correct disclaimers and monochramatic musings. I can report to you that, after a year and a half back at school (this time not as lazy a chase and for a masters degree now) that same pablum persists. But I've noticed one significant change (and pehaps this is due to my lack of perception in my first go around, but I don't think so.) The change is in how students begin their arguments these days.
My fellow students (many are a decade my junior) often say things like: "I feel like Margaret Meade's point of view was really skewed by the era she wrote in," or "I feel like Christopher Hitchens' argument breaks down when he changes tone on the fourth page." Notice how they start off with "I feel" instead of "I think."
It seems like a little thing at first until you look closely at how ingenious a rhetorical move it really is --and what a stiffling effect it has on learning through discourse.
See, when you begin an assertion with "I think" -- or if you skip the preamble positioning altogether -- then you bear the burden of constructing some kind of logical argument based upon reason and facts and rationality. Of course, such an argument is hard to construct. It takes work. And worst of all, it can be assailed by someone more reasonable, more well-equipped with the facts, or nimble with rhetoric.
On the other hand, when you begin a statement with "I feel," you have secured your argument behind a fortress of ad hominem. Anything someone says contrary to your point is then attacking your feelings, and since we all have a right to our feelings -- which needn't be based on reason or facts -- their attack is automatically ad hominem. Even if the assailent makes valid points against your "feeling," his position is in trouble because you can always retreat to your castle of feelings by saying "well, that's just the way I feel."
Brilliant really, and yet totally suffocating.
It's no wonder that much of what happens in class is a series of these feeling assertions and then agreement or a change of subject -- it's hard to go deep into a debate about any one thing or another when the conversation is like an unarmed crusade travelling between fortresses.
So what am I going to do about it? Well, for one, I'll use the damn tactic when I feel like it! And when I come up against it I'll ask probing questions. Ultimately, that's the best offense against the "I feel" tactic. Just keep on asking questions about the feelings until the person's argument breaks down or holds up or whatever. It doesn't make sense to refute someone's feelings (afterall, how can you refute the way someone feels?) but you may be able to expose contradictions and gaps by asking the right questions.
Alas, that's just a little, but insidious, change I've noticed recently. I feel like this could represent an erosion of our societry's ability to learn from one another.
-----
In another note, last week the class went out for an end-of-the-term drink with Christopher Hitchens, who co-taught my class. It pleased me that I had the chance to talk with him one on one for abojut 20 minutes as we walked to the bar since I'd had to miss two of his four classes due to IBM obligations.
The best part is that when we placed our order at the Waverly Tavern my peers all ordered this and that martini or cosmo or whatever and I ordered a Black Label on the rocks. Hitchens said something to the effect of "now that's a good drink" and ordered a Black Label too. I guess we admire/personify/perpetuate the same writerly stereotypes.
Ten years ago when I was lazily chasing a BA in creative writing at Ohio University I remember classroom discussion containing the usual steamy pile of academic poopy, politically correct disclaimers and monochramatic musings. I can report to you that, after a year and a half back at school (this time not as lazy a chase and for a masters degree now) that same pablum persists. But I've noticed one significant change (and pehaps this is due to my lack of perception in my first go around, but I don't think so.) The change is in how students begin their arguments these days.
My fellow students (many are a decade my junior) often say things like: "I feel like Margaret Meade's point of view was really skewed by the era she wrote in," or "I feel like Christopher Hitchens' argument breaks down when he changes tone on the fourth page." Notice how they start off with "I feel" instead of "I think."
It seems like a little thing at first until you look closely at how ingenious a rhetorical move it really is --and what a stiffling effect it has on learning through discourse.
See, when you begin an assertion with "I think" -- or if you skip the preamble positioning altogether -- then you bear the burden of constructing some kind of logical argument based upon reason and facts and rationality. Of course, such an argument is hard to construct. It takes work. And worst of all, it can be assailed by someone more reasonable, more well-equipped with the facts, or nimble with rhetoric.
On the other hand, when you begin a statement with "I feel," you have secured your argument behind a fortress of ad hominem. Anything someone says contrary to your point is then attacking your feelings, and since we all have a right to our feelings -- which needn't be based on reason or facts -- their attack is automatically ad hominem. Even if the assailent makes valid points against your "feeling," his position is in trouble because you can always retreat to your castle of feelings by saying "well, that's just the way I feel."
Brilliant really, and yet totally suffocating.
It's no wonder that much of what happens in class is a series of these feeling assertions and then agreement or a change of subject -- it's hard to go deep into a debate about any one thing or another when the conversation is like an unarmed crusade travelling between fortresses.
So what am I going to do about it? Well, for one, I'll use the damn tactic when I feel like it! And when I come up against it I'll ask probing questions. Ultimately, that's the best offense against the "I feel" tactic. Just keep on asking questions about the feelings until the person's argument breaks down or holds up or whatever. It doesn't make sense to refute someone's feelings (afterall, how can you refute the way someone feels?) but you may be able to expose contradictions and gaps by asking the right questions.
Alas, that's just a little, but insidious, change I've noticed recently. I feel like this could represent an erosion of our societry's ability to learn from one another.
-----
In another note, last week the class went out for an end-of-the-term drink with Christopher Hitchens, who co-taught my class. It pleased me that I had the chance to talk with him one on one for abojut 20 minutes as we walked to the bar since I'd had to miss two of his four classes due to IBM obligations.
The best part is that when we placed our order at the Waverly Tavern my peers all ordered this and that martini or cosmo or whatever and I ordered a Black Label on the rocks. Hitchens said something to the effect of "now that's a good drink" and ordered a Black Label too. I guess we admire/personify/perpetuate the same writerly stereotypes.
Labels: argue, black label, discourse, feel, hitchens, new school, reason, think
posted by Ethan at 9:30 PM
11 Comments:
Ethan, I think it's partly a legacy of postmodernism, rather than a retreat into some invisible fortress. I see it in my classes too and generally find that the people who make those claims are still very much open to argument/debate, but are erring on the side of caution. With the whole debate about conceptual frameworks, situated knowledge, etc., perhaps they're afraid of sounding too authoritative, whereas "I feel" lets them make a claim and make explicit the assumption of epistemological doubt. I find myself doing something similar, except it takes the form, "it seems to me" rather than "I feel"... Problematic, I agree, but maybe not really diversionary? That's just my two cents.
How was Hitchens doing? Still can't stand him. Now there's someeone who refuses to actually engage in a debate.
I think I feel that you are wrong.
A part of me believes that beginning an 'argument' with "I feel" is not a strategy to shut down discourse, but a sign of weakness. It is a confession by the speaker that they do not have an argument based on logic.
Another part of me believes that it is an attempt to express the intensity of ones conviction. To feel, in many minds, is to be involved in a process more powerful and committed than 'merely' thinking.
Either way, my conceptualization of this phenomenon excludes any daliance with notions of ad hominen attack, which have nothing to do with this subject at all.
You sniveling worm.
Just kidding! ;)
You have good points, but I feel like you're wrong.
The person who begins an argument with "I feel" isn't necessarily intentionally shutting down discourse any more than they are intentionally connecting with a process more powerful than thinking.
I do agree, however, that it's weak.
What would have been really awesome is if Hitch order liked a Lava Flow or Sex on the Beach or something. That would have been post-modern, contrarian and generally wacky.
jeremy
Starting any premise with "I feel" is a basic argumentum ad misericordiam, which is a sub-category of the emotional appeal fallacy, which is a sub-category of the red herring fallacy. The effect of the "appeal to pity," in this case, though, is to make the speaker's entire argument meaningless. One can feel "hot" or "sad," but one cannot feel that 2+2=4 any more than one can think a hammer just slammed down on one's thumb without crying out in pain first.
We have a tendency to mix the acts of thinking and feeling because of our emotional attachments to memories. A person might recall feeling confused reading Derrida, and so that person starts a premise in class: "I feel that Derrida is not a very clear writer."
We can easily avoid ad hominem attack by insisting on clarity: ask the person what it means to feel such a thing. Always take a person's words at face value. If he or she doesn't have an answer, then move on, because the statement is meaningless. If the person says: "I meant to say I think!" then you can attack the premise with confidence.
Of course, the best rhetoricians avoid both "I feel" and "I think" in their speech, because declarative statements are more persuasive when uttered from a universal standpoint: "Two plus two equals four" always trumps "I think two plus two equals four." And both make "I feel that two plus two equals four" sound ridiculous, which it is.
The entire problem has nothing to do with post-modern equivocation, or even politically correct cowardice. These people should have been taught the basics of rhetoric back in second grade, but unfortunately their teachers were all mired in bureaucratic state-testing requirements to actually teach something useful.
Thanks for this thoughtful post, Ethan. I envy your time with Hitchens!
I THINK the answer is this:
Think is used when pursuing an idea or argument that has little or no emotional consquence.
Feel is used when pursuing an idea or argument that has high emotional content.
At least for me.
Maybe everybody in your class needs to realize that they aren't sitting on their therapist's couch.
there was this study done on girls at varying ages. Young, they would speak their minds, looking straight ahead, not flicking hair, as a tweener they began glancing at the floor or sort of up talking when delivering an opinion, and in the teens, late teens, all of their opinions were delivered with disclaimers. I'm a firm believer that the older we get the more and more leary we are of sharing our bare bones opinions lest we be judged or, in a warmer view, lest we offend someone. The jury in my mind is still out regarding if that's always bad. I catch myself all the time saying "This is just my opinion" (well DUH), and being jealous of people who just straight out say "This doesn't jibe"
AS a side bar, you may not sound crusty, but you definitely smell crusty.
Beav's comment is interesting...I think the results of that study are indicative of the social conditioning of girls in this country. The results do not translate to boys.
I occasionally accompany my self-defense instructor to seminars to help him teach, and the impishness of girls and young women is on full display in that kind of setting. Debate is a form of violent interaction, and girls and young women aren't taught to navigate through that kind of world. I remember the segregration in my math class as a young girl of 10. The boys were taught how to play chess and the girls were left to themselves in the back of the room to gossip amongst themselves.
We still have social anachronisms like the Miss America pageant, and Miss America is still held up to be some sort of role model in this country, though the pageant itself is viewed by fewer and fewer Americans.
I would imagine that more women use "I feel" than men. The problem is partly one of sexism in the raising of girls as well as the tendency of parents to protect their girls from hardship in an increasingly decadent and affluent America. Though I admit that the problem or issue is a little more complex than that.
I've noticed a gender bias here too. Women in my classes and in the meetings at work seem to do this kind of disclaiming a bit more than men. I'd be interested to see a study on that in both the workplace and academic circles.
I didn't mean "impishness". I meant timidity. I used the wrong word, however my observation still stands.
Hi, I'm Ethan, I wrote in my blog, like.. a month ago. I'm probably shwishing my hair right now!
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