Lesson Five

1. Lesson Five Love is a Fallacy by Max Shulman Wand Cheng-jun

2. Background information About the author Max Shulman Wand Cheng-jun

3. Max Shulman • a writer in the early '40s as one of America’s best-known humorists. Lots of his novels were adapted to the screen. • Best remembered for creating the popular character Dobie Gillis, a typical American teen who frequently suffered from romantic angst. The character appeared on a popular television sitcom during the '50s and was in a feature film in 1953. Wand Cheng-jun

4. Charles Lamb (1775-1834) • English essayist and critic who is now best known for his "Essays of Elia" (1823,1833). He collaborated with his sister Mary in adapting Shakespeare's plays into stories for children. • "Tales from Shakespeare" • "Specimens of English Dramatic Poets" Wand Cheng-jun

5. Thomas Carlyle ( 1795-188) • English author, Scottish writer • He influenced social thinking about the new industrial working class through his essay "Chartism" and his book “The Present and the Past”. He is best known for his epic history of “The French Revolution” 1837 and his lectures “On Heroes and Hero-Workshop” 1841 Wand Cheng-jun

6. Thomas Carlyle ( 1795-1881) • Carlyle developed a peculiar style of his own which was called --- "Carlyese" "Carlylism" • Style -- a compound of • biblical phrases • colloquialisms • Teutonic （条顿的，日尔曼的）twists • his own coinings arranged in unexpected sequences. Wand Cheng-jun

7. Thomas Carlyle ( 1795-1881) • He produced Sartor Resartus 1833-34, the book in which he first developed his characteristic style and thought. This book is a veiled Sardonic (scornful ) attack upon the shams and pretences of society, upon hollow rank, hollow officialism, hollow custom, out of which life and usefulness have departed. Wand Cheng-jun

8. John Ruskin -- (1819-1900) • English critic and social theorist • a writer on art and architecture • In his later writings he attacked social and economic problems • Modern Painters • The Stones of Venice • The Seven Lamps of Architecture • Time and Tide Wand Cheng-jun

9. John Ruskin -- (1819-1900) • Positive program for social reforms: • Sesame and Lilies （芝麻和百合） • The Crown of Wild Olive • The King of the Golden River Wand Cheng-jun

10. Frankenstein • The young student in Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (1797--1851) romance of that name (1818), a classic horror story. Frankenstein made a soulless monster out of corpses from church-yards and dissecting-rooms and endued it with life by galvanism. The tale shows the creature longed for sympathy, but was shunned by everyone and became the instrument of dreadful retribution on the student who usurped the prerogative of the creator Wand Cheng-jun

11. Special terms in logic • Argument--a statement which is offered as an evidence or a proof. • It consists of two major elements • 1. conclusion • 2. premises -- a previous statement serving as a basis for an argument. • Conclusion is to be drawn from premises. Wand Cheng-jun

12. Special terms in logic • Fallacy -- false reasoning, as in an argument • a weakness and lack of logic or good sense in an argument or piece of reasoning Wand Cheng-jun

13. Fallacy • Usually, an argument is correct (deductively valid) if the premises can provide enough conclusive evidence for the conclusion. Otherwise the argument is wrong. It is said to be fallacious. Wand Cheng-jun

14. Special terms in logic • Three kinds of fallacy: • 1. material fallacy -- in its material content through a misstatement of the facts. • 2. verbal fallacy -- in its wording through an incorrect use of terms. • 3. formal fallacy-in its structure through the use of an improper process of inference. Wand Cheng-jun

15. False Analogy • "High school should not require a freshman writing course . Harvard doesn't require a freshman writing course, and the students get along fine without it". • --- The analogy is false because the two items don't have strong enough similarities to predict that what happens in one will happen in the other. Wand Cheng-jun

16. Dicta Simpliciter • "Everyone wants to get married someday." • --- The example starts a logical train of thought with an assumption that is false. Not "everyone" wants to get married. Wand Cheng-jun

17. Evading the issue • There are a number of handy fallacies that people press into service to side step a problem while appearing to pursue the point. Wand Cheng-jun

18. 1）Distraction • "Suds ' n ' Puds is a great restaurant : you can see how shining clean the kitchens are ". • --- The example is called distraction because the reader's attention is drawn to the cleanliness of the kitchen instead of to the excellence of the food, which is usually the determiner of a great restaurant. Wand Cheng-jun

19. 2）Ad hominem • "against the person". "poisoning the well" • " Ms Bauer is a terrible English teacher. She always wears blue jeans" • --- Instead of point out faults in teaching technique, it calls attention to things about a teacher as a person that are unrelated to her teaching performance. Wand Cheng-jun

20. 3）Ad misericordian (an appeal to pity) • "Look at this fourteen-year-old child who's run away from home to hide her shame-- pregnant, unwashed, friendless. penniless, at the mercy of our social service agencies. Can you till claim that sex should be taught in the classroom?" Wand Cheng-jun

21. 3）Ad misericordian (an appeal to pity) • --- In this shifty approach to argumentation, the writer gives tear jerking descriptions of the cruel opponents' victims in order to arouse sympathy from the reader. Wand Cheng-jun

22. Hasty Generalization • "Mr Wang's handwriting is terrible. Mr. Hu's handwriting is also terrible and you know how terrible men's handwriting is ." • --- It applies a special case to general rule. That fact that certain person's handwriting is bad doesn't imply that all men‘s handwriting is bad. Wand Cheng-jun

23. Post hoc, ergo propter hoc – • “After this, therefore because of this" • "The last five times that I've worn my white pants, something depressing has happened. I'm not going to wear those pants again!" • -- This fallacy assumes that if event Y happened after event X, then X must be the cause of Y. Wand Cheng-jun

24. Circular Reasoning • or Begging the question: • "Juan is an impressive speaker because he always touches his listeners deeply." Wand Cheng-jun

25. Circular Reasoning • --- This problem occurs when the writer tries to support a claim by restating it in different words. You can tell this example is circular by considering this “Why is Juan an impressive speaker?”“Because he touches his listeners deeply.?”“Why are Juan's listeners touched so deeply?”“Because he is an impressive speaker.” • impressive = touching someone deeply Wand Cheng-jun

26. Appeal to the Wrong Authority • "My political science teacher says that the new math is impossible for children to learn“. Wand Cheng-jun

27. Appeal to the Wrong Authority • --- If the student believes that political science teacher's low opinion of new math strongly supports an argument against new math, the student is wrong. The political science teacher is an authority, but in a different field. Wand Cheng-jun

28. Non Sequitur -- "it doesn't follow" • "Students who take earth science instead of physics are lazy. Susie took earth science instead of physics. Susie should be kicked out of school" • --- If the first statement is correct, then you could conclude that Susie is lazy. But there's nothing in that line of reasoning that says lazy students should be kicked out of school. The conclusion doesn't follow. Wand Cheng-jun

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30. Pre-class questions • 1 How do you understand the title of the lesson? • 2 Which rhetorical speech is repeatedly used in this lesson to achieve the fixed effects? • 3 How many sections can you divide the lesson into? • 4 Tell the students what difficulties they will face in understanding the lesson. • 5 What is the theme of the story? Where is it stated? • 6 What role does the raccoon coat play in the development of the story? • 7 What is the purpose of the narration? Can you find evidence from the text? • 8 How does the story end? In what sense is the conclusion ironic? Wand Cheng-jun

31. Detailed study of the text: • title -- humorous/ well chosen • 1. When "fallacy" is taken in its ordinary sense, the title means: • There is a deceptive or delusive quality about love. • Love has delusive qualities Wand Cheng-jun

32. 2. When "fallacy" is having logical sense, it means : • Love cannot be deduced from a set of given premises. • Love can not follow the given rules. • Love is an error, a deception and an emotion that does not follow the principles of logic. Wand Cheng-jun

33. Fallacy: a false or mistaken idea • It is a fallacy to suppose that riches always bringhappiness. • Love is a fallacy: • 1. There is a deceptive or delusive quality about love. • 2. Love is an error, a deception that does not fellow the principle of love Wand Cheng-jun

34. Paras 1-3 • Charles Lamb, as merry and enterprising a fellow as you will meet in a month of Sundays. Charles Lamb is the kind of merry and enterprising person you rarely encounter. He wrote the essays, Old China and Dream's Children, which set free the informal essay. Wand Cheng-jun

35. enterprising: energetic, initiative • in a month of Sundays: in a long time • unfetter: free from fetter, to set free or keep free from restrictions or bonds. • limp: drooping, having lost stiffness, rigidity • flaccid: Lacking firmness and resilience, flabby • spongy: soft and porous * Wand Cheng-jun

36. Pedantic: • Characterized by a narrow, often ostentatious concern for book learning and formal rules • 迂腐的， 乏味 • a pedantic attention to details.学究式地注意细枝末节 • apedanticstyle of writing; 学究式的写作风格； • an academic insistence on precision; 一种学院式的苛求精神； • donnishrefinement of speech; 学究式的雅语； • scholasticand excessively subtle reasoning.学究式且过于机巧的推理 * Wand Cheng-jun

37. Implication: • My writing is even more informal. I can do better than them. He says this only with his tongue in cheek. Wand Cheng-jun

38. What is his purpose of writing this essay? • He compared logic to a living thing ( a human being). Logic is not at all a dry learned branch of learning. It is like a living human being, full of beauty, passion and painful emotional shocks. Wand Cheng-jun

39. Trauma • a term in psychiatry meaning a painful emotional experience. • Trauma: A painful emotional experience, wound or shock that creates substantial, lasting damage to the psychological development of a person, often leading to neurosis. Wand Cheng-jun

40. Author’s note • 1) His own idea about his own essay. • From his point of view, his essay is sth limp, spongy. It is very informal. • 2) His own idea about the purpose of that essay. • It is not a dry branch of learning , but like a human being. Wand Cheng-jun

41. Para 4 • 1. How did the narrator describe himself? What does it show? How does the author bring out the pomposity of the narrator? What makes the satire humorous? • The writer is satirizing a smug self-conceited freshman in a law school, who keeps boasting at every opportunity. He heaps upon himself all the beautiful words of praise he can think of--cool, logical, keen, calculating, perspicacious , acute , astute , powerful, precise and penetrating . This exaggerated self-praise and the profuse use of similes and metaphors help to make the satire humorous. Wand Cheng-jun

42. 2. Cool was I and logical. • Inversion to emphasize "cool". • 3. Keen, calculating, perspicacious, acute and astute-- I was all of these. • keen: (of the mind) active, sensitive, sharp (syn. nimble, quick, adroit prompt, sharp smart swift)敏捷的，敏锐的 • ~ sight 敏锐的视力 • ~ intelligence 敏捷的智力 Wand Cheng-jun

43. calculating • coldly planning and thinking about future actions and esp. whether they will be good or bad for oneself. Wand Cheng-jun

44. perspicacious • fml. quick to judge and understand 敏于判断与了解， 敏捷 • having or showing keen judgment and understanding Wand Cheng-jun

45. acute, astute • acute-- (senses, sensation, intellect) • 五官，感受，智力 • able to notice small differences • Dogs have an acute sense of smell. • astute -- shrewd , quick at seeing how to gain an advantage • clever and able to see quickly sth, that is to one's advantage.精明的，狡黠的 Wand Cheng-jun

46. Dynamo; Scalpel • Dynamo: generator • Scale: standard in measurement • Scalpel: A small, straight knife with a thin, sharp blade used in surgery and dissection. Wand Cheng-jun

47. comparison • His brain – • 1. dynamo -- powerful • 2. a chemist's scales--- precise, accurate • 3. scalpel -- penetrating Wand Cheng-jun

48. Para.5 • Emotional type. Unstable. Impressionable. Worst of all, a faddist----introduction of the first antagonist – Petey Burch • He downgrades his roommate. • nothing upstairs -- (Am. slang) empty-headed Wand Cheng-jun

49. unstable • unstable • -- easily moved, upset or changed • emotional • -- having feelings which are strong or easily moved Wand Cheng-jun

50. impressionable • -- easy to be influenced, often with the result that one's feeling and ideas change easily and esp. that one is ready to admire other people. Wand Cheng-jun