politics

May 1, 2025

Addendum to: The Political Rhetor and the Future. 6.2.b. Children.

Addendum to: The Political Rhetor and the Future. 6.2.b. Children: The concept of “child/children” appears to have been changing along with technology and globalisation. But adults change, too. We’re the ones studying children, reporting on them, hypothesising about them, and rearing them! — and we have the technological means to distribute these worries and observations. Continue reading

Political Rhetoric

child, children, concept, future, future generations, Plato, politics, rhetor, rhetoric, technology
March 10, 2025

Thoughlets. LXX. Trust me, I’m Rational.

…Maintaining an appearance of rationality is crucial to one’s reputation, i.e. the credibility one requires to be a trusted source of information among her peers, e.g. colleagues, co-workers, hiring committees.[1] [1] This charade is akin to inflating one’s resume to outperform equally qualified applicants for a job position, which, unless stretched beyond all plausibility, is not Continue reading

Philosophy, Political Rhetoric, Thoughtlets

appearances, competition, credibility, media, Philosophy, politics, rational, rhetoric, self-effacement
March 10, 2025

Thoughtlets. LXVII. When the term “motivated reasoning” is deployed in rhetoric …

Another candidate for the Department of Idiotic Redundancies is the term “motivated reasoning”. Assuming one wants to overcome motivated reasoning, in so-doing she is processing information to arrive at conclusions that suit her own needs and goals; i.e. her goals to overcome motivated reasoning. What non-motivated reasoning means I can’t imagine. Cf David Hume: “Reason Continue reading

Philosophy, Political Rhetoric, Thoughtlets

ad hominen, Hume, motivated reasoning, passion, political, politics, reason, rhetor
March 10, 2025

Upcoming in my Political Rhetor Series.

I’ve published: 6.1. Intro. Pam and Aristotle on the Political Rhetor; The Political Rhetor and the Future: 6.2.a. The Poor; 6.2. b. Children; 6.2.c.i. Future Generations. The Political Rhetor and the Future, Future Generations: 6.2.ii. Who are the Future Generations?; 6.2.iii The Glimmer of Hope Move; and, 6.2.iv. Stewardship — are each in the editing Continue reading

Political Rhetoric, Social and Political Commentary

action, concepts, ethics, mental states, movement, ontology, oratory, perlocutionary, Philosophy, political, politics, rhetoric, speech acts
March 10, 2025

Aristotle and Pam on The Political Rhetor. 6.1. Series. Intro.

I’ve already published 6.2.a. The Poor, 6.2. b. Children, and 6.2.c.i. (of ii, iii, and iv) on Future Generations. So this intro is out of chronological order. The most important concept for political rhetoric is the “perlocutionary speech act” as described below. “The political orator* aims at establishing the expediency** or the harmfulness of a Continue reading

Political Rhetoric, Social and Political Commentary

audience, ends, oratory, perlocutionary speech act, persuasion, Philosophy, political, politician, politics, polity, rhetor, rhetoric, speaker, speech, speech act, ways and means, words
March 8, 2025

The Political Rhetor and The Future. 6.2.c.i. Future Generations: The end of ‘my’ world versus the end of ‘the’ world.

To help you navigate political rhetoric. This post is largely analytic compared to the previous two research dense entries in this series. In this entry, I examine a broad swath of the conceptual territory underpinning future generations. Since this topic is particularly content-dense, I’ve decided to break this blog entry into several posts under a Continue reading

Political Rhetoric, Social and Political Commentary

analytic, children, earth, environment, future, future generations, Philosophy, political, politics, rhetoric, stewardship, sustainability, world
March 7, 2025

The Political Rhetor and the Future. 6.2.b. Children

To help you navigate political rhetoric. This entry is a long read, but it’s quite interesting. (This post was originally published in 2020. I’ve done some light editing and ensured the links are active.) “Preparing for the future must begin, as always, with our children.” Children have little to no political voice. They can neither Continue reading

Political Rhetoric, Social and Political Commentary

abortion, child, children, Clinton, concepts, enfranchisement, Hobbes, person, persons, Philosophy, political, politics, Reagan, rhetoric, rights of children, rights of the child, Thunberg, Trump, youth
March 7, 2025

The Political Rhetor and the Future. 6.2.a. The Poor.

To help you navigate political rhetoric. *updated from June 2020 for readability and to ensure active links See 6.1 Intro here. I’ve broken The Political Rhetor and the Future into: 6.2.a. The Poor; 6.2.b. Children; and, Future Generations 6.2.c.i. , 6.2.c.ii, & 6.2.c.iii. Subsequent posts in this series are: 6.3. Attainability of Ends; 6.4. Warnings; Continue reading

Political Rhetoric, Social and Political Commentary

analyses, aristotle, class, Clinton, concepts, future, Malthus, Obama, oratory, perlocutionary, Philosophy, political, politics, poor, poverty, rhetoric, speeches, the poor, Trump, underclass
January 16, 2025

Doing our doxastic labour together (vetting candidates for beliefs with our peeps) 1 of 4

This post is comprised of some slightly retooled old work (published in 2019, then unpublished). It might just win the banality award (although it’s made some people angry). But some might find it interesting. Some of my references are a bit out of date now, but are still useful. Note: Doxa is belief or opinion. Continue reading

Philosophy, Political Rhetoric, Social and Political Commentary

belief, companionship, delectation, doxa, doxastic, epistemology, friends, mattering, mutual, opinion, peeps, Philosophy, politics, psychology, religion, shame, social, social epistemology, survival, trust
August 23, 2024

The Right(eous)ness of the Wronged: A Powerful Tool of Persuasion.

Righteous anger motivates personal crusades just as it does a march of thousands, even hundreds of thousands. *Herein, I use rhetor, orator speaker and writer interchangeably. Likewise for the words hearer, audience, judger, and reader. An overview of what Aristotle means by rhetoric and some of its features is helpful here. Aristotle defines rhetoric as, Continue reading

Philosophy, Political Rhetoric, Social and Political Commentary

anger, aristotle, campaign, emotion, ethos, God, good, harris, Hobbes, injustice, justice, karma, oratory, pathos, persuasion, Philosophy, political, politics, revenge, rhetoric, right, righteous, speaker, Trump