Beyond Feelings - Vincent Ruggiero.original_ [67]
Vince Lombardi's now-famous view of wining is as follows: "Winning isn't everything – it's the only thing." Is this a healthy view to bring to athletic competition? To other forms of competition?
Should parents be held legally and financially responsible for children over the age of sixteen who live at home?
Group discussion exercise: select one of the cases you analyzed in application 7 and discuss it with two or three of your classmates. Try to reach a consensus on the issue. Be prepared to present your idea(s) to the class.
1 Lawrence K. Altman, "Discovery 60 Years Ago Changed Doctors' Minds on Heart Attack Survival," New York Times, December 10, 1972, pp.56-57.
2 Earl Ubell, "Lysozyme: One of the Body's Miracle Workers," New York Times, November 12, 1972, Sec.4, p.6
3 "Attacking Disease," a dialogue between Jacques Monod and Jean Hamburger, Intellectual Digest, May 1974, pp.12-14.
4 Binghamton Press, March 22, 1989, p.1A.
P3-C17-5
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CLARIFYING ISSUES
Many people make the scope of their analysis larger than they can manage. Uncertain as to whether they can find enough about one aspect of a topic, they address the whole topic. Unfortunately, by grouping all aspects together rather than separating them, such people tend to ignore important distinctions, miss subtleties, and distort the relationships among ideas. Any inquiry and judgment that follow such a beginning are likely to be shallow and oversimplified.
Skilled analysis, on the other hand, understand that if they conduct their inquiry carefully, they will usually find more than enough to say about even a small aspect of an issue. They know that a quality analysis, particularly of a controversial matter, usually demands that their focus be severely limited. They realize that unless they are writing a long book, they must sacrifice breadth of treatment to achieve depth. In other words, they have learned the wisdom of the saying, "Less is more."
HOW TO CLARIFY AND ISSUE
To get the most out of our thinking we must, like the skilled analysts, limit our topics appropriately. That is, we must determine at the outset what aspect or aspects of the broad general issue we are concerned with. We should select the particular aspect we wish to focus on, and in doing so settle not for a rough, vague notion but only a precise one. The following steps provide a quick yet effective way to select and clarify an issue.
List as many specific subheadings as you can that are included under the broad, general issue you have chosen. In the case of an important controversial issue, your list may include more than a dozen subheadings, each of which is a minor issue in itself and therefore a challenge to your critical thinking.
Decide exactly which specific issue (subheading) you are concerned with. Seldom will you be able to treat all specific issues adequately. The one or ones you choose should not only meet your interest but also fit the occasion and purpose of your analysis and the amount of time and space you have available.
Express the specific issue (subheading) you are concerned with in one or more clear, carefully focused questions. Doing this helps keep the subsequent inquiry focused and prevents your drifting from the issue. If the questions are written out, when your thoughts move in a certain direction, you can quickly glance at the questions and decide whether that direction is likely to be productive.
Let's see how these three steps apply to some actual issues.
SAMPLE ISSUE: ABORTION
In January 1973 the U.S. Supreme Court decided in Roe v. Wade that abortion was legal. Yet as we enter the final decade of this century the American people are sharply divided on the matter. Like most controversial matters, the issue of abortion is not merely a single issue but a cluster of smaller issues. No