Response 6

1. Proposal is to send more people to Africa to fight Ebola.

2. It prioritizes the solution because it talks about combating it more than it is a problem.

3. The audience has fear of ebola becoming an epidemic and they know only a little info about the disease. 

4. It talks about the lack of good healthcare in Africa.

5. He does a good job of explaining how we can help solve the problems in Africa.

6. Facts and emotional appeal are the most effective strategies.

Jaspreet Mondair

Project 2

Todd Brejiak

October 22, 2014

Joy, Sorrow, and Feeling

            In the book Looking for Spinoza: Joy, Sorrow, and The Feeling Brain Antonio Damasio shed light on feelings and why we have them. The goal of the book is to connect scientific knowledge to human significance, “is to present a progress report on the nature of and human significance of feelings and related phenomena, as I see them now, as neurologist, neuroscientist and regular user”(Demasio 6).

            The rhetoric was meant for an educated audience. The language and techniques he uses in this book show he has a high knowledge on neurology and human senses and emotions. He argues that emotion and feeling are separate functions and to be understood correctly he has to look at them separately. However, they are related in the fact that feelings are results of emotions. He also explains the philosophers (Spinoza) opinion of feelings and emotions. His opinion has less scientific reasoning. He believes mind and body are linked and that without the body there can be no emotions.

            In the article Feeling our Emotions Damasio has a very similar rhetoric. This is not surprising since he is a neurologist and many people in these fields are very educated. For example, “My interest now extends way past the question of decision making. In our lab, we are working more intensely with social feelings such as sympathy, shame or pride—they form a foundation for morality. Neurobiology doesn’t simply help us to better understand human nature but also the rules of social interaction. Yet to really grasp this, we need a broader research approach: along with cognitive and neurological sciences, many of the humanities could contribute, especially anthropology and sociology.” This short excerpt shows the wide vocabulary and scholarly rhetoric that Damasio uses regularly.

            Comparing the article and the book, Damasio demonstrates a consistent voice and rhetoric between the two pieces of literature. He uses many terms from his field of study and explains his entire concepts and ideas well.

            In conclusion, Damasio has the same style of writing in both the article and the book. He explores human emotion and why we feel the way we feel in both texts using the same language.