Aristotle's Rhetoric

The book talks about how Aristotle’s thoughts on rhetorical speech (logos, pathos, ethos, delivery, style, organization, form, memory) as being a prime influence on historical and current knowledge of rhetoric and persuasive speaking. But after reading the chapter I began to ponder “How do we know that Aristotle was the person responsible for such influence?” Couldn’t someone else have persuaded Aristotle into thinking the way he did about rhetoric? Maybe he was evil, and took ideas of others and made them his own. We only know and trust what we decide to believe. I think it’s very illogical to credit Aristotle for much of the historical knowledge that influences the study of rhetoric.

To me, it just felt as if Smith arguably puts Aristotle on a pedestal. How you may ask, and the answer is simple. Smith doesn’t use words such as, “the rhetoricians” or other plural words. Everything was singular and referring solely to Aristotle. Yes, the chapter was on one man, but we don’t know if other people were involved in the influence of modern rhetoric, so why leave everyone else out? This is just my opinion, I think one person is getting more credit than he deserves.

I did enjoy the theory of enthymemes which basically states that the most powerful way of reasoning is allowing the audience to interpret the meaning of your message by themselves, rather than telling them what it is. He must have been a democrat since enthymemes create the illusion that you have the power to interpret the meaning of a message. But the fact is, rhetoric is persuasion and giving the audience that kind of power is just so that they can get an ego boost and feel good about themselves while they slip into your rhetorical trick. Just like democracy. Just to clarify, I believe democracy is just an ideology that makes us believe that we have the power to rule this country. The truth is we don’t have the power. I am against US army in Iraq, I am against raising gas prices, but I can’t change it. Yet, I tell people in my native land that I live in a democratic society where the people govern the country. Aristotle was correct in his interpretation of what the most powerful way of reasoning is, “enthymemes”.