Margaret Wente’s Globe and Mail article on why grit is highly overrated are merely scientific, educational, and political. Wente discusses nature vs. nurture and parenting beliefs. The author in this article tries to convince the audiences that genetic factors are determine once success. The writer used appeal to logic strategy effectively to relate the child’s school achievement to his/her genetic background. However, her argument is severely weakened by her bias and post hoc fallacy The author begins her article by telling a small story about her failure to achieve her goal for being a ballet dancer. She correlates her failure to her lacking of genetic backgrounds that gives her the success although she has grit that might give her a strong power to reach her goal. However, Wetne minimizes the effect of the grit on a person’s success; in contrast, she puts a huge emphasis on the genetic factors and it’s relation to one’s success. Then, the author mentions how the educators and political consumed by the blank-slate theory, which explains that each kid has a chance of success when good schools, parents, and environment are provided. She believes that theory dose not explain the child’s development process as it dose not discuss the genetic effect. Finally, the author thinks that the parents are not able to change their kids’ intelligence and abilities but they are able to give them love and care. The author’s persuasive strategy is her appeal to logic towards the public, which is the audience, in this article.
…show more content…
As Prinsen states, appeal to logic “persuades readers by addressing them on a rational level is extremely effective” (Prinsen 2). The author tries to convince the audience that student heritable traits are the major factor that relates to success; once the appropriate environment is conveniently established. For example, Wente supports her notion by mentioning a statistical study done in UK on 2,321 twin pairs, at age of 16 to determine the various components that affect the life outcome. They found that educational achievement does not depend only on IQ but also it depends more on non-cognitive factors such as self-efficacy and motivation, curiosity, emotional intelligence which also are heritable (Par. 9). In addition, the writer persuades the audience that, the role of school is teaching the child the value of civility, citizenship, and kindness rather than making them smarter as this is genetically determined (Par. 14). Also she pointed that, almost every parent would agree schools should teach and promote the values to their students. However, based on the study that provided in the article, the schools are limited by this fact as it can not affect the child’s gene rather that teaching them some values. The author used a “post hoc” fallacy to show that the child genetics is the only factor that leads to success. For example, the author claimed that, the educational achievement is predetermined by a child genetic factor based on the study that the author presented it in this article. (Par. 6). According to Prinsen “post hoc” fallacy occurs when someone says that because A preceded B, A must have caused B” (Prinsen 4).the author apply this fallacy when she refers to the genetic component as the only component that affect a child’s success. For instance, the author relates the non-cognitive components of school
As Prinsen states, appeal to logic “persuades readers by addressing them on a rational level is extremely effective” (Prinsen 2). The author tries to convince the audience that student heritable traits are the major factor that relates to success; once the appropriate environment is conveniently established. For example, Wente supports her notion by mentioning a statistical study done in UK on 2,321 twin pairs, at age of 16 to determine the various components that affect the life outcome. They found that educational achievement does not depend only on IQ but also it depends more on non-cognitive factors such as self-efficacy and motivation, curiosity, emotional intelligence which also are heritable (Par. 9). In addition, the writer persuades the audience that, the role of school is teaching the child the value of civility, citizenship, and kindness rather than making them smarter as this is genetically determined (Par. 14). Also she pointed that, almost every parent would agree schools should teach and promote the values to their students. However, based on the study that provided in the article, the schools are limited by this fact as it can not affect the child’s gene rather that teaching them some values. The author used a “post hoc” fallacy to show that the child genetics is the only factor that leads to success. For example, the author claimed that, the educational achievement is predetermined by a child genetic factor based on the study that the author presented it in this article. (Par. 6). According to Prinsen “post hoc” fallacy occurs when someone says that because A preceded B, A must have caused B” (Prinsen 4).the author apply this fallacy when she refers to the genetic component as the only component that affect a child’s success. For instance, the author relates the non-cognitive components of school