The concept of believing someone’s words or having solid information towards a subject has people misinterpreting what is fact or fiction. In the article Things People Say, Niel Degrasses Tyson crafts an argument that heavily relies on analogies and providing examples to explain the thesis of the article. Tyson begins his essay by questioning why people believed Aristotle’s theories and the negligence of religion to facts. The rest of the author’s article compares various heavily misinterpreted concepts like “what goes up must come down” and “the sun is yellow” for example and corrects the reader why others believe this as factual information. Tyson concludes his argument by stating, “”. People tend to always believe a tale and undervalue evidence. Tyson’s articles, argues the importance of evidence, without evidence nothing can be proven accurate. Tyson’s argument begins by introducing Aristotle, and how for the longest time his ideas were believed to be accurate. The author provides various examples of what Aristotle accomplished to help the audience understand why these ideas are not accurate. Stated by Tyson, “Aristotle also made other kinds of claims. He said that heavy things fall faster than light things. Who could argue against that? Rocks obviously fall to the ground faster than tree leaves” (Tyson Para 2). Tyson continues by stating that no one at the time was willing to test his theories even if some theories had accessibility for testing. Aristotle’s ideas ended up being accepted and eventually adopted in teachings in churches. The second example Tyson provides is that people often deny the truth.
…show more content…
During A.D 1054 a constellation star increased in brightness, which different countries at the time witnessed, but no records indicated that people in Europe witnessed it. As stated “The Chinese astronomers wrote about it. Middle Eastern Astronomers wrote about it. Native Americans of what is now the southwestern United made rock engraving of it. The star became bright enough to be plainly visible in the daytime for weeks, yet we have no record of anybody in all of Europe recording the event” (Tyson Para 4) The author includes a counter argument by stating that Europe at the time was suffering through the Dark Ages, but follows up with another claim. Tyson states that Europe Astronomers recorded a different cosmic event after the constellation, “For example, 12 years later, in 1066, what ultimately became known as Halley’s Comet was seen and duly depicted complete with agape onlookers in a section of the famous Bayeux tapestry, circa 1100. (Tyson Para 5). The statement by Tyson, confirms that the reason for Europe having records of Halley’s Comet and not the constellation was due to the bible. Various Church’s at the time follow the idea that stars cannot change was due to Aristotle work, but never tested or proven accurate. The author connects this new information with his previous paragraph, to ensure the reader that population’s fall victim to believing what one says rather than finding solid evidence to support claims. With these introductory paragraphs Tyson sets up his claim that people are willing to accept someone’s word due either being recognized as intelligent or people tend believe what they choose to be true and ignore other claims. As stated, “We all carry some blindly believed knowledge because we cannot realistically test every statement uttered by others” (Tyson Para 6). Not only that,
During A.D 1054 a constellation star increased in brightness, which different countries at the time witnessed, but no records indicated that people in Europe witnessed it. As stated “The Chinese astronomers wrote about it. Middle Eastern Astronomers wrote about it. Native Americans of what is now the southwestern United made rock engraving of it. The star became bright enough to be plainly visible in the daytime for weeks, yet we have no record of anybody in all of Europe recording the event” (Tyson Para 4) The author includes a counter argument by stating that Europe at the time was suffering through the Dark Ages, but follows up with another claim. Tyson states that Europe Astronomers recorded a different cosmic event after the constellation, “For example, 12 years later, in 1066, what ultimately became known as Halley’s Comet was seen and duly depicted complete with agape onlookers in a section of the famous Bayeux tapestry, circa 1100. (Tyson Para 5). The statement by Tyson, confirms that the reason for Europe having records of Halley’s Comet and not the constellation was due to the bible. Various Church’s at the time follow the idea that stars cannot change was due to Aristotle work, but never tested or proven accurate. The author connects this new information with his previous paragraph, to ensure the reader that population’s fall victim to believing what one says rather than finding solid evidence to support claims. With these introductory paragraphs Tyson sets up his claim that people are willing to accept someone’s word due either being recognized as intelligent or people tend believe what they choose to be true and ignore other claims. As stated, “We all carry some blindly believed knowledge because we cannot realistically test every statement uttered by others” (Tyson Para 6). Not only that,