October Meeting:
Taped lecture by Carolyn Ray on
"How to Win Arguments"
For those of you who could not attend The Objectivist Center's Summer
Seminar, we will listen to one of the most interesting lectures at our
next meeting. In "How to Win Arguments," Carolyn Ray, Ph.D.,
examines communication with both Objectivists and non-Objectivists. She
notes the pitfalls in reasoning that occur in the arguments made by many
Objectivists.
Carolyn Ray is a philosophical consultant who received her Ph.D. in
Philosophy from Indiana University. She is also the head of Enlightenment,
an on-line forum to encourage, promote and publish Objectivist scholars
and scholarship. Enlightenment's Website can be found at http://enlightenment.supersaturated.com.
Join us for an excellent lecture from one of the seminar's most popular
speakers. The meeting will be on Saturday, October 21, at 8 p.m., at the
home of Joy & Jeff Kiviat. Call (314) 469-2723 for directions.
Mind Games
At our last meeting, John Drake presented a rationality workshop with
the goal of understanding and developing thinking skills. He moderated
several exercises and games with group participation, keeping everyone
interested throughout the evening.
In the first set of games, we played a variation of "Twenty
Questions," with everyone taking turns asking the questions. One
scenario involved an 18th century English Duke sending a long-distance
message, and the other was figuring our why 15 cars were wrapped in
plastic and buried in the desert. We didn't answer in less than 20
questions, but our discussion afterward focused on how we came up with
questions and how other's questions influenced our own.
The next exercise was an integration game where each team had to come
up with as many associations as possible using the terms
"honesty" and "free markets", respectively. The most
points were awarded for the team with the broadest generalization.
In the final game, everyone anonymously wrote a definition to the word
"honesty." Then, we each had to pick one definition with which
we didn't agree and use it in a sentence to show the absurdity of the
definition - a difficult task for many. In our heated debate that
followed, we found out the importance of agreeing on a definition before
debating what wasn't a proper definition.
Through entertaining exercises and then stepping back to examine what
we did, John helped us understand our approach to problem solving and
rational thinking during a very interesting meeting.
Quotable Quotes
"They tell me I have to use the active voice for the resume. You
know, things like 'Commanded U.S. Armed Forces,' 'Ordered air strikes,'
'Served three terms as president.' Everybody embellishes a little.
'Designed, built and painted Bridge to the 21st Century.' 'Supervised vice
president's invention of the Internet.' 'Generated, attracted, heightened
and maintained controversy.'"
-- Soon-to-be job hunter Bill Clinton at the White House
correspondents' dinner, talking about suggestions from his staff on
writing a resume, April 29, 2000, from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch,
October 1, 2000.
We welcome submissions of reviews, articles, columns and commentary.
Direct all correspondence to gwobjctvst@aol.com. |