I'm Giving A Persuasive Speech On Bigfoot!

[wiiawiwb]

The content of the speech would depend upon what its purpose is to begin with.

Speeches serve many purposes. One such purpose is entertainment in which a counter point could be used to introduce humor rather than inform.

[Guest]

Pay attention to what HarryAbe has asked for. It's suppose to be a persuasive speech, not Bigfoot on trial.

Correct. That's why, as a professor, I gave him specific insights that I would be looking for in his speech. I will, in fact, be grading 8 students this afternoon on their performance in public speaking exercises; evaluation of speeches like Harry's is something I do frequently.

Skeptics need to leave their personal feelings out if they are to help with convincing the audience.

I can think of no better example of me leaving my "personal feelings" out than by offering Harry specific advice on a topic that would stymie me.

Harry, I think it's great that you connected with Bill Munns. He's a smart guy, and he knows a lot about the PGF. He's also almost certainly wrong in his conclusions about the film. That doesn't mean that I can prove his errors in a quick soundbyte, but it should at the very least be obvious to you from reading various threads that his conclusions are controversial. Controversy is poor ground for sowing persuasion.

In contrast, there is no controversy regarding the alleged eyewitness accounts. I don't refute them, and I don't know any skeptics that do. Now the potential explanations for those accounts are grounds for fertile discussion, but it is a fact that people have been reporting them for a long time.

You're incorrect, the "hump" image was in several threads here and was the single determining factor by a primatologist.

Do you mean the apparent articulation of the scapula? The one that matched a bear?

Sorry, if you want to revisit the Jacobs creature, please revive one of the long-dead but never quite dead enough threads on the topic. You should know, however, that those of us who've studied vertebrate morphology (and ursine life history) find it kind of sad and pathetic that some holdouts among the "bigfoot community" are still trying to pass off those photos as depicting something other than a bear. In other words, the Jacobs photos would be among the worst information Harry could possibly include in a persuasive speech on bigfoot.

[Guest]

But he isn't trying to win an argument. It's speech class, they could care one wit whether or not it makes a persuasive argument, he'll be graded on arrangement, presentation and how well he speaks and holds the audience. I'd say he has a head start with that last one since it will probably be something different from what they've heard.

Unless he titled this wrong, it's exactly a persuasive speech he's making. It's been a while since I had communications 101 or whatever this class is, but a persuasive speech is about more than arrangement, presentation and how well he speaks and holds the audience. If he isn't persuasive, which is best done with fact-based argument, he will receive a lower grade than he would otherwise. His speech is to be a persuasive speech. Read the title of the thread. One of the things I'd suggest to the OP is to take a quick read through a Philosohphy 100/200 level book on logical reasoning, and become familiar with what makes a stronger/weaker argument. Persuasive, in a college-level course is less about opinion and feelings, and more about presentation/arrangement of facts. His professor is much more likely to give him an A-grade with a well thought out, fact-based argument than entertaining anecdotal stories.

Edited September 27, 2012 by Ace!

[Guest ajciani]

See.

Every individual piece of evidence can be argued about.

I have seen where many people new to the field were unaware of what is good, bad, and ugly. Individually, most of the good evidence would need 15 to 30 minute speeches alone, and all of those would require the audience to have some level of preexisting knowledge. 'Bigfoot exists' is a very high hurdle, especially when every piece of evidence can be argued about, inconclusively, for hours. Abe only has 6 to 8 minutes. 'Bigfoot may be a not-so-relict human with a long, widespread and continuing history' is a lower hurdle, which only requires well established facts. If Abe can fit it in, the audience may even be surprised at the huge holes and scant evidence concerning the 'established' human lineage and relict humans.

All we know about Gigatopithecus is some teeth and jaw fragments. All we know about H. neanderthalensis are a few partial or deformed skulls and a few long bones, which at various times in history have been argued about as being from different species. The evidence we have for Neanderthals spans a range of descriptions from 'very similar to modern humans with tool use' to 'large, hairy giants without tools'. It could be both, they could be different species, one could have split into two. 'We don't know as much as we think we know about Neanderthals' alone could be a persuasive speech (again a long one), while 'this is the evidence we have concerning Neanderthals, look how scant it is and there are arguments about it' could be good for an informative speech.

ed. highlighting for emphasis.

Edited September 27, 2012 by ajciani

[Rockape]

Unless he titled this wrong, it's exactly a persuasive speech he's making. It's been a while since I had communications 101 or whatever this class is, but a persuasive speech is about more than arrangement, presentation and how well he speaks and holds the audience. If he isn't persuasive, which is best done with fact-based argument, he will receive a lower grade than he would otherwise. His speech is to be a persuasive speech. Read the title of the thread. One of the things I'd suggest to the OP is to take a quick read through a Philosohphy 100/200 level book on logical reasoning, and become familiar with what makes a stronger/weaker argument. Persuasive, in a college-level course is less about opinion and feelings, and more about presentation/arrangement of facts. His professor is much more likely to give him an A-grade with a well thought out, fact-based argument than entertaining anecdotal stories.

He wants the speech to be persuasive, but according to Harryabe himself

I do not have to give contrary views.

He only has a short time and worrying with presenting a pro/con argument is just a Red Herring in my opinion. He doesn't need to worry with that and just present what he wants to cover in a meaningful fashion.

Correct. That's why, as a professor, I gave him specific insights that I would be looking for in his speech. I will, in fact, be grading 8 students this afternoon on their performance in public speaking exercises; evaluation of speeches like Harry's is something I do frequently.

If this were a debate I might agree with you, but it's not. From what I remember of speech class and from what HarryAbe has said, This is about public speaking ability, not a debate. If you looked for factual evidence in his speech when it isn't about that nor required, that would be dirty pool. This professor will be looking at story telling ability and how well he arranges his story as well as presents it.

Throwing in a demand for counter arguments is sending him down the wrong road in my opinion. Ih he decides he wants to include a qualifier, he could do so simply by stating, "Opinion's vary on this evidence".

Edited September 27, 2012 by Rockape

[Guest]

Throwing in a demand for counter arguments is sending him down the wrong road in my opinion.

That's my opinion too. That's why I'm encouraging him to stress the one item in bigfootery for which there is no counter-argument: people claim to see bigfoots.

I suppose he could present something controversial like Bill Munn's efforts to legitimize the PGF and do so from the point of view that there is no counter to Bill's claims. I am strongly recommending that he not do that because 1) it would be intellectually dishonest to ignore the majority view that is in opposition to Bill's and 2) if there's one person in the audience who has read "The Making of Bigfoot" and starts raising some of Greg Long's points then Harry's presentation will be DOA as a persuasive speech. Harry would face no such risk by sticking to the indisputable fact that people have been claiming encounters with hairy man-apes for a long time.

[Guest]

I'm not saying anything about pro AND con. I'm saying support your side with a fact-based argument and you'll be more persuasive. You can argue one side, persuasively, with facts, not opinion. It's not a debate, it's a persuasive speech. Opinion, even emotion and feeling will be less persuasive to a professor than a well thought out fact based presentation. But to each their own.

[Rockape]

I agree saskeptic on your first point, I also encouraged HA to include such stories and stressed older ones, which were before national media and harder to explain why people from other parts of the country or indeed world have said to see these, for the most part, same creatures.

If the Munns interview and the PGF is going to be a large part of his presentation, as it should, I still say he could qualify it simply by saying, "Opinion's vary" on the subject, as well as the entire subject of BF.

Put that way, I agree with your last post Ace!

[Guest]

Sorry, if you want to revisit the Jacobs creature

That's not necessary I was discussing it here on a new thread just last week. In fact I can link you to threads about it with thousands of hits daily. It's far from being a dead topic as most skeptics want it to be.

I do think witness accounts are important especially when they can be referenced back to a famous sighting like the Jacobs juvenile. There were multiple witnesses to Sasquatch there, I just talked to one that contacted me on here a few days ago.

What is seen in the Jacobs image is not a ursine. I work with biology everyday and know vertebrate morphology of form and structure. I also know the proportions and other important visible factors make it impossible for it to be a bear. Articulation of the scapula, clavicle, or humerus is not

identifiable as man or beast on those stills. This is getting off topic but to not include the classic foundations of Sasquatch history is like giving a speech a out football and omitting the NFL.

That's "about football" I hate these new auto correct phones and sorry about the spacing. I'm not an English professor.

[Guest Forbig]

I've been around as long as dirt and there was never proof that Jacobs or Patty were not Sasquatch. Use the photo evidence it's more impressive than hundreds of stories or DNA that could be false. At least it gives them something they can see and get their imaginations working. Then hit em with the other junk.

[Guest]

@Kerry:

That's just it. If you're considering the Jacobs creature to be among the "classic foundations of Sasquatch history" then you're way off the mark. Forget bigfoot skeptics, a great many bigfoot proponents recognize the Jacobs creature for what it was: a bear. If the people who absolutely believe in bigfoots are not in agreement that the Jacobs creature was one, then it is hardly foundational to the bigfoot phenomenon, and among the very last things I would recommend including in a persuasive speech.

[Guest]

It was one of the most popular sightings since Patty. Millions of people around the world wondered what it was. You can call it a bear as many times as you like but that's not what the majority called it. Large polls have shown the results and it was no bear. Investigations have proved it was not a bear.

Can you name one photo that has revived the topic as MSNBC has said or received as much publicity? From Russia to China?

[Guest]

Nope, but "reviving the topic" does not equal "providing evidence of bigfoot" and if your scientific standard is coverage on MSNBC then I suggest you raise your bar.

[Guest]

The scientific standard has not been found...yet, hang in there.

[Guest ajciani]

For those who are advocating that HA should go for the high fruit and use PGF, Jacobs and his own videos to persuade that bigfoot is real, please consider something very important: it must be a persuasive speech. That means it must be a speech which persuades the audience, not just a speech which presents a position. Whether-or-not the speech actually persuades the audience is immaterial. Rather, the speech must have the capacity to persuade the audience.

Consider this: What if I were to give a speech to persuade the audience that ghosts are real. For my "facts", I present a thermal video that I claim shows a ghost, but in actuality it obviously, briefly caught my own reflection. I present an audio recording of an open mic, in which I claim you can hear some say, "help me please", but the audience hears "peperoni pizza". Now, my speech might be good, and it might argue for the existence of ghosts, but the evidence I presented made the audience think I was nuts. As a persuasive speech, it fails, because my "facts" are actually mistakes, and they reduce the credibility of the speech.

What you are asking HA to do is quite similar. You are asking him to show what are widely viewed as a picture of a bear and a man in a suit, and asking the audience to accept them as proof that bigfoot is real. Even after Ketchum's paper is published, PGF and Jacobs will still be argued about. So such a speech would not be a persuasive speech, but a position statement of HA's opinions concerning the evidence.

On the other hand, most people are probably unaware of the long history and global spread of bigfoot sightings. That the sightings map covers every forested bit of the US could itself be a wake-up call. It might even get the audience thinking, "maybe there is something to this bigfoot thing", and that is a persuasive speech. It has the ability to move the position of the audience. Not necessarily change it, but definitely move it.

Don't think that this is "just an exercise". Those speech instructors can be very picky, and they base grades entirely on their opinions. For example, my brother gave a very nice informative speech concerning local tree ordinances, what you had to do to cut down a tree, and the penalties you could face if you failed to file the proper forms and obtain permission. Suffice to say, he lives in Illinois, and the audience was clearly surprised by the three-ring circus and expense one had to endure just to cut down a tree. His instructor was one of those left-wing, big-government, save the environment types, and he decided that the speech was actually "persuasive", because he choose not to believe that the tree ordinances where really that bad, and even if true, that revealing such a horrendous public policy could only serve to sway the audience against it. My brother got an 'F' on that one, for giving the wrong type of speech.

If HA gives what the instructor thinks is a position statement, rather than a persuasive speech, then HA may get an 'F'.