Rachel Agan

Professor Deborah Ernie

WRIT 118.004

2/21/15

Segment 2 Paper: A Rhetorical Analysis on the TED Talk: The Danger of Science Denial

There are many reasons why mankind should be thankful for the world we live in at the

present moment. As Michael Specter outlined five years ago in his TED Talk: The Danger of

Science Denial, health, wealth, mobility, opportunity, and declining rates of disease are all

reasons to look forward to what the future brings instead of looking to the past for answers to

lifes problems (Specter, 2010). Overall, Specter does an excellent job of drawing in his audience

with information that is contingent with current issues, while simultaneously challenging others

to view the future for what it really is, rather than allowing skepticism to poorly affect smart

decision making. To summarize, he is asking his audience of Americans and international TED

Talk fans alike to look at the big picture, the ethical picture, the logical picture; which is worse?

Having a slight fever and a few seizure-like reactions to a smallpox vaccine, or to be severely

afflicted by smallpox itself?

By using the analogy of the time machine, he appeals directly to the audiences

perception of logos by recognizing that (a) the world today is the most safe, having the best

overall comparative health, wealth, etc., (b) people want to live longer, therefore, (c) shouldnt

we appreciate the world we live in today and what scientific discoveries have to offer? An

example of this when Specter points out the stark contrast between the worlds advancements

made in science and technology in recent years, but contrastingly, our ability to help the poor and
the starving has declined. Logically, this should not be happening, Specter argues. Ideologically,

if one aspect of a civilization is demonstrating prosperous accomplishments, should not the rest

of that civilization prosper? Specter brings this dire situation to the attention of his audience in an

attempt to first make them aware of reality. Some Americans are so intent on staying inside their

safety ring that many do not realize the trouble the rest of the world is often in. Specter

encourages us as Americans, and as leaders in scientific advancements in the world, to accept the

responsibility of bumping up their safety levels from a national scale to a global scale.

The reason why public spokesmen such as Specter are often so well received by

audiences is partially due to their uncanny ability to effectively and strategically incorporate

persuasion into their speeches. In the beginning of the talk, he is arranging his ideas to the public

in a way that was aimed to stir a sense of relatability amongst his audience members It was

interesting to see what contrasting evidence Specter came up with to back up his persuasive

arguments. In application, persuasion is seen in Specters responsibility for discovering facts and

applying those facts to concrete decision making. The evidence that Specter cites to support his

claims are often statistically based, such as the chart he displayed in reference to the number of

starving people that has skyrocketed in recent decades, or in noting the billions of individuals

who died from smallpox before a vaccine was created in the last half a century. On other

occasions, his acts of persuasion were based primarily on enthymemes, in which he applied his

knowledge of the American cultural background to the anticipated reactions of his audience. In

doing this, he is making an especially effective use of rhetoric in being mindful of this cultural

factor, thus being able to anticipate and capture his audiences attention and intrigue to the

matters at hand. This will, theoretically, lead to a larger chance that a decision will be made on
the issue of to trust science, or to not trust science, sooner rather than later, and it could be

claimed that his persuasiveness in this talk was not all for naught.

After about two minutes of reveling in the Golden Age of scientific discoveries and

health care providence that is the 21st century in the United States, he goes out on a tangent with

a statistic regarding the shocking amount of starving people worldwide at the time, and remarks

on how disgraceful it is that we as a world population have yet to solve the world hunger

problem, despite our countrys countless contributions to the world of science. After all, what

good will advances in science be to us when we run out of strategies and the necessary

capabilities to agriculturally grow healthy food to feed everyone in the next few decades? This

leads to one of his goals of using rhetoric in his talk, which emerges in his obvious appeal to

human motives. Humans, especially Specter, are striving to save the Earth from destruction. He

does not hesitate to lay the guilt and responsibility of others suffering on the shoulders of his

audience, as he describes statistics of the dead or the dying from around the world as

disgraceful and horrible. On a different note, examples of ethos-based rhetoric can also be

heard throughout the talk, especially in his rebuking of the United States for their faulty health

care system. Although initially he began the talk by showing signs of support with the

incomparable levels of health care America has reached in this day and age, he now takes the

side of possibly some of the more right-wing Americans who remain skeptical of big government

and their plans for its citizens. However, the products many Americans have now turned to, such

as daily multivitamins, fish oil, and other dietary supplements that are advertised to be beneficial

to ones health are usually products of fraudulent, unethical companies. According to Specters

description, they are placebos that do nothing more than leave ones pee looking more yellow-

colored than it would otherwise. Specter also appeals to the ethos component of rhetoric in his
telling of the completely useless deaths in South Africa due to the wide spread of AIDS, all

because their government leader would not accept the vaccine against AIDS as legitimate or

safe. This is a prime example of how people should not allow their fear of science ruin their

chances of having any future of their own. Granted, there are many reasons to be distrustful of

big corporations or various government policies involving vaccinations, but that does not change

the fact that these vaccines are saving millions of lives from terrible diseases. Still, it is apparent

from Specters approach to the subject that he really does wantand believe in the possibility

ofchange in the world in years soon to come.

Specters public speaking also serves a couple of social functions in testing his ideas and

to advocate his own personal convictions, as well as shaping the knowledge base of his general

audience. As a journalist, Specter has been intent on discovering the truth of matters and getting

down to the bottom of things, and has likely been wrestling with this information he presents for

a significant period of time. By appearing on a program as well-known and widely broadcasted

on the Internet as TED talks are in the 21st century, Specter is taking a big step in presenting his

ideas to the world and seeing what happens when people are confronted with the facts. He

attempts to address evenly the good news and the bad news of our current stance as a nation by

itself and in relation to the rest of the world, according to his research and backed up with the

persuasiveness of his personal convictions. The second social function that is apparent in

Specters talk is the shaping of knowledge that occurs as he shares what he knows with countless

others. Some of these people may be American mothers or young college students such as the

one he mentioned in his speaking, who are skeptical of vaccinations, especially in the mass

quantity American children receive nowadays that are highly encouraged by medical institutions

across the country. By challenging these Americans tendencies to distrust the system and not
buy all of what the government tells them, yet at the same time encouraging them to keep that

skepticism, he is inadvertently molding the mindsets of countless individuals and is making them

think deeply about the social consequences of avoiding vaccinations. The effectiveness of

rhetoric having these social functions is somewhat self-explanatory, in knowing that what

Specter is telling his audience is, in fact, changing their opinions and potentially their lives. He

might now know forthright what effect sharing his ideas and his knowledge and others will have,

but the way in which he presents it along with other rhetorical tools makes his speaking turn into

an overall success.

To tie in all of the rhetorical tools that Specter utilized in his talk, I am making the claim

that his public speaking proved to be an extremely effective use of rhetoric in four key areas: the

application of logos, the use of persuasion, the application of ethos and human motivation, and

the social functions that his shared knowledge and ideas inadvertently cause. As a viewer of his

speech myself, I personally concur that his usage of these aspects of rhetoric kept me attentive

and interested in what he had to share. I felt both positive and negative vibes after the conclusion

of the video; on the brighter side, I agreed with Specter in that I believe that the world will figure

out a way to solve the problems we are currently facing one way or another. On the dire side of

things, this talk encouraged me to take into account all sides of a situation instead of remaining

skeptical of the government based on conspiracy theories, or remaining sheltered because the

United States makes this a particularly easy task for Americans, or refusing to help others that

are worse off than we are.