Chapter 10 discusses the concept of Appeal to Emotion, which is as way to sway someone into considering a specific point of view or evoke a sense of feeling which persuades them to do something. The chapter also expands on various subcategories - the appeal to fear, the appeal to vanity, the appeal to pity and the appeal to spite - each based on the use of emotionally loaded words to bend audience sentiment. These individual concepts are unique in that a picture can substitute the words required to convey opinion and induce feelings, possibly with the exception of the appeal to spite. Epstein writes, “An appeal to spite often invokes the “principle” that two wrongs make a right”. Or simply said it is an argument that includes an accusation of misconduct that is responded to by a rationalization that others have sinned, or might have sinned.
Jane: I having a dinner party this Saturday and I’m inviting Julie and her husband.
Maggie: Wow, that’s very generous of you, considering they didn’t invite you to their dinner last month.
Jane: You’re right, I completely forgot about that. Well, I guess I will be crossing them off the invite list.
This example uses justification of spite to reverse a decision previously made. It is a bad argument because it assumes Julie intentionally did not invite Jane and that decision is based on implied decent behavior of reciprocation. Spite usually calls into play a moral dilemma.
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