Project 2 Outline

In this post, I will review and analyze a portion of the text from Writing Public Lives. I will also be outlining my upcoming rhetorical analysis of the article I have been breaking down in my previous posts. The article highlights climate scientist David Keith's views of geoengineering on a biased standpoint being an advocate while being interviewed.

Nicholas A. Tonelli. "Thunderhead." 06/12/2007 via Flickr. Public Domain Dedication.

REVIEW of Writing Public Lives: Writing Your Rhetorical Analysis by Christopher Minnix

Starting with the Introduction,  I find the statement, "shape your introduction in a way that helps you achieve the goal or purpose of your analysis" (Minnix 122), to be very helpful for when I create my starting paragraph. I am going to want to stay focused on the main idea of my analysis on of Brad Plumer's interview with David Keith during my introduction. This will need me to provide enough background information to include in the opening statements before delving deeper into my rhetorical analysis. Minnix stresses that developing an analytical claim is important because it "is your major argument or point about the text that you are analyzing" (Minnix 123). Creating an analytical claim will need the following attributes - debatability and supportability. Moving on to the body of an rhetorical analysis, I will need to frame my argument with "strong textual evidence to back up [my] focus or supporting arguments" (Minnix 124). Drawing strong conclusions after each body paragraph will help readers better understand the information presented before them. Lastly, when constructing a conclusion I will not just restate the main points of my argument, but I will "analyze how the text attempts to persuade its readers and whether or not it is persuasive" (Minnix 125). All in all, I will freely develop my own implications for my conclusion as well as the rest of my paper based on my research into the topic, and my understanding on the article and the people presented within it.



OUTLINE

Introduction:

• Background Information
• Give description as to what geoengineering entails, what solar engineering entails
• Explain what the controversy is and why people are upset

• Thesis
• "Climate scientist and Harvard professor, David Keith, can help the world's misunderstood better understand the benefits and risks of geoengineering methods by weighing in his expert opinion with regards to solving global warming."

Body I: The Use of an Interview

• Focus / Topic

• The use of an interview in this article works great to convey information
• Plumer's choice helps his readers get a breakdown of each specified sub-topic

• Textual Support to Topic

• "...climate scientist David Keith has long argued that we should start thinking seriously about both strategies."

• Both strategies being: "Stop adding carbon-dioxide to the atmosphere." and "try to artificially cool the planet."

• The interview was initiated with the purpose of talking to Keith about his new book, "A Case for Climate Engineering"

• Conclusion

• Discuss how Plumer's use of an interview is most effective
• Dicuss why an interview would be best to explain a person's thoughts

Body II: Organization of the Interview

• Focus / Topic

• Plumer logically constructs his article in the format of an interview
• Using this format helps distinguish between each question paired with its answer

• Textual Support to Topic

• Plumer uses bold text to introduce each subcategory in his article

• Each subcategory is introduced with a question by Plumer followed by the response from David Keith

• For each question that Plumer asks, Keith goes in depth to explain his standpoint and views to the question being asked with regards to the plant's climate

• Conclusion

• Discuss why Plumer's article format is best for this type of publication
• Discuss how a question and answer organization is the best format

Body III: Arguments Presented by Plumer with Counterarguments from Keith

• Focus / Topic

• Keith presents the benefits and the risks of using solar engineering
• He gives examples and possibilities of predicted outcomes as well as consequences

• Textual Support to Topic

• Keith provides reasonable statements to say his claims will not work in the short-term. "Nothing we know about cutting carbon-dioxide emissions says that's going to help us deal with the risk of CO2 that's already in the atmosphere, or deal with climate risks in the very short term."

• He provides a counterargument with regards to geoengineering in terms of misuse. "People often talk about using these technologies to return temperatures to pre-industrial levels. If you do that, that would be a dramatic climate cooling, with bad consequences, like reducing precipitation a lot."

• The climate scientist provides his support for geoengineering while also giving a reasonable amount of attention to the risks. In his mind, he still is a very strong advocate of geoengineering the planet's natural occurrences to reduce the human impact. He states with regards to his company, "(And full disclosure: I work on a company related to that.)." This statement, which Plumer decides to include, tells a reader that Keith wants to continue to argue his evidence even though stating possible risks.

• The company Keith works on is called Carbon Engineering, and their goal is to reduce the amount of carbon-dioxide in the atmosphere by use of giant vacuums whose sole purpose is to remove such unwanted atoms.

• Conclusion

• Discuss the importance of understanding both the good and the bad of geoengineering methods used to solve global warming
• Present the idea that readers can get a glimpse of both sides of the debate

Conclusion:

• Review the three strategies (use of an interview, formatting article for interview, presenting counterarguments and refutations) that Plumer uses in his article and find the importance of each

• Explain how these strategies represent the goals of Brad Plumer for his article and interview

Reflection: Looking at Savannah's outline for her project got me inspired to create an essay of myself that would focus mainly on relating to my readers to get them to understand the topic with more ease. She has presented a very effective way of getting the information of rhetorical strategies across and will definitely help her in the long run. Isabel chose to format her outline in a way that will help her readers understand what she want them to understand easier. She includeds four different body sections that will explain the debate and give an example of electric stimulation as described in the view of the article author, Gad Alon. She should have no problem producing a great paper.