EXTRA CREDIT OPPORTUNITY
Communication Across the Curriculum (CAC)
Questions and Discussion Proposals? communicationacross.thecurriculum@lonestar.edu
Wed, Sept 21
3 to 4pm
Blue Star C.A.F.É.—E202
Rahula Basnagoda (English/Rhetoric)
“Rational Argumentation: A Buddhist Perspective”
Invitation from Rahula:
The so-called rational argumentation that we promote in classrooms is heavily flawed. Common logical fallacies given in modern textbooks, for instance, fail to hone the actual reasoning skills of students.
In fact, the Socratic tradition initiated the blunting of rational argumentation, and the Roman Empire made the task fully complete. What we mostly use in today’s classrooms are the residues of pseudo reasoning jointly invented by the Greek philosophers and Roman rhetoricians.
To understand actual reasoning in its purest form, we have to dig deep into the history of argumentation and rhetoric, creeping beyond Greek philosophers and even the pre-Socratic Greek sophists.
Let us examine what the earliest Buddhist texts offer as a way to enrich the field of modern rational thinking.
