2/27


I had an American rhetoric student who was writing a paper on a controversy surrounding some automated technology.  She was to find three rhetors invested in the controverst with three different views on the issue, and she was to synthesize their arguments. She chose self-driving cars. The first reading problem seemed to be the assignment sheet.  The student’s first attempt did have three different articles summarized, but they were informative articles explaining how self-driving cars work.  She had tried to frame the controversy in the form of the question, “Are the lives saved by self-driving cars worth the cost?”   
                One article was from a tech magazine.  It described the “lidar” technology used in the sensors of the cars.  Although this tech was originally prohibitively expensive, the cost is falling dramatically.  She explained that the owner of the lidar tech company had said that 95% safe isn’t safe enough.
                Her interpretation was that this rhetor felt the technology was initially too expensive, but that in making it less expensive, it would be too dangerous.  So this rhetor was clearly arguing that self-driving cars would always either be too expensive or too unsafe.
                After reading Bean’s article, I think the issue may have stemmed from two possible causes.  The first is similar (but not the same) as reason 4 (p135). He says that weak readers may interpret the author’s meaning into “ideas that they are comfortable with.” In this case, I don’t think a lack of familiarity with the author’s values was the problem, but that the student really wanted to find a rhetor who had a particular view, so she tried to shoehorn it to fit.  The student was also having difficulty with the rhetorical context, difficulty 5 (p153-136). I asked the student whether she really thought someone would be involved in a company designing lidar if they thought it could never work.  The student agreed that this didn’t make sense.  I asked what investment someone involved in lidar research would have in the topic, and she figured he must want the self-driving cars to succeed.  I asked her if there might be another reason he’d say 95% isn’t good enough.  Eventually we concluded that he’d set a goal for his tech, and that he must think that safe and affordable self-driving cars are achievable.
                The student didn’t change much, got very critical feedback on the rough draft, redid it, and she still failed to find three rhetors who had something to gain and lose by the controversy.  We worked together Wednesday to find three, and when she rewrote it again, she still hadn’t synthesized their positions or discussed why the rhetors might hold their respective positions.  I eventually turned the assignment sheet into a list of criteria to check off (or not) and she has now at least paid lip service to all the requirements.  I’m frustrated a little that she wrote and rewrote it four time, but she’s not going to be happy with her grade.

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