Thanks everyone. We’ve really enjoyed being on the Book Salon

I think they will be helped. Writing (and giving) a speech can be challenging and stressful for many people, including children. This will not dampen their creativity. For persuasive speeches, this will help them, and liberate them, and allow them to be more creative within the elements. It did this for Lincoln. In his Baltimore Sanitary Fair speech, he uses a parable as his construction – very creative). It is important to note this structure only works for persuasive speeches.

In our second book, “Barack Obama, Abraham Lincoln, and the Structure of Reason”, we describe President Obama’s use of Lincoln’s system for structuring speeches. The book contains a selection of President Obama’s speeches from 1H2011, including the Gabrille Giffords Tucson speech, and the Osama Bin Laden speech. President Obama’ speeches are easier to demarcate than Abraham Lincoln’s. President Obama is clear and direct.

We are currently working on a book about Thomas Jefferson’ use of Euclid. The manuscript is presently 600 pages, but not done.

To ability to tell a story certainly did not hurt. His reputation for integrity was enhanced by the six elements. His political instincts were superb.

We demarcated Bill Clinton’s speech at the 2012 DNC on our web site:

http://www.thestructureofreason.com/barack-obama-abraham-lincoln-and-the-structure-of-reason/arithmetic–bill-clinton

In the telegraph office scene, Lincoln talked with two telegraph operations, discusses Lincoln’s second common notion (discussed in chapter 2 of our book), and forms his hands into a triangle (as in Euclid’s Proposition 1). This was a clear acknowledgment to Lincoln’s awareness of Euclid.

I’ve been listening to State of the Union messages for many years. On several occasions (going back over 40 years), I can remember the commentators immediately after the State of the Union asking “Was there a memorable sound bite?” If they can identify one, they would use that to support the fact that it was a good speech. The sound bites, not the content, seems to be a strong focus.

In March 2010 when we were working to get the manuscript finalized for our publisher, I was asked (at a time when I had no time) to give a speech to my county board on the subject of video poker. I wrote a four minute speech using the six element or a proposition in about 30 minutes, and felt pretty good about it. Without the six elements, it would have taken me a lot longer, and I suspect would not have been as good. I was able to concentrate on saying things clearly, concisely, and well, because the structure worked for me.

Thus far have not seen evidence of Euclid in Douglas’s speech.

Lincoln wrote his letter to Horace Greeley arguing that to preserve the Union, he would free the slaves, or nor free the slaves, as required. The most important goal was to preserve the Union.

Lincoln’s second Inaugural demarcates beautifully into the six elements of a proposition. It is in the book.

1. I’m sure Lincoln heard of Aristotle. “Aristotle’s Rhetoric” has been considered a definitive book on rhetoric – but it never talks about the six elements of a proposition, as they are defined in Proclus’s Commentaries on Euclid. Aristotle talks about many techniques useful in gaining the sympathy of the audience, etc.

2. The Euclidean approach is to convince people through logic that is developed based on your fundamental axioms and the evidence, which lead to a logical argument. When we first researched Aristotle’s Rhetoric, and were discussing what it covered, my co-author David’s comment to me was Aristotle’s Rhetoric is a book about how to lie – it covers every trick in the book about how to convince people you are right.

3. We prefer the Euclidean approach, because it is based on data, evidence, and clearly stating your logical argument. This is an ancedote to a “sound bite” approach, where people present their conclusions, and present them with emphasis, but no logic.

As far as Jefferson’s speeches and letters, the answer is a strong yes. We are writing a book on Jefferson now. Stay tuned.

In researching Lincoln, we found a book called “The Voice of Lincoln”, where Judge Wanamaker, an Ohio Supreme Court justice, speculated that Lincoln may have been influenced by the Declaration of Independence. Judge Wanamaker then commented about the Declaration having three parts, and then continued to say that none of Linocln’s biographies describe his system for writing. This led us to look at the Declaration of Independence, which we both demarcated into the six elements of a proposition. This led us to look into Jefferson a bit more – on his tombstone he asked to me remembered for three things: the Declaration, founding UVA, and the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom. It turns out the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom Jefferson also wrote as a proposition (and he states he did in his Autobiography).

The main thesis is that Abraham Lincoln used the structure of a Euclidean proposition to structure his speeches, letters, and legal arguments, beginning in 1854. He initially did this to become a better lawyer, but ultimately used these in his political career.

We started out to write a book about Abraham Lincoln as a lawyer. One question we asked ourselves was “How did Abraham Lincoln make his arguments”. The statement that came up over and over was he read the first six books of Euclid to learn what it meant to demonstrate. With that, co-author David challenged me to do what Lincoln did, study the first six books of Euclid, and learn what Lincoln did, what it means to demonstrate. In the process, I learned about the six elements of a proposition, which are hidden in Euclid’s propositions. We then saw the six elements in Lincoln’s speeches.

Yes, we are both on.

Bev
This seems to be working!
Dan