Thompson Response

Finney 1

Jill Finney

Mr. Werry

RWS 100

03 September 2014

Thompsons “Public Thinking” Response

            In Thompson’s article, “Public Thinking”, he addresses the topic of writing in today’s society. He starts his article with a brief story about a young female blogger from Kenya who wrote about the corruption of her country; branching to daily life and even her love of the Steelers. However this is all quite irrelevant to the main message that Thompson wants to get across to his readers. What Thompson is really saying can be found on pg. 51 of the article, “We are now a global culture or avid writers…we’re also writing a stunning amount of material about things we are simply interested in- our hobbies, or friends, or weird things we’ve read or seen online, sports, current events, last nights episode of our favorite TV show.” (Thompson 51). This prompts the question, “how is this all changing our cognitive behavior?” (Thompson 51), which is the number one question of the article.

            There are three main ways that Thompson tries to answer this question. They include but are not limited to, the following claims. The first, “For one, It can help clarify our thinking” (Thompson 51).  “The explosion of online writing has a second aspect that is even more important than the first, though: it is almost always done for an audience,” provides for the framework of the second claim (Thompson 52). Lastly, Thompson states, “Once thinking is public, connections take over.” (Thompson 58).

Finney 2

In stating these three claims Thompson uses evidence such as Expert Testimony, Experimental, and Individual Examples. In talking about his first claim Thompson uses Expert Testimony by tying in how poets complete their works. “I [Cecil Day-Lewis] do not sit down at my desk to put into verse something that is already clear in my mind….If it were clear in my mind, I should have no incentive or need to write about it….” (Thompson 51). In this piece of evidence from expert Cecil Day-Lewis; it can be explained that yes cognition is clarified by writing thoughts down. Lewis doesn’t have a topic in mind when he goes to write about poetry; but when he writes he is writing to understand his thoughts better. Thus relating back to the first claim that writing creates a clearer image of thought for individuals. Moving on to Thompsons next piece of evidence of Personal Anecdotes for his claim regarding always writing to an audience. “…a group of Vanderbilt University professors in 2008 published a study in which several dozen four and five year olds were shown patterns of colored bugs and asked to predict which would be next in sequence” (Thompson 55). Thompson further elaborates that in this particular study the kids were divided into groups (one group did puzzle silently, second group talked aloud to themselves through the puzzle, third had to show mom how to complete the puzzle) the group that had the highest success rates happened to be talking to mom, because she is a very important audience. Obviously this form of evidence directly backs up Thompsons claim about audiences and how writing to an audience creates an overall better writing. Lastly, Individual Examples, “Anyone who’s googled their favorite hobby….the Internet is a connection making machine” (Thompson 58). In this last bit Thompson uses himself as an example to show his personal, individual connection with the reader.

Works Cited

Thompson, Clive. "Public Thinking_." Smarter than You Think: How Technology Is Changing Our Minds for the Better. 45-69. Print.