THE GREEKS HAD A WORD FOR IT - The Pocket Internet

"THE GREEKS HAD A WORD FOR IT"

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But if you speak to a thousand people, you cannot see each of their expressions; you cannot hear their questions. True, they may throw eggs at you, boo or even applaud -- but, except for these crude expressions of approval or disapproval, you have little guidance as to what is taking place in their minds.

Let me call to mind an experience that most of us must share in common: our first youthful experience as a public speaker. If it was not terrifying to you, I can only assume that you were a child of the most objectionable kind. For even if those whom you addressed were personal friends and you had only finished chatting with them, when you were the speaker and they were the audience, a yawning gulf opened between you. If your heart didn't flop and butterflies did not invade your stomach, you were made of stern stuff indeed.

"One-to-one
communication
is easy.
One-to-many
communication
can be
painfully
difficult."

The trouble was, of course, that you suddenly realized that you had none of what we today call feedback. You were flying blind. You had come face to face with a fact of life. One-to-one communication is easy. One-to-many communication can be painfully difficult.

This probably had the effect of thinning out those who volunteered to be spokesmen in the forum at Syracuse.

"...those who were skillful
in communication on a
one-to-many basis
were those you wanted
on your side..."

But those that persevered developed professional status. For it soon became clear that those who were skillful in communication on a one-to-many basis were those you wanted on your side of the public argument.

The occupation became so important that the Greeks invented a word for it: rhetor -- a man set aside for his professional skill in effective one-to-many communication.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is who you are.

And without rhetors, according to Plato, Athenian democracy would never have been possible.

By Plato's time, some 75 years later, Athenian rhetors had greatly developed their skills. And by that time, also, these rhetors had attracted a great deal of unfavorable comment that persists to this very day.

Plato was disturbed. He pointed out that these men had become so skilled that they were able to make the worse side of any argument appear to be the better. Others complained that the rhetors appealed to baser emotional instincts of the people, were loose in dealing with the truth, and manipulated the masses by deceptive strategies and clever devices of oratory.

"Breed an intellectual leader,
arm him with faithful troops
and you will need no more rhetors."

Plato, who took a very dim view of democracy, made the famous suggestion that the answer was to breed and educate philosopher kings to make the proper decisions for the fundamental good of the public. Breed an intellectual leader, arm him with faithful troops and you will need no more rhetors.

His pupil, Aristotle, however, came up with an opposing argument. Acknowledging that the skills of these professionals were not always employed on the side of truth and justice, he answered with a famous generalization.

He said there is no good thing in the world that cannot be turned to an evil purpose -- virtue itself being the only exception.

"...one could not attribute
evil to a thing merely
because it was possible
to use it for evil purposes."

It followed, then, that one could not attribute evil to a thing merely because it was possible to use it for evil purposes.

So far as I know, he was right. A chair seems to be a perfectly good object. But in a barroom brawl, a man with evil intentions can crack your skull with it. It is indeed difficult to identify any good thing that a bad man cannot use for malign purposes.

This is certainly true of any improvement in communications. The printing press made it possible to lie to many people at once. The telephone made it possible to lie to other people at long distance.

Aristotle took very firm exception to Plato's ideas on this matter and went to a lot of trouble to explain why.

"How to Persuade -
When You're Persuading
More Than One."

He wrote what is today a 300 page book on the subject. The title, translated into today's English, is totally misleading. So, I will give it a title that makes sense, and one that I believe Aristotle would approve of. That title would be "How to Persuade - When You're Persuading More Than One."

He is typically straightforward. He studies what the rhetors had been doing. He clearly outlines the difference between a dialog and a one-to-many communication. He gets off one-liners that don't sound too bad 2300 years later. For example, and I quote:

"It is not enough to know what to say, but it is necessary also to know how to say it."

"Naturalness is persuasive, and artificiality the reverse."

"Demonstration is the best possible proof."

The dispute between Aristotle and Plato was fundamental. Plato had no faith in the citizen. He believed that power to decide all things must be placed in an elite, educated and trained authority. Aristotle was clearly of the opinion that the citizen, if he heard arguments skillfully presented on both sides, might learn to distinguish between good and bad policies of government.

Today, we have a world divided on that very principle.

"A tyrant does not need
rhetors to persuade the people."

Aristotle lost the first round. Athenian democracy did not survive, and tyrants came back into style. A tyrant does not need rhetors to persuade the people. If you don't agree, he simply has his soldiers put a sword all the way through you. The rhetor profession ceased.

The Romans, during three republics, borrowed liberally from Aristotle's thinking. But before the birth of Christ, the last republic winked out.

Plato had won by a knockout. For the next 1500 years there would be little use for Aristotle's principles. Emperors, kings, princes and noblemen ruled the world and they had little need for Aristotle's techniques of persuasion.

"Crowned heads tend to
want a monopoly of the
channels of persuasion..."

The citizen was not called upon to make many decisions, and where this is the case, you don't need effective methods of persuasion.

Crowned heads tend to want a monopoly of the channels of persuasion, and they have such efficient alternatives as hanging or beheading if their persuasion is not effective.

This royal monopoly of the means of persuasion suffered a very bad setback in 1450 with the invention of the printing press. Suddenly it was no longer necessary to gather about you a crowd that the authorities could easily disperse.

"This royal monopoly of the means
of persuasion suffered a very bad
setback in 1450 with the
invention of the printing press."

No longer was it necessary to travel painfully from place to place to widen the scope of your persuasion.

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