2.6 Exercises in Recognizing Potentially Useful Thesis

Rate each of the following statements as a useful thesis, that is, something which might form a clearly opinionated basis for a good argument. Use the following scale: 0-really poor, nothing to argue about here; 1-okay, there's an opinion, but it's quite feeble and doesn't really challenge the reader; 3-workable thesis, which might be made more specific and energetic; 4-really good thesis, clear and energetic.

1. Socrates was a historical character, and Plato is the author of the Socratic dialogues.

2. Shakespeare's Hamlet is a vastly overrated play, contradictory in its presentation of characters, ambiguous in its literal details, and excessively melodramatic in many crucial scenes.

3. Modern North Americans spend a great deal of money on supplies, veterinary medicine, and food for their pets.

4. Modern North Americans spend far too much money on supplies, veterinary medicine, and food for their pets.

5. McIntyre and Robinson, two psychology researchers at McGill University, conducted five separate studies of foetal alcohol syndrome. They concluded that it is a serious problem in modern society.

6. The study by McIntyre and Robinson, two psychology researchers at McGill University, which concluded that foetal alcohol syndrome is a serious problem, is a badly flawed study which produced very misleading conclusions.

7. Frost's poem "Mending Wall" is constructed around a central image of two men repairing a wall between their two properties.

8. In Frost's poem "Mending Wall" the central image of the two men repairing a wall is really effective in bringing out the paradoxical feelings of the narrator.

9. In the Communist Manifesto, Marx argues that capitalism is inevitably doomed, because it generates inescapably the very forces which will lead to its overthrow.

10. Ariel Theatre Company's production of Main Street is interesting.

11. The major Hollywood film Titanic was directed by a Canadian, who also made True Lies.

12. I quite enjoyed the film the Titanic.

13. The Titanic is such a sentimental and poorly scripted and acted work that one wonders what on earth our public standards are coming to when it wins all sorts of awards and people all over the world flock to see it several times. Is Doomsday near, or have I missed something?

14. One common way of dealing with the declining salmon stocks is to increase samanoid enhancement programs.

15. We should be paying more attention to dealing with spousal abuse in our society.

16. Spousal abuse is a common problem in modern society.

17. The recent measures used by North American police forces to combat the sale of illegal narcotics are stupid, ineffective, and very expensive. Only some deranged bureaucrat or someone eager to give the police added powers could have devised such totally ridiculous procedures.

18. Homer's Odyssey is a well known story of wandering.

19. New Cadillacs are more expensive than new Honda Civics.

20. A new Cadillac is, in the long run, a much better investment than a new Honda Civic.

21. Hobbes begins his argument with an analysis of human nature on mechanical principles.

22. Descartes's argument for the existence of God (in the Meditations) is a fascinating, if questionable, part of his opening argument. It is well worth a close look.

23. What is most effective about Wordsworth's imagery is the way it so richly captures the ambiguity in the speaker's feelings, not just about the natural scene but about life itself.

24. Wordsworth's poetry is characterized by frequent images of nature or people in nature.

Evaluate the following as thesis sentences (3 = really clear and useful, 2 = satisfactory but weak, 1 = no use at all):

1. The Book of Genesis tells the story of the creation of the world and thus serves as an explanation for how the world is the way it is.

2. There are many similarities which we can draw between the Book of Genesis and life today.

3. In the Book of Genesis the central concern is the depiction of the nature of God, particularly His relationship to the earth and the people in it. What emerges from this is an overwhelming sense of the mystery, power, and ambiguity of God's actions among people.

4. The story of the sacrifice Isaac by his father Abraham is the clearest depiction we have of just how incomprehensibly barbaric the god of the Old Testament really is. A god who would treat His people this way is quite clearly an evil god.

5. The significance of Adam and Eve is that they disobey God and are thus expelled from paradise and have to suffer for the rest of their lives.

6. I find the story of the creation of Adam and Eve extremely puzzling for a number of reasons. It strikes me that this story is very revealing about the nature of God, but what it reveals is beyond any easy rational explanation. In that quality, perhaps, lies the power of the story.

7. The story of Adam and Eve tells why Christian cultures have always been so harsh on women and have featured so much patriarchal domination.

8. Human cultures are all really different. We can learn a lot about how cultures are different by reading Genesis and comparing it with our own world.

9. Of particular significance in the Abraham and Isaac story is the way in which the religious vision of Genesis (and Exodus) is so closely bound up with political questions. In fact, this vision of God and His people inextricably unites politics and religion. This feature makes the story particularly fascinating.

10. The Book of Genesis clearly indicates that God made the world and everything in it in a week.

11. The story of the creation of men and women in Genesis is a wonderful story emphasizing the total moral freedom of both genders and the importance of their living in harmony together (under the divine sanction of God). In this story, part of God's plan calls for meaningful relations (in all senses of the term) between men and women as equals.