Fear has become omnipresent in society generating conflicts such as anxiety. Professor of clinical psychiatry and director of the psychopharmacology clinic, Richard A. Friedman, in his article, “A Drug to Cure Fear”, argues that the elimination of pathological anxiety with the use of drugs is possible by altering painful emotional memories. He builds his credibility with reputable sources, citing statistics, researches and conveying his knowledge of the subject. He adopts an erudite tone in order to appear optimistic and informed about the possibility that a single drug could cure fear for individuals with fear or neuroscience specialist’s readers. Friedman’s purpose is to persuade and prove his claim through ethos, pathos and logos.
Friedman begins his article utilizing pathos by questioning the audience “Who among us hasn’t wanted to let go of anxiety or forget about fear?” (1),
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acknowledging that fear is ubiquitous which encourages the audience to continue reading. He appeals to distressed emotions of the audience by providing relief suggesting “dose of a drug, combined with exposure to your fear at the right moment, could free you of that fear forever” (3) and provides an analogy for a counterargument. Friedman recognizes the counterargument and applies pathos in order to induce hope towards relief in a capsule seeing there isn’t “a reason not to help frightened individuals soften their painful emotional memories” (4) and gathering believers of his claim. The utilization of emotion conveys an idea of community amongst the audience as individuals search for relief. Throughout his piece, Friedman utilizes various reliable sources strengthening his credibility and appeal to ethos. These sources include, “Merel Kindt, a professor of psychology at the University of Amsterdam”,” A study on prescription stimulants in the military services” , “A 2015 review of PTSD studies published in Biological Psychology”,” and “Marieke S. Tollenaar a psychologist at Leiden University in the Netherlands” Citing these sources enhances his credibility in ethos by providing expert opinions, researches, facts and statistics to support his claim. Personal examples such as “I was standing next to a young man […] fear of heights and had exposure treatment […] fear was triggered and he was having a full blown panic attack. I suppose he was lucky to be stuck with a psychiatrist” (5) in order to demonstrate his experience and acknowledgment of the issue. This reassures the audience of Friedman’s knowledge considering it’s a controversial issue affection many. Lastly, Friedman applies enthralling appeals to logos, with various facts, statistics and logical advancement of ideas.
He explains how fear isn’t specified with just humans but animals as well by describing how “Several studies of rats done in 2000 showed that a drug called anisomycin […] reduce fear associations […] exposed to the fear again […] they had forgotten their original fear” (3) and that “29 percent of America adults will suffer from anxiety at some point in their lives. Cause-and-effect is present with Mere; Kindt’s research on arachnophobia “exposed to the spider and given the drug were able to touch the tarantula within days and, by three months, many felt comfortable holding the spider in their bare hands” (2). These statistics and observations are a few of various that logically assist his claim that a drug could potentially cure pathological anxiety. In order to make his claim believable, Friedman demonstrates his knowledge through logos by using collected data. The data constructs an appeal to logos and suggests to the reader that this is a problem worth
observing. In conclusion, Professor of clinical psychiatry and director of the psychopharmacology clinic, Richard A. Friedman, in his article, “A Drug to Cure Fear”, utilizes ethos, pathos and logos to persuade individuals with fear or neuroscience specialist’s readers that relief of fear is possible with a single drug. His use of ethos, pathos and logos is effective because it provides readers with reliance, similarities and contrasting ideas that were proven contrary.
The article “The Coddling Of The American Mind”, written by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt, was written about how teachers are afraid of what they are allowed to say during in class because of the emotional effect on the students. While writing the article the authors have many examples of logos, ethos, and pathos. The logos of the article appeals to logic by presenting facts and statistics. The writers provide definitions of words such as microaggression and trigger warning. While explaining the definitions they go on to give real world examples to further the understanding of the words. Also statistics of the amount of mental health issues are provided to enhance the logos. Secondly to make the article more appealing is adding an emotional
ubiquitous and constitutes the greatest psychical danger-situation known to the human organism...' (ibid.). Isabel Menzies Lyth argues that these anxieties are
Fear is a powerful emotion. Wikipedia.com describes fear as “an emotion induced by threat perceived by living entities, which causes a change in brain and organ function and ultimately change behavior, such as running away, hiding or freezing from traumatic events.”Most people tend to avoid fearful situations, not realizing that something positive may come out of the event or experience. Victor Villaseñor focuses on the topic of fear in his novel titled Burro Genius. Villaseñor demonstrates to readers how growing up he was extremely fearful of any situation. Victor also tells his readers how he turned his fear into motivation into motivation to keep going and reach his ultimate goal of becoming a published author.
Chipotle uses pathos, ethos, and logos in their advertisement to attract electronic consumers to download their app “The Scarecrow.”
“Fear becomes easier to master when the patient’s mind is diverted from the thing feared to the fear itself, considered as a present and undesirable state of his own mind; and when he regards the fear as his appointed cross he will inevitably think of it as a state of mind.” (9) Once the patient has figured out the states of fear, then they can conquer it. They immediately transfer paths so they do not get pulled into the dark forces. 1 John4:18 says “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love”
A lot of times, people find music a great way to express how they feel. Perhaps they cannot find the words to explain how they feel but a song can put it perfectly. Songs can tell a story, give a message, or simply be a nice beat to dance to. In the song, “Same Drugs” by Chance the Rapper, he tells a story of someone he grew up with who has since changed now that they are adults. Talking about the simplicity of when they were kids and now they are adults. Comparing their relationship to the story of Peter Pan, he uses the lines, “When did you change? Wendy, you’ve aged,” to express them growing up, aging, and changing (Chance The Rapper). He compares his old childhood friend to Wendy and compares himself to Peter Pan. Although it is easy to believe this song is about drugs, this song is not about drugs. Not only is this song enjoyable to listen to, but listening to the story allows people to relate. Using Peter Pan to compare to
By doing this, Levin uses pathos as well as ethos to present himself as a nice guy who's not unreasonable. Though his argument is different from Levin's, Andrew Sullivan tries a similar approach in his article, “Bush's torturers follow where the Nazis led”. The article demonstrates a clear use of pathos from the beginning. Sullivan begins with some personal information about himself, showing that he is one of the regular people. His imagery is subtle, but powerful.
The addition of fear is sometimes too much for people to handle. As if they didn’t have enough already” (Baker 1).
... audience, it made it more complex to have pathos effect all the audiences. To sum up, the author use of pathos did get the audience to be interested in the topic by giving them a solution to help yet, most would not like the topic of depressed doctor in need of aid.
Karl Albrecht, Ph.D. "The (Only) Five Basic Fears We All Live By." Psychology Today (2012).
“At the University of California at Irvine, experiments in rats indicate that the brain’s hormonal reaction to fear can be inhibited, softening the formation of memories and the emotions they evoke” (Baard).
The Dangers of Fear Irish Playwright, George Bernard Shaw, once said, “The worst sin toward our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them; that's the essence of inhumanity.” Inhumanity is mankind’s worst attribute. Every so often, ordinary humans are driven to the point where they have no choice but to think of themselves. One of the most famous examples used today is the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night demonstrates how fear is a debilitating force that causes people to lose sight of who they once were.
In the words of Bertrand Russell, “Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom” (Russell). Fear causes many problems in our lives. Fear influences many of a person’s actions and decisions. However, people usually regret the decisions or actions they made out of fear. Also, these actions and decisions can cause problems for those people in their future. Fear is a harmful emotion, for it clouds people’s judgement, disables them from taking action, and causes them to make decisions that they will regret later.
This paper is focused on how fear as a subject is being perceived by many as a dominant and primitive human emotion. An uncontrollable energy that’s exists and created within every individual, which is directed towards an object or a given situation that does not present an actual danger. The individual then analyzes that the fear is contradictory and thus cannot help the reaction. Gradually, the phobia aims to build up and aggravate as the fear of fear response takes hold. Eventually they distinguish their fear responses as negative, and go out of their way to avoid those reactions. ‘Fear is derived as a basic feeling and therefore created by us – it is not something we have, but something we do. The principle of fear is to keep us safe.’
Gulli, C. (2009, 10 19). Fear Factor. Maclean's, 122(40), p. 100. Retrieved April 30, 2014