Ghost Story Presentation Outline

 Introduction:

-          Hook

Ø  Ghosts are real, obviously. The footsteps, particles of dust going into the camera, and words coming through a tiny box with a million other sounds. But they are only real if you can experience something paranormal, especially if you don’t have other outside factors.

-          Thesis

Ø  They are creating a story about how they did not get a lot of evidence so that the audience will feel bad for them. They believe stories from other experiences and because they were tired, and didn’t have all of their equipment, they did not get as much evidence to prove these experiences. They are using emotional manipulation to make the audience believe this place is haunted.

-          Credibility

Ø  Being in Vroomans rhetoric class, use of his charts.

Ø  My name, being an English major.

Body:

-          Go through the website and explain what they are saying.

 

-          Fallacies Chart:

Ø  We see different types of fallacies being used within this paranormal investigation. Including- (insert analysis of fallacies chart here. Printing out the chart so I can say definition and example)

 

Transition

 

-          P-OT Chart

Ø  Within the P-OT chart, I found a few more examples than the other fallacies chart. (Insert analysis of P-OT chart here. Printing out the chart so I can say definitions and examples)

Conclusion:

-          From this paranormal analysis of Rolling Hill’s asylum, we can conclude that there is some paranormal activity here based on the building’s history. But, because of the lack of evidence that the team presented, we can infer that the building is not as haunted as they make it seem, and regardless of the reasons why they did not get the evidence they wanted, there should have been more paranormal experiences. 

Sallie House Fallacies/P-OT Chart

Sallie House

Braydee Frederick 

 Fallacies 

P-OT

Sources:

http://faculty.tlu.edu/svrooman/perelman.htm

http://faculty.tlu.edu/svrooman/fallacies1.htm

https://www.ghostresearch.org/Investigations/sallie.html

Fallacy/ P-OT charts

 Fallacy Chart

Appeal to Force/Fear	Her violently throwing what was not hers is using force/fear that if its not hers then it is wrong.	While heavily blindfolded, she takes a box of letters received from friends and sits down, examines each one, and reads them (out loud) without error or hesitation. Father and friends put their own letters in with hers, and while heavily blindfolded, she correctly draws out the intruding letters and examines them. She reads aloud the address and throws violently away every letter not her own.
Post Hoc	Because Mary died, the spirit moved on to Lurrany.	Mary returns to good health, but her violent fits increase, and her parents are advised to place her in an asylum; however, on July 5, 1865, while her parents are in Peoria, Mary enters into a violent fit and dies. ----- Now, Lurrany Vennum comes into the picture. She was born July 11, 1864.
Unrepresentative Sample	They believe the house is haunted but no evidence.	Summation:  I made no paranormal findings.
Hasty Generalization	They say they heard the word “bitch” but it sounded more like a frog cut off.	http://youtu.be/AOwOYzS04zQ

P-OT chart

Repetition	Say it again. And again. And again.	She knows the names and life histories of friends and neighbors from the period of 1852-1865.   She recalls hundreds of incidents that transpired during her natural life.   It repeats SHE a couple more times
Observed	Concrete data.	She was born October 8, 1846, and died July 5, 1865.
Presence	Drawing attention to premises.	During a very despondent mood on July 16, 1864, Mary secretly took a knife with her to the back yard and cut her arm terribly, until bleeding excessively, she fainted.
Dilemma	Two choices have the same result or an equally bad result.	Both groups went to investigate, and both complained about the ‘noise contamination’
Pragmatic	Evaluation of an act through consequences.	They evaluated the girl as she went through fits that included lots of bleeding, and also evaluated her as she fought back.

Black Moon Manor Fallacies/P-OT

 

Black Moon Manor 

Brylie Nedd 

P-OT 

Fallacies 

Sources 

http://faculty.tlu.edu/svrooman/perelman.htm

http://faculty.tlu.edu/svrooman/fallacies1.htm

bmoon.html

Hannah House Investigation P-OT & Fallacies Post

 Ashley Medellin 

02.25.2024

COMM 274: Rhetoric 

Dr. Vrooman 

Hannah House Investigation: P-OT & Fallacies Argument Post 

Argument: With the evidence provided from the post, I will argue that, although the site says that the Hannah House is haunted, I say that it is not after examining the P-OT and Fallacies charts. 

Fallacies in the Ghost Post

Unrepresentative Sample	A conclusion is drawn from an insufficiently representative sample.	All of the “examples” of data they caught.
Hasty Generalization	A conclusion is drawn from too small a sample of evidence.	See above.
Begging the question	A circular argument. The conclusion is part of a premise.	Is the place actually haunted? The investigators being there is them trying to answer this question.
Wishful Thinking	Something is true because I want it to be.	At the end, it says Most everyone agreed that the evening was pretty even compared to some past investigations that some from the GRS had attended in the past.” They are still trying to convince themselves of this haunting.
Post Hoc	A thing that happens before another thing caused that.	Underground Railroad Fire is the cause of decaying flesh smell & “evps”.
False Equivalence	A particular word or expression in multiple senses throughout an argument leading to a false conclusion.	Urban Legend

 

 

P-OT Chart

Premises
Supposed Facts/Truth	Probable Data.	The voice audios attached at the bottom.
Premise Modifier
Repetition	Say it again. And again. And again.	The constant mentioning of the Underground Railroad & smell of rotting flesh.
Interpretation	Make the data relevant	Mention of one previous visit, to this one all in attempts to catch ghosts.
Quasi-Logical
Definition	Identifying or linking an expression with a concept.	Urban Legend = Haunted House
Division	Breaking something into parts.	The site has the account of each individual investigator.
Golden Age	Previous time better than now.	Almost all investigators who had been there before say they had more data than that time.
Based on the Structure of Reality
Succession	A cause-and-effect argument	Haunting caused by fire, so is the smell of decaying flesh.
Intention	Various acts reveal a unified essence.	All of the people there believe the house is haunted.
Symbolic Liaison	A thing is connected with an essence.	The house is "rustic".
Establishing the Structure of Reality
Example (Hierarchically arranged)	One event is an example.	House fire > haunting.

 

Resources: 

https://www.ghostresearch.org/Investigations/hannah.html

http://faculty.tlu.edu/svrooman/perelman.htm

http://faculty.tlu.edu/svrooman/fallacies1.htm

Memorial Opera House Fallacies & P-OT Evaluation

 https://www.ghostresearch.org/Investigations/memorial2.html

Clarity	"events make rule clearer"	Lots of whisperings in the corners of the room that you can’t quite make out what is being said.  Some students were here recently with their teacher. A girl went inside there and was in there for a few minutes when she called for her teacher. When she was lit up by a flashlight, she was bleeding out of one nostril. She apparently was somewhat sensitive and when she walked into the hallway, later recordings reported you hear a male voice say, “Get out!” It was after that, she acquired a nosebleed.
Post Hoc	A thing that happens before another thing caused that.	the use of ghost lights  The practical use of a ghost light is mainly for safety. A ghost light enables one to navigate the theater to find the lighting control console and to avoid accidents such as falling into the orchestra pit and stepping on or tripping over set pieces. Aside from its obvious practical purpose, there are a number of superstitions associated with the origin and purpose of ghost lights. The superstitious have various justifications for the ghost light in relation to the supernatural. A popular theatrical superstition holds that every theater has a ghost, and some theaters have traditions to appease ghosts that reach far back into their history.
Quantifier Shift	"A “some” statement in a premise becomes an “all” in the conclusion"	fter seeing the drapes moving in an upper level window at the museum later that same day, MacDonald said he sent a text message to Pazour, who was baffled since the building was closed. He told MacDonald there is also no forced-air heating or cooling system in the building and the motion-detector security system was never triggered. While working in his office, he has heard footsteps in an above loft area that only can be reached by a 15-foot ladder. 'There's no way anyone could access it without me knowing,' MacDonald said.

Tu quoque	An argument must be untrue since the author of the argument has acted inconsistently with the argument’s conclusions.	Upon reviewing all of my evidence, it’s sad to note that nothing appeared out of the ordinary, image-wise, on my night-shot camcorder (except for some light refraction on a piece of metal on a chair in the atrium); and also nothing really audio-wise, on my digital voice recorder.
Clarity	event makes rule clear	while conducting a Phasma Box session near the Stage area, a question was asked, “Can you say hello to everyone?” The device responded with, “Hi.”

There is tons of history at and around this opera house from the old jail/holding cells that were once located/used on the property to Many Civil War attributes are here as well, it is 100% possible that this opera house is haunted also considering the evidence they found via investigations. 

Fallacies and P-OT Chart Sip Coffee House

 Fallacies

Cum hoc	Two things that happened at the same time must have a causal relationship.	When speaking to the investigation team, Williams mentions that when mentioning a previous waitress with blue hair both he and the waitress who asked smelled blueberry muffins. This incident is repeated when Williams relays the story to the investigation team.
Poisoning the Well	A preemptive ad hominem.	One of the investigators, Jim Piscopo notes that about the traffic and local activity surrounding the cafe during their investigation and recordings and this presentation of information before announcing he had no evidence seems to suggest that it was because of the traffic and activity that he was either A) unable to record due to noise/traffic or B) the activity in the vicinity was causing a lack of paranormal activity
Bandwagon	A popular idea is correct.	The blueberry phenomenon is used as the only crucial evidence of the investigation and in the apps used to discover the word blueberry appeared multiple times.
Emotional Appeal	Something is true because it makes us feel good or untrue because it doesn’t.	When discussing his investigation and it’s success he mentions the history of the coffeeshop and the dog that passed away (supposedly) next to his chair. His concluding notes are actually about the coffee shop currently and how great a coffee it makes as opposed to speaking on the actual investigation.
Texas Sharpshooter	Causal attributions are made about a cluster you analytically create. But the clustering effect make be chance or another cause.	The statistics made by the Ghost app on the phone, produced the most evidence/results however the “manager(?)” of the investigation himself notes that he doesn’t trust the app as it seemed to be spitting out random words of no significance.
False Equivalence	A particular word/expression in multiple senses throughout an argument leading to a false conclusion	“Blueberry”

P-OT

Repetition	Say it again and again	Blueberry story happened 3 times and is the only observed evidence by person and not device
Succession	Cause and effect argument	Mention blue-haired worker, smell blueberry muffins. Must be related to the haunting.
Import	Event calls attention to rules possible applications	Mention blue-haired worker, smell blueberry muffins. Must be related to the haunting.
Premises-Presumptions-The Normal	Based on a reference group or experience	Blueberry muffins happened, and when telling the story it occurred again.
Modifiers-interpretation- interpretive schemes	Limit the context of interpretation to gain clarity.	When speaking of the shops past history, the information given first are related to death. It was a funeral home,andalsoabarbershop, people did die in it, butitalsohasapartmentsattached.
Retort	When someon e says is incompatible with its own application	The argument benign made by the investigation is that despite it being 3am, the local traffic and noise from the surrounding bars and scene near the square disrupted their recordings and activity - despite the historical sightings happening during work hours of the coffee shop, meaning that activity would not be a disqualifying factor for supernatural occurences
Double hierarchy	Two hierarchies so closely related that one can cue the other	Both relating to the blueberry muffin and mentioning the girl as well as saying the failure of the investigation is because of traffic

I'm going to argue that the coffee shop is (surprise, surprise!) not haunted. The only proof of a possible haunting is the blueberry muffin story that has concrete observed witnessed (twice) which can easily be fabricated, if not easily the brain playing a trick on itself. And the fact that the investigator themselves discredit their own evidence and results in their report by questioning the credibility and authenticity of the app their were using on their phone.

Using these two points as my main argument as well as the fact that outside activity shouldn't be a factor when looking for evidence is how I plan on disproving this haunting.