Critical Thinking Subject

Although millions of people have seen professional magicians like David Copperfield and Siegfried and Roy perform in person or on television, it’s probably a safe assumption that almost nobody believes they accomplish their feats by means of real magical or supernatural powers—that is, that they somehow “defy” the laws of nature. But even though they’ve never had a personal demonstration, a significant portion of the population is said to believe that certain psychics are able to accomplish apparent miracles by exactly such means. How might you explain this difference in belief?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Coherence is product of many different factors, which combine to make every paragraph, every sentence, and every phrase contribute to the meaning of the whole piece. Coherence in writing is much more difficult to sustain than coherent speech simply because writers have no nonverbal clues to inform them if their message is clear or not. Therefore, writers must make their patterns of coherence much more explicit and much more carefully planned. Coherence itself is the product of two factors — paragraph unity and sentence cohesion.

 

Paragraph Unity

To achieve paragraph unity, a writer must ensure two things only. First, the paragraph must have a single generalization that serves as the focus of attention, that is, a topic sentence. Secondly, a writer must control the content of every other sentence in the paragraph’s body such that (a) it contains more specific information than the topic sentence and (b) it maintains the same focus of attention as the topic sentence.

 

This generalization about paragraph structure holds true for the essay in particular. The two major exceptions to this formula for paragraph unity are found in fiction and in journalism