6. Games that girls like.
7. The inhabitants of the United States.
(Have you mentioned all important divisions of your subject? Have you included any minor and unimportant divisions? Consider other possible principles of division of your subject. Have you chosen the one best suited to your purpose?)
+163. Exposition of a Proposition.+—Two terms united into a sentence so that one is affirmed of the other become a proposition. Propositions, like terms, may be either specific or general. "Napoleon was ambitious" is a specific proposition; "Politicians are ambitious" is a general one.
When a proposition is presented to the mind, its meaning may not at once be clear. The obscurity may arise from the fact that some of the terms in the proposition are unfamiliar, or are obscure, or misleading. In this case the first step, and often the only step necessary, is the explanation of the terms in the proposition. The following selection taken from Dewey's Psychology illustrates the exposition of a proposition by explaining its terms:—
The habitual act thus occurs automatically and mechanically. When we say that it occurs automatically, we mean that it takes place, as it were, of itself, spontaneously, without the intervention of the will. By saying that it is mechanical, we mean that there exists no consciousness of the process involved, nor of the relation of the means, the various muscular adjustments, to the end, locomotion.
It is possible for our listeners or readers to understand each term in a proposition and yet not be able to understand the meaning of the proposition as a whole. When this is the case, we shall find it necessary to make use of methods of exposition discussed later.
EXERCISES
Explain orally the following propositions by explaining any of the terms likely to be unfamiliar or misunderstood:
1. The purpose of muscular contraction is the production of motion.