ABSTRACT
Invention or “inventio” is the rhetorical art of finding effective arguments and pertinent information about a subject. Some 2400 years ago, Aristotle wrote his Rhetoric, one of the most influential philosophical treatises on rhetorical theory [1]. In Books One and Two of this work, Aristotle demonstrates that rhetoric was a genuine discipline that could be taught, thereby refuting Plato’s notion that rhetorical skill was just a natural gift [2, p. 598]. Aristotle emphasizes that the rhetorical art of persuasion rests in the notion of probability rather than solely on universal truths that were rarely discoverable or verifiable. According to Aristotle, rhetoric as art centers around belief: rhetors base their arguments on the audience’s beliefs and understanding of a subject. For Aristotle, analyzing an audience’s beliefs provides speakers and writers with the highest probability of success in presenting ideas to others.
