Before I read the assigned sections of "The New Humanities Reader", I was a little unsure about having to take Exposition and Argument simply because I did not believe it could prove to be relevant or helpful to me, a pharm-d candidate.  I had taken the AP exam and received a 5, and hence I was set on being able to utilize my AP credits for the course. However, after reading the assigned passage, I realized that this class was not so much a writing class as it was a class on how one should make the best use of knowledge one gains and how one should think. I realized that I need to take this course because this course teaches us how to make connections between different branches of knowledge and different articles and encourages us to interpret texts in unique ways. It is through this type of thought that new innovations and ideas come about. As a pharmacy major interested in research, I understand the importance of being able to think in unique ways in order to develop new ideas to test. Learning to concoct my own ideas from text,  to develop and adapt unique perspectives, and understand the perspective of others may allow me to make connections between different disciplines and facilitate discovery; skills that prove to be extremely useful to many scientists and researchers.
              To use writing as a way of thinking new thoughts is to adapt new ideas or perspectives on certain topics. By adding their own input through writing, people can modify arguments and opinions on the given topics, illuminate new possibilities and perhaps influence reforms to current issues. It is a way to consistantly modify and possibly even improve the current thoughts and opinions on a specific issue or topic.
             As stated in the new humanities reader, “Each time you extend your prospective view by looking carefully at a text’s details, you draw closer to the kind of mastery that accomplished readers can achieve” (Miller, Spellinmeyer xxvii). This truly exemplifies the main purpose of the humanities reader. It emphasizes to students the importance of being open-minded about reforming their ideas and opinions and learning to use experiences to expand their perspective; qualities which prove vital to training ordinary students to become extraordinary thinkers. By paying attention to the text's details, students are able to understand nuances in the author's argument and perhaps use those details to refine their own arguments on the issue. Though  I was originally not necessarily familiar with the term prospective view before reading "The New Humanities Reader", I ultimately learned that the best way to handle a text is not simply to focus on all the minor details as one reads, but rather to adapt a prospective view which ultimately allows the reader to interpret a future argument for themselves, and to keep reforming that view as the reader reads on.
            This passage certainly highlighted the importance of a shared horizon, which is ultimately the connections that can be drawn between two different ideas or fields of study. As people begin to the read the texts at hand actively and begin read and explore other pieces, they are able to improve their views by drawing meaningful connections between the texts.