1150-1200 word argumentative paper

Rubric and Writing Guide for Papers

When assessing your midterm and final papers, I will be looking at three things:

1. Quality of your writing

2. Quality of your explanations

3. Quality of your argument

The below sections of this handout explain each of these three criteria in more detail.

Quality of your writing:

Your paper should be grammatical, properly punctuated, clearly written, and well organized.

Your paper should use proper grammar and punctuation. Also, the thesis of your paper should be clear, and it should be easy to see how each part of your paper connects to the thesis.

To make the organization of your paper clear, it’s helpful to include “signposts,” that is, explicit statements about the direction your paper is taking. In his “Guidelines on Writing a Philosophy Paper” (which I’ve linked to in the Papers and Exam folder on Blackboard), Jim Pryor gives these examples of signposts:

· I will begin by...

· These passages suggest that...

· Further support for this claim comes from...

· For example...

As the first example suggests, it’s sometimes OK to use the first-person when writing a philosophy paper, especially to make the organization of your paper clear. However, use “I” sparingly. Make sure you’re not using it to simply state what you think, as in the following: “Kant argues such-and-such, but I think he’s wrong.” Remember that you’re trying to convince your reader—me—that you’re right, and to convince me, you need to give me reasons, not just your opinion.

As Pryor notes, it’s also important to be explicit about the logical relationships between your claims. Pryor gives these examples of logical connectives:

· because, since, given this argument

· thus, therefore, hence, it follows that, consequently

· nevertheless, however, but

· in the first case, on the other hand

Quality of your explanation:

Your explanation should be accurate, well supported, complete, and concise.

When assessing the accuracy of your explanation, I’ll be looking for whether you’ve accurately characterized the author’s reasoning. Your explanation should go beyond stating what the author claims; it should unpack the relationship between his or her claims. (Thus, it’s important to use the sorts of logical connectives I mention above.)

An accurate explanation isn’t necessarily one that is well supported. For your explanation to be well supported, you should provide textual evidence. Textual evidence includes direct quotation but is not limited to it. Even if you’re not directly quoting, provide a page or section number whenever you refer to a particular passage from one of the readings. It’s important to be judicious in your use of direct quotations. Shorter quotations are usually better than long ones. (Long, block quotations are almost always out of place in a paper of this length.) And you need to demonstrate your understanding of what you quote.

As for completeness and concision: say what you need to say and no more.

Quality of your argument:

Your argument should be specific, perceptive, logical, and thorough.

In order to make your task manageable, your thesis statement should focus on a specific aspect of the author’s reasoning and make a specific point about it. If you cast your net more widely, you’re likely to make claims that are not sufficiently supported. Also, even if you focus on one specific part of the author’s view, you likely won’t have space to say everything you think about it. Focus on developing your strongest point logically and thoroughly (see below).

A strong thesis statement is also perceptive. If you argue a point that no reasonable person would dispute—such as that it’s at least sometimes ethical for professionals to follow codes of ethics—you’re wasting your (and my) time. Instead, your claim should be one that even a careful reader of the text may be inclined to doubt. This doesn’t mean that your point must be one that no one in the history of the world has made before. But your point should show that you have thought carefully and independently about the text.

By logical, I mean that your conclusion should follow from your premises. We won’t get into the details of logic in this course, but you should be able to develop a logical argument without knowing those details. For example, we all know that making contradictory statements is bad.

Finally, your argument should be thorough. By that, I mean two main things. First, your reasons in support of your thesis should be well developed. Often the best way to illustrate and substantiate a point is through using an example. Philosophers use both real-world and hypothetical examples.

Second, your argument should anticipate objections. You may choose to explicitly address one or more objections. (You can do so by saying something like, “One may object to my point here by…” Then, be sure to provide a reply to the objection.) Whether or not you explicitly address objections, you should develop your argument so that it is not subject to clear objections.