Philosophy research paper guidelines

On writing a philosophy ophical writing is different from the writing you'll be asked to do in other courses. Nor should you assume that every writing guideline you've been given by other teachers is important when you're writing a philosophy paper. You should assume that your audience does not already accept your position; and you should treat your paper as an attempt to persuade such an audience. Good philosophy paper is modest and makes a small point; but it makes that point clearly and straightforwardly, and it offers good reasons in support of very often attempt to accomplish too much in a philosophy paper. The usual result of this is a paper that's hard to read, and which is full of inadequately defended and poorly explained claims. Done properly, philosophy moves at a slow aim of these papers is for you to show that you understand the material and that you're able to think critically about it. To do this, your paper does have to show some independent doesn't mean you have to come up with your own theory, or that you have to make a completely original contribution to human thought. An ideal paper will be clear and straightforward (see below), will be accurate when it attributes views to other philosophers (see below), and will contain thoughtful critical responses to the texts we read. Merely summarizing what others have said won't be stages of early stages of writing a philosophy paper include everything you do before you sit down and write your first draft. These early stages will involve writing, but you won't yet be trying to write a complete paper. You should instead be taking notes on the readings, sketching out your ideas, trying to explain the main argument you want to advance, and composing an s the issues with i said above, your papers are supposed to demonstrate that you understand and can think critically about the material we discuss in class. I've discovered time and again while teaching philosophy that i couldn't really explain properly some article or argument i thought i understood. This will help you understand the issues better, and it will make you recognize what things you still don't fully 's even more valuable to talk to each other about what you want to argue in your paper. Strongly recommend that you make an outline of your paper, and of the arguments you'll be presenting, before you begin to write. This lets you organize the points you want to make in your paper and get a sense for how they are going to fit together. It also helps ensure that you're in a position to say what your main argument or criticism is, before you sit down to write a full draft of your paper.

How to make a term paper in philosophy

For a 5-page paper, a suitable outline might take up a full page or even more. Find that making an outline is at least 80% of the work of writing a good philosophy paper. Writing a good philosophy paper takes a great deal of need to leave yourself enough time to think about the topic and write a detailed outline. So you should start working on your papers as soon as the paper topics are you've thought about your argument, and written an outline for your paper, then you're ready to sit down and compose a complete 't shoot for literary elegance. I guarantee you that this will make your paper your paper sounds as if it were written for a third-grade audience, then you've probably achieved the right sort of your philosophy classes, you will sometimes encounter philosophers whose writing is obscure and complicated. So do not try to emulate their writing the structure of your paper should make the structure of your paper obvious to the reader. Don't throw in a "thus" or a "therefore" to make your train of thought sound better-argued than it really r way you can help make the structure of your paper obvious is by telling the reader what you've done so far and what you're going to do next. The reader should never be in doubt about whose claims you're presenting in a given can't make the structure of your paper obvious if you don't know what the structure of your paper is, or if your paper has no structure. That's why making an outline is so concise, but explain yourself write a good philosophy paper, you need to be concise but at the same time explain yourself demands might seem to pull in opposite directions. One or two well-mapped paths are better than an impenetrable ate the central problem or question you wish to address at the beginning of your paper, and keep it in mind at all times. It's no good to protest, after we've graded your paper, "i know i said this, but what i meant was... If you understand the material you're writing about, and if you aim your paper at such a reader, you'll probably get an plenty of examples and is very important to use examples in a philosophy paper. For instance, suppose you're writing a paper about abortion, and you want to assert the claim "a fetus is a person. The author should be explicit about how he is using this a philosophy paper, it's okay to use words in ways that are somewhat different from the ways they're ordinarily used. And likewise for other 't vary your vocabulary just for the sake of you call something "x" at the start of your paper, call it "x" all the way through. In philosophy, a slight change in vocabulary usually signals that you intend to be speaking about something words with precise philosophical ophers give many ordinary-sounding words precise technical t the handouts on philosophical terms and methods to make sure you' these words correctly.

See my tips on how to read a philosophy paper for some help doing ask yourself: are x's arguments good ones? A lot of the work in philosophy is making sure that you've got your opponent's position can assume that your reader is stupid (see above). Try to figure out what reasonable position the philosopher could have had in mind, and direct your arguments against your paper, you always have to explain what a position says before you criticize it. Paper doesn't always have to provide a definite solution to a problem, or a straight yes or no answer to a question. Hence, if these papers are right, the question will be harder to answer than we might previously have thought. These are all important and philosophically valuable it's ok to ask questions and raise problems in your paper even if you e satisfying answers to them all. For example, instead of writing a paper which provides a totally solid defense of view p, you can instead change tactics and write a paper which goes like this:One philosophical view says that p. Is not clear how the defender of p can overcome this you can write a paper which goes:One argument for p is the 'conjunction argument,' which goes as follows... Conclude that the conjunction argument does not in fact succeed in establishing g a paper of these sorts doesn't mean you've "given in" to the opposition. You should never introduce any points in your paper unless they're important to your main argument, and you have the room to really explain you're not happy with some sentence in your draft, ask yourself why it bothers you. Reading the paper out loud can help you notice holes in your reasoning, digressions, and unclear should count on writing many drafts of your paper. Check out the following web site, which illustrates how to revise a short philosophy paper through several drafts. Notice how much the paper improves with each revision:Don't begin with a sentence like "down through the ages, mankind has pondered the problem of... In a philosophy paper, it's ok to use this verb as much as you need most classes, i will put some articles and books on reserve in bobst library for additional reading. These are optional, and are for your independent shouldn't need to use these secondary readings when writing your papers. The point of the papers is to teach you how to analyze a philosophical argument, and present your own arguments for or against some conclusion.

The arguments we'll be considering in class are plenty hard enough to deserve your full attention, all by you write your paper as a dialogue or story? You need to master ordinary philosophical writing before you can do a good job with these more difficult to make your papers less than or equal to the assigned word limit. If a paper topic you've chosen asks certain questions, be sure you answer or address each of those double-space your papers, number the pages, and include wide margins. We prefer to get the papers simply stapled: no plastic binders or anything like e your name on the paper. But we will have no trouble agreeing about whether you do a good job arguing for your specifically, we'll be asking questions like these:Do you clearly state what you're trying to accomplish in your paper? For instance, is it clear what parts of your paper are expository, and what parts are your own positive contribution? Comments i find myself making on students' philosophy papers most often are these:"explain this claim" or "what do you mean by this? Kind of complaint that is common in undergraduate philosophy papers goes like this:Philosopher x assumes a and argues from there to b. If this is all you do in your paper, it won't be a strong paper and it will get a mediocre grade, even if it's are some more interesting things our student could have done in his paper. These would be more interesting and satisfying ways of engaging with philosopher x's ding to comments from me or your you have the opportunity to rewrite a graded paper, keep the following points in rewrites should try to go beyond the specific errors and problems we've indicated. If you got below an a-, then your draft was generally difficult to read, it was difficult to see what your argument was and what the structure of your paper was supposed to be, and so on. Use your draft and the comments you received on it to construct a new outline, and write from in mind that when i or your ta grade a rewrite, we may sometimes notice weaknesses in unchanged parts of your paper that we missed the first time around. Or perhaps those weaknesses will have affected our overall impression of the paper, and we just didn't offer any specific recommendation about fixing them. So this is another reason you should try to improve the whole paper, not just the passages we comment is possible to improve a paper without improving it enough to raise it to the next grade level. But i hope you'll all do better than often, you won't have the opportunity to rewrite your papers after they've been graded. So you need to teach yourself to write a draft, scrutinize the draft, and revise and rewrite your paper before turning it in to be graded.

Also, i've browsed some other writing guidelines on the web, and occasionally incorporated advice i thought my students would find useful. Thanks to professor horban for allowing me to incorporate some of his suggestions lly, i owe a huge debt to the friends and professors who helped me learn how to write philosophy. Gmt / 10:00 sgt (saturday 25th nov for sgt log in / register log in / > philosophy > phenomenology > philosophy and phenomenological research journal tools get new content alerts get rss feed save to my profile get sample copy recommend to your librarian journal menujournal homefind issuescurrent issueall issues find articles early view get access subscribe / renew for contributors for refereesopen accessauthor guidelinessubmit an article about this journal newsovervieweditorial boardpermissionsadvertisecontact special features professional opportunitieswiley job networkjobs philosophy and phenomenological research© philosophy and phenomenological research, llcedited by: ernest sosaonline issn: 1933-1592 recently published issuessee allcurrent issue:november 2017volume 95, issue 3september 2017volume 95, issue 2july 2017volume 95, issue 1may 2017volume 94, issue 3march 2017volume 94, issue 2author guidelines recently published articlesthe undesirable & the adesirablevida yaoversion of record online: 12 nov 2017 | doi: 10. 45k)pdf(45k)request permissions search search scope all contentpublication titlesin this journal search string advanced >saved searches > search by citation volume: issue: page:Guidelines on writing a philosophy ophical writing is different from the writing you'll be asked to do in other courses. The structure of your paper concise, but explain yourself ting and assessing the views of does one do in a philosophy paper? Done properly, philosophy moves at a slow aim of these papers is for you to display familiarity with the material and an ability to think critically about it. Your critical intelligence will inevitably show up in whatever you ideal paper will be clear and straightforward (see below), will be accurate when it attributes views to other philosophers (see below), and will contain thoughtful critical responses to the texts we read. You're just trying to present a claim and some reasons to believe it or disbelieve it, as straightforwardly as are some guidelines on how to do you begin to write, you need to think about the questions: in what order should you explain the various terms and positions you'll be discussing? If you have a good outline, the rest of the writing process will go much more the structure of your paper should make the structure of your paper obvious to the reader. Beat him over the head with you need to do is to make it clear what sort of move you're making at each point in your paper. Hence, we should reject x's claim that can't make the structure of your paper obvious if you don't know what the structure of your paper is, or if your paper has no structure. So take special pains to be as clear and as explicit as you possibly 's no good to protest, after we've graded your paper, "i know i said this, but what i meant was... If you understand the material you're writing about, and if you aim your paper at such a reader, you'll probably get an 't shoot for literary elegance. If you wouldn't say it, don't write your paper sounds as if it were written a third-grade audience, then you've probably achieved the right sort of 's ok to show a draft of your paper to your friends and get their comments and advice. If your friends can't understand something you've written, then neither will your grader be able to understand your paper out loud. If you don't explain what you take philosopher x's view to be, your reader cannot judge whether the criticism you offer of x is a good criticism, or whether it is simply based on your misunderstanding or misinterpretation of x's least half of the work in philosophy is making sure that you've got your opponent's position right.

Of course, there's no way to deal with all the objections someone might raise; so choose the ones that seem strongest or most pressing, and say how you think they might be paper doesn't always have to provide a definite solution to a problem, or a straight yes or no answer to a question. You should try to provide reasons for this claim that might be found convincing by someone who didn't already think that the two views were equally 's ok to ask questions and raise problems in your paper even if you cannot provide satisfying answers to them all. You can leave some questions unanswered at the end of the paper (though you should make it clear to the reader that you're leaving such questions unanswered on purpose). Writing a good philosophy paper takes a great deal of should leave yourself enough time to think about your topic and write a detailed outline (this will take several days). You're writing the final version of your paper, it's much more important to work on the structure and overall clarity of your paper, than it is to clean up a word or a phrase here or there. Your paper is going to be late, check out our policy for late double-space your papers and include wide papers should be less than or equal to the assigned word limit. Your name on the paper, and number the 't turn in your only copy of your most classes, i will put some articles and books on reserve in robbins library for additional reading. These are optional, and are for your independent you are writing your papers, i do not expect you to consult these or any other secondary sources we haven't discussed in 't begin with a sentence like "down through the ages, mankind has pondered the problem of... In a philosophy paper, it's ok to use this verb as much as you need words with precise philosophical ophers give many ordinary-sounding words precise technical meanings. Pretend that your readers have never heard them 't vary your vocabulary just for the sake of you call something "x" at the start of your paper, call it "x" all the way through. In philosophy, a slight change in vocabulary usually signals that you intend to be speaking about something you write your paper as a dialogue? So you shouldn't try to write dialogues for this we grade your paper, we will be asking ourselves questions like these:Do you clearly state what you're trying to accomplish in your paper? Comments i find myself making on students' philosophy papers most often are these:"explain this claim," or "what do you mean by this? To you have the opportunity to rewrite a graded paper, keep the following points in rewrites should try to go beyond the specific errors and problems we've indicated. Use your draft and the comments you received on it to construct a new outline, and write from in mind that when i or your tf grade a rewrite, we may sometimes notice strengths or weaknesses in unchanged parts of your paper that we missed the first time keep in mind that it's possible to improve a paper without improving it enough to raise it to the next grade often, you won't have the opportunity to rewrite your papers after they've been graded. So you need to teach yourself to write a draft, scrutinize the draft, and revise and rewrite your paper before turning it in to be to revise a you're revising a paper, it's much more important to work on the structure and overall clarity of your paper, than it is to clean up a word or a phrase here or there.

I encourage you to do following sites offer excellent further advice on writing good philosophy papers:Writing tutor for introductory philosophy site walks you through the process of writing a philosophy paper in several drafts.