A few notes on writing philosophically

General Instructions:

1. Be thorough. Your essay questions are fairly limited in scope – stay on topic! Careful exploration of one issue, no matter how narrow, is more desirable than something broad, superficial, or off topic.

2. Defend a position. A philosophical essay is a thesis defense. Your thesis must be stated clearly and nothing should go into your essay that does not lend itself directly to that purpose.

3. Be clear. Stylistically boring but clear essays will get better grades in this course than stylistically exciting but unclear ones. This is neither an exercise in creative writing nor one in the mastery of polysyllabic jargon.

4. Organize. List all the points you want to make in favor of your thesis and their relation to one another. Ideally, you would then flesh out this skeleton into a coherent set of points which, taken together, support your thesis.

5. Be reasonable. No matter how good your argument, there will be objections that to many will seem worth making. Your writing should address such objections as necessary. The stronger and more plausible the objections considered, the stronger your essay.

6. Argue. You may well get a good grade on your writing assignments even if you defend a position that I think is simply silly. Likewise, you may do poorly even if I agree with your conclusions. So far as this class is concerned, I don’t care what your actual opinion is, but rather the reasons offered in support of that opinion. This is because philosophy is about arguments, not opinions. To merely state an opinion is not to do philosophy.

7. Remember the audience. Your writing should be addressed to an intelligent reader who knows little or nothing about philosophy. Do not write your essay for me; I already have a handle on most of this stuff and want to know if you do. An important test of your comprehension of material is your ability to explain it to your mother, a roommate or the clerk at the video store.

Criteria used for evaluating your writing:

8. Addressing the point. Does the essay do exactly what the assignment asks?

9. Relevance. Does the essay contain anything that makes no important contribution to the essay’s goal?

10. Completeness. Does the essay omit anything important needed to achieve its goal?

11. Accuracy. Does your essay accurately describe all views, arguments and objections it discusses?

12. Originality of expression. Is what you say expressed in your own words as far as is possible?

13. Coherence. Is the organization a logical one given the essay’s goal?

14. Clarity. Is your essay clear enough that a reasonably intelligent reader can understand it?

(While modified by me numerous times over the years, the core ideas in these lists were taken from guides composed by R. Johnson and A. Melnyk – both of the University of Missouri Philosophy Dept.)