How to Write a Philosophy Paper

The ReaderIn reality, likely only one person will read your paper: me.

However, writing papers in class is supposed to be training you to write papers for a general audience.

Therefore you should write your paper as if people who don’t know you, have never been to this class, and do not know who I am are going to read it.

The ReaderDo not:

• Cite the professor• Cite the powerpoints• Mention examples from class as if the reader knows about them

The Reader

I think it would be best for you to assume that the reader is one of your peers– for example, a second-year philosophy major who has not taken a philosophy of language class.

Thesis

The point of a philosophy paper is to convince the reader that a thesis is true.

The thesis is the main claim in the paper. It is why you wrote the paper: to get people to believe the thesis.

Structure of a Philosophy PaperGeneral guidelines (not always true):

1. Introduction containing the thesis and a roadmap2. Exposition of key concepts in thesis and arguments3. Arguments in support of the thesis4. Charitable consideration of objections to your arguments or your

thesis5. Conclusion, summarizing what you have accomplished

Thesis Statement

ThesisThe thesis should appear toward the beginning of the paper.

It should be stated in a clear, straightforward way. You are allowed to end the paper by endorsing a more complicated thesis than you started with

The reader should be able to spot the thesis easily. You can but do not have to precede it with “In this paper I will argue that…”

Cut the Crap

Philosophers hate papers that begin “Since the dawn of time, mankind has wondered…”

Get to the point, be clear, and skip the flowery language.

Thesis Recommendations

A thesis should be a claim that not everyone already believes. There’s no point in convincing people of what they already believe.

A thesis should make a small claim. You cannot solve the deep mysteries of philosophy in a 5-7 page double-spaced paper written in a few weeks. You can, however, write a clear, well-reasoned paper that adds to the debates and discussions we’ve encountered in class.

Thesis Types

1. Modify a view to overcome an objection.2. Demonstrate what the view is committed to.3. Defend a view against an objection.4. Argue that a certain view can (or cannot) overcome an objection.

(There are more, this is just a sample.)

Theses Samples1. The idea theory can avoid the problem posed by theoretical

entities, if it replaces its notion of resemblance with a broader notion of structural similarity.

2. If verificationism is true, then we can never represent the mental lives of other people.

3. The circularity objection to the generalized definition theory is misguided. Just because you cannot learn a language from a circular dictionary does not mean that meanings aren’t always definitions.

4. There is no way of modifying the causal-historical theory of meaning to solve the problem of meaning change.

Coming up with a ThesisRemember that you have to convince your reader of your thesis, so it’s good to have a thesis that you believe and that you have good arguments for.

Usually, paper topics come to me when I read something that strikes me as wrong or unconvincing. Then I try to identify why I think it’s wrong– I develop a thesis and the arguments for it simultaneously. I further refine the thesis/ arguments by reading more about the issue and talking with other philosophers.

Roadmap

Some people (not everybody) like to provide a “roadmap” at the end of the introduction that describes how the paper will proceed.

Roadmap“In the first part of this paper I shall examine the account of structurally valid inference which Davidson’s writings suggest and try to indicate why I think that we have not there reached a finally satisfactory account of the matter. In the second part of the paper I shall sketch another approach to the idea with which I began. Finally from the vantage point provided by the sketch I shall look briefly at some recent and not so recent proposals concerning semantic structure.”

--Evans, “Semantic Structure and Logical Form”

Exposition

After stating your thesis, you will probably need to explain the key concepts that you used in your thesis or will use in your arguments.

Explain the things that (a) your reader doesn’t already know and (b) are needed to understand your thesis and your arguments.

Quotes

In philosophy, we try to quote sparingly. You are supposed to explain the views you are arguing for or against, you do not use a large quoted piece of text to do so.

Use quotes to illustrate what others believe, and to provide evidence of their views, but don’t use them as a substitute for your own voice. Always contextualize and don’t let a quote stand on its own.

Keeping Your Voice While Quoting“Martí (2004), for example, points out certain adjectives that Kripke took to be rigid, such as ‘hot’ and ‘yellow,’ are not rigid appliers: “a yellow dress could be dyed and a yellow house could be repainted” (p. 132). The form of the argument is that dresses and houses are objects to which ‘yellow’ sometimes applies; yet they persist through changes in color; and thus they would persist through such changes in color, that is, they could exist in worlds where they were not yellow.”

--me, my dissertation

Keeping Your Voice While Quoting“Martí suggests taking this tack: “given the wide variety of terms [that Kripke gives as examples of rigid expressions], it would not be surprising if some of them were not to be in the final cut” (p. 132). The idea then is that someone who endorses Rigid Application can simply bite the bullets of ‘hot’ and ‘yellow’, while hoping that there aren’t many more bullets. But I will argue that no general term is a rigid applier (save again for special cases involving logical or mathematical terms).”

--me, dissertation again

ArgumentsThe bulk of your paper should consist of a reasoned defense of your thesis a.k.a. your arguments.

Charitable InterpretationsCharity is when you freely help others.

In philosophy, “charity” means that you interpret the views you are arguing against in a way that makes them most likely to be true.

If your opponent makes a claim and it could be interpreted as either A or B– where A is easy to argue against– assume your opponent meant B. You won’t convince anyone by arguing against uncharitable interpretations of your opponents.

Philosophical TermsPhilosophers go to great lengths to be clear. To this end they often use special vocabulary with clearly defined meanings.

Sometimes this vocabulary involves more precise versions of ordinary words (like “idea” in the Idea Theory).

Make sure you know when you’re dealing with philosophical vocabulary and that you know what the clearly defined meanings are.

The Importance of Examples

Examples are your friends!

The Importance of Examples“Natural language syntax is recursive. This means that phrases of one syntactic type can be embedded in larger phrases of that same type. For example, ‘dog’ is an English noun phrase, and it is a proper part of ‘old dog,’ which is also an English noun phrase. In turn ‘old dog’ is a proper part of the noun phrase ‘smelly old dog,’ which itself is a proper part of the noun phrase ‘big brown smelly old dog.’ This process can be repeated: any time we have a noun phrase, we can add an adjective to the front of it and get a new noun phrase.”

--me, “Compositionality”

The Importance of Examples“Natural language syntax is recursive. This means that phrases of one syntactic type can be embedded in larger phrases of that same type. For example, ‘dog’ is an English noun phrase, and it is a proper part of ‘old dog,’ which is also an English noun phrase. In turn ‘old dog’ is a proper part of the noun phrase ‘smelly old dog,’ which itself is a proper part of the noun phrase ‘big brown smelly old dog.’ This process can be repeated: any time we have a noun phrase, we can add an adjective to the front of it and get a new noun phrase.”

--me, “Compositionality”

Signposting

Just as we can give a “roadmap” at the beginning of the paper, philosophers are fond of “signposts” that tell us where we are.

Signposting

• “A second reason why…”• “As we saw in the first section…”• “Now I will consider an

argument that…”Be clear about what you’re doing!

SignpostingYou can also signpost by indicating the relationship between your sentences:Addition: “also,” “furthermore,” “in addition”Opposition: “however,” “instead,” “nonetheless”Inference: “thus,” “so,” “therefore,” “as a result”

Signposting“The empirical conception of compositionality need not be thought of as a competitor to the alternative conceptions considered above. Instead, it provides a methodological backdrop against which we can evaluate various proposals regarding the sense of “dependence” at the heart of compositionality. As we saw, the functional conception of dependence is ill-favored precisely because it fails to explain our abilities to learn and understand the natural languages we speak.”

--me, “Compositionality”