Some Thoughts On Writing A Philosophy Paper
There is no formula that will produce a good philosophy paper every time, or in
every circumstance, or with every particular question or set of materials. In fact,
the first step in setting out to do a good job is to determine exactly what the
specific context, question, and materials demand. What is the course I am
writing this paper for? Is it an Intro class, where my concerns can range
broadly over metaphysical, ethical, epistemological, and even every-day types
of concerns? In an Intro class it is usually assumed that students bring little
or no previous preparation in philosophy to the tasks of the course. So, in
such a situation, a paper will be expected to range more broadly over technical
sub-fields in philosophy and also to include more "real life" content
from one's own experience than in the context of a more specific course. If the
class is in, say, ethics, or epistemology, or a particular period in the
history or philosophy like "Ancient Greek Thought," or "Modern
Western Philosophy," then it will be more likely that the instructor
expects the paper to reflect the specific frame of mind, technical vocabulary,
and typical concerns and problems that are characteristic of the more specific
field or era of philosophy.
A paper you write for a philosophy course is one which can be understood as addressing "a question," even if its title or the assignment presented to you was not phrased as a question. So an assigned philosophy paper on "Descartes' Methodical Doubt" is not so interested, as a literature or history paper would be, in showing that you read and understood the "plot" and "movement" or the historical impact of the text involved. These are important dimensions of any philosophical work, but in the case of writing a philosophy paper you are trying to show that you understand the problems or questions that Descartes' text is attempting to address, the specific ways that Descartes proposes to conceptualize and answer those questions, and then whether questions remain after his attempt to answer them has been seriously considered. If our interest as philosophers were only historical and/or literary it would be enough to present Descartes' views and examine carefully their impact and the content and the form of his writing. But while philosophers may start with such concerns, what is distinct in our writing is the attempt to critically assess whether a work of philosophy answers (or at least advances toward an answer to) some set of distinctly philosophical questions or concerns.
So, the materials which are set-out by an assignment (the texts or passages one has been asked to read or to write specifically about) are not exactly what the assignment is "about" in the same sense that a history or a literature assignment might be "about" an historical event or a work of literature. We can write of works of literature or historical events in a philosophical way : "The Concept of Individuality in Melville's Moby Dick"; or "Human Liberty and the French Revolution." We can write of philosophical works from the standpoint of their historical impact or their literary quality and form: "On Plato's Use and Abuse of Metaphor," or "The Impact of Thomas Paine's Rights of Man in Post-Revolutionary France." But if we are trying to write a philosophy paper on a philosophical topic or text, we are primarily trying to conceive the content we are writing about in terms of the questions it is attempting to answer, the quality of those answers, and any questions which are left open or which perhaps arise anew from that content.
The second step in approaching your philosophy paper, once you have determined how to think of the context, questions, and materials in a general way is to carefully examine the particular assignment itself. There are many ways to assign a philosophy paper, and the choices your instructor has made are the ones you have to follow because he or she has definite intentions in mind with reference to what the course intends to present and prepare you to do. There is no such thing as a generalized philosophy paper, but only specific assignments given by specific professors asking specific questions expecting specific answers put in a specific form for a specific class for which you have had a specific preparation. So you must start by determining the specifics that the instructor has worked-into the assignment, and where he or she has put them. For example, did the instructor assign a paper on "Descartes' Methodical Doubt," or is the paper on the "methodical doubt" as it appears in some particular passages from Descartes' Meditations? In the second case, a general paper that does not treat of or refer to the passages the instructor has asked be considered is not going to be a good paper, no matter how much light it sheds on the general issue. Why is this? Because one of the skills you can develop in a philosophy class is the close and careful treatment of complex passages of text. Your instructor challenges you by looking to see and to coach your reading of complex passages in addition to making sure you understand the issues. You may know in general what the "methodical doubt" is about, and that is good. But if the assignment also requires you to treat specific passages of the text, then there is more at stake in what the instructor is looking for you to gain from the assignment.
Is it an open-ended assignment that asks you to develop a topic of your own? Freedom entails responsibility, or so they say: get as much feedback from the instructor as possible before you start writing, to set clear boundaries on how the issue or texts should be treated, what texts you will be expected to look at, and what questions you are specifically trying to address and answer. Is it a general topic or theme that you have been asked to write on or discuss? Again, clarify as much as possible what the instructor expects before you begin to write. Usually an instructor has certain texts and questions in mind when they assign a paper in this way. Part of what they will consider when they grade your paper is how well you discerned this on your own. You beat them to the punch by getting as much leading information as they are willing to offer you before you start. Your instructors are also generally impressed with a student who shows this much perspicacity and concern as they begin an assignment....
Perhaps easier than these types of assigned papers is the type which already gives you the question or questions and asks you to answer them as presented. This type of assignment also requires clarification before you start, but the range of problems, issues, concerns, and texts that you can select from in developing your approach will obviously be somewhat bounded already. In the question or questions you have been given are there key instructions and clues that you can use to set about writing the paper? What would such clues and instructions look like? Here are some examples of things to look for and questions to ask: Am I asked to "identify" or to "explain" a key concept or important topic? Am I asked to "recount" or to "analyze" a text or a problem? Am I asked to "describe" or to "define" key words and phrases?
Most of the time these instruction terms are implied, and in philosophy one is safe to always assume that the instructor expects more than he or she says: if they don't say exactly what they expect, or if you don't ask them, assume philosophy instructors expect definitions, explanations, and analyses unless they say otherwise. So instead of identifying or recounting or describing, they tend to expect you to explain, analyze, and define whatever you are talking about. Briefly, I identify Descartes' methodical doubt by just saying that it is "Descartes' unique approach to the problem of certainty." I explain it only if I lay-out in a step-by-step fashion the main considerations which led Descartes to devise it, and by which, step-by-step, he thinks it will solve the problem it seeks to address. Explaining is trying to show that you grasp how it is supposed to work. I define a key term or concept when I give an account of it that tells as precisely as possible what is essential, distinct, and unique to that idea. This is not the same thing as giving an example or a description of the concept or idea. A definition is what I must be thinking of in order to tell that something is an example of something else. I can only know that "piety is an example of justice" if I already see in my mind what "justice" is and see that in order for something to be "pious" it has to share the characteristics of "justice." The definitions of things we think about all the time are not often very clear, but it is something very central in philosophy to work toward clarity and precision in reference to the definitions of concepts we use.
Finally, I am analyzing a concept or a passage, as opposed to merely recounting or describing it, when I show that I can read "between the lines" in some significant sense. Here, we can use a distinction commonly used in literary criticism, that between the "literal meaning" (not literary) and the "figurative meaning" of words, phrases and texts. I am speaking or writing literally when I mean and expect you to understand only the most obvious, surface, direct meanings of the words I am using and the things I say. I am speaking or writing figuratively when my words and phrases are intended to suggest a meaning that is "between the lines" or underneath the surface of the words I say. Why do this? Why not be direct? Well, the intention is not to be indirect or oblique by being figurative. The intention is, rather, to be as clear as possible in explaining content that is hard to capture in the literal meanings of the words and phrases we are familiar with.
In a well-known example, Plato presents the "Allegory of the Cave" in his dialogue The Republic in order to communicate what he takes to be true about a realm of super-real objects which transcends the boundaries of physical sensation. He does this not to make it harder to understand, but easier, in the same way a poet or novelist might use a metaphorical expression to communicate things that cannot be captured in simple everyday words. In philosophy it is not, as it is often in poetry, that we want to express feelings that are hard to grasp through words and their literal meanings, rather it is because we think we see or know things that escape the usual words. In philosophy we are asked to use concepts and words in ways that often require us to recover dimensions of meaning that lie below the surface and between the lines of the literal text. In philosophy we attempt to uncover the "structure" and the "shape" of an idea, a text, or an argument, rather than being concerned with its more obvious, superficial, literal content or meaning. We might start with a very literal claim that "Descartes said that if I doubt my existence, then I must be thinking in order to be doubting that I exist. As a result, he concluded 'I think, therefore I am.'" But we might then analyze this claim in the following way:
"For Descartes, the fact that I can place my existence into doubt means that I must be thinking in order to doubt. If this is so, then thinking precedes doubting, and if he is doubting, then, logically, he must already be thinking. But if this is so, then Descartes must also already exist as a thinking and doubting self when he is thinking of all this, and we must recall his original question if we are to see the significance of this otherwise rather simple recognition. Descartes wanted to establish whether anything could be known with certainty. And even though we would always claim to be sure that we exist, the point is that we have no evidence of this from our senses. So Descartes' problem requires that he find evidence that comes from another source and which is not simply the habit of taking it for granted that he exists with no real evidence. Where there is no evidence there can be no rational certainty. But 'if I doubt, then I think, and if I think, then I exist' provides rational evidence and certainty, because Descartes' own doubt becomes a premise, or evidence, that allows him to conclude rationally and deductively that he certainly exists. His argument goes something like: 'If I doubt, then I think. If I think, then I exist. So, if I doubt, then I must exist.' This can be slightly rephrased to produce Descartes' most famous formulation I think, therefore I am: 'If I think, then I exist. But I am not certain I do think: I can doubt that I exist, and therefore doubt I think. (But) if I doubt, then I must actually think. But I do doubt, and therefore I do think. Thus, I think, and, therefore, I must actually exist."*
Expanding the meaning and displaying the structure of Descartes' claim in this way is not a matter of just saying more and more about less and less. It is analytical in the sense that it takes the original proposition and presents its meaning with reference to the structures of Descartes' thinking expressed in the texts and passages from which the propositions come. It is a matter of seeing how the key terms and concepts we are trying to understand get their meaning and how their meanings fit together as a structure in certain propositions. Notice in the expanded analytical treatment that its author moves between the phrases and concepts of Descartes and the over-all intentions and problems Descartes intends to solve by using them in the way he does.
Another sense of "analysis" involves looking closely at a single concept or term in order to derive hidden dimensions of its meaning. Thus, for example, the following analysis of Anselm's famous Ontological Argument for the existence of God, which is itself an example of philosophical analysis in this second sense:
"Anselm begins his argument by analysis of the single concept 'God.' If I am thinking of this concept, what must I be thinking of? I am thinking of a Being who must be the greatest Being that can be conceived of. Starting with this, Anselm asks 'would the greatest Being I can possibly conceive of be one which I could imagine not existing, or one I could not imagine not existing?' Obviously the latter, if this Being is the greatest Being I can imagine. (If I can imagine Beings whose existence can be doubted, and Beings whose existence cannot, then the ones whose existence cannot be doubted would have to be greater than the ones whose existence I can doubt.) Thus, not only must God exist, but it also must be impossible, based on the analysis of what the concept 'God' means, that I can really even imagine that God does not exist. Atheists are therefore kidding themselves according to Anselm...."*
So analysis refers to taking apart a text or an argument in order to expand it to its full structural dimensions, (as in the treatment of Descartes, and the analysis of Anselm above), and it can also mean looking closely and carefully at a single concept in order to derive its central structural and hidden meanings (as Anselm was doing himself). In the way Anselm uses analysis, by looking at just the single concept "God" and what Anselm claims that concept must mean in order to be coherent, we can derive enough material to spin out an argument for God's existence that has been a source of interest to philosophers and theologians for almost a thousand years. Analysis can be a pretty powerful tool or a dangerous weapon, depending on how you look at it.
After you have developed a clear idea of your assignment in terms of the considerations presented above, you are ready to start writing. If you have done the first two steps well, then you will find that the writing is the easy part. Clear intentions and instructions, a clearly defined problem, and definite topics or texts to work with will have been more-or-less laid out already. In your writing, keep the central question or questions you are trying to answer always in view. Try to answer only those questions or problems set out by the assignment. Anything else that makes its way into your paper should be thought of as a way to expand or extend your paper, but is not the paper itself. Save it for after you have written the paper! If you are looking at a text and writing a paper mainly concerned with exegesis, (look it up) then always try to identify the location of central arguments in the text and focus your attention there. An argument is not merely any old claim, but an organized set of propositions intended to establish a definite proposition. In an argument some premises offer evidence for some conclusion. The movement from the premises to the conclusion which transfers the truth-value attributed to the premises to their conclusion is the inference or entailment that the author intends to make. Focusing as directly as possible on these aspects of your text will help you to see the author's intentions clearly. The structure of good exegetical writing should follow the structure of the argument or arguments that the writing concerns.
Although there are many good ideas about what makes the best writing style
for philosophers, usually it is best to use the simplest and most precise terms
possible, in the least complicated sentence structures possible. Also,
philosophers tend to use adjectives and adverbs very infrequently in their
writing. There are many styles which can be well-suited to the writing of good
philosophy papers, but emphasis should be placed on economy, clarity, and
precision so much as these can be achieved. Of course, the subject matter of
philosophy is broad-ranging, and style will tend to reflect the subject matter
you are writing about.
*Were these paragraphs actually extracted from another larger work, they
would of course need to be duly cited. I have written them for illustrative use
here.
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