PHIL 350:
PAPER GUIDELINES
1. STANDARD OF CLARITY. Your paper should be understandable to a
reasonably intelligent person who has never taken an epistemology course.
2. PAPERS SHOULD BE 5-7 PAGES (300 WORDS PER
PAGE). THEY SHOULD BE PREPARED AS WORD
DOCUMENTS (OR IN RTF FORMAT). THEY
SHOULD BE SUBMITTED TO ME (wtalbott@u.washington.edu)
AS EMAIL ATTACHMENTS BY MIDNIGHT ON THE MONDAY, NOV. 27. THE FILENAME SHOULD BEGIN WITH YOUR
LAST NAME. There is no penalty for length per se, but papers exceeding
seven double-spaced pages of text (2100 words) will be penalized, if they could
have been shortened by careful editing.
(Footnotes may appear on a separate page.) Although papers are evaluated chiefly on
their philosophical merits, grammar, spelling, and diction will also be
evaluated. You are expected to express
your thoughts in clear, grammatical, English sentences.
3. INCLUDE CITES TO BOTH TEXTS. CITE FULLY AND ACCURATELY. In your paper, you should one cite to both
the BonJour text and the Pojman text. I
would expect multiple cites to both texts.
Make sure you accurately state the position of any author you
discuss. Any time you quote an author or
attribute a proposition to an author, the quotation or attribution must be
supported by a citation to the text, with page numbers. YOU MAY NOT CITE ME AS AN AUTHORITY ON WHAT
AN AUTHOR SAYS (UNLESS I AM THE AUTHOR!).
YOU MUST CITE THE AUTHOR HIM/HERSELF.
Where the reference is to a text in the assigned readings, it is
sufficient to provide page references in parentheses immediately after the
quotation or attribution. In all other
cases, provide a full bibliographic reference in a footnote or endnote. The page limit on the paper applies to the text
of the paper only. Footnotes are free.
4. TO SHOW THAT YOU UNDERSTAND AN AUTHOR'S
POSITION, IT IS NOT SUFFICIENT TO SIMPLY PARROT THE AUTHOR. Where you quote the author, make sure you
explain in your own words the significance of the quoted material. It is often helpful to use your own examples
to clarify the views of the author you are discussing.
5. USE CARE IN INTERPRETING AN
AUTHOR, PARTICULARLY SOMEONE YOU DISAGREE WITH.
If on your interpretation of an author, the author either is inconsistent
or has made an obvious error of reasoning, begin by assuming that you have
misinterpreted the author. Reread the
relevant passages carefully to see if you can put together a consistent
position that is not obviously erroneous.
If you cannot do so, or come to my office hours or make an appointment
to discuss it with me.
6. CAREFULLY DISTINGUISH VIEWS THAT YOU CLAIM AN
AUTHOR HOLDS FROM VIEWS THAT YOU CLAIM THE AUTHOR SHOULD HOLD OR IS COMMITTED
TO HOLDING. Claims that an author holds
a particular view must be supported with cites to the text. But claims that an author should hold or is
committed to holding a particular view must be supported with relevant
arguments, in addition to cites to the text.
7. USE LABELS. In your paper, you will typically have to
distinguish between a number of different theses or positions. It is often useful to give names or labels to
the various theses or positions, for ease of reference. For example, in class we will distinguish
between two different kinds of internalism about justification, access
internalism and psychological internalism.
8. USE EXAMPLES.
In philosophy, it is easy to get lost in a discussion of abstract ideas.
You should not feel that you understand an author's view unless you can explain
how it applies to relevant examples. In
your paper, you should not deal entirely in abstractions. You should try to develop one or two or more
examples which (perhaps with some variations) can be used to illustrate the
main issues in the paper.
9. CRITICAL EVALUATION. In your paper, you must critically evaluate
the positions taken by the author you discuss on the relevant issue—that is,
you must make the strongest case you can make on both sides of the relevant
issue, then take your own stand on which side is, on balance, the most
reasonable position to take, and explain why you think so.
10. AVOID PLAGIARISM. Whenever you turn in any assignment in this
course, the understanding is that what you are turning in is your own original
work, except to the extent that you explicitly credit others for their
contributions. You have an obligation to avoid even the appearance of
impropriety, by always attributing any argument or idea that you have borrowed,
even if you have modified it, to its source.
The source may be written or oral.
For example, if an argument was suggested by a fellow student, include
that information in a footnote.
11.
STYLISTIC SUGGESTIONS
(including some adopted from Professor
BonJour)
1. Make sure that you express
yourself in complete sentences. Each
sentence must contain, at a minimum, a subject and a predicate in grammatical
agreement that make sense together.
2. A common mistake is sentences that run on too
long. Two or more gramatically complete
sentences should be separated by a period, not a comma. If you want to link them more closely, you
can use a semi-colon, or a comma and a conjunction (e.g., "and" or
"but). Other things being equal,
two short sentences are better than one longer sentence.
3. Check the meanings and spellings of all words
that you are not sure of. It is
recommended that you use a computer spelling checker before printing your final
draft.
4. Some people believe that really good
philosophy must be very deep, and thus hard to understand. You will not be rewarded for such writing in
this course. Your goal should be to make
your papers as clear, as unambiguous, and as easy to understand as the subject
matter allows. A good way to test for
awkward constructions as well as for sense is to read your paper aloud to someone
else, or even just to yourself. You may
also have it read by one of the tutors in the