Introduction

It is early in the semester, and yet your instructor (whose name you probably do not even know how to spell correctly yet) may be already talking about the first essay that is not due for weeks, if not months, down the road. You might be tempted to wait until the very last minute to actually start writing it, but by then, five other assignments from your other classes are also due. Not a smart move, but understandable. It is only human nature to try and avoid doing those things that we do not like, whether it is doing homework or going to the dentist. Even if you receive a “B” on the paper, imagine what you could have received if you had spent more time on it!

What are the consequences of waiting until the very last minute? Well, on the positive side, you have managed to avoid doing something that you do not really want to do. But on the negative side, you will lose a lot of sleep, skip a few early morning classes, be cranky and stressed, and ultimately submit a flawed piece of work that does not accurately represent what you think or what you are capable of. And you will probably get a poor grade, too.

What students often do not realize is that you really do not need to spend more time writing your paper, but you need to spend more time planning it.

Before we begin, let us make sure that we are on the same track. More often than not, a philosophy paper is a position or argumentative paper. It is not a “research paper.” A pure research paper involves (among other things) establishing, discovering or describing facts, such as medical facts, historical facts, or geopolitical facts. A position paper is just that: a paper in which you take or explain a position or point of view. You are trying to convince your reader of the thesis that you put forward.

In order to successfully persuade the reader of your own views, your instructor will be checking to see whether you adequately grasp the material and its implications, whether you can critically analyze and evaluate the relevant issues, and whether you can reasonably defend your thesis.

A position paper should not be considered just an opportunity for stating your own opinions. Remember, opinions are philosophically uninteresting, since they simply are unsupported claims. They only tell the readers your personal attitude towards something, whereas what you want to do is rationally persuade someone that he or she should think the same way that you do. Although we are contrasting this process with a standard “research paper,” we are not saying that you do not do any research for your project. Research is a key element to find out more about your topic as well as the different views and arguments that people have offered regarding it. You will need to do research to first understand the topic, the surrounding issues, and implications. Then, you will need to do research to find out what other people think. Then, you will need to do research to support your own views. Doing all of this requires time — something you will sorely lack if you put the paper off until the last minute.

If there is any theme of this section, it is to stress the need to have enough time to devote to your project. Let us repeat that again: GIVE YOUR ASSIGNMENT, YOUR TOPIC, AND YOUR READER THE TIME THEY DESERVE.

You need time to reflect and conduct research; time to reflect some more and put your ideas down on paper. You need time to walk away from those ideas and time to revisit them. You need time to dig around in libraries and the internet and then, armed with this additional input, alter, strengthen, and revise your work. You will then need more time to do the mechanical bits like editing, proofreading, and making sure that you have ink for your printer…

And, since time is important, let us get on to the main points, shall we?

Understand the Nature of the Assignment

Your topic may be assigned to you, or you may be directed to choose a topic within certain parameters. Regardless of which approach is taken by your instructor, you must understand the topic and the assignment requirements, for although you might write a competent paper, it might completely miss the point!

Be sure you understand the instructions:

• Are you asked to analyze a particular work or concept?
• Are you asked to summarize without evaluation?
• Are you asked to compare and contrast the positions of different philosophers or philosophies?
• How many words are required?
• Is it a short paper or a longer one?

Whatever the length, be mindful to stay close to the established limits. A paper that is too short will indicate that you did not spend adequate time to sufficiently develop and explore complex ideas. A paper that is too long may suffer from repetition or be “long winded” and defeat the purpose of the assignment (e.g., to be able to present material in a concise manner).

If you are unclear about the assigned essay topic, if you are unfamiliar with the topic background, or if you are unsure about the philosophical terminology, look to the reference section of your library for a philosophy dictionary or encyclopaedia. This reading will also help you frame the topic within a larger context and has the potential to provide you with information to assist you when you actually start the formal writing process. Do not simply turn to a standard dictionary, since those definitions will be inappropriate for your needs. These “reportive” definitions are by their very nature brief (just try defining words like “justice” or “love” in four words or less!) and may suffer from a number of deficiencies, such as being be too broad (i.e., they include things in the definition that ought not to be included, such as broadly defining the word “chair” as “a piece of furniture” — this does not distinguish between a chair and a table) or too narrow (i.e., they exclude things that ought to be included, such as narrowly defining the word “chair” as “a piece of furniture made out of yellow plastic” — this does not recognize that some chairs made out of brown wood).

If you are required to come up with your own essay topic, you should pick one after considering the following four guidelines.

Pick Something That is Relevant

It sounds obvious, but sometimes students will get off track quickly and choose a topic that is not quite what the instructor wanted. This might be due to you not understanding the nature of the assignment or due to you choosing a topic that is too general or vague. It is wise to clear your topic with your instructor to see if you are on the right track. They will then be able to give you some further direction on what to do.

Pick Something That You Are Interested In

They say time flies when you are having fun… While some topics may seem easier than others, do not let your initial impressions be the overriding factor. If you are not interested in the topic, then the actual writing process will become more difficult since you do not have anything vested in the project.

Choose a Topic That Is “Doable”

Essay topics like “The Philosophy of Aristotle,” “What is Truth?” or “Science versus Religion” are far too broad in scope. When thinking about your topic, it is better that “the pond is small and deep, rather than wide and shallow.” That is a murky metaphor, but basically it means do not bite off more than you can chew. You do not want to touch on fifty different and disjointed points and say nothing substantial about any of them. Instead, you want to pick a manageable topic that allows you some room for an in-depth exploration of the particular issue. Are you keen on the topic of euthanasia? What aspect? Voluntary vs. non-voluntary? Active vs. passive? The role of family members as decision makers vs. the physician? Narrow your focus and develop your thoughts.

Pick Something That You Can Find Materials On

While you may find a topic that interests you, you should check to see what sorts of resources are available. You might struggle with arguments and ideas if you cannot find more than two or three pieces that only mention your topic in passing. Do not forget that content that you find on the internet can be posted by anyone (or any lobby group), so it may be biased, false, and misleading. Hence, the internet may be worse than no resource at all. Consult with your university librarian or instructor for suitable databases and website resources.

Make Preliminary Notes about the Topic from Your Own Perspective

Once you have tentatively chosen a topic and have an understanding of it, try putting some of your own thoughts down on paper. Put your comments down as potential areas that you may want to explore later on. Just because you have chosen a topic does not necessarily mean that you already know what you think about it, let alone know what you want to say about it.

To do this, try and answer the following questions:

• What do you think about the topic?
• What do you want to say?
• What troubles you about this topic?
• What do you like about it?
• What do you find interesting or confusing?
• Do you see it leading to particular or general consequences?
• Can you think of any examples that highlight any of your concerns or which will highlight the claims being put forward by proponents of the particular position?
• Do you find that you seem to be in favour of one stance over another?
• Are you leaning in one direction but are not quite sure?

Just put your thoughts down on paper. This does not have to be any sort of formal presentation right now and by no means do these precursory comments have to be well-developed or even consistent with each other. You do not need to include every single point you have thought of, since some will just foster digressions. The challenge is to just get started. The mechanical process of putting pen to paper — even if you are not sure what you want to say — will help you get you going.

Conduct Your First Search for Potential Sources

After you have selected your topic and put down a few thoughts about it, you need to find out what material is out there. While you might think that the internet is the best place to go to see what sorts of resources are available, it is not the best place to start with. Look first to your own class text. It may contain a bibliography or a list of “recommended or further readings.” Does the author or editor have an introduction to the text or for each chapter? In the introduction, they might explicitly refer to other books or at least raise some discussion questions that can provide key terms that you can use for your searching. The book or article might mention other sources, like journals or some other texts, that you can go search for in your university’s library. Look at the footnotes or endnotes that are provided in the different resources. These too will point you to other sources.

Remember, each source, whether it is an encyclopaedia, journal, book, anthology, index, glossary of terms or bibliography, has the potential to lead you to other sources. This process of using one reference to link to another is just the same as using hyperlinks on the internet. So, sit yourself down in the middle of the library stacks and start flipping through various journals and texts that you find on the shelves. You will be pleasantly surprised by what you can discover by just spending an hour digging around!

I should point out that if you have not taken a tour of your library yet, do so:

• Find out where things are.
• Find out how to look things up.
• Find out the locations of the reference books, the periodicals, and the photocopy machines.
• Ask questions.
• Ask for assistance.

Scout out the place before wasting any more time because otherwise you will be doing this every time you have to return to the library to research a paper.

Get Your Preliminary Sources Together

It is now time to get your readings together. You may find out later that some of the sources are not appropriate or quite what you need but, for now, gather a small collection together and start digging through them for applicability. Often, it does not take very long to figure out that a particular article is relevant or irrelevant to what you want. Read the table of contents, look at the author’s introduction, and look at the index to see what key terms are mentioned frequently. Use those key terms to find other sources and then use those sources to find others, and so on. If you look up a book on a library shelf, look at all the others on the same shelf. If you found a useful article in a journal, look at previous issues and later ones (perhaps someone has written a rebuttal to the piece you like!)

While you can rely on the fact that the library books or journals that you are using are “quality” works, given that they were selected by someone to include in the university collection, remember to critically evaluate any work that you are considering using as support for your own views. This is even more pressing when you turn to the internet, where anyone can publish anything online. Fortunately, many people have taken the time to put together websites that list various resources for you to use. Your instructor may be able to direct you to some of these.

Understand and Critically Reflect Upon the Articles You Have Found

Read the articles that you have selected. You need to be a bear (as in “Goldilocks and the Three Bears”) about your research now. You do not want too many references that overwhelm the project because you cannot tackle everything (remember the shallow pool metaphor from earlier?), and you do not want too few because you do not want to just use the paper as a soapbox for your own ideas — no matter how marvellous they may be. You must understand the material before you can evaluate it. Make notes on your photocopies to capture ideas or quotes that you want to use and do not plagiarize! Take time to digest and reflect upon the information.

Create an Outline

Go back to the ideas that you jotted down a while ago:

• Are there any common threads?
• Can you pull some of them together to form a roadmap of where you might want to go?
• Do the articles that you found offer new insights and leads?
• Do they answer any questions, or do they lead you to ask more?

Think of this process as teamwork. Many others have been down the road you are traveling before you and can offer suggestions on where to turn and what to watch out for. Try to build on what they have done. Now is the time to create an outline of your arguments or, at a minimum, sketch out your ideas and construct an informal flow chart connecting this idea to that.

Attribution

Unless otherwise noted, “How to Do Philosophy” in The Originals: Classic Readings in Western Philosophy by Jeff McLaughlin (2017) is adapted and used under a CC BY-NC 4.0 license.