Instruction
A successful philosophical paper balances exegesis and argument. Exegesis is explanation of claims in a text, including the reasons an author states for holding a certain view. Adequate quotation and citation of the text is essential to establishing any exegetical claim. Argument is your own philosophical reasoning about the merits and drawbacks of such a view, what its implications are,
etc.
Exegesis encourages you to engage closely with the sense, structure, and significance internal to a particular text. It should represent your attempt to wrestle with the basic interpretive
question: what does the text mean? Therefore, I expect to see evidence, grounded in the text itself, that supports your reasoned interpretation
For example you cannot claim that an author holds a certain view without pointing to convincing evidence that they do in fact hold it.
The challenging aspect of exegesis is exercising your best judgment to determine what constitutes good evidence. Finding the right evidence will often require going to more than
one section of a text in order to find the most appropriate supporting evidence with which to build your response.
There is no single “correct” response to a text, but responses can be better or worse. First and foremost, a good response
will make sense it will adhere to an internal logic of its own, and jive with the logic and meaning internal to the text.
The majority of the paper should be devoted to a clear, concise response to the prompt listed on the last page below:
PROMPT:
Write an essay that discusses the libertarian/utilitarian perspective on the one hand, and the Rawlsian perspective on the other.
Start by giving a succinct summary of each position that draws from the readings, lectures, videos, etc.
Then, explore the nuances and implications of each view. Make sure your essay has a clearly stated thesis
that tells the reader what you are going to try and accomplish with your paper (i.e. the ‘goal’ of your paper), as well as how
you are going to accomplish it.