Read the DIRECTIONS Carefully!!

Paper must FLOW when making arguments and writing the paper. Meaning no confusing paragraphs or sentences!!

Articles you must read: Macintrye, Cristiano, Hurd, Smith, McGarth, Raz, and the two handouts

I don’t want you to use other sources beside the article I have uploaded

READ ALL OF THE ARTICLES I’VE GIVEN YOU TO READ AND YOU MUST INCLUDE OTHER AUTHORS IN THE ESSAY. YOU MUST COMPARE AND CONTRAST YOUR ARGUMENT WITH THEIR ARGUMENTS. WHAT YOU AGREE AND DISAGREE WITH THE AUTHORS ARGUMENTS!!!!!!! YOU CAN’T MAKE THE EXACT SAME POINTS AS THE AUTHORS. THINK ABOUT HOW THE AUTHORS AND AUDIENCE WOULD RESPOND TO YOUR ARGUMENTS , ESPECIALLY FOR COUNTEREXAMPLES. MAKE STRAIGHT FORWARD ARGUMENTS!! YOU CANNOT USE THE AUTHORS ARGUMENTS . MAKE YOUR OWN UNIQUE ARGUMENT !!

You might want to do a little bit of research paper writing the thesis proposal.

There must be NO plagiarism or grammatical errors of any kind!! PLEASE PROOFREAD THREE TIMES BEFORE SUBMITTING IT TO ME

I want someone who is an EXPERT in philosophy and philosophical questions !! THIS IS NOT AN EASY WRITING ASSIGNMENT . IT WILL REQUIRES A LOT OF CRITICAL THINKING

Paper 2 topics and theses

Craft a thesis which answers all of the following questions:

Do beliefs affect whether it is morally wrong/permissible/obligatory for a judge to adhere or deviate in a particular case?
– If so, whose beliefs? (The judge’s? The voters’? The legislature’s? Someone else’s?)
– If so, which beliefs of those believers? (Any? Just the reasonable ones? Just the ones that are produced through social deliberations? Just the true ones? Etc.)
– If so, how? (Do they fully determine what is wrong or permissible? Do they just provide some reasons, and if so, how weighty of reasons?)
– If not, why not?

You can limit your thesis to being just about moral beliefs, or talk about both moral and descriptive beliefs, but you cannot just talk about descriptive beliefs. If you think only descriptive beliefs affect what a judge should do, your paper would have to also argue that moral beliefs do not. If you do limit your thesis, make that clear in your thesis.

If you want, you can talk about beliefs only, or beliefs and credences, or credences only.

A note on trivial theses
This applies to both pre-approved and novel theses. A trivial thesis is one that no one can argue against, because it is true basically by definition. For example: “Judges have an obligation to adhere when the reasons strongly favor adherence over deviation.” That’s not worth writing about; the thesis is not saying anything of substance. You are not allowed to write on trivial, or partly trivial, theses.

Paper grading rubric

Paper Part 1:
60% of your grade.

Thesis:
These criteria on the thesis are a minimum bar for a passing paper. If you far exceed them, it’s not going to push your grade up. But if you fail to meet them, it will be very hard to get even a decent grade. This is because your thesis is what makes sense of everything else you say in the paper.

******THESIS MUST BE TRUE AND SUPPORTED BY EVIDENCE!! THESIS MUST BE AN ARGUMENT!!
1. Your topic and questions are either pre-approved or Brian has approved it in writing. Topics/questions that are different in any meaningful way from what has been approved can potentially result in an F.
1a. Your thesis is your answer to all the questions posed for your topic.
* Your thesis must be the first thing you say in the paper, and explained immediately after.
2. Your thesis is not trivial or partly trivial. Trivial theses can potentially result in an F. A thesis can be graded down for being somewhat trivial.
3. Any terms that are vague, ambiguous, or unclear are defined or explained early in your paper. A reader should be able to think of example situations and determine exactly what your thesis says about them.

Argument for your thesis:
4. The argument gives evidence which could be compelling to a reasonable person who has understood the course material and started out not agreeing with your thesis.
5. The evidence is sufficient to establish that your entire thesis is true – you sufficiently argue for all of the answers to all of the relevant questions.
6. It is clear and well explained how the evidence supports your thesis, and why the evidence is sufficient to establish that your thesis is true.

Response to “obvious” objections.
7. You identify and explain all of the obvious objections to your thesis or to the points you made in making your arguments.
* An obvious objection is anything discussed in class or in the reading that seems to go against your thesis or the points you make in arguing for your thesis. Obvious objections also include any objections that would come to mind to a reasonable and attentive reader who had taken this class, given a modicum of reflection about your claims.
8. For each objection, you correctly characterize what the disagreement is and why it exists.
9. You respond to each obvious objection. This involves either explaining why the apparent disagreement is not a real disagreement, or why the objection is mistaken or irrelevant.
10. The response to the objection must be clear, and must be able to able to convince a reasonable person who had made that objection.
(Note: I will apply 8-10 separately to each obvious objection you discuss. If you leave out an obvious objection, this is like getting an F for that objection)

Grading standards 4, 5, and 9 are the most heavily weighted in determining the grade for part 1.

Part 2. Non-obvious objection
20% of your grade

11. Gives one counterexample to your thesis. This must be significantly different from anything discussed in class or in the readings.

* A counterexample to your thesis is a specific example (not a general worry) that is supposed to directly show that your thesis is false (rather than undermining one of the arguments for your thesis).
12. The counterexample is plausible, relevant to the thesis, and not ruled out by what is said in Part 1. A reasonable person who had read Part 1 and taken this class could think that this counterexample disproves your thesis.
* It must not be the case that small changes to the counterexample would clearly make it a better counterexample.
13. It is explained why the counterexample is relevant to the thesis, why it shows that the thesis is false, and why a reasonable person would believe it is a strong counterexample.

Part 3. Response to the non-obvious objection
20% of your grade

Note: If part 2 is very weak, then part 3 cannot get a high grade. A response to a bad objection does not demonstrate philosophical understanding.
14. Gives an argument that the objection does not show your thesis is false.
* This must not misinterpret the objection.
* This does not change the thesis.
* The response does not rely on details of the counterexample that could easily be changed.
15. The response gives evidence which could be compelling to a reasonable person who was initially convinced by the example from Part 2.
16. The evidence is sufficient to show that the counterexample does not disprove your thesis.
17. It is clear and well explained how the evidence responds to the counterexample.
18. The response does not change or misuse the meanings of any terms discussed in class or in the reading.
19. The response does not rely on any misunderstandings of concepts or arguments from class or the reading.

General standards:
These apply to the entire paper.
20. Any discussion of ideas, terms, or arguments from class or the readings is correct and accurate (This is extremely important; mistakes about class material can bring down your grade significantly).
21. The meaning of every sentence is clear.
22. No significant grammar/spelling/word choice errors.
23. No use of quotations unless absolutely necessary. My general policy is to not read quotes at all. I should be able to understand everything in your paper without them.

Formatting
Your grade will be reduced 1/3 of a grade (e.g. from a B+ to B) for each of these rules you break.
* ID page: after the last body page, add a new page with nothing on it but your name; put your name at the bottom of this page. This allows us to grade all papers anonymously.
* Do not put your name, or any other identifying marks, anywhere on the paper except for your ID page.
* Single spaced, 1″ margins, 12 point font (Times New Roman or something very similar. I recommend Garamond).
* No introduction or conclusion. You thesis is the first thing you say.
* Must be in .doc or .docx format.
* The file name must be “[your student id number] [course number] PAPER 1.doc” or “.docx”.
* Please label “Part 1,” “Part 2,” and “Part 3” of your paper (see above for what goes in each part).
* If you are writing on a topic or questions that was not pre-approved, you must have gotten approval by email from Brian. If you did, please put a footnote after your thesis saying “This thesis was approved by Brian on [date].”

Length
* The paper can be as long as you want. However, if it goes over 5 single spaced pages, excluding bibliography and ID page, you will be marked down for any unnecessary material. Material is unnecessary if it is not needed to fulfill the above grading standards. So, going over 5 pages is fine as long as it is done to satisfy the above grading standards

Paper overview

This is my attempt to explain in plain language what the paper is supposed to do. The official grading rubric, which I will use to grade, is posted on a different page.

Audience( keep this in mid as you are writing the paper)

YOU MUST THINK ABOUT ALL THE POSSIBLE QUESTION THE AUDIENCE MIGHT HAVE WHILE READING THE ESSAY.

FOR EXAMPLE , WHAT ARE YOU NOT ADDRESSING WITH YOUR ARGUMENT FROM THE AUDIENCE PERSPECTIVE

The audience for the paper is a reasonable person who has taken this class, understood everything we have covered, and starts off disagreeing with your thesis. Keep this audience in mind as you write your paper.

Part 1
Part 1 will be read and graded independently from part 2 and 3. Ideas and arguments in part 2 or 3 will not contribute to your grade for part 1.

Part 1 gets an A if it could convince the audience that your thesis is true. This means that Part 1 must do all of the following:

Part 1 must explain what your thesis means. Any unclear or ambiguous terms should be explained. Given this explanation, a person should be able to think of example situations and determine what your thesis would say about them. If they cannot, then no one can tell whether or not Part 1 could convince your audience, since we don’t know what it is trying to convince the audience.

Part 1 must contain an argument for your thesis. The argument must give evidence that your thesis is true, evidence which could convince the audience. Remember, your audience starts off disagreeing with you; don’t give arguments that would only convince someone who already shares your view. The argument should address every aspect of your thesis: if your thesis has multiple conditions, or answers multiple questions, you must argue for all of these.

Part 1 must address all obvious objections. Your thesis, and/or your arguments, will seemingly disagree with arguments we covered in class, or ideas in the readings. Or, there may be problems with your arguments, or counterexamples to your thesis, that your audience would very easily think of. These are “obvious” objections – objections that your audience will know of, which must be addressed in order to convince your audience.

So, your paper must state all the obvious objections. For each, it must explain why this objection would seem relevant to your thesis or arguments.

Your paper must respond to each objection (showing that your thesis is still true) in a way that could satisfy your audience. This will require giving evidence that your audience would find compelling.

Part 2
In Part 2, you must give a reasonable counterexample to your thesis.

This must be a specific example, which is significantly different from any we have covered in class, or anything that was in the reading. You must clearly explain the specific situation that is your counterexample. And you must clearly explain why someone would think that this is a strong counterexample to your thesis.

To get an A, you must both give a counterexample to your thesis that could convince a reasonable person that your thesis is false, and also clearly explain why a reasonable person could be convinced by it, in a way that shows that you understand (some of) those who disagree with you.

Part 3
In Part 3, you must respond to the counterexample given in Part 2. You may not change your thesis, nor change any part of the objection from Part 2.

Your response should be able to convince a person who was originally compelled by the example in Part 2.

If your response shows that there is a better counterexample to your thesis than the one in Part 2 (e.g. it focuses on a detail of Part 2 that could easily be changed to make Part 2 a better counterexample), that is bad for your grade.

If Part 2 is a weak or bad counterexample to your thesis, then you cannot get a good grade for Part 3; this is because Part 3 does not demonstrate your ability to really engage with people who disagree with you.

KEY WORDS DEFINITIONS. I WANT YOU TO INCLUDE THEM THE ESSAY AND APPLY THEM ACCORDINGLY. IN OTHER WORD,S THEY MUST FIT THE PARAGRAPH,

FEEL FREE YOU GOOGLE IF YOU NEED A BETTER DEFINITION OF THE WORD!!

Standpoints: Be able to explain what the legal and prudential standpoint are. Be able to give examples that illustrate the difference between the different standpoints of evaluation (legal, prudential, moral) – e.g. give an example of something that is legally wrong but morally permissible, legally wrong but prudentially permissible, morally wrong but legally permissible, morally wrong but prudentially permissible, prudentially wrong but legally or morally permissible. If given claims about what is wrong or permissible, be able to say which standpoint these are most plausible from and why.

Wrongness: Be able to give plausible examples of permissible, wrong, and obligatory actions (from each of three standpoints – moral, legal, prudential). Be able to give examples of acts that are morally wrong but also wrong to prevent, acts that are morally permissible but morally permissible to prevent, and acts that are morally obligatory but morally permissible to prevent. Be able to rewrite sentences using “wrong,” “permissible,” “duty,” or “obligation” into sentences using the other terms, which mean the same things.

Reasons and prima facie duties: Key terms: “reason for,” “reason against,” “prima facie duty,” “overriding,” “conflict.” Be able to explain what each of these mean, and give plausible examples of each. Be able to give examples in which there are moral reasons for doing x and moral reasons against doing x (for the same x, at the same time); be able to explain what is morally wrong or permissible for a person to do in that situation and why. Be able to give examples in which two prima facie moral duties conflict, and one duty overrides the other; be able to explain what is wrong and permissible for the person to do in that situation. If I give you examples of situations, be able to identify the moral reasons for and against the available options.

Free riding / complicity: Key terms: “free ride,” “free riding,” “complicit,” “complicity.” Be able to explain each term in your own words. Be able to give examples of each. If I give you examples of situations, be able to identify if they are examples of free riding or complicity (or neither) and explain why. Be able to give examples where acts seem morally wrong because they are free riding, or morally wrong because they are complicity, and examples where free riding seems morally permissible or complicity seems morally permissible. Note: it is easy to give examples where doing x is wrong and doing x makes a person complicit, but the complicity is not clearly what makes x wrong (the same for free riding). For example, a person who runs someone over with a very polluting car is complicit in climate change. Is this wrong because of the complicity? It’s most clearly wrong because it is a murder, not because of the complicity. When you give examples of acts that are wrong because they free riding/complicity, don’t give examples like that.

Adherence/deviation: Key terms: “adhere,” “deviate.” Be able to explain what each means, and give your own examples of each. If I give you examples of acts, be able to identify if they are acts of adherence or deviation or neither, and to explain why. Be sure that you understand that adhering or deviating involves applying or misapplying legal rules; it’s not the same as what we normally call “breaking the law” (i.e. it is not doing something criminal).

Demandingness: Key term “demanding.” Be able to give an example in which there is usually aprima facie moral duty to do x, but some specific person does not have that duty because it would be too demanding for them. Be able to give an example where a moral duty to do x is somewhat demanding for a person, but that person still has a moral duty to do x. If I give you examples, be able to correctly identify if they are examples involving demandingness. Be able to distinguish between cases where there is no duty to do x because that would be overly demanding, and cases where there is no duty to do x because x is impossible to do.

Authority: Key terms: “authority,” “content independent reason.” Be able to explain what each means. Be able to give plausible examples of authorities outside the context of the law (you don’t have to agree that these are authorities, you just need to have some examples that others will find plausible). If I give examples, be able to explain whether or not these terms apply to them.

First and second order reasons: Key terms: “first order reason,” “second order reason,” “exclusionary reason” (this last one is a concept from Raz and is explained in the Hurd reading). Be able to explain what each of these are. Be able to give plausible examples of each (you may not believe that, e.g., exclusionary reasons exist, but you should be able to give an example that would be plausible to someone who does believe in these types of reasons). Be able to give examples in which a particular fact is (or gives) both first and second order reasons. If I give you examples, be able to explain whether they are first or second order reasons (or both or neither).

Causal, explanatory, and justificatory reasons: Key terms: “causal reason,” “explanatory reason,” “justificatory reason.” Be able to give an example of causal reasons and explanatory reasons that are not moral justificatory reasons. Be able to give examples of moral justificatory reasons that do not cause any event or explain any event. Be able to give examples of moral reasons that also do cause or explain events.

Moral vs. descriptive beliefs: Be able to give examples of beliefs that are clearly moral and beliefs that are clearly descriptive. Be able to give examples of disagreements about moral questions that are fundamentally driven by disagreements in descriptive beliefs, and disagreements that are based in moral beliefs (for example: when people disagree about how we should fight climate change, this is often based on different beliefs about what would actually work, which are are descriptive beliefs; people who disagree about what is right to do in trolley cases share all the same descriptive beliefs about the cases, but have different moral views). If I give you examples of beliefs, or of disagreements, be able to identify whether they are moral beliefs or descriptive, or whether they involve disagreements in moral or descriptive beliefs, and be able to explain why.