Guidelines for Developing Extra Credit Arguments

I plan to devote much of our class time to discussing and evaluating arguments that class members submit for extra credit. The following are the criteria I will use to grade your submissions and to decide which arguments to present to the class:

1. The conclusion of the argument must be controversial: It should be an issue of concern for many people, and there should be a significant number of them who would disagree with or are uncertain about your conclusion. Also, don’t use a conclusion that has already been argued for in class or in our textbook (though you may argue for the opposite conclusion if it hasn’t been used.) If you aren’t sure whether a claim is sufficiently controversial, run it by me before you start working on the argument.

2. Each of the statements in the argument should be clearly stated, and any concepts that would be unfamiliar to your classmates need to be carefully defined.

3. Make the argument as strong as possible, using multiple independent lines of argument for the same conclusion if possible, and supporting controversial premises with additional arguments.

4. Indicate the logical structure of the argument by stating in parentheses at the end of each conclusion the line numbers of the premises, and the type of argument it is (if you know this).

5. Though you are allowed to do research when constructing arguments, you need to cite your sources in an appendix, and state each of your argument’s premises and conclusions in your own words. Plagiarism will not be tolerated. Originality is one of the things I will consider when grading this assignment.