How to write an essay (p.2)

Introduction

If you're just joining, this is a series about essay writing in Philosophy. How to do it, and how to do it well.

In this article we're looking at evidence, and how to identify good evidence within Philosophy.

Evidence and Field

The first step that really helps is to recognise that different forms of evidence are used in different fields. The types of evidence that are appealed to in Physics, Neuroscience, Psychology, Philosophy and English literature are all very different.

If you tell a neuroscience researching free will and freedom that Sartre has already found the answer - “he says our freedom is grounded in the idea that our existence precedes our essence” - you would, at the least, get a funny look.

That’s not to say that this isn’t true, and I imagine many neuroscientists would actually find this helpful, but that you would be appealing to a form of evidence that isn’t appropriate within the field of neuroscience.

So, when you’re writing your essay, remember that you want to work with evidence that is aligned with your topic.

Within Philosophy, there are two main forms of evidence that we use:

• Logical Reasoning

• Conceptual Analysis

There is a lot that can be said about these two forms of evidence, so for now, I'm going to elaborate a bit more on the first.

Logical Reasoning

At base, Philosophy is a subject that analyses arguments about ideas, and appeals to logic in order to verify their cogency (how correct they are).

We use deductive arguments to showcase cogency in our argument. Here's an example of a deductive argument: P1 - All humans are mortal

P2 - Socrates is a human

C - Socrates is mortal

You can see how both premises are true, and logically lead to the conclusion. This is a sound argument. When we produce philosophical arguments, we want to use this structure to validate it's cogency. Let's apply it in practice.

In practice

Let’s take a concept like ‘freedom’ -

For example, in a Philosophy essay, you might have a question about the definition of freedom. Your job is to analyse and argue for-or-against the definition. Here’s how it might look:

“The standard definition of freedom is the “the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants”. In this essay, I will argue that this definition is incorrect.”

How do we employ logic reasoning to do this?

Here’s one example:

Let’s start by assessing the value of each word within the definition. For argument's sake, I will take issue with the idea that rights are relevant to the definition of freedom.

So, the right to freedom is irrelevant to definitions of freedom because freedom can exist whether there is a right to be free or not. For example, a prisoner of war has no right to be free in the prison, but they still have the power to be free and escape.

Here’s the logical reasoning I’ll employ to underpin this claim, and argue that we don’t need to use the idea of rights in the definition of freedom.

P1: You can be free without having the right to be free.

P2: You cannot be free without the power to be free.

C: Therefore, freedom can be defined without rights.

This is a classically philosophical approach to arguing for a particular position by appealing to a form of logical reasoning as the basis (in this case, a deductive argument).

Let’s remember, this does not mean that the logic cannot be disputed. Someone else may have a greater preference for the importance of rights within the definition of freedom, and in doing so, take issue with your reasoning and craft a reasoned counter-argument.

For example:

P1. To believe is to accept a fact of reality

P2. To believe in one’s right to be free is to accept that freedom is a fact of reality

P3. Believing in a fact of reality empowers action in relation to that fact

C: The right to be free motivates the power to be free

As you can tell, this can quite easily turn into a game of ping-pong, with the winner being the person who put forward an argument that no one could counter. This game can occur with 1 person, or with 20. The ideal within philosophy is for the initial essay to produce some strong counter-argument to the initial arguments in order to pre-empt the issues that someone else might find the with argument. This is why objections are so important to Philosophy essays.

Now, if we go back to the evaluations that we put forward in the first part of this series, you will be able to use this form of reasoning to identify which one is a better form of argumentation.

Evaluation 1

“The claim is correct because I agree that God doesn’t exist and therefore it is up to us to decide how to live. This is because no one has ever seen God in the sky and as a result there is no evidence that God exists. Because this means God doesn’t exist, and therefore that no one can tell us what to do and not to do, the only other person it could be is myself, and therefore I must exist first and then define myself, and if that is the case, then I must be able to make free choices, and therefore have human freedom.”

Discussion

So, let’s look into this evaluation, and use logical reasoning to identify issues.

P1. It is possible that God exists even if God does not exist in the sky

P2. God not existing is integral to Sartre’s argument that “existence precedes essence”

C. The evaluation of Sartre’s argument is weak

As you can see, we found a claim that doesn’t appear to be valid, and used logical reasoning to show how. This is a good basis for the claim we made.

Now let’s look at the second evaluation:

Evaluation 2

“The claim is correct on the condition that all arguments in favour of the existence of God are incorrect. This is because atheism is a prerequisite to the idea that we define our existence for ourselves. If atheism as a belief is proven, then human freedom is not the result of an entity separate to ourselves, and is instead the result of our capacity for self-definition. That said, Sartre’s statement does not discuss evolution as a potential basis for human freedom, nor does he define how his definition of “existence precedes essence” might relate to evolution. The reason that evolution is relevant is because there is a wealth of scientific literature on the potential for evolution to account for development in species behaviour. Therefore, if God doesn’t exist, the emphasis is on the defender of the claim to describe how “existence precedes essence” successfully grounds human freedom in relation to evolution. The truthity of the claim is also contingent on the scope of the context that we might take as a basis for evidence. Furthermore, the correctness of the claim is also contingent on the strength of the evidence in representing Sartre’s viewpoint. The evidence is only taken from one piece of work, and it is known that Sartre rejected the validity of the work after it was produced, and favoured different work as the true basis of the claim. Therefore, there are a variety of factors that contribute to the strength and correctness of the claim that ”existence precedes essence successfully grounds human freedom.”

Discussion

This evaluation is immediately stronger than the first as it predicts the issue of God within the argument, and in doing so, strengthens the evaluation. The evaluation also raises various possible issues with the argument that might affect its strength. This is good too. Finally, it also discusses the textual basis of the claim, which was found in one of Sartre’s works that he himself acknowledged as a weak version of his general argument. These are good aspects to the evaluation, however, it does have a significant weakness - one that speaks to discussion within this article. Can you find it?

P1. Evolution is a scientific phenomena.

P2. Sartre’s argument is standardly non-scientific

P3. This evaluation of Sartre’s argument is inappropriate

This is a category error; appealing to an argument from a different field is a risky approach to evaluating a philosophical argument. Sartre’s account of freedom as “existence precedes essence” is not meant to be an argument against evolution, it is meant to be an argument against a particular philosophical tradition - namely, that essence precedes existence. If we were objecting, we’d note that appealing to evolution is an incomplete counterpoint, as Sartre’s argument isn’t meant to be compared to scientific reasoning.

So, which is better?

We’ve now used logical reasoning to see what aspects of the evaluation are strong and weak. What we found was that the second evaluation was better, as it predicted issues with the argument, and identified different areas to consider.

However, the second evaluation doesn’t actually tell us whether Sartre’s existence precedes essence is successful ground for human freedom. This was the whole point of doing the evaluation. As a result, while Evaluation 2 is better as an evaluation, Evaluation 1 is better as an answer.

Conclusion

Now, in an ideal world, we want a good evaluation, and a good answer. So that's what we'll be looking at next week - how to combine the two to produce a thorough and precise answer to a philosophical question. For now, I hope you can use some of what has been discussed today to refine your approach to evaluating arguments and appealing to the right kinds of evidence. If you have any questions or other aspects to the article that you’re interested in, then let me know.

Otherwise, thanks for reading, and I’ll see you for the final part - Part 3.

Extra Resource: Action List

Here's a list of the steps we took in this article for you to takeaway!

• Identify the type of evidence appropriate to your field.

• Use logical reasoning to test claims (deductive or conceptual analysis).

• Break down definitions and arguments into premises and conclusions.

• Anticipate counterarguments and pre-empt objections.

• Avoid cross-field category errors when evaluating arguments.

• Consider both the thoroughness of evaluation and the clarity of the answer.