Quizzes
Each of the questions asks you to explain an author’s argument for a given claim. To answer the question, you will need to reconstruct the author’s argument and provide a clear statement of it, in your own words, step by step. Why, exactly, does the author think what he thinks? Note that you are not asked to evaluate the argument, but merely to identify and clearly reproduce the argument in your own words.
The purpose of the quizzes is to give you a chance to demonstrate that you understand the arguments we are studying, and to help you prepare for writing your papers, in which you will be critically evaluating arguments and making arguments of your own. For each quiz, you must submit a response of no more than 1–2 (double-spaced) pages.
Paper Topics
Each of the following paper topics asks you to reconstruct and critically evaluate an argument. Therefore, you will need to be clear on what counts as an argument and how one goes about critically evaluating an argument. Helpful explanations can be found at http://www.jimpryor.net/teaching/vocab/index.html.
