PST 3109 Ethics and the Technical Professions
Spring 2005
ARGUMENTATIVE ESSAY ASSIGNMENT
Rough draft due Friday, April 8, in discussion section.
Final version due Monday, April 11, in class.
Write a 4-6 page argumentative essay in which you propose and defend a solution to the
following case (based on NSPE Cases, No. 92-6):
You are an engineering student employed for the summer by a consulting environmental
engineering firm. R.J., the engineer who supervises you, directs you to sample the
contents of drums located on the property of a client. From the look and smell of the
drums, you conclude that analysis of the sample will show hazardous waste in the
drums. You know that if the material contains hazardous waste, there are legal
requirements for the transport and disposal of the drums, and that federal and state
authorities must be notified.
You inform R.J. of the likely contents of the samples and ask what to do next. R.J.
instructs you to report only that samples have been taken, and not to do the analysis.
Since the client does other business with the firm, R. J. proposes to tell the client where
the drums are located and that they contain questionable material, and to suggest that
they be removed.
What should you do?
(Some questions to consider along the way: Would R.J. fulfill his professional
responsibilities by informing the client only of the presence of the drums and withholding
more specific information on their contents? What are his responsibilities? What are
yours?)
Here is a bunch of unsolicited advice on how to proceed:
Pre-writing
1. You should do a good deal of work on this essay before you begin to write anything
resembling a draft.
2. Start by doing a complete analysis of the case, including identification of facts, factual issues,
conceptual issues, and ethical issues, as well as application of various ethical perspectives
(i.e. utilitarian considerations, respect for persons, etc.). At some point, consult the relevant
professional code(s) of ethics.
3. Apply various problem-solving techniques to expand your options and reframe the problem.
4. Decide which solution you favor, and formulate it as a thesis: a simple declarative sentence
that makes a concrete and specific claim or proposal. Your thesis should be refined enough
and modest enough to be supported adequately by a 4-6 page argument. Note that, as you
proceed and as your thinking about the case advances, you may need to revisit your thesis in
order to revise or even replace it.
5. Gather ideas and arguments that support your thesis. Be modest here, as well. Your goal is
simply to show that you have found a particularly reasonable solution to the problem at hand,
one that balances the various values and obligations that are in play. Your goal is not to
PST 3109 Ethics and the Technical Professions
Spring 2005
prove that yours is the only possible solution or that people who disagree with you are
basically evil.
6. Identify several serious objections to your thesis and/or several strong alternative solutions.
Gather ideas and arguments that support those opposing views, and consider what ideas and
arguments you might bring to bear in addressing them. In writing, you may choose to
address only one or two of the strongest objections or alternatives.
7. At this point, you might consider outlining your entire essay. Remember, each paragraph
should have one and only one main idea.
8. You may ask others for ideas and advice only for the initial analysis and problem-solving
stage – asking around is, after all, a legitimate problem-solving technique. When it comes to
gathering arguments and counter-arguments, and planning your essay, you should work
alone.
Writing
1. At this point, you should be working entirely on your own. Anything you write and hand in
for credit in this course should consist of your own ideas expressed in your own words and
informed by your own judgment. If you quote or paraphrase ideas from any other source,
you must provide complete documentation in a consistent standard format; you must also
carefully distinguish between quotation and paraphrase through the use of quotation marks.
2. Write a good argument. This means that your premises should be more acceptable to your
reader than the conclusion, and that they should fit together in a way that compels the reader
to agree with you.
3. The order in which you present your ideas should have its own logic: all of the work you did
in the pre-writing phase should remain in the background, informing your judgment but not
obvious to the reader. You should not, for example, include the entire fact/concept analysis
in the text of the essay.
4. There are many different ways to organize an essay. The choice is yours, but keep in mind
that your goal is to give the reader reasons to agree that your solution to the problem is an
especially good one.
5. Consider objections. An argument is only as strong as its best counterargument. Raise at
least one strong objection or reasonable alternative to your thesis and provide the reasoning
behind it. Be fair to the opposition; make them look good. Then, respond with a reasoned
argument of your own. It will significantly reduce your credibility if you ignore other points
of view or, worse, to dismiss them out of hand.
6. Be concise. There is no need for a wordy introduction or for a conclusion that simply repeats
the main points of the argument. Get to the point as quickly as you can.
7. Write for a general audience. Assume that your reader is a generally well-educated person
who has no specific knowledge of the content of this course. This should give you an idea of
how much you need to explain and clarify the points you make.
8. Use plain English. If you write as though you were trying to impress someone with a Ph.D.
in Philosophy, you will end up not impressing anyone.
9. If you have trouble writing the first paragraph, start with the second paragraph; if you have
trouble with the second paragraph, start with the third. Then, go back and fill in gaps later.
10. As you write, feel free to go back and tinker with the outline, and even with the thesis, as
necessary.
PST 3109 Ethics and the Technical Professions
Spring 2005
11. Do not be anxious if the first draft does not turn out very well. That’s what post-writing is all
about.
Post-writing
1. The best writing you will ever do will happen as you rewrite. Never, under any
circumstances, should you hand in a first draft to be graded.
2. Revision must be more than checking the spelling and grammar of the essay. As the term
implies, you should see your essay again, which may lead you to change your thesis, the
overall structure, the relation of paragraphs to one another, the relation of sentences within a
paragraph, the choice of words within sentences, and so on.
3. Here, once again, you may seek the help of others: a good way to “re-vise” your essay is to
see it through other people’s eyes. The discussion sections on Friday, April 8 will be devoted
to peer assessment, a process through which you should receive concrete and constructive
ideas for improving your essay. As always, however, any revisions you make to the essay
should be in your own words and based on your own judgment, and the quality of the final
work will be your own responsibility.
Resources
There are many other resources to help you approach a writing assignment of this kind, including
the appendix in Weston and the whole of the (recommended) Harvey book. You might also
want to find and consult another book by Weston: A Rulebook for Arguments, third edition
(Indianapolis: Hackett, 2001)