o what extent is free will an essential element of a function

Final Paper Due: End of Week 9
Annotated Bibliography Due: End of Week 8
Length: 5-6 pgs. (Not including your Works Cited Page)
For your final formal essay in this class, you will be tasked with doing research on the following
topic:
To what extent is free will an essential element of a functioning society?
We have focused much of our reading in this class around concepts that relate back to logic on
which our society has been created upon. We have focused on democracy (Aristotle, Emerson,
De Tocqueville), as well as gender equality (Wollstonecraft, Mead), and will focus on morality
and ethics (Murdoch, Gazzaniga). All of these tie together in your analysis of the topic question
for your research paper. Your job is to make an argument based on what you have read in this
class and use the work of these writers and outside sources to explain your logic.
This paper has several elements that will need to be addressed in order to be successful. First you
will need to define vague terms like “free will” and “functioning society” so that your audience
understands the perspective from which you are arguing. You will also need to provide
examples, use hypotheticals, and rely on the work of other authors and writers who have
explored the subject in order to make a rational argument that either argues that free will is not
essential to a functioning society or that it is elemental to a functioning society.
Questions that you might ask, as an entry into the work are:
1. What is the relationship between the individual to larger society?
2. What responsibilities does society have to ensure free will for people?
3. What are the individual’s responsibilities to society?
4. How does free will and individual innovation and expression lead to the betterment of the
whole?
5. How has the relationship between the individual’s free will and society played out
historically? Meaning, have society’s which highly respect individual autonomy historically
flourished or crumbled? What are examples from history you can draw from?
I do not want you to respond to these questions one by one in your essay, but rather expect that
they help guide you in your writing, so please do not submit a research paper that simply
responds to these questions.
Due to the fact that this paper will require some research and time to compose, you are required
to turn in an annotated bibliography at the end of the 8
th
week. An annotated bibliography is
essential a Works Cited Page, but without the essay. It is a means to ensure that you begin the
research early on, because it is going to take you some time to formulate an argument that
saliently addresses the topic.
You should at least have 5 different sources from which you are drawing your research from.
These sources needs to be from reputable, peer-reviewed publications, or based on the work of
writers who arte generally considered to be authorities on the subject.
Please note- this page is appearing in Week Five’s Module because it is imperative that you
begin working on your research and formulating your ideas as soon as possible. It is not due this
week, so please do not panic. However, it is due in 3 weeks, and therefore will require you to
begin working on it is as soon as you are able. The lessons we cover in Week 7 and Week 8 will
provide additional information that will help shape your writing, but you will still need to get
started on the work early.
Final Paper Due: End of Week 9
Annotated Bibliography Due: End of Week 8
Length: 5-6 pgs. (Not including your Works Cited Page)
For your final formal essay in this class, you will be tasked with doing research on the following
topic:
To what extent is free will an essential element of a functioning society?
We have focused much of our reading in this class around concepts that relate back to logic on
which our society has been created upon. We have focused on democracy (Aristotle, Emerson,
De Tocqueville), as well as gender equality (Wollstonecraft, Mead), and will focus on morality
and ethics (Murdoch, Gazzaniga). All of these tie together in your analysis of the topic question
for your research paper. Your job is to make an argument based on what you have read in this
class and use the work of these writers and outside sources to explain your logic.
This paper has several elements that will need to be addressed in order to be successful. First you
will need to define vague terms like “free will” and “functioning society” so that your audience
understands the perspective from which you are arguing. You will also need to provide
examples, use hypotheticals, and rely on the work of other authors and writers who have
explored the subject in order to make a rational argument that either argues that free will is not
essential to a functioning society or that it is elemental to a functioning society.
Questions that you might ask, as an entry into the work are:
1. What is the relationship between the individual to larger society?
2. What responsibilities does society have to ensure free will for people?
3. What are the individual’s responsibilities to society?
4. How does free will and individual innovation and expression lead to the betterment of the
whole?
5. How has the relationship between the individual’s free will and society played out
historically? Meaning, have society’s which highly respect individual autonomy historically
flourished or crumbled? What are examples from history you can draw from?
I do not want you to respond to these questions one by one in your essay, but rather expect that
they help guide you in your writing, so please do not submit a research paper that simply
responds to these questions.
Due to the fact that this paper will require some research and time to compose, you are required
to turn in an annotated bibliography at the end of the 8
th
week. An annotated bibliography is
essential a Works Cited Page, but without the essay. It is a means to ensure that you begin the
research early on, because it is going to take you some time to formulate an argument that
saliently addresses the topic.
You should at least have 5 different sources from which you are drawing your research from.
These sources needs to be from reputable, peer-reviewed publications, or based on the work of
writers who are generally considered to be authorities on the subject.
Please note- this page is appearing in Week Five’s Module because it is imperative that you
begin working on your research and formulating your ideas as soon as possible. It is not due this
week, so please do not panic. However, it is due in 3 weeks, and therefore will require you to
begin working on it is as soon as you are able. The lessons we cover in Week 7 and Week 8 will
provide additional information that will help shape your writing, but you will still need to get
started on the work ea