Length: 900-1000 words (three to four pages), double-spaced, in MLA format.
Your Works Cited page does not count toward the assignment length.
Sources: Do not quote more than one word or one phrase at a time. Your originality index must not exceed 4%. Your primary source is How to Think About Weird Things. You do not need to have any secondary sources. A Works Cited page is required, although you may have only the Weird book listed. If you quote any part of the passage, or any other passage from Weird, you must include the page number within your text in parentheses (using correct MLA in-text citation form).
Thesis statement: In this essay, your thesis statement will be your answer to the research question.
Explanation: SEARCH the following passage, from page 31 of Weird:
After attending the conference on the Bigfoot phenomenon-the possible existence of a giant ape-man in North America-I am struck by how my beliefs have changed. I no longer dismiss the possibility of Bigfoot out of hand. I don't know exactly what is going on in the forests of western United States and Canada, but I believe that it is mysterious and strange. I was struck by the fact that no one has offered any proof that Bigfoot does not exist. There are tantalizing bits of evidence suggesting that Bigfoot might be real, but there are no knock-down arguments or volumes of evidence showing that he definitely does not exist. No one has shown me a scientific survey of all of North America in which Bigfoot was searched for but not detected anywhere. There is only one conclusion that I can draw from this: However unlikely it might seem, Bigfoot exists-and he likely exists exactly where eyewitnesses say he exists, in the wilderness of the West.
Helpful hints:
Include concepts discussed in Chapters 1 through 3 in our textbook. For instance:
Do you spot any logical fallacies in the claim?
Can you diagram the logical argument used in the claim?
Is the claim logically, physically, or technologically possible? Why or why not?
What guiding principles are you able to use when looking at the claim?