Thesis Writing
In the big picture overview, I said that a thesis needs to have three things:
A clear conclusion.
A reason to support that conclusion.
Some additional detail to support the main argument.
Since there are different ways to write a strong thesis, the best way to see how a strong thesis meets these requirements will be to take a look at some examples.
The Conclusion Goes Up Front
Let’s take a look at a thesis that fails to meet the first condition:
Thesis 1: “Incentivizing organ donations with financial compensation without regulation poses an ethical problem.”
Notice that, in this thesis, the author is stating that he/she will argue that selling one’s organs is morally problematic. But that doesn’t yet tell the reader what the conclusion is supposed to be! If it’s morally problematic to sell one’s organs, what should the reader draw from this claim? Does it follow that it should be illegal to sell one’s organs? That it is morally impermissible for a doctor to harvest the organs? That it is morally impermissible for the seller to sell her organs? Notice all these questions arise because the thesis here is too unspecific; it needs to tell the reader what conclusion they should take away from the fact that organ selling poses and “ethical problem” (more on that phrase later). There is not a clear conclusion in this thesis. An improved thesis would have a much clearer conclusion. Let’s modify the above example:
Thesis 2: “It is morally impermissible for hospitals to incentivize organ donations with financial compensation without regulation because it poses an ethical problem.”
This is better; it states clearly that it is morally impermissible for someone or something (e.g., hospitals) to financially compensate organ donors. That is what this paper will try to convince you of, at least.
Reasons to Accept the Conclusion
However, the revised thesis still doesn’t tell the reader anything about how the author will argue for that conclusion. So, this thesis gives us the what he/she will argue for but not the how he/she will argue for it. The thesis states that such sales pose an ethical problem. But saying that there is a moral problem doesn’t tell the reader anything about what that problem is. In other words, what we have so far doesn’t give us much reason to accept the conclusion. When writing your thesis, think about the “how will I argue for my conclusion?” part of the thesis like this: “what reason will I give the reader to think my conclusion is true?” Often times, there are many ways to argue for the conclusion. At this point, pick a reason to accept the conclusion that you find compelling, and, generally, focus on providing one argument. For instance, here’s one reason one might accept the conclusion that hospitals should not financially incentivize organ donation:
Thesis 3: “It is morally impermissible for hospitalsto incentivize organ donations with financial compensation without regulation because creating an unregulated market in organ sales will likely result in the exploitation of the poorest people in society.”
Notice two important things about this updated thesis: first, that this new thesis gives us a reason to think that organ sales are morally problematic. The reason that it should be impermissible for hospital to incentivize organ donations with financial compensation is because it’s likely to result in the exploitation of the poor.
Second, it doesn’t give us too many arguments. Providing too many arguments will make the paper less focused. It doesn’t say, for instance, that organ sales are morally impermissible because they result in exploitation of the poor and it is wrong to sell parts of one’s own body. These are two different reasons to accept the same conclusion. Generally, it’s better to focus on a single argument rather than two. This will keep your paper focused.
Additional Detail Strengthens the Thesis
But also notice that the argument can be strengthened with additional details. For instance, the thesis doesn’t tell us how the poor will be exploited by this system. Of course, the details you need to add will depend on what your thesis is. But, at least in this case (and in most cases), you can certainly say more about why creating such a system will result in the exploitation of the poor. Here is one possible way to add some more relevant detail:
Thesis 4: “It is morally impermissible for hospitalsto incentivize organ donations with financial compensation without regulation because creating a system that incentivizes the financially disadvantaged to sell their body parts will likely result in the exploitation of the poorest people in society. The poor may be exploited by an unregulated market because financial pressures to cut costs may result in hospitals under compensating individuals who opt to sell their organs.”
This addition gives the reader a very strong sense of what you will be arguing for in your paper. Now, this may not be a perfect thesis, and you may want to go through many revisions to improve. But adding these key details give the reader a much better sense about how you will reach the conclusion that hospitals should not pay people who want to sell their organs.
To be clear, I certainly don’t mean to suggest that you need to include every important detail in the thesis. That’s what the rest of your paper is for. But youshouldinclude all the big picture details in the thesis. What I mean by that is this: most of the very specific details of your argument need not be included in the thesis; those should be presented throughout the rest of the paper. These details – what you should and should not include in the rest of the paper – will be the topic of the rest of this guide.