Should Humans Eat Meat?

DUE DATE ：NOV 01

Topic:  Should Humans Eat Meat?

Most people eat meat at least once, if not many times, every single day.  It is such a common thing to do, and so ingrained in our culture and habits, that few of us think about it deeply at all.  Everyone does it, so we do it.  But is it really a rational thing to do in the modern world?  Einstein once said “Nothing will benefit human health and increase chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet.”  Hmm, most people think he’s a pretty smart guy.  Should humans be eating meat, or should we all become vegetarians?  There are actually many facets to this debate.  People have considered the implications of meat versus vegetarian diets in terms of ethics, health and impact on the environment.

Your task is to make a claim whether or not humans should eat meat for some specific reason, and present an argument that is well-structured, convincing, and efficiently written to support your claims.   Do not try to take on too much in this assignment — focus on one small, specific issue related to this debate.

Remember that this is not about presenting your opinion, it is about presenting a compelling and efficient argument. You are not stating what you think or believe, but rather, you are trying to convince others that they should share your perspective. To do this well, keep the following in mind:

Make sure your point is clear early on, and make sure there is one primary argument (not several).  Your primary point should be obvious within the first paragraph.

Provide support for your claim.  Use logical arguments and reliable academic sources to persuade the reader of your position (see the section below about citations).

Stay on topic.  For example, if you were writing an argument about legalizing marijuana and your primary argument was that legalization would lead to economic benefits for all of society, then when you give specific examples in support of this, make sure each example is tied to that economic benefit argument (i.e.) don’t suddenly start talking about social justice issues, or addiction issues, etc.

Do not fall victim to argumentative fallacies.  What are they?  Here is a one website that will introduce argumentative fallacies to you , and  here is another .

Keep in mind that when TAs consider the strength of your argument, one of the things they will consider is how easy it is to come up with an effective counterargument.  If it’s easy, then your argument is not that strong.  So consider this as well … are there obvious counterarguments?  If so, be sure to address them in your work.

Although the work you submit in the “Create” phase is called a draft, your work should still reflect your best effort.  When you try hard to create a strong draft, the comments you get help you create an even better final version.  If you submit a poor first draft, you tend to get comments that say “this is awful”, which doesn’t really help you much.  To put this another way, the TAs grade your draft as though it were a final product. Two of the twelve marks for the peerScholar assignment are based on the quality of your initial composition.

Before you write your assignment you should go into peerScholar, and click on “Assignment” and then the “Rubric” button to review the rubric that the TAs will use to assess your work.   Sometimes students are disappointed with their peerScholar grade and often this disappointment is the result of them not paying close attention to what it is we are looking for.  To be as explicit and helpful as possible we are giving you the same grading rubric we give to our TAs when we meet with them to discuss grading of pS assignments.  When you are finished any given phase, check the rubric again to ensure you have done everything to the best of your ability.

Citations

Any claim you make that is not obviously true must be backed up by a citation, in APA style.  By that, we mean both an in-text citation and a reference list in APA style.

With respect to the citations you use, stick to primary sources.  Remember – your argument is only as strong as the information backing it up.  If you use scientific peer-reviewed journal articles, it’s likely that your information is legitimate.  If you’re citing something like a blog or a newspaper article, it weakens your claims.

This  is a good starting point if you have never searched for psychological journal articles before. If you need further assistance, please visit the  UTSC library !

Word Limit

Part of the task is to create an efficient argument.  Your argument should be between 300 and 500 words.  We won’t be checking specific numeric count within the peerScholar system, but if your work is noticeably outside these guidelines, you will lose marks. Your in-text citations and reference list do not count toward the word limit.