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Gaining enough focus to start thinking about originality Often the process of selecting a topic does not take place in writing, but instead in discussion. The example below shows how this process could go really well, crucially involving conferring with supervisors at key points. (Caveat: Depending on the length of your dissertation, you might need to narrow your topic down yet more. This is something to discuss with your supervisor.)

Interaction 1

Most commonly, a student will start with a general idea, like “I want to write about the semantics of proper names”. This is far too broad, so a supervisor might suggest that the student considers a range of possible issues and tries to settle on one of them to discuss, like the problem of empty names, substitution puzzle cases, and belief-reporting puzzles.

Interaction 2

The student may come back and say “OK, I really want to focus on the problem of empty names.” The supervisor might ask what way the student is inclined to argue, and the student might say that they really want to find a way to defend a direct reference view.

Interaction 3

Now the student knows they want to discuss the problem of empty names and defend a direct reference view. The dissertation will start to take shape fairly readily. They’ll need to describe the problem of empty names, with special focus on how it affects direct reference views. Then they’ll need to look at how existing direct reference views deal with the problem. BUT MORE IS NEEDED. There has to be something original—perhaps they will offer a new direct reference solution; perhaps they will show that an existing solution is better than people have thought—by, for example, showing that an objection taken to be decisive isn’t decisive after all. If the student is feeling that they won’t be able to come up with anything original, they may want to re-think the topic.