Research Project Reflection

I liked the research project because the project made me think about writing in a more argumentative way. The project allowed me to research different author’s perspective on humanity and what it means to be human. For my research project, I chose to argue that Data in Star Trek is not human, but instead just an android. At first, I wanted to argue that Data was human based off of certain sources that had philosophical ideas about what it means to be human. Pretty early on into my research though I found that arguing that Data is not human would make more sense and have more evidence to support it. The research I did to show that Data was human was not wasted though because I was able to use what I learned as a counterargument later in the paper. The project was difficult because it was hard to map out how I was going to set up the paper and what different sources I would use in what places in the essay. It was also difficult to figure out how I was going to argue that Data was not human, such as, what aspects of humanity I wanted to dissect and then use in my argument. To start my research, I brainstormed first and came up with a bunch of different sources that I could use and went over past materials that were looked at in class. After that, I started to make an outline and figured out what I saw as most important in supporting the argument and then what could be used as a counterargument to be refuted. Overall, this experience did inspire me to make some changes for future assignments, especially in future English courses.