Ebony is trying to decide what she is going to do for her philosophy class project. according to the rational decision making model of bazerman and moore, her first step would be to:

Ebony needs to define the Problem that she intends to solve.

Explanation:

Defining the problem will give Ebony a direction that she needs to follow and how she will follow it.

I'd we can not define what we are dealing with that it is hard to move forward or even tackle it the right way.

We become stuck in one place instead of moving forward but after Ebony has defined her problem she will be able to proceed with her project and find ways to do it properly.