Arctic deer live on islands in Canada's arctic regions. They search for food by moving over ice
from island to island during the course of the year. Their habitat is limited to areas warm
enough to sustain the plants on which they feed and cold enough, at least some of the year, for
the ice to cover the sea separating the islands, allowing the deer to travel over it. Unfortunately,
according to reports from local hunters, the deer populations are declining. Since these reports
coincide with recent global warming trends that have caused the sea ice to melt, we can
conclude that the purported decline in deer populations is the result of the deer's being unable
to follow their age-old migration patterns across the frozen sea.
The author concludes that the purported decline in deer population is the result of deer’s being unable to follow age-old migration patterns because the reports of declining of deer population coincide with the recent global warming trends that have caused the sea ice to melt. The author’s line of reasoning is that deer walk on frozen sea ice to migrate from one island to another in search of food and since the sea ice has melted, they cannot migrate from one island to another and thus, their population has declined. The author’s argument is unconvincing for various reasons.
First of all, the author concludes that the deer population is declining as a result of the deer’s being unable to follow age old migration patterns across the frozen ice based on the questionable assumption that the decline in deer population is not due to deer’s trying to cross the sea and drowning but is solely because of the deer’s being unable to follow migration patterns. It is entirely possible that the deer might be trying to cross the sea thinking that it is shallow and thus, as a result, drowning in it. This might be a more dominating reason for the decline in deer population. Thus, author’s generalization is unreliable.
Secondly, the author assumes that the island on which the deer are does not have enough plants to sustain the deer population for few more years. Suppose the island has enough plants to sustain the deer population. Then they might still be able to survive on their own island rather than dying of hunger. Thus, the decline in deer population might not be because of the deer’s not being able to follow age-old migration patterns across frozen ice.
Finally, the author uses Causal Flaw. It is a flaw where a correlation between 2 things is mistaken for a causal relationship between the two. The author assumes that because the decline of deer population coincides with the melting of sea ice because of recent global warming trends, the melting of sea ice has caused the deer to be unable to migrate and hence cause the decline in population. Hence, the argument is flawed.
In sum, the argument is not a strong argument. The author must provide support for the assumption that the island on which deer are living does not have enough food to sustain the population for few more years. Moreover, proper evidence has to be provided to support the assumption that the decline is solely due to deer’s being unable to follow age-old migration patterns across the sea and not because of the deer drowning in the sea in an attempt to cross it. Also, support has to be provided for the assumption that the coinciding of decline in deer population with melting of sea ice due to global warming implies a causal relationship between the two. Only with more convincing evidence will this argument become more than just a causal flaw.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 20 15
No. of Words: 492 350
No. of Characters: 2318 1500
No. of Different Words: 156 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.71 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.711 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.452 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 187 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 116 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 67 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 39 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 24.6 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 16.69 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.6 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.374 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.545 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.141 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 534, Rule ID: ENGLISH_WORD_REPEAT_BEGINNING_RULE
Message: Three successive sentences begin with the same word. Reword the sentence or use a thesaurus to find a synonym.
...nd thus, their population has declined. The author's argument is unconvincing ...
^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, finally, first, hence, moreover, second, secondly, so, still, then, thus, as to, as a result, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 28.0 19.6327345309 143% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 7.0 12.9520958084 54% => OK
Conjunction : 7.0 11.1786427146 63% => OK
Relative clauses : 15.0 13.6137724551 110% => OK
Pronoun: 23.0 28.8173652695 80% => OK
Preposition: 70.0 55.5748502994 126% => OK
Nominalization: 31.0 16.3942115768 189% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2413.0 2260.96107784 107% => OK
No of words: 492.0 441.139720559 112% => OK
Chars per words: 4.90447154472 5.12650576532 96% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.70967865282 4.56307096286 103% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.64380427997 2.78398813304 95% => OK
Unique words: 157.0 204.123752495 77% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.319105691057 0.468620217663 68% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 745.2 705.55239521 106% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 5.0 4.96107784431 101% => OK
Article: 12.0 8.76447105788 137% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 2.70958083832 37% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 1.0 4.22255489022 24% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 24.0 22.8473053892 105% => OK
Sentence length SD: 96.9094809603 57.8364921388 168% => OK
Chars per sentence: 120.65 119.503703932 101% => OK
Words per sentence: 24.6 23.324526521 105% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.85 5.70786347227 102% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 6.0 8.20758483034 73% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 7.0 4.67664670659 150% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.153214325945 0.218282227539 70% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0693313935595 0.0743258471296 93% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0864774128825 0.0701772020484 123% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.115264201991 0.128457276422 90% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0791233652076 0.0628817314937 126% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.9 14.3799401198 97% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 55.58 48.3550499002 115% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 12.197005988 94% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.44 12.5979740519 91% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.04 8.32208582834 85% => OK
difficult_words: 69.0 98.500998004 70% => More difficult words wanted.
linsear_write_formula: 19.0 12.3882235529 153% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.6 11.1389221557 104% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.9071856287 101% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 50.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.