Cot-Ten, a cotton production company, has recently faced profitability issues based on the use of
Chemical X in its manufacturing process. The main by-product produced when using Chemical X is
covered under stringent environmental regulations, making it very difficult and expensive to dispose of. A
similar processing product, Chemical Y, has recently been discovered, and can be used by Cot-Ten at a
minimal cost of switching. The CEO of Cot-Ten has declared that the company will increase profits by
switching to Chemical Y by the end of the month.
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and
explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
The argument claims that by switching from "Chemical X" to "Chemical Y" in its manufacturing process, Cot-Ten will be able to increase profits. Stated in this way the argument fails to mention several key factors, on the basis of which it could be evaluated. The conclusion of the argument relies on assumptions for which there is no clear evidence. There may be several other factors impacting the company's revenue or the cost of Chemical Y may be much higher than the cost incured by the company on COGS of Chemical Y in comparison to the cost price and disposal cost of X. Hence, without these evidence the argument is weak and unconvincing.
Firstly, the argument readily assumes that the disposal cost of Chemical X is the primary cause for decline in profitability of the company. This statement lacks evidence by which one can come to a conclusion that it is the primary cause in for declining profit and not increase in raw material cost or increase in production cost or may be decline in market share/sales of the company's product. There may be a case that the profitability of the company has gone down due to increase in Cost of Goods(Raw Materials) or increase in production cost due to sudden increase in electricity charges. In such a situation the disposal cost of the chemical X may not be the main culprit and switching from Chemical X to Chemical Y will not help in increasing profit. The argument could have been much clear if it explicitly stated that the cost of disposal of Chemical X is the primary cause of decline in profit, then we would have been able to reach to a conclusion.
Secondly, the argument claims that there is a minimal cost of switching from Chemical X to Chemical Y. This again lacks information regarding cost of the product, disposal cost of Chemical Y or cost on machinery required to substitute the Chemical X with Chemical Y. If the COGS of chemical Y is much higher than X or cost of machinery required for the switch and its cost of disposal is much higher than the saving the company will be able to attain with the switch then the company will instead loss more money thereby decreasing the profit. Also, the term "minimal" used by the author in the argument is in itself an ambigious one and without proper defination or a number associated with it, it would be hard to determine the impact(cost) of the switch. The author may mean few dollars to few thousand dollars by minimal, so it would be hard to evaluate the case without explicit defination or number( dollar value).
Thirdly, there may be some side effects or decline in product quality by switching from Chemical X to Chemical Y. If such is the case than the product quality will be at toss and the company will loss its customer and thereby its market share may decrease. This may then hit company's revenue and lead to a decline in its profitability. So, without proper information on effect of the switch on product quality the argument can not be evaluated properly to reach a conclusion.
In conclusion, the argument is flawed for the above mentioned reason and is therefore unconvincing. It could be considerably strengthened if author clearly mentioned all the relavant facts such as the primary cause of the decline in profitability, COGS of Chemical Y as compared to Chemical X and effect of the switch on product quality. Without these information the argument remains unsubstantiated and open to debate.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Sentence: Also, the term 'minimal' used by the author in the argument is in itself an ambigious one and without proper defination or a number associated with it, it would be hard to determine the impactcost of the switch.
Error: impactcost Suggestion: impacts
Error: defination Suggestion: definition
Error: ambigious Suggestion: ambiguous
Sentence: The author may mean few dollars to few thousand dollars by minimal, so it would be hard to evaluate the case without explicit defination or number dollar value.
Error: defination Suggestion: definition
Sentence: It could be considerably strengthened if author clearly mentioned all the relavant facts such as the primary cause of the decline in profitability, COGS of Chemical Y as compared to Chemical X and effect of the switch on product quality.
Error: relavant Suggestion: relevant
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argument 1 -- not OK. need to ask whether the cost of disposing the chemical is majorly relevant to the total cost.
argument 2 -- not OK. In GRE, we accept all data or evidence are true. we may argue like your argument 3:
need to check whether the new chemical would be able to produce the same quality of cotton since it is recently discovered. though the switching is cheap.
argument 3 -- OK but we need to argue against the conclusion always. For this topic it is:
The CEO of Cot-Ten has declared that the company will increase profits by switching to Chemical Y by the end of the month.
//we may argue like: other factors may affect the profits too, for example, since Chemical Y is new, it may need more test, or extra machines... or maybe Chemical Y has other by-products which are expensive too.
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 2.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 5 2
No. of Sentences: 19 15
No. of Words: 597 350
No. of Characters: 2785 1500
No. of Different Words: 198 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.943 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.665 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.717 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 206 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 170 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 111 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 53 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 31.421 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 18.791 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.737 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.375 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.562 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.15 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 5, column 799, Rule ID: TO_TOO[2]
Message: Did you mean 'too'?
Suggestion: too
...switch. The author may mean few dollars to few thousand dollars by minimal, so it ...
^^
Line 9, column 347, Rule ID: THIS_NNS[2]
Message: Did you mean 'this information' or 'these informations'?
Suggestion: this information; these informations
... the switch on product quality. Without these information the argument remains unsubstantiated an...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, first, firstly, hence, if, may, regarding, second, secondly, so, then, therefore, third, thirdly, in conclusion, such as
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 28.0 19.6327345309 143% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 23.0 12.9520958084 178% => OK
Conjunction : 21.0 11.1786427146 188% => OK
Relative clauses : 9.0 13.6137724551 66% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 26.0 28.8173652695 90% => OK
Preposition: 95.0 55.5748502994 171% => OK
Nominalization: 24.0 16.3942115768 146% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2867.0 2260.96107784 127% => OK
No of words: 596.0 441.139720559 135% => OK
Chars per words: 4.81040268456 5.12650576532 94% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.94096258147 4.56307096286 108% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.88512700192 2.78398813304 104% => OK
Unique words: 208.0 204.123752495 102% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.348993288591 0.468620217663 74% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 913.5 705.55239521 129% => 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: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 2.0 2.70958083832 74% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 8.0 4.22255489022 189% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 22.0 19.7664670659 111% => OK
Sentence length: 27.0 22.8473053892 118% => OK
Sentence length SD: 59.3283516186 57.8364921388 103% => OK
Chars per sentence: 130.318181818 119.503703932 109% => OK
Words per sentence: 27.0909090909 23.324526521 116% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.72727272727 5.70786347227 100% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 11.0 6.88822355289 160% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.67664670659 64% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.13075628882 0.218282227539 60% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0480215252798 0.0743258471296 65% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0366345112511 0.0701772020484 52% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.083907575858 0.128457276422 65% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0233196711411 0.0628817314937 37% => Paragraphs are similar to each other. Some content may get duplicated or it is not exactly right on the topic.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.8 14.3799401198 103% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 52.53 48.3550499002 109% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.6 12.197005988 103% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 10.91 12.5979740519 87% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.68 8.32208582834 92% => OK
difficult_words: 102.0 98.500998004 104% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.8 11.1389221557 115% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 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.