The following appeared in a business magazine.
"As a result of numerous complaints of dizziness and nausea on the part of consumers of Promofoods tuna, the company requested that eight million cans of its tuna be returned for testing. Promofoods concluded that the canned tuna did not, after all, pose a health risk. This conclusion is based on tests performed on samples of the recalled cans by chemists from Promofoods; the chemists found that of the eight food chemicals most commonly blamed for causing symptoms of dizziness and nausea, five were not found in any of the tested cans. The chemists did find small amounts of the three remaining suspected chemicals but pointed out that these occur naturally in all canned foods."
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be addressed in order to decide whether the conclusion and the argument on which it is based are reasonable. Be sure to explain how the answers to the questions would help to evaluate the conclusion.
The argument concludes that Promofoods tuna cans are not responsible for causing nausea and dizziness among its consumer. To bolster his claim the author furnishes the testing results of the returned cans. Promofoods’ chemist confirms that out of eight well-known chemicals responsible for causing nausea and dizziness, five were absent in their tested samples. As for the other three chemicals, a minimal quantity is present which is normal for any canned food. The author’s claim lacks credibility and stands on several undependable assumptions; therefore, the argument is too weak and skeptical.
First, the argument readily accepts that Promofoods’ chemist results are not dubious and artless; however, no evidence of his naiveness or honesty has been provided. The argument stated in this way can not be trusted and relied upon. The chemist might be trying to save his companies reputation and profit by refuting all the claims. Promofoods might have pressurised the chemist to make up or set up a report that does not hamper the sale of their tuna products. The company might have offered a good incentive and benefits to the chemist for his report. Until the report is cross-checked and verified by the authenticated food department of the city, the accusations should not be dropped. The author needs to assure that the report is free from any malicious intension of the company.
Moreover, the argument fails to provide any statistical data and percentage as to the number of returned cans tested. The argument does not furnish evidence about the number of cans that went under the testing process. To illustrate, if ten cans were tested out of eight million cans. The results of such testing can not be taken as a measure and assurance for the entire batch of cans. The results of such a small sample is distorted and any decision made on these results are undependable. The author requires to present the numerical data regarding the samples tested, so that a proper analysis can be done.
In addition to this, the chemist focuses only on the eight most commonly known chemicals and it has been readily assumed that no unique chemical present will have any deleterious effect on the human body. If it is found in further research that due to an unknown chemical in the cans the entire testing phase of cans can be called under question. The continued sale of the products on this claim can lead to further worsening of the case. The author needs to present assured evidence on solid grounds to let Promofoods drop the complaints.
To sum up, Promofoods, claim that it is safe for consumption can not be taken for granted. The author might have considered the merits well but the argument presented in this way fails to support his claims. The author needs to provide concrete evidences the chemist is not dubious and there is no unique element present in the cans. Further, he also has to provide us with numerical figures regarding the samples tested. Without the answer to these questions, one can not assume that Promofoods is guilty free.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: ??? out of 6
Category: Poor Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 27 15
No. of Words: 513 350
No. of Characters: 2492 1500
No. of Different Words: 228 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.759 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.858 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.539 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 191 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 147 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 85 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 52 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 19 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 4.706 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.407 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.287 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.287 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.077 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 1 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 493, 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.
...made on these results are undependable. The author requires to present the numerica...
^^^
Line 3, column 513, Rule ID: ALLOW_TO[1]
Message: Did you mean 'presenting'? Or maybe you should add a pronoun? In active voice, 'require' + 'to' takes an object, usually a pronoun.
Suggestion: presenting
...s are undependable. The author requires to present the numerical data regarding the sample...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 4, column 206, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “If” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
...y deleterious effect on the human body. If it is found in further research that du...
^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, however, if, moreover, regarding, so, then, therefore, well, as for, as to, in addition, to sum up
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 25.0 19.6327345309 127% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 13.0 12.9520958084 100% => OK
Conjunction : 17.0 11.1786427146 152% => OK
Relative clauses : 12.0 13.6137724551 88% => OK
Pronoun: 30.0 28.8173652695 104% => OK
Preposition: 62.0 55.5748502994 112% => OK
Nominalization: 17.0 16.3942115768 104% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2551.0 2260.96107784 113% => OK
No of words: 513.0 441.139720559 116% => OK
Chars per words: 4.97270955166 5.12650576532 97% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.75914943092 4.56307096286 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.64650880044 2.78398813304 95% => OK
Unique words: 239.0 204.123752495 117% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.465886939571 0.468620217663 99% => OK
syllable_count: 785.7 705.55239521 111% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 1.0 4.96107784431 20% => OK
Article: 20.0 8.76447105788 228% => Less articles wanted as sentence beginning.
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 6.0 4.22255489022 142% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 27.0 19.7664670659 137% => OK
Sentence length: 19.0 22.8473053892 83% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 30.303449305 57.8364921388 52% => The essay contains lots of sentences with the similar length. More sentence varieties wanted.
Chars per sentence: 94.4814814815 119.503703932 79% => OK
Words per sentence: 19.0 23.324526521 81% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.2962962963 5.70786347227 75% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 13.0 6.88822355289 189% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 6.0 4.67664670659 128% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.266954623424 0.218282227539 122% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0753087414612 0.0743258471296 101% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0682484662764 0.0701772020484 97% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.155056899951 0.128457276422 121% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.064544304025 0.0628817314937 103% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 11.5 14.3799401198 80% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 60.65 48.3550499002 125% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 9.5 12.197005988 78% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.55 12.5979740519 92% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.43 8.32208582834 101% => OK
difficult_words: 125.0 98.500998004 127% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 8.0 12.3882235529 65% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.6 11.1389221557 86% => 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.