The following appeared in a health magazine published in Corpora.
Medical experts say that only one-quarter of Corpora's citizens meet the current standards for adequate physical fitness, even though twenty years ago, one-half of all of Corpora's citizens met the standards as then defined. But these experts are mistaken when they suggest that spending too much time using computers has caused a decline in fitness. Since overall fitness levels are highest in regions of Corpora where levels of computer ownership are also highest, it is clear that using computers has not made citizens less physically fit. Instead, as shown by this year's unusually low expenditures on fitness-related products and services, the recent decline in the economy is most likely the cause, and fitness levels will improve when the economy does.
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
The argument states that Corpora’s citizens meeting adequate fitness standards have reduced from half population to one-quarter of it within the last twenty years. As medical experts attribute this decline to the rising use of computers, the argument claims that it is due to the decline in the economy while making some assumptions.
As the overall fitness levels are highest in regions of Corpora where computer ownership is also highest, the argument assumes that computer usage hasn’t affected the fitness standards of the people there at all. The fitness levels of these regions could be high because of the great encouragement of sports in this place resulting in many sport-training centres, availability of many parks and gyms for daily exercise. The fitness levels could also be maintained because of the crops prominently grown, and diet followed by people traditionally. Even though high computer usage might have a negative effect on the fitness of the people there, there could be many other factors as mentioned above that positively contributed to it. So, the assumption that computer usage had no negative impact on fitness standards doesn’t hold true in the above cases.
The other assumption made in the argument is that low expenditures on fitness-related products & services are because of the decline of the economy. The low expenditures on these products can be because of the declining enthusiasm for fitness and using this money to buy computers. It could also be because of increasing prices of primary needs like education, health or food items in the region resulting in the in-affordability of people on the fitness equipment. Also, the per cent of the decline in consumption of fitness products can be far high not in proportion of the decline in the economy. This assumption that the economy is the only factor that affected fitness-products consumption stays unwarranted in the above cases.
Even if we consider that expenditure on fitness-products reduced because of the economy, there is no proof that once the economy gets secure, the interest of people on fitness would spring up. They could be deviated by other activities in the meantime like singing, crafting, painting, etc. And they might spend their incomes on products related to those arts instead of fitness products even when the economy rises back.
Thus, when the above assumptions prove unwarranted, the resurging of the economy might not help in improving fitness levels of the people of Corpora. Hence the argument is weak and requires more information on the negative impact of computer usage and economy on fitness levels of the people.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 9 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 11 2
No. of Sentences: 16 15
No. of Words: 428 350
No. of Characters: 2174 1500
No. of Different Words: 194 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.548 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.079 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.825 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 162 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 133 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 79 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 47 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 26.75 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 5.528 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.562 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.424 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.424 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.173 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 1 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 5, column 150, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Hence,
...itness levels of the people of Corpora. Hence the argument is weak and requires more ...
^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, hence, if, so, thus, while
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 15.0 19.6327345309 76% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 11.0 12.9520958084 85% => OK
Conjunction : 7.0 11.1786427146 63% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 25.0 28.8173652695 87% => OK
Preposition: 70.0 55.5748502994 126% => OK
Nominalization: 16.0 16.3942115768 98% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2222.0 2260.96107784 98% => OK
No of words: 426.0 441.139720559 97% => OK
Chars per words: 5.21596244131 5.12650576532 102% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.54310108192 4.56307096286 100% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.88596055506 2.78398813304 104% => OK
Unique words: 197.0 204.123752495 97% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.462441314554 0.468620217663 99% => OK
syllable_count: 711.0 705.55239521 101% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 3.0 4.96107784431 60% => OK
Article: 11.0 8.76447105788 126% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 0.0 4.22255489022 0% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 17.0 19.7664670659 86% => OK
Sentence length: 25.0 22.8473053892 109% => OK
Sentence length SD: 31.6969866381 57.8364921388 55% => The essay contains lots of sentences with the similar length. More sentence varieties wanted.
Chars per sentence: 130.705882353 119.503703932 109% => OK
Words per sentence: 25.0588235294 23.324526521 107% => OK
Discourse Markers: 2.17647058824 5.70786347227 38% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 11.0 8.20758483034 134% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 0.0 4.67664670659 0% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.171331207822 0.218282227539 78% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.060872280971 0.0743258471296 82% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0755103130593 0.0701772020484 108% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.108334451984 0.128457276422 84% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0768153347342 0.0628817314937 122% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.7 14.3799401198 109% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 37.64 48.3550499002 78% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 14.2 12.197005988 116% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.29 12.5979740519 105% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.36 8.32208582834 100% => OK
difficult_words: 94.0 98.500998004 95% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.0 11.1389221557 108% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => 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.