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 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 economy does."
Write a response in which you examine the stated/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 rebukes the claim made my medical experts who cite that too much time using computers has caused a decline in the physical fitness of the people of Corpora. The argument takes in account some interesting assumptions to provide strength to it’s claim. However these assumptions suffer from some serious fallacies which the argument doesn’t account for.
First of all the claim made by the medical experts itself looks skeptical. They conclude that since only one-quarter of Corpora’s citizens pass the current standards of physical fitness and twenty years ago, one-half of the Corpora’s citizens passed the standards in their time, hence the number of people who can be called physically fit have declined. In making this conclusion they have taken a extraneous assumption, and that is they have considered the total population for the last twenty years to be relatively the same. In their study, they have provided no information whatsoever regarding the change in this sample. If really the population has remained almost the same, then there conclusion does hold true. However, it is very much likely that the population wouldn’t have remained constant and, in fact, could have increased or decreased. If the population would have increased, then the one quarter of that population could very well be more than the one half of the population twenty years ago. This would mean that there are actually more people who are physically fit today than there were twenty years ago. Furthermore, the experts consider the standards as “then defined”. Again they assume that the fitness standards have remained the same, which again could be wrong. There could be a significant difference as to what fitness was defined twenty years ago and what it is defined now. Such fallacies result in the weakening of the argument made by the medical experts.
Building upon this implication, the argument tries to show a direct relationship between the fitness levels and computer ownership. The assumption here is that each and every person who buys a computer is actually using it for himself and it still doesn’t affect his physical fitness. However, how reliable is this assumption?It is possible that kids comprise of a large percentage of those regions and the computers were actually being used by them for playing games or doing some other stuff. There could also be some big IT companies in the area who would have brought the computer in large quantities for their workforce and hence contributed to the large computer ownership. Moreover, fitness levels depend on a variety of factors such as nourishment, genetics, general lifestyle etc. There are just too many variables to consider and the argument doesn’t pay heed to any of such factors.
Additionally, the argument is blaming the slow economy for the drop in fitness level. It assumes that due to the rising cost of fitness related products, people are actually unable to afford them and hence are losing there fitness. But there could be other reasons too for this fall in expenditure. It could be possible that instead of the economy, the people themselves are not motivated enough to buy such products and services, hence accounting for the fall in expenditure. Moreover, even without such products and services a person can easily maintain his/her fitness by simply practicing some simple exercises such as running, doing crouches etc. On similar grounds, it is not necessary that as the economy improves the fitness will improve. In fact, if people start enjoying more lavish lifestyles due to the booming economy, it could actually result in lower fitness levels due to their lifestyles.
The argument provides an interesting take regarding the causality between people’s fitness and computer ownership, economy etc. These arguments, however are not well supported and suffer from various blind spots. There are many angles and variables to consider which the argument doesn’t ponder on. The lack of credibility of the conclusion by medical experts, showing computers don’t affect fitness and lacking a solid explanation as to how economy and fitness are related all contribute to the weakening of the argument’s claims.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 29 15
No. of Words: 687 350
No. of Characters: 3440 1500
No. of Different Words: 290 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 5.12 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.007 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.549 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 254 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 205 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 133 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 78 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 23.69 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.617 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.724 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.283 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.469 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.114 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 55, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...ebukes the claim made my medical experts who cite that too much time using comput...
^^
Line 1, column 271, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: However,
...to provide strength to it's claim. However these assumptions suffer from some seri...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 407, Rule ID: EN_A_VS_AN
Message: Use 'an' instead of 'a' if the following word starts with a vowel sound, e.g. 'an article', 'an hour'
Suggestion: an
... making this conclusion they have taken a extraneous assumption, and that is they...
^
Line 5, column 559, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...elatively the same. In their study, they have provided no information whatsoever ...
^^
Line 5, column 887, Rule ID: IF_WOULD_HAVE_VBN[1]
Message: Did you mean 'had increased'?
Suggestion: had increased
...creased or decreased. If the population would have increased, then the one quarter of that populatio...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 332, Rule ID: SENTENCE_WHITESPACE
Message: Add a space between sentences
Suggestion: It
...owever, how reliable is this assumption?It is possible that kids comprise of a lar...
^^
Line 9, column 357, Rule ID: COMPRISE_OF[1]
Message: Did you mean 'comprise' or 'consist of'?
Suggestion: comprise; consist of
...his assumption?It is possible that kids comprise of a large percentage of those regions and...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 526, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...e other stuff. There could also be some big IT companies in the area who would h...
^^
Line 9, column 816, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...eneral lifestyle etc. There are just too many variables to consider and the argum...
^^
Line 13, column 128, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...t assumes that due to the rising cost of fitness related products, people are act...
^^
Line 17, column 354, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...lack of credibility of the conclusion by medical experts, showing computers don&a...
^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, first, furthermore, hence, however, if, look, moreover, really, regarding, so, still, then, well, as to, in fact, such as, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 30.0 19.6327345309 153% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 14.0 12.9520958084 108% => OK
Conjunction : 21.0 11.1786427146 188% => OK
Relative clauses : 20.0 13.6137724551 147% => OK
Pronoun: 50.0 28.8173652695 174% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 67.0 55.5748502994 121% => OK
Nominalization: 24.0 16.3942115768 146% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 3599.0 2260.96107784 159% => OK
No of words: 679.0 441.139720559 154% => Less content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.30044182622 5.12650576532 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 5.10466731938 4.56307096286 112% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.78245610672 2.78398813304 100% => OK
Unique words: 299.0 204.123752495 146% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.440353460972 0.468620217663 94% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 1116.9 705.55239521 158% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 10.0 4.96107784431 202% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 9.0 8.76447105788 103% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 32.0 19.7664670659 162% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 22.8473053892 92% => OK
Sentence length SD: 50.9420530941 57.8364921388 88% => OK
Chars per sentence: 112.46875 119.503703932 94% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.21875 23.324526521 91% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.875 5.70786347227 85% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 11.0 5.25449101796 209% => Less language errors wanted.
Sentences with positive sentiment : 16.0 8.20758483034 195% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 12.0 6.88822355289 174% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 4.0 4.67664670659 86% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.149000625152 0.218282227539 68% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0367936796867 0.0743258471296 50% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.065963981175 0.0701772020484 94% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0714776656228 0.128457276422 56% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0749094234896 0.0628817314937 119% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.1 14.3799401198 98% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 50.16 48.3550499002 104% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 12.197005988 94% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.46 12.5979740519 107% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.12 8.32208582834 98% => OK
difficult_words: 148.0 98.500998004 150% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 11.1389221557 93% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Write the essay in 30 minutes.
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.