The following appeared in a health newsletter.
"A ten-year nationwide study of the effectiveness of wearing a helmet while bicycling indicates that ten years ago, approximately 35 percent of all bicyclists reported wearing helmets,
whereas today that number is nearly 80 percent.
Another study, however, suggests that during the same ten-year period, the number of bicycle-related accidents has increased 200 percent.
These results demonstrate that bicyclists feel safer because they are wearing helmets, and they take more risks as a result.
Thus, to reduce the number of serious injuries from bicycle accidents,
the government should concentrate more on educating people about bicycle safety and less on encouraging or requiring bicyclists to wear helmets."
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.
An article which appeared in a health newsletter stated that the government should focus more on educating people about bicycle safety than persuading them to wear helmets. The proposition is based on the fact that more accidents happen because people tend to take more risks while wearing helmets, the number accidents have increased irrespective of increase in the number of bicyclists and no injuries have happened due to natural or unpredictable circumstances. However, the above argument would be deemed viable if there is necessary evidence to support the below three assumptions.
Firstly, it is assumed that people take more risks while wearing helmets compared to while not wearing one. There is no strong evidence to validate the assumption. There maybe certain section of people who are adrenaline junkies, and tend to operate in a raffish manner. These people, have total disregard to life and would be ready to take risks irrespective of the presence of a helmet. One cannot generalize that every individual who wears a helmet is going to take an unnecessary risk. People from staid environments respect rules and tend to follow them with diligence. Thus, the above stated assumption may need more data to validate the argument.
Secondly, the article states that there has been an increase in the number of accidents over a 10 year period but totally discounts the fact that even the number bicyclists would have increased. The more the number of people riding bicycle, the higher the number of accidents. One cannot conclude that the increase in number of accidents is directly proportional to people taking more risks due to helmets. If there is necessary data that states that the number of bicyclists remained the same over the course of 10 years, then the attribute of higher accident rate can be related to helmets. Until then, it shall remain open ended.
Thirdly, the author assumes that all the accidents that have happened are due to people taking risks. This may not be completely true. People would be involved in accidents due to inadvertent situations such as being hit by a car driven by a drunk person, obstructed by animals, bicycle failure with respect to brakes, tires etc. These are a few to state. One cannot narrow down the cause for all the accidents to one particular reason unless necessary evidence or data is obtained. If the number of accidents due to people taking risks increases over the 10 year period, then one can validate the assumption and proceed further.
In conclusion, the author basis his recommendation on a number of above unwarranted assumptions which totally derail the argument. The author needs to provide necessary evidence and data to support his claim and assumptions so that it can be validated further. Until then, the argument shall remain flawed.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 23 15
No. of Words: 464 350
No. of Characters: 2307 1500
No. of Different Words: 206 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.641 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.972 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.601 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 179 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 118 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 80 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 53 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 20.174 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.827 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.609 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.31 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.512 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.076 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 203, Rule ID: WHO_NOUN[1]
Message: A noun should not follow "who". Try changing to a verb or maybe to 'who is a are'.
Suggestion: who is a are
.... There maybe certain section of people who are adrenaline junkies, and tend to operate...
^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 251, Rule ID: IN_A_X_MANNER[1]
Message: Consider replacing "in a raffish manner" with adverb for "raffish"; eg, "in a hasty manner" with "hastily".
...adrenaline junkies, and tend to operate in a raffish manner. These people, have total disregard to ...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, first, firstly, however, if, may, second, secondly, so, then, third, thirdly, thus, while, in conclusion, such as, with respect to
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 19.0 19.6327345309 97% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 16.0 12.9520958084 124% => OK
Conjunction : 10.0 11.1786427146 89% => OK
Relative clauses : 16.0 13.6137724551 118% => OK
Pronoun: 22.0 28.8173652695 76% => OK
Preposition: 64.0 55.5748502994 115% => OK
Nominalization: 17.0 16.3942115768 104% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2363.0 2260.96107784 105% => OK
No of words: 464.0 441.139720559 105% => OK
Chars per words: 5.09267241379 5.12650576532 99% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.64119157421 4.56307096286 102% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.67549096337 2.78398813304 96% => OK
Unique words: 213.0 204.123752495 104% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.459051724138 0.468620217663 98% => OK
syllable_count: 758.7 705.55239521 108% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 5.0 4.96107784431 101% => OK
Article: 12.0 8.76447105788 137% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 24.0 19.7664670659 121% => OK
Sentence length: 19.0 22.8473053892 83% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 60.0807182741 57.8364921388 104% => OK
Chars per sentence: 98.4583333333 119.503703932 82% => OK
Words per sentence: 19.3333333333 23.324526521 83% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.625 5.70786347227 99% => 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 : 14.0 6.88822355289 203% => Less negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 2.0 4.67664670659 43% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.138097309746 0.218282227539 63% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0400451397466 0.0743258471296 54% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0502223270052 0.0701772020484 72% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0804998942169 0.128457276422 63% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0443983171528 0.0628817314937 71% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.2 14.3799401198 85% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 52.19 48.3550499002 108% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.7 12.197005988 88% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.24 12.5979740519 97% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.05 8.32208582834 97% => OK
difficult_words: 102.0 98.500998004 104% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.6 11.1389221557 86% => OK
text_standard: 10.0 11.9071856287 84% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
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.