The following appeared in a letter to the editor of the Balmer Island Gazette.
"The population on Balmer Island increases to 100,000 during the summer months. To reduce the number of accidents involving mopeds and pedestrians, the town council of Balmer Island plans to limit the number of mopeds rented by each of the island's six moped rental companies from 50 per day to 30 per day during the summer season. Last year, the neighboring island of Torseau enforced similar limits on moped rentals and saw a 50 percent reduction in moped accidents. We predict that putting these limits into effect on Balmer Island will result in the same reduction in moped accidents."
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to decide whether the prediction and the argument on which it is based are reasonable. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the prediction.
In the letter to the editor of the Balmer Island Gazette it is stated that putting certain limits to mopeds rental will result in a reduction in moped accidents in the Balmer Island. The author has come to this conclusion based on a similar policy applied in Torseau Island have reduced these kind of accidents. However, in order to decide if the prediction is reasonable, three questions should be answered.
Firt of all, Why the knew limit of 30 mopeds to be rented is an accurate number. The author is relying in this "magic" number because he thinks that could work, but what if the real useful number is lower. For instance, 30 mopeds rented could be a large number if the Island's streets are narrow and the drivers do not have so much space to to travel. Moreover, perhaps the tourists who rent this mopeds are not responsable drivers. In this case, 30 mopeds would be as dangerous as 50. The author needs to explain why this number its accurate, because if a lower number was the "solution", the argument would be weakened.
Secondly, the next question Are the Balmer Island and the Torseus enough similar to establish an analogy. The author says that since this limitation worked in Torseus, it will also work in Balmer just because they are neighborhods. But this is not necessarily true. For instances, in Torseus the driving laws could be harder than those in Balmer. Or maybe, the rental companies in Torseus only rent mopeds to people who has passed a driving test. If this was the case, the analogy is weak, and also the prediction.
Thirdly, the last question is Will this limit attract the same amount of tourists? The author does not say anything about the impact of this policy. Perhaps, tourists feel attract to Balmer Island because the can rent many mopeds without several controls. With this policy, the amount of tourism could be reduced. Moreover, this tourist could change mopeds by cars, making the problem of accidents even worse. If this limitation reduce implied a change in the tourists preferences, the accident would occured, making the prediction not sound.
To conclude, the prediction, as it stands now, is considerably flawed due to its reliance in several unstated assumptions. If the author answered these three questions mentioned above and provided a research study, then his or her predition would be better evaluated.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.0 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: 402 350
No. of Characters: 1902 1500
No. of Different Words: 198 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.478 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.731 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.36 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 158 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 93 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 53 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 27 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 17.478 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 6.021 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.609 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.276 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.495 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.066 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 288, Rule ID: THIS_NNS[2]
Message: Did you mean 'this kind' or 'these kinds'?
Suggestion: this kind; these kinds
... applied in Torseau Island have reduced these kind of accidents. However, in order to deci...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 348, Rule ID: ENGLISH_WORD_REPEAT_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a word
Suggestion: to
...d the drivers do not have so much space to to travel. Moreover, perhaps the tourists ...
^^^^^
Line 3, column 402, Rule ID: THIS_NNS[1]
Message: Did you mean 'these'?
Suggestion: these
...Moreover, perhaps the tourists who rent this mopeds are not responsable drivers. In ...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, however, if, may, moreover, second, secondly, so, then, third, thirdly, for instance, kind of
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 23.0 19.6327345309 117% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 14.0 12.9520958084 108% => OK
Conjunction : 8.0 11.1786427146 72% => OK
Relative clauses : 5.0 13.6137724551 37% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 28.0 28.8173652695 97% => OK
Preposition: 43.0 55.5748502994 77% => OK
Nominalization: 13.0 16.3942115768 79% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1990.0 2260.96107784 88% => OK
No of words: 402.0 441.139720559 91% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 4.95024875622 5.12650576532 97% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.47771567384 4.56307096286 98% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.670446382 2.78398813304 96% => OK
Unique words: 206.0 204.123752495 101% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.512437810945 0.468620217663 109% => OK
syllable_count: 605.7 705.55239521 86% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 4.96107784431 40% => OK
Article: 13.0 8.76447105788 148% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 4.0 1.67365269461 239% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 6.0 4.22255489022 142% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 23.0 19.7664670659 116% => OK
Sentence length: 17.0 22.8473053892 74% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 35.6034131029 57.8364921388 62% => OK
Chars per sentence: 86.5217391304 119.503703932 72% => OK
Words per sentence: 17.4782608696 23.324526521 75% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.52173913043 5.70786347227 79% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 6.0 8.20758483034 73% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 9.0 6.88822355289 131% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 8.0 4.67664670659 171% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.167727124274 0.218282227539 77% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0519428396089 0.0743258471296 70% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0695695628624 0.0701772020484 99% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.104752266643 0.128457276422 82% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0809222618417 0.0628817314937 129% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 10.6 14.3799401198 74% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 62.68 48.3550499002 130% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 8.7 12.197005988 71% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.13 12.5979740519 88% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.13 8.32208582834 98% => OK
difficult_words: 93.0 98.500998004 94% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 10.5 12.3882235529 85% => OK
gunning_fog: 8.8 11.1389221557 79% => OK
text_standard: 9.0 11.9071856287 76% => 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.