The following appeared in a letter to the editor of the Balmer Island Gazette.
"On Balmer Island, where mopeds serve as a popular form of transportation, the
population increases to 100,000 during the summer months. To reduce the number
of accidents involving mopeds and pedestrians, the town council of Balmer Island
should limit the number of mopeds rented by the island's moped rental companies
from 50 per day to 25 per day during the summer season. By limiting the number of
rentals, the town council will attain the 50 percent annual reduction in moped
accidents that was achieved last year on the neighboring island of Seaville, when
Seaville's town council enforced similar limits on moped rentals."
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered
in order to decide whether the recommendation is likely to have the predicted
result. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to
evaluate the recommendation.
The letter says that by limiting the number of moped rentals, moped accidents would reduce to 50 percent that was achieved last year on the neighboring island of Seaville. The conclusion and the assumptions behind the conclusion seems cogent at first sight. However, if scrutinized deeply, the assumptions are found to be full of lacunas.
First of all, the assumption that if the town council of Balmer Island limits the number of mopeds, the number of accidents would reduce significantly is not completely favourable. If the number of mopeds is reduced, pedestrians and passengers riding in mopeds will increase. With extra load of passengers, the mopeds would be more prone to accident. So more investigation should be done to know the available transport options and pedestrian behaviour before reaching to any conclusion.
Secondly, the town council assumes that by limiting the number of rentals, accidents would reduce significantly. But it should not be forgotten that if moped rental is limited, there might be a increase of other transportation rentals. But there is no information presented on other transport vehicles, which are essential for drawing any conclusion.
Thirdly, there is no information about the population of Seaville. If population of Seaville is far less than Balmer Island, accidents are less likely to happen in Seaville. Also there is no comparison or data about geographical nature of the two islands. That Seaville achieved a 50 percent reduction in accidents last year is not enough to conclude that accident rate in Balmer Island would also decrease in the same rate this year. So other necessary comparisons of driving factors such as population, available transport options, number of accidents between two islands should also be presented.
In sum, the conclusion drawn in the letter is based on some seriously flawed assumptions. To validate this conclusion, further investigation is needed and more information about two neighboring island should be presented.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
argument 1 --not OK
argument 2 -- not OK
argument 3 -- OK
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 2.0 out of 6
Category: Poor Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 17 15
No. of Words: 315 350
No. of Characters: 1651 1500
No. of Different Words: 147 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.213 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.241 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.898 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 134 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 94 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 72 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 53 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 18.529 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 6.05 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.765 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.329 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.575 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.086 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 192, 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
...moped rental is limited, there might be a increase of other transportation rental...
^
Line 4, column 174, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Also,
... are less likely to happen in Seaville. Also there is no comparison or data about ge...
^^^^
Line 5, column 194, Rule ID: CD_NN[1]
Message: Possible agreement error. The noun 'island' seems to be countable, so consider using: 'islands'.
Suggestion: islands
... more information about two neighboring island should be presented.
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, however, if, second, secondly, so, third, thirdly, such as, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 21.0 19.6327345309 107% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 11.0 12.9520958084 85% => OK
Conjunction : 7.0 11.1786427146 63% => OK
Relative clauses : 8.0 13.6137724551 59% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 10.0 28.8173652695 35% => OK
Preposition: 44.0 55.5748502994 79% => OK
Nominalization: 11.0 16.3942115768 67% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1697.0 2260.96107784 75% => OK
No of words: 315.0 441.139720559 71% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.3873015873 5.12650576532 105% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.21286593061 4.56307096286 92% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.0034833225 2.78398813304 108% => OK
Unique words: 155.0 204.123752495 76% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.492063492063 0.468620217663 105% => OK
syllable_count: 522.0 705.55239521 74% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 1.0 4.96107784431 20% => OK
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 17.0 19.7664670659 86% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 22.8473053892 79% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 36.7838538372 57.8364921388 64% => OK
Chars per sentence: 99.8235294118 119.503703932 84% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.5294117647 23.324526521 79% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.29411764706 5.70786347227 93% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 4.0 8.20758483034 49% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 11.0 6.88822355289 160% => OK
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: 0.165638077287 0.218282227539 76% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0528554696844 0.0743258471296 71% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.053694278677 0.0701772020484 77% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0937615009728 0.128457276422 73% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0307698838441 0.0628817314937 49% => Paragraphs are similar to each other. Some content may get duplicated or it is not exactly right on the topic.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.2 14.3799401198 92% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 44.75 48.3550499002 93% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 12.197005988 94% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.98 12.5979740519 111% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.54 8.32208582834 103% => OK
difficult_words: 80.0 98.500998004 81% => More difficult words wanted.
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.2 11.1389221557 83% => OK
text_standard: 9.0 11.9071856287 76% => 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.