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 prompt claims that by reducing the moped rentals by 50 per cent in Balmer Island (BI) will reduce the accidents involving mopeds and pedestrians. It used the evidence of results achieved by implementing similar steps in Seaville (S). However, the argument does not make a cogent case since it is rife with holes and fissures. Before the argument is properly evaluated, following questions must be answered.
First, do S and BI comparable? In other words, is it possible or reasonable to assume that S and BI have similar geography, road conditions and same size of population? It may be not. It may happen that population density in S is so large that they live nearby to main roads and highways where as in BI it is very less. Therefore, the accidents in S may be in large numbers since there may be less space available for pedestrians to walk but due to sufficient space in BI, accidents involving pedestrians may not be significant. Further, it may also happen that BI is tourist location and it is preferred during summer months but S is a commercial district which is crowded throughout the year. Therefore, the accidents in S may be larger in a whole year but it may not be so in BI. Therefore, the results achieved in S may not be recrudesce in BI. If both the hypothesis were true, then the argument is significantly weakened.
Second, does moped rental is solely responsible for accidents? It may not true. For instance, it may happen that no. of accidents involving pedestrians and cars are larger than that of mopeds since people who come to this location during summers may be tourists and may like to hire a car instead of mopeds. Further, do the increased population during summer months hire mopeds and these mopeds are responsible for accidents? It may be specious since it may happen that the tourist population follow traffic rules strictly who hires mopeds but the regular citizen of this island are flouting rules and therefore may be responsible for accidents. Therefore, reducing the rentals may be futile. If both the examples were true, then the argument does not hold the water.
Third, will reduction in rental reduce accidents? Only time will tell but nothing certain as of now. Since, it may happen that mopeds are not responsible for accidents because people have already reduced using mopeds but to compensate that they have started using motor cars and for their this new venture, accidents are on rise since their car driving skill may not be tested. Will 50 per cent reduction reduce accident by 50 per cent? It may not be realised. Since it may happen that it is not a problem of using a particular vehicle but with the driving skills of a driver. For instance, people using mopeds does not abide by rules and have no verified safe driving skills, therefore they are responsible for accidents. By reducing the rentals, they may be forced to start using the alternative and accidents would keep on increasing. Therefore, unless the claim is fully verified, it cannot be used to support its desired results.
In conclusion, the argument as it stands now, is flawed due to its reliance on several unwarranted assumptions. If the council is able to offer more evidence, perhaps in the form of research study covering number of accidents involving only mopeds, number of people using mopeds and frequency of other vehicles responsible for accidents, then it will be possible to fully evaluate the viability of the argument.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 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: 593 350
No. of Characters: 2797 1500
No. of Different Words: 235 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.935 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.717 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.612 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 206 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 147 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 109 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 69 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 20.448 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 12.274 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.897 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.319 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.48 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.1 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 289, Rule ID: WHERE_AS[1]
Message: Did you mean 'whereas'?
Suggestion: whereas
... live nearby to main roads and highways where as in BI it is very less. Therefore, the a...
^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, however, if, may, second, so, then, therefore, third, for instance, in conclusion, in other words
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 40.0 19.6327345309 204% => Less to be verbs wanted.
Auxiliary verbs: 30.0 12.9520958084 232% => Less auxiliary verb wanted.
Conjunction : 23.0 11.1786427146 206% => Less conjunction wanted
Relative clauses : 15.0 13.6137724551 110% => OK
Pronoun: 43.0 28.8173652695 149% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 65.0 55.5748502994 117% => OK
Nominalization: 19.0 16.3942115768 116% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2875.0 2260.96107784 127% => OK
No of words: 593.0 441.139720559 134% => OK
Chars per words: 4.84822934233 5.12650576532 95% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.93473315629 4.56307096286 108% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.7110200823 2.78398813304 97% => OK
Unique words: 249.0 204.123752495 122% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.419898819562 0.468620217663 90% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 907.2 705.55239521 129% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 11.0 4.96107784431 222% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 6.0 8.76447105788 68% => OK
Subordination: 6.0 2.70958083832 221% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 6.0 4.22255489022 142% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 32.0 19.7664670659 162% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 22.8473053892 79% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 70.4403282485 57.8364921388 122% => OK
Chars per sentence: 89.84375 119.503703932 75% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.53125 23.324526521 79% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.59375 5.70786347227 63% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 7.0 8.20758483034 85% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 15.0 6.88822355289 218% => Less negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 10.0 4.67664670659 214% => Less facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.138278448026 0.218282227539 63% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.03944199258 0.0743258471296 53% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0536161040032 0.0701772020484 76% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0947532293366 0.128457276422 74% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0388095779639 0.0628817314937 62% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 10.7 14.3799401198 74% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 61.67 48.3550499002 128% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 9.1 12.197005988 75% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 10.85 12.5979740519 86% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.59 8.32208582834 91% => OK
difficult_words: 115.0 98.500998004 117% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 7.0 12.3882235529 57% => Linsear_write_formula is low.
gunning_fog: 9.2 11.1389221557 83% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => 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.