The following appeared in a letter from a firm providing investment advice for a client.
"Most homes in the northeastern United States, where winters are typically cold, have traditionally used oil as their major fuel for heating. Last heating season that region experienced 90 days with below-normal temperatures, and climate forecasters predict that this weather pattern will continue for several more years. Furthermore, many new homes are being built in the region in response to recent population growth. Because of these trends, we predict an increased demand for heating oil and recommend investment in Consolidated Industries, one of whose major business operations is the retail sale of home heating oil."
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.
It is predicted that as the decrease of temperature, the need of home heating oil will increase. Regarding this issue, the author argues that people need to invest in Consolidated Industries to keep up with this need. They present evidence to validate their view by including the areas affected by these decrease of temperature. Though the underlying issue may have merit, due to vague terminology that the author uses and the lack of relevant evidence, the author’s argument is unsubstantial and deeply flawed.
Firstly, the author supports their argument using terminology to show the need of home heating oil; however, the terminology that they use are vague. For example, the author states that, “many homes in the northeastern United States, where winters are typically cold, have traditionally used oil as their major fuel for heating”. The use of “many” and “typically” weakens the author’s argument instead of strengthen it because although “many” homes use oil, there are other uses for heating. Also the use of “typically” shows that it is not cold and the use of heating is not needed. Throughout the author’s argument, they use these types of terminology to assume that the use of oil is needed for heating.
Secondly, the author lacks relevant evidence for their argument. Although they provide sound arguments, the argument is lacking more evidence to strengthen the author’s point. For example, if the author provided a study that gave more statistical data about the use of oil being used for heating. If the author provided more evidence that showed how the need of oil is needed, it would make their argument more substantial.
Although the author has a good argument, as it stands now, their argument is unsubstantial and flawed. The author uses vague terminology and lacks relevant evidence that hinders their argument.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: ??? out of 6
Category: Poor Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 15 15
No. of Words: 300 350
No. of Characters: 1493 1500
No. of Different Words: 127 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.162 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.977 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.583 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 105 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 80 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 61 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 26 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 20 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 5.292 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.533 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.441 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.621 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.183 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 4 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 538, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Also,
... oil, there are other uses for heating. Also the use of 'typically' shows ...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, first, firstly, however, if, may, regarding, second, secondly, so, then, for example
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 12.0 19.6327345309 61% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 8.0 12.9520958084 62% => OK
Conjunction : 6.0 11.1786427146 54% => More conjunction wanted.
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 30.0 28.8173652695 104% => OK
Preposition: 29.0 55.5748502994 52% => More preposition wanted.
Nominalization: 16.0 16.3942115768 98% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1621.0 2260.96107784 72% => OK
No of words: 300.0 441.139720559 68% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.40333333333 5.12650576532 105% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.16179145029 4.56307096286 91% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.23668383106 2.78398813304 116% => OK
Unique words: 138.0 204.123752495 68% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.46 0.468620217663 98% => OK
syllable_count: 508.5 705.55239521 72% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 5.0 4.96107784431 101% => OK
Article: 10.0 8.76447105788 114% => OK
Subordination: 6.0 2.70958083832 221% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 15.0 19.7664670659 76% => Need more sentences. Double check the format of sentences, make sure there is a space between two sentences, or have enough periods. And also check the lengths of sentences, maybe they are too long.
Sentence length: 20.0 22.8473053892 88% => OK
Sentence length SD: 37.246685162 57.8364921388 64% => OK
Chars per sentence: 108.066666667 119.503703932 90% => OK
Words per sentence: 20.0 23.324526521 86% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.0 5.70786347227 105% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 5.15768463074 78% => More paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 3.0 8.20758483034 37% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 10.0 6.88822355289 145% => 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: 0.242244500097 0.218282227539 111% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.108413321388 0.0743258471296 146% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.110713805167 0.0701772020484 158% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.135527076692 0.128457276422 106% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0818166487187 0.0628817314937 130% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.0 14.3799401198 97% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 42.72 48.3550499002 88% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.3 12.197005988 101% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.04 12.5979740519 111% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.15 8.32208582834 98% => OK
difficult_words: 67.0 98.500998004 68% => More difficult words wanted.
linsear_write_formula: 11.5 12.3882235529 93% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.0 11.1389221557 90% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => 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.