The following appeared in a letter from the owner of the Sunnyside Towers apartment complex to its manager.
"One month ago, all the showerheads in the first three buildings of the Sunnyside Towers complex were modified to restrict maximum water flow to one-third of what it used to be. Although actual readings of water usage before and after the adjustment are not yet available, the change will obviously result in a considerable savings for Sunnyside Corporation, since the corporation must pay for water each month. Except for a few complaints about low water pressure, no problems with showers have been reported since the adjustment. I predict that modifying showerheads to restrict water flow throughout all twelve buildings in the Sunnyside Towers complex will increase our profits even more dramatically."
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 this argument, the author concludes that restricting water flow of waterheads in the twelve buildings in the Sunnyside Towers can increase profit dramatically. To bolster this argument, the author points out the modification to restrict the maximum water flow in the first three buildings bring out savings for Sunnyside Corporation. However, unless several questions being answered, this argument is not convincing enough.
First, the author uses the modification of showerheads in the first three buildings as evidence of the positive prospect of modification of showerheads in the all twelve buildings. But the analogy between the first three buildings and all the twelve buildings might be unsubstantiated. Are the first three buildings and the twelve buildings are similar enough to be comparable? Perhaps the employees in the first three buildings are more aware of water-saving and thus the water usage is lower than before. Moreover, it is likely that the worker in the first three buildings used to use a large quantity of water which is much larger than the restriction volume, and the workers working in the other nine buildings used to use a small quantity of water and the new modification has no effect on them. Therefore, there may be considerable savings of the first three buildings, but at the same time no considerable savings of the other nine buildings.
Second, the statement that there are few complaints about the low water pressure and there are no problems with showers being reported is unjustifiable. To begin with, the author only implies that there are few complaints about low pressure, but what about the base number? If only 10 employees have used the shower, but 6 of them have complained of water pressure, the percentage is 60%, which is relatively high. Thus, without detailed information of the base number of the total number of those who have used the showerheads, the implication is unwarranted. In addition, no problems being reported does not mean no problems at all. Have all the employees who have problems with the showerhead reported those problems? Maybe many employees do not have time to report the problems of the showerheads, and many of them are worried about offending their boss. In a conclusion, substantial surveys are needed to strengthen the statement that there are few problems of the showerheads.
Third, the author fails to provide any evidence to support the prediction that modifying showerheads to restrict water flow throughout all twelve buildings in the Sunnyside Towers complex will increase the company’s profits even more dramatically. Profitability is both restricted by revenue and expense. Without weighing revenue against expense, it is weak to indicate that the profit will increase. Does the revenue increase along with the shrinkage of expenses? The company may be influence by the worldwide economic downturn and suffers the difficulty of finance, and the total revenue has slumped greatly. Therefore, although the expenses decrease thanks to the restriction of the water flow, the profit may drop. To back the prediction, the author should also provide information about the revenue of the company as well.
In a nutshell, the argument is unconvincing as additional questions should be answered. To validate the argument, we would need to demonstrate the similarity between the first three building and the other nine buildings, the problems of the restriction, and whether the profit can increase or not.
Comments
Essay evaluation 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: 26 15
No. of Words: 558 350
No. of Characters: 2871 1500
No. of Different Words: 221 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.86 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.145 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.812 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 208 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 171 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 131 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 83 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 21.462 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.431 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.692 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.305 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.534 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.177 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, however, if, may, moreover, second, so, then, therefore, third, thus, well, in addition, to begin with
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 28.0 19.6327345309 143% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 12.0 12.9520958084 93% => OK
Conjunction : 17.0 11.1786427146 152% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 19.0 28.8173652695 66% => OK
Preposition: 75.0 55.5748502994 135% => OK
Nominalization: 25.0 16.3942115768 152% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2951.0 2260.96107784 131% => OK
No of words: 558.0 441.139720559 126% => OK
Chars per words: 5.28853046595 5.12650576532 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.86024933743 4.56307096286 107% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.93305015941 2.78398813304 105% => OK
Unique words: 233.0 204.123752495 114% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.417562724014 0.468620217663 89% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 895.5 705.55239521 127% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 4.0 4.96107784431 81% => OK
Article: 13.0 8.76447105788 148% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 8.0 1.67365269461 478% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 10.0 4.22255489022 237% => Less preposition wanted as sentence beginnings.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 26.0 19.7664670659 132% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 22.8473053892 92% => OK
Sentence length SD: 54.6151273017 57.8364921388 94% => OK
Chars per sentence: 113.5 119.503703932 95% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.4615384615 23.324526521 92% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.61538461538 5.70786347227 81% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 10.0 8.20758483034 122% => 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: 0.222271341994 0.218282227539 102% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0630591172221 0.0743258471296 85% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0761873216371 0.0701772020484 109% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.122716251249 0.128457276422 96% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0728582108297 0.0628817314937 116% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.2 14.3799401198 99% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 50.16 48.3550499002 104% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 12.197005988 94% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.4 12.5979740519 106% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.13 8.32208582834 98% => OK
difficult_words: 122.0 98.500998004 124% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 11.1389221557 93% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => 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.