The following appeared in a memo to the board of the Grandview Symphony.
"The city of Grandview has provided annual funding for the Grandview Symphony since the symphony's inception ten years ago. Last year the symphony hired an internationally known conductor, who has been able to attract high-profile guest musicians to perform with the symphony. Since then, private contributions to the symphony have doubled and attendance at the symphony's concerts-in-the-park series has reached new highs. Now that the Grandview Symphony is an established success, it can raise ticket prices. Increased revenue from larger audiences and higher ticket prices will enable the symphony to succeed without funding from the city government."
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
The argument states that after the Grandview Symphony hired a well known conductor last year, the private contributions have doubled and attendance has reached new heights. Using these reasons the argument infers that the symphony can raise the ticket prices such that it will enable the symphony to succeed without funding from the state government. Stated this way, the argument reveals several instances of poor reasoning and careful scrutiny of the reasons reveal that they provide little credible support for the conclusion. Hence the argument can be considered incomplete or unsubstantiated.
First of all, the argument readily assumes that the Grandview Symphony's success in last year will continue in coming years and that private contributions will keep on pouring. This is merely a assumption made without much solid ground. For example, it is possible that the conductor may not be able to attract high-profile musicians in the coming years, or that the people will get tired of the same high-profile musicians each year. Given the above scenario, the symphony would not be able to succeed with increased ticket prices. Hence the argument would have been much more convincing if the argument could provide future plans instead of relying on the last years success.
Furthermore, the argument states that the private contributions have doubled since last year. However, the argument fails to mention the share of private contribution in the total budget of the Grandview Symphony. Perhaps, the private contributions last year accounted for 10% of total budget. After doubling this year they may in fact contribute 20% to the total budget but that still leaves the reader wondering if raised ticket prices would account for the remaining 80% (given that no funding from government is received). This again is a weak and unsupported reason. If the argument had provided numerical evidence to support this reason then the conclusion could have been a lot more convincing.
Finally, the argument claims that the attendance of the symphony reached an all time high. However, this claim provide little credible support for the conclusion in several critical respects, and raises several skeptical questions. What was the attendance before last year? By how much did the attendance increase last year? Will the attendance increase next year? Is the attendance enough to contribute enough to the total budget of the symphony? Without convincing answers to these questions, the reader is left with the impression that the claims in the argument are more of a wishful thinking than substantive evidence.
In conclusion, the argument's conclusion is unpersuasive as it stands. To bolster it further, the argument must provide concrete evidence, perhaps by way of a detailed analysis of the source of incomes, the shares contributed by those sources and expenditures of the Grandview Symphony. If the suggestion provided by the argument is implemented with the given reasons, it would probably lead to the downfall of the Symphony.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 9 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 4 2
No. of Sentences: 25 15
No. of Words: 480 350
No. of Characters: 2499 1500
No. of Different Words: 217 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.681 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.206 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.7 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 197 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 158 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 104 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 58 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 19.2 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.381 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.52 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.332 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.509 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.118 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 531, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Hence,
...le credible support for the conclusion. Hence the argument can be considered incomple...
^^^^^
Line 2, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...sidered incomplete or unsubstantiated. First of all, the argument readily assum...
^^^
Line 2, column 194, 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
...ns will keep on pouring. This is merely a assumption made without much solid grou...
^
Line 2, column 535, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Hence,
...o succeed with increased ticket prices. Hence the argument would have been much more ...
^^^^^
Line 2, column 665, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[2]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'years'' or 'year's'?
Suggestion: years'; year's
...re plans instead of relying on the last years success. Furthermore, the argument ...
^^^^^
Line 3, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
... of relying on the last years success. Furthermore, the argument states that th...
^^^
Line 3, column 573, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “If” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
...again is a weak and unsupported reason. If the argument had provided numerical evi...
^^
Line 4, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...could have been a lot more convincing. Finally, the argument claims that the at...
^^^
Line 4, column 501, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...nvincing answers to these questions, the reader is left with the impression that ...
^^
Line 5, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...l thinking than substantive evidence. In conclusion, the arguments conclusion ...
^^^
Line 5, column 23, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'arguments'' or 'argument's'?
Suggestion: arguments'; argument's
...ntive evidence. In conclusion, the arguments conclusion is unpersuasive as it stands...
^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, finally, first, furthermore, hence, however, if, may, so, still, then, well, for example, in conclusion, in fact, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 15.0 19.6327345309 76% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 16.0 12.9520958084 124% => OK
Conjunction : 9.0 11.1786427146 81% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 29.0 28.8173652695 101% => OK
Preposition: 54.0 55.5748502994 97% => OK
Nominalization: 29.0 16.3942115768 177% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2553.0 2260.96107784 113% => OK
No of words: 480.0 441.139720559 109% => OK
Chars per words: 5.31875 5.12650576532 104% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.68069463864 4.56307096286 103% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.76149035723 2.78398813304 99% => OK
Unique words: 224.0 204.123752495 110% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.466666666667 0.468620217663 100% => OK
syllable_count: 772.2 705.55239521 109% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 5.0 4.96107784431 101% => OK
Article: 13.0 8.76447105788 148% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 25.0 19.7664670659 126% => OK
Sentence length: 19.0 22.8473053892 83% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 57.1912440851 57.8364921388 99% => OK
Chars per sentence: 102.12 119.503703932 85% => OK
Words per sentence: 19.2 23.324526521 82% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.24 5.70786347227 92% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 11.0 5.25449101796 209% => Less language errors wanted.
Sentences with positive sentiment : 9.0 8.20758483034 110% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 12.0 6.88822355289 174% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 4.0 4.67664670659 86% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.246657212607 0.218282227539 113% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0756930819535 0.0743258471296 102% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0687964302995 0.0701772020484 98% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.147889953981 0.128457276422 115% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0579797779489 0.0628817314937 92% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.2 14.3799401198 92% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 52.19 48.3550499002 108% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.7 12.197005988 88% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.58 12.5979740519 108% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.3 8.32208582834 100% => OK
difficult_words: 113.0 98.500998004 115% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 10.5 12.3882235529 85% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.6 11.1389221557 86% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
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.