The following appeared in a memo from the director of a large group of hospitals.
"In a laboratory study of liquid antibacterial hand soaps, a concentrated solution of UltraClean produced a 40 percent greater reduction in the bacteria population than did the liquid hand soaps currently used in our hospitals. During a subsequent test of UltraClean at our hospital in Workby, that hospital reported significantly fewer cases of patient infection than did any of the other hospitals in our group. Therefore, to prevent serious patient infections, we should supply UltraClean at all hand-washing stations throughout our hospital system."
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.
The director of a large group of hospitals has written in a memo that a concentrated solution of UltraClean can reduce the bacteria than the liquid hand soaps which is currently used in their hospitals. He has concluded that they should supply UltraClean in all their hospital system. However, the argument of the author relies on three unwarranted assumptions that, if not substantiated, dramatically reduced the persuasiveness of his argument.
To begin with, in the laboratory test, the Ultraclean is only compared with the liquid hand soaps that are currently used in the author’s hospitals, and based on that result, he reached the conclusion that the hand soaps should be supplanted by their tested concentrated solution. But, though the current soaps are unable to compete with the concentrated solution by 40%, no other soaps that are out of their hospitals, have been tested to verify the effectiveness of the solutions. It may be possible that the other soaps can reduce the bacteria more than the UltraClean. Without comparing other soaps rather than currently used soap, the author’s argument does not hold water.
Secondly, in the subsequent test, the author has assumed that the patients in their workby hospital are less infected because of the use of UltaClean. However, it may be not the case--- maybe the other hospitals in the group have patients who are already infected by other germs, or maybe they have not washed their hands with the hospital’s liquid hand soaps, rather than their personal soaps. Without proper investigation being done on the patients, the author’s argument is currently rife with holes and assumptions. They should provide the evidence that the other hospital’s patients properly use soaps to justify their subsequent test is accurate.
Thirdly, the author has assumed that the replacement of liquid soap with UltraClean can prevent infections in the patients. But, maybe the soap is not the problem: maybe the patients are reluctant to practice any soap or solutions; maybe they are not that hygienic or cautious about the bacterial infections. Also, there is no data presented on that the patients are regularly using hospital’s soaps but still got affected. So, without proper evidence, it will be a naive act to tell the solution will impede the severe infections.
In conclusion, the director’s argument, as it stands now, is flawed due to its reliance on several unwarranted assumptions. If the author can provide three pieces of evidence stated above and perhaps conduct a systematic research study, then it is possible to determine whether the UltraClean should be used at all the hand-washing stations in order to reduce the serious bacteria infections.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 4 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 7 2
No. of Sentences: 17 15
No. of Words: 437 350
No. of Characters: 2217 1500
No. of Different Words: 187 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.572 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.073 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.716 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 160 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 124 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 99 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 55 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 25.706 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 10.277 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.706 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.359 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.583 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.096 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 9, column 394, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...reduce the serious bacteria infections.
^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, however, if, may, second, secondly, so, still, then, third, thirdly, in conclusion, to begin with
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 23.0 19.6327345309 117% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 12.0 12.9520958084 93% => OK
Conjunction : 7.0 11.1786427146 63% => OK
Relative clauses : 15.0 13.6137724551 110% => OK
Pronoun: 34.0 28.8173652695 118% => OK
Preposition: 51.0 55.5748502994 92% => OK
Nominalization: 15.0 16.3942115768 91% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2298.0 2260.96107784 102% => OK
No of words: 437.0 441.139720559 99% => OK
Chars per words: 5.2585812357 5.12650576532 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.57214883401 4.56307096286 100% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.85834433285 2.78398813304 103% => OK
Unique words: 197.0 204.123752495 97% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.450800915332 0.468620217663 96% => OK
syllable_count: 692.1 705.55239521 98% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 4.96107784431 121% => OK
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 7.0 4.22255489022 166% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 17.0 19.7664670659 86% => OK
Sentence length: 25.0 22.8473053892 109% => OK
Sentence length SD: 59.9668882106 57.8364921388 104% => OK
Chars per sentence: 135.176470588 119.503703932 113% => OK
Words per sentence: 25.7058823529 23.324526521 110% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.35294117647 5.70786347227 111% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 5.0 8.20758483034 61% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 8.0 6.88822355289 116% => 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: 0.226002574022 0.218282227539 104% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0851599121037 0.0743258471296 115% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0877087489621 0.0701772020484 125% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.141749330128 0.128457276422 110% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0712955360865 0.0628817314937 113% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 16.2 14.3799401198 113% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 46.1 48.3550499002 95% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.0 12.197005988 107% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.52 12.5979740519 107% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.6 8.32208582834 103% => OK
difficult_words: 103.0 98.500998004 105% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.0 11.1389221557 108% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => 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.