The following appeared in a memo from a vice president of Quiot Manufacturing.
"During the past year, Quiot Manufacturing had 30 percent more on-the-job accidents than at the nearby Panoply Industries plant, where the work shifts are one hour shorter than ours. Experts say that significant contributing factors in many on-the-job accidents are fatigue and sleep deprivation among workers. Therefore, to reduce the number of on-the-job accidents at Quiot and thereby increase productivity, we should shorten each of our three work shifts by one hour so that employees will get adequate amounts of sleep."
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.
In this passage, the author recommends to shorten the duration of work shift and predicts such change could reduce the number of on-the-job accidents efficiently. Quite convincing though such recommendation appears at first glance, the author's recommendation might be unconvincing due to several unsubstantiated assumptions which, if prove unwarranted, will seriously challenge the author's conclusion.
To start off, the author's reasoning heavily relies on the assumption that less percentage of one-the-job accidents represents safer working situation in plants. Based on this assumption, the author therefore extend his/her solution to improve Quiot's safety level. However, such assumption might be potentially problematic because we do not know the exact employee number of two factories. Nor do we know that the latest situation of both accident rate. If it turns out that Quiot has actually much larger employee numbers or the latest accidental rate in Quiot has been improved, the author's statement about Quiot's inferior safety status will be unconvincing.
Furthermore, by stating that Quiot's longer work shift compared with Panoply Industries, the author rules out alternative reasons beside working shift which could lead to the accidental happening mentioned in the passage. However, we need to re-examine the assumption that the working shift duration is the unique one that accounts for the accident number. It is likely that the qualification of both employee and employee in the plants could impact their daily operation, thus contributed to the final accidental rate. It is of equal likelihood that the ultimate work pressure based on the overall profit status could also give great impacts on their workload, which implicitly lead to the increasing accidental rate. Furthermore, the commute distance between factories and their home could also exert great influence on their daily life, then lead to accidental rate fluctuation. If any of those probability is true, we are inclined to believe that a single gamble on reduction of working shift time could be somehow oversimplifed for handling with the complex cause of accidental happening.
Last but not least, while all of these aforementioned assumptions prove warranted, the author's recommendation would be still unnecessary due to the doubtful assumption regarding the efficiency of reduction of working shift time. Claiming that such reduction will be effective, the author seems too optimistic. It is unreasonable to assume that people will make use of those additional time for sleep. It is possible that people may leverage such time for additional private leisure, which could in turn increase the probability of their fatigue during the work. Also, the author hastily come to a conclusion that one hour shift could work, but does not discuss whether one more hours could actually help to ameliorate employee's exhausted status under current situation. Furthermore, even if a longer rest could help employee recover from the tension mental status, it is possible that they would not adapt to the tension of work when having too long rest. If they don't use extra time for rest, or one additional hours actually fall into limited or too long for their rehabilitation from work, we are reluctant to believe that such reduction of work shift could work as expected.
In summary, whether we should implement the author's recommendation heavily depends on the validity of these aforementioned assumptions. If these assumptions prove unwarranted, the author's recommendation could become little more than his/her wishful thinking and therefore we should resort to other solutions to decrease accidental rates in Quiot Manufacturing.
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: 22 15
No. of Words: 572 350
No. of Characters: 3085 1500
No. of Different Words: 268 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.89 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.393 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.905 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 226 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 181 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 135 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 94 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 26 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.781 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.773 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.331 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.537 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.199 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 29, Rule ID: ADMIT_ENJOY_VB[1]
Message: This verb is used with the gerund form: 'recommends shortening'.
Suggestion: recommends shortening
In this passage, the author recommends to shorten the duration of work shift and predicts...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 1, column 237, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...mmendation appears at first glance, the authors recommendation might be unconvincing du...
^^^^^^^
Line 1, column 383, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[2]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...warranted, will seriously challenge the authors conclusion. To start off, the auth...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 585, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...al rate in Quiot has been improved, the authors statement about Quiots inferior safety ...
^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 732, Rule ID: A_INFINITVE[1]
Message: Probably a wrong construction: a/the + infinitive
...ncreasing accidental rate. Furthermore, the commute distance between factories and their ho...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 892, Rule ID: THIS_NNS[2]
Message: Did you mean 'this probability' or 'those probabilities'?
Suggestion: this probability; those probabilities
... accidental rate fluctuation. If any of those probability is true, we are inclined to believe tha...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 13, column 88, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...tioned assumptions prove warranted, the authors recommendation would be still unnecessa...
^^^^^^^
Line 13, column 965, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: don't
...work when having too long rest. If they dont use extra time for rest, or one additio...
^^^^
Line 17, column 45, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...ummary, whether we should implement the authors recommendation heavily depends on the v...
^^^^^^^
Line 17, column 181, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...hese assumptions prove unwarranted, the authors recommendation could become little more...
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, first, furthermore, however, if, may, regarding, so, still, then, therefore, thus, while, in summary, such as
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 16.0 19.6327345309 81% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 24.0 12.9520958084 185% => OK
Conjunction : 10.0 11.1786427146 89% => OK
Relative clauses : 20.0 13.6137724551 147% => OK
Pronoun: 47.0 28.8173652695 163% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 68.0 55.5748502994 122% => OK
Nominalization: 28.0 16.3942115768 171% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 3150.0 2260.96107784 139% => OK
No of words: 569.0 441.139720559 129% => OK
Chars per words: 5.53602811951 5.12650576532 108% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.88402711743 4.56307096286 107% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.95907304841 2.78398813304 106% => OK
Unique words: 279.0 204.123752495 137% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.490333919156 0.468620217663 105% => OK
syllable_count: 960.3 705.55239521 136% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 8.0 4.96107784431 161% => OK
Article: 11.0 8.76447105788 126% => OK
Subordination: 7.0 2.70958083832 258% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 3.0 1.67365269461 179% => OK
Preposition: 4.0 4.22255489022 95% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 22.0 19.7664670659 111% => OK
Sentence length: 25.0 22.8473053892 109% => OK
Sentence length SD: 50.8388517079 57.8364921388 88% => OK
Chars per sentence: 143.181818182 119.503703932 120% => OK
Words per sentence: 25.8636363636 23.324526521 111% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.90909090909 5.70786347227 104% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 10.0 5.25449101796 190% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 13.0 8.20758483034 158% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => 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: 0.154170224771 0.218282227539 71% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0502843352863 0.0743258471296 68% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0424216096213 0.0701772020484 60% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0905861067862 0.128457276422 71% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0174697170372 0.0628817314937 28% => Paragraphs are similar to each other. Some content may get duplicated or it is not exactly right on the topic.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 17.6 14.3799401198 122% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 37.64 48.3550499002 78% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 14.2 12.197005988 116% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 15.15 12.5979740519 120% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.87 8.32208582834 107% => OK
difficult_words: 144.0 98.500998004 146% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 12.0 12.3882235529 97% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.0 11.1389221557 108% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.9071856287 101% => 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.