The following is a memorandum from the business manager of a television station.
"Over the past year, our late-night news program has devoted increased time to national news and less time to weather and local news. During this period, most of the complaints received from viewers were concerned with our station's coverage of weather and local news. In addition, local businesses that used to advertise during our late-night news program have canceled their advertising contracts with us. Therefore, in order to attract more viewers to our news programs and to avoid losing any further advertising revenues, we should expand our coverage of weather and local news on all our news programs."
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 the given argument, the business manager of a television station talks about restoring the time devoted for weather and local news. He makes this remark due to various complaints from viewers regarding the telecast of wheather and local news as well as the revoking of contracts by the advertisers for the late night programs. However, the manager fails to present a cogent argument as his claims are riddled with unwarranted assumptions.
Firstly, the manager didn't provide any information on the reasons due to which they increased time for national news and decreased coverage for the late night weather and local news. It could have been done due to the viewers' demands and surveys.
Moreover, he hasn't mentioned the number of complaints, the age group and demographics of the complainants as well as their nature of complaint. It might be the case that only people from a certain age group and/or a certain locailty made the majority of complaints. The nature of complaints has also not been revealed. There could be a plethora of reasons for this: viewers might want the weather and local news to be aired at different timings, to point out some errors and inaccuracies in the reported news or some topics that they feel must be covered during its telecast.
Additionally, the reason for abjurgation of the contracts by the advertisers hasn't been mentioned explicitly. The advertisers could have cancelled the contract as they would have faired better deals at other channels. It could be due to any changes in the television station's policies regarding advertisements, the time given to them in between programs' telecast or substantial increase in cost to maintain their contracts.
At the end, the manager talks about restoring the time devoted to weather and local news in general. He does not specifically talk about increasing it's duration at late night news programs. To sum, the manager has made many bold assumptions in reaching his conclusion to change the duration for weather and local news. Until and unless all other possibilities are probed and the predominant reason for complaints by viewers and cancellation of contracts by advertisers is found, the managers conclusion seems to be insubstantial.
Comments
e-rater score 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: 16 15
No. of Words: 367 350
No. of Characters: 1829 1500
No. of Different Words: 172 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.377 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.984 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.803 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 126 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 109 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 75 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 47 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.938 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.304 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.438 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.344 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.585 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.114 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 22, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: didn't
...ed assumptions. Firstly, the manager didnt provide any information on the reasons ...
^^^^^
Line 5, column 14, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: hasn't
...s demands and surveys. Moreover, he hasnt mentioned the number of complaints, the...
^^^^^
Line 7, column 78, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: hasn't
...ion of the contracts by the advertisers hasnt been mentioned explicitly. The advertis...
^^^^^
Line 7, column 180, Rule ID: FAIRED_BADLY[1]
Message: Did you mean 'fared better'?
Suggestion: fared better
...ncelled the contract as they would have faired better deals at other channels. It could be du...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 484, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'managers'' or 'manager's'?
Suggestion: managers'; manager's
... contracts by advertisers is found, the managers conclusion seems to be insubstantial.
^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, first, firstly, however, if, moreover, regarding, so, well, in general, as well as
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 : 17.0 11.1786427146 152% => OK
Relative clauses : 3.0 13.6137724551 22% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 20.0 28.8173652695 69% => OK
Preposition: 52.0 55.5748502994 94% => OK
Nominalization: 8.0 16.3942115768 49% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1872.0 2260.96107784 83% => OK
No of words: 363.0 441.139720559 82% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.15702479339 5.12650576532 101% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.3649236973 4.56307096286 96% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.87113935112 2.78398813304 103% => OK
Unique words: 175.0 204.123752495 86% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.482093663912 0.468620217663 103% => OK
syllable_count: 563.4 705.55239521 80% => 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: 11.0 8.76447105788 126% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 2.70958083832 37% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 16.0 19.7664670659 81% => 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: 22.0 22.8473053892 96% => OK
Sentence length SD: 55.1097980739 57.8364921388 95% => OK
Chars per sentence: 117.0 119.503703932 98% => OK
Words per sentence: 22.6875 23.324526521 97% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.5 5.70786347227 96% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 5.0 5.25449101796 95% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 7.0 8.20758483034 85% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.67664670659 64% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.331383736252 0.218282227539 152% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.113741219089 0.0743258471296 153% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.112278037703 0.0701772020484 160% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.203105142745 0.128457276422 158% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0905010780883 0.0628817314937 144% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.2 14.3799401198 99% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 49.15 48.3550499002 102% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.9 12.197005988 98% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.94 12.5979740519 103% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.38 8.32208582834 101% => OK
difficult_words: 84.0 98.500998004 85% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.8 11.1389221557 97% => 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.