The following is a memorandum from the office of Mayor Harrison Smith Jones.
"In order to relieve Briggsville’s notorious traffic congestion, Mayor Harrison Smith Jones plans to build a multi-million dollar subway system. The subway will run through the major downtown areas, a part of the town where buses serve as the only form of public transportation. For years, residents have been complaining both about inconsistent buses, and the general lack of safety while riding the buses. Additionally, the subway will be running twenty-four hours a day. Since motorists will spend less time in traffic, Mayor Harrison Smith Jones expects to see an immediate increase in worker productivity, which will improve the economy of Briggsville."
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.
Mayor Harrison Smith Jones believes that with the construction of the new subway system, the productivity of workers will improve and thus the economy of Briggsville will follow suit. His argument is based on the fact that the subway system will reduce the traffic congestion in city and thus people will spend less time in commute. However, this argument put forth by the mayor depends on several unwarranted assumptions.
Firstly, the argument assumes that most of the people who go through the Briggsville downtown area are all headed to work. In other words, the argument assumes that the Briggsville downtown region is highly congested during the time when many of the city's residents go to work. However, it is possible that the Briggsville downtown region is most crowded in the evening (when many people are returning home from work) rather than the morning and thus have no direct relation to worker productivity. Further, it might be the case that the Briggsville downtown area might be the only way to reach a bustling commercial complex where the residents of the city do all their shopping. In such a case the validity of the argument that worker productivity will improve with the building of the subway system is called into question.
Secondly, the argument prematurely assumes that the subway system will be efficient and effective. For instance, the reason many busses were late might not have been an issue of the transport system rather it could have been the fault of lazy and irresponsible drivers. If the city corporation recruited similar people, who were irresposnible, to manage the subway system, then the subway system too will prove to be inefficient and ineffective. In such a case the developemnt of a new subway system will only lead to a wastage of money.
Another factor the argument assumes is the reliability of the complaints registered by the residents of Briggsville. It could be possible that only a small set of people have issued multiple repetitive complaints, whereas a major part of the residents are satisfied with the bus transport system. In such a scenario the complaints registered by these few individuals cannot describe the overall situation of the Brigssville downtown area, and thus no drastic measure should be taken inorder to revamp the transport system in the area. If, however, a drastic measure is taken, it would effect the countless number of residents who are comfortable the bus based transport system, and turn out to be counterproductive.
In conclusion, the argument offered by Mayor Harrison Smith Jones is severely flawed due to its dependence on several unwarranted assumptions. The validity of his argument can only be evaluated once a clarification on the assumptions made are provided.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 18 15
No. of Words: 452 350
No. of Characters: 2267 1500
No. of Different Words: 199 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.611 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.015 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.797 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 172 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 124 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 89 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 56 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 25.111 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 6.975 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.722 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.355 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.592 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.108 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 7, column 586, Rule ID: AFFECT_EFFECT[6]
Message: Did you mean 'affect'?
Suggestion: affect
...r, a drastic measure is taken, it would effect the countless number of residents who a...
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
first, firstly, however, if, may, second, secondly, so, then, thus, whereas, for instance, in conclusion, in other words
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 25.0 19.6327345309 127% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 17.0 12.9520958084 131% => OK
Conjunction : 8.0 11.1786427146 72% => OK
Relative clauses : 15.0 13.6137724551 110% => OK
Pronoun: 20.0 28.8173652695 69% => OK
Preposition: 54.0 55.5748502994 97% => OK
Nominalization: 18.0 16.3942115768 110% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2318.0 2260.96107784 103% => OK
No of words: 452.0 441.139720559 102% => OK
Chars per words: 5.12831858407 5.12650576532 100% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.61088837703 4.56307096286 101% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.8796268445 2.78398813304 103% => OK
Unique words: 205.0 204.123752495 100% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.453539823009 0.468620217663 97% => OK
syllable_count: 725.4 705.55239521 103% => 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: 1.0 2.70958083832 37% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 6.0 4.22255489022 142% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 18.0 19.7664670659 91% => OK
Sentence length: 25.0 22.8473053892 109% => OK
Sentence length SD: 41.1717270844 57.8364921388 71% => OK
Chars per sentence: 128.777777778 119.503703932 108% => OK
Words per sentence: 25.1111111111 23.324526521 108% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.66666666667 5.70786347227 117% => 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 : 12.0 6.88822355289 174% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 1.0 4.67664670659 21% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.23029784914 0.218282227539 106% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0795421941862 0.0743258471296 107% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0864950048823 0.0701772020484 123% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.142956650462 0.128457276422 111% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0976882166768 0.0628817314937 155% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.3 14.3799401198 106% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 46.1 48.3550499002 95% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.0 12.197005988 107% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.77 12.5979740519 101% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.33 8.32208582834 100% => OK
difficult_words: 99.0 98.500998004 101% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 10.5 12.3882235529 85% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.0 11.1389221557 108% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => 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.