"Manned space flight is costly and dangerous. Moreover, the recent success of a series of unmanned space probes and satellites has demonstrated that a great deal of useful information can be gathered without the costs and risks associated with sending men and women into space. Therefore, we should invest our resources in unmanned space flight."
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.
While at first glance the argument presented by the author seems to be persuasive, a lengthy perusal highlights some unwarranted assumptions on the author's behalf. These assumptions have not been backed by solid data and thereby render this argument not cogent enough.
First, the author states that manned space flight is costly and dangerous. Despite the obvious inference that there is a cost of life involved, the author has not specified his reasons for believing so. Unmanned space flights can be equally costly and dangerous if not more. During the 1960s or so, when the space technology was relatively inchoate, manned space flights were associated with a lot of risks. But since then it has developed into an inexorable technology. If the author has substantial evidence that proves that manned space flight is costly and dangerous, and unmanned space flight is not, then his argument should be backed by such evidence.
Second, the author mentions the recent success of a series of unmanned space probes and satellites that has proven to be a great deal of success. But if the event is recent, it is likely that the technology required for this feat is not available with all countries and space institutes. Even if it were available, it is only one success and does not suffice to conclude that it supersedes manned space flights or the efficacy of unmanned space flights is more.
Third, the author believes that the unmanned space flights are relatively not as costly when compared to manned flights. It is worth mentioning that technology has been developed by humans and it acts as a tool that enables us to pursue more complex tasks. If the flights are not manned, then a much more complex technology would be needed to cover the tasks that were initially administered by humans. This is likely to incur more costs in order to train the technology to gather all the useful information. Also, while technology has advanced more than ever before, there still remain tasks where they cannot mimic the complexity of the human mind. Therefore, the dexterity, alacrity of the humans would be required.
In conclusion, the argument has the capacity to be approbated by the editor of national aeronautics magazine, but it needs to be back by statistical data, citing examples of myriad of unmanned space flights that were successful. Also, if at all they reduce cost and risks to life, then a detailed argument needs to be presented for the same. Currently the argument is not persuasive enough to be approved.
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: 20 15
No. of Words: 423 350
No. of Characters: 2052 1500
No. of Different Words: 190 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.535 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.851 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.551 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 154 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 101 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 79 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 47 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 21.15 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.418 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.8 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.325 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.557 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.094 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 149, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[2]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...hts some unwarranted assumptions on the authors behalf. These assumptions have not been...
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, if, second, so, still, then, therefore, third, while, in conclusion
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 31.0 19.6327345309 158% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 5.0 12.9520958084 39% => OK
Conjunction : 15.0 11.1786427146 134% => OK
Relative clauses : 15.0 13.6137724551 110% => OK
Pronoun: 29.0 28.8173652695 101% => OK
Preposition: 44.0 55.5748502994 79% => OK
Nominalization: 10.0 16.3942115768 61% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2119.0 2260.96107784 94% => OK
No of words: 423.0 441.139720559 96% => OK
Chars per words: 5.00945626478 5.12650576532 98% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.53508145475 4.56307096286 99% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.62995537404 2.78398813304 94% => OK
Unique words: 203.0 204.123752495 99% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.479905437352 0.468620217663 102% => OK
syllable_count: 669.6 705.55239521 95% => 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: 7.0 8.76447105788 80% => OK
Subordination: 7.0 2.70958083832 258% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 4.0 1.67365269461 239% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 22.8473053892 92% => OK
Sentence length SD: 43.2398832098 57.8364921388 75% => OK
Chars per sentence: 105.95 119.503703932 89% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.15 23.324526521 91% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.25 5.70786347227 74% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 5.0 4.67664670659 107% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.386722514982 0.218282227539 177% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.126682998801 0.0743258471296 170% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.117048037374 0.0701772020484 167% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.205187720872 0.128457276422 160% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.138786905536 0.0628817314937 221% => More connections among paragraphs wanted.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.7 14.3799401198 88% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 50.16 48.3550499002 104% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 12.197005988 94% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.78 12.5979740519 94% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.67 8.32208582834 104% => OK
difficult_words: 107.0 98.500998004 109% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 8.0 12.3882235529 65% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 11.1389221557 93% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.9071856287 101% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 58.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.5 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.