Milk and dairy products are rich in vitamin D and calcium — substances essential for building and maintaining bones. Many people therefore say that a diet rich in dairy products can help prevent osteoporosis, a disease that is linked to both environmental and genetic factors and that causes the bones to weaken significantly with age. But a long-term study of a large number of people found that those who consistently consumed dairy products throughout the years of the study have a higher rate of bone fractures than any other participants in the study. Since bone fractures are symptomatic of osteoporosis, this study result shows that a diet rich in dairy products may actually increase, rather than decrease, the risk of osteoporosis.
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
Given above is a prompt wherein the arguer states that a diet rich in dairy products may actually increase, rather than decrease, the risk of osteoporosis. Such a statement by the arguer contradicts a widely held belief that milk and dairy products are rich in vitamin D and calcium - substances that are essential for building and maintaining bones. In order to bolster his claim, the arguer provides the results of an experiment that support his claim. While glancing thorough the prompt, the evidences do provide substance to the arguer's claim, although a closer look unearths a few possible fallacies that might undermine the arguer's claim.
Firstly, the arguer states that according to the study, individuals who consumed dairy products more frequently had higher cases of bone fractures, a symptom of osteoporosis. As a result, the arguer claims that dairy products increase, rather than decrease the risk of osteoporosis. The arguer fails to throw light on the working background of individuals who suffered fractures. What if the participants who suffered fractures worked in harsh and rigorous work conditions? This would possibly hint towards the reason why the participants, pointed out specifically by the arguer are suffering from fractures. The fact that these are the same individuals who also consume dairy products might just be a co-incidence. Without further evidence, it would not be apt to conclude that milk and dairy products are the reason for an increase in the risk of osteoporosis.
Secondly, the arguer has also mentioned that osteoporosis is linked to genetic factors. What if the reason for an increased number of fractures, in the individuals pointed out by the arguer, is due to the genes that they have inherited from the parents. It might be possible that the people who have not inherited this disease from their parents are keeping it at bay by consuming dairy products. It could be the case that, since genetic diseases stay with a person from the moment they are born, even an increased amount of dairy product consumption is not helping them out, whereas in other cases dairy products might work well towards preventing this disease. Since the arguer has failed to provide evidence regarding possible cases of inheritance of the disease in the pool of participants, it cannot be categorically stated if dairy products are to be blamed for the increasing risk of osteoporosis.
Lastly, the environmental conditions are also said to be a contributing factor to osteoporosis. So, what if the participants, who have suffered fractures belong to a palace who's environmental conditions increase the risk of contracting osteoporosis. The arguer fails to provide evidence regarding the participants' demographic backround. It might be the case that participants from a more favorable background, counteract the risk of contracting osteoporosis by consuming dairy products. Owing to the lack of relevant data and various other possibilities, it would not be ideal to blame daily products for the increase in risk of contracting osteoporosis.
In sum, the evidence provided by the arguer, that support his claim, are dubious as well as erroneous. The evidence hint at various other possibilities that seriously undermine the arguer's position and cast a doubt on his final conclusion.
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: 23 15
No. of Words: 529 350
No. of Characters: 2731 1500
No. of Different Words: 218 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.796 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.163 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.918 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 201 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 159 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 124 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 76 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 23 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.23 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.609 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.36 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.54 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.128 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 7, column 174, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: who's
...e suffered fractures belong to a palace whos environmental conditions increase the r...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, first, firstly, if, lastly, look, may, regarding, second, secondly, so, well, whereas, while, as a result, as well as
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 23.0 19.6327345309 117% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 11.0 12.9520958084 85% => OK
Conjunction : 7.0 11.1786427146 63% => OK
Relative clauses : 22.0 13.6137724551 162% => OK
Pronoun: 35.0 28.8173652695 121% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 67.0 55.5748502994 121% => OK
Nominalization: 12.0 16.3942115768 73% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2794.0 2260.96107784 124% => OK
No of words: 529.0 441.139720559 120% => OK
Chars per words: 5.28166351607 5.12650576532 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.79583152331 4.56307096286 105% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.02539153632 2.78398813304 109% => OK
Unique words: 230.0 204.123752495 113% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.434782608696 0.468620217663 93% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 861.3 705.55239521 122% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 8.0 4.96107784431 161% => OK
Article: 13.0 8.76447105788 148% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 7.0 4.22255489022 166% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 23.0 19.7664670659 116% => OK
Sentence length: 23.0 22.8473053892 101% => OK
Sentence length SD: 47.0842465799 57.8364921388 81% => OK
Chars per sentence: 121.47826087 119.503703932 102% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.0 23.324526521 99% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.0 5.70786347227 105% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 6.0 8.20758483034 73% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 14.0 6.88822355289 203% => Less negative sentences wanted.
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: 0.234419358547 0.218282227539 107% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0744752182474 0.0743258471296 100% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0885640917533 0.0701772020484 126% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.124755726198 0.128457276422 97% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0788873733236 0.0628817314937 125% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.9 14.3799401198 104% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 48.13 48.3550499002 100% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.3 12.197005988 101% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.64 12.5979740519 108% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.42 8.32208582834 101% => OK
difficult_words: 122.0 98.500998004 124% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 11.1389221557 101% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => 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.