"Over the past year, the Crust Copper Company (CCC) has purchased over 10,000 square miles of land in the tropical nation of West Fredonia. Mining copper on this land will inevitably result in pollution and, since West Fredonia is the home of several endangered animal species, in the environmental disaster. But such disasters can be prevented if consumers simply refuse to purchase products that are made with CCC's copper unless the company abandons its mining plans."
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.
The statement is flawed at the very beginning. Without citing any news resources, the speaker assumes that, because the Crust Copper Company's majot business is copper mining, the reason that they purchase the island is to exploit the place's mining resources. As mentioned, West Fredonia, is not only home to precious coppers, but is also featured for its natural beauty. There is possibility that the company is seeking to expand their business lines, and West Fredonia appears as the idea place for their new business plan.
Admittedly, the advancement of human society is often accompanied by the exploitation of natural resources and habitats. However, in the case of CCC, the speaker fails substantiate that the action will necessarily result in pollution and reduction of domestic species. The several endangered species could only live around a small corner on the island, and the mining activities have little influence to their daily live, compared with their natural predators. Even if there is an overlap between the species’ habitats and the mining area, the speaker does not provide any information about whether the company is taking actions to minimize the potential negative influence. Maybe the international society poses strict laws on oversea mining activities. To abide to the regulations, so to avoid the huge amount of penalties, the Crust Copper Company may have to abide to all the guidance, which include consulting local governors and getting approval before taking any actions, hiring local experts as consultants, reporting to the international society periodically, and so forth. Such rules have a strong constraining power on any illegal attempts.
The last point in the statement is neither possible nor feasible. Just as fossil fuels and gases, copper is one of the essential natural resources that humans are still heavily relying upon. The products made by copper that is produced by the Crust Copper Company could have permeated people’s life without their awareness. Even if they are voluntary, it is not feasible that they abandon all those products. For example, One small chip inside their phone could have used the copper mined by the CCC, is it unreasonable to ask people to stop using their phone. Switching to a new one might be tricky as well, because the majority of other phones could also be using the CCC copper, because their copper and products represent the highest quality in the market.
Alternatively, I suggest that, people have an open attitude towards the exploration of new natural resources. Mining does not necessarily equal to pollution. With appropriate regulations, the potential harm can be controlled and minimized.
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: 20 15
No. of Words: 428 350
No. of Characters: 2203 1500
No. of Different Words: 228 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.548 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.147 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.623 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 173 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 131 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 80 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 53 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 21.4 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 10.979 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.4 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.275 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.464 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.039 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 4 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, however, if, may, so, still, well, for example
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 20.0 19.6327345309 102% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 8.0 12.9520958084 62% => OK
Conjunction : 12.0 11.1786427146 107% => OK
Relative clauses : 9.0 13.6137724551 66% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 24.0 28.8173652695 83% => OK
Preposition: 45.0 55.5748502994 81% => OK
Nominalization: 12.0 16.3942115768 73% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2266.0 2260.96107784 100% => OK
No of words: 428.0 441.139720559 97% => OK
Chars per words: 5.29439252336 5.12650576532 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.548423998 4.56307096286 100% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.74527440793 2.78398813304 99% => OK
Unique words: 236.0 204.123752495 116% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.551401869159 0.468620217663 118% => OK
syllable_count: 718.2 705.55239521 102% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 4.96107784431 40% => OK
Article: 11.0 8.76447105788 126% => OK
Subordination: 6.0 2.70958083832 221% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 4.0 1.67365269461 239% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 4.0 4.22255489022 95% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 22.8473053892 92% => OK
Sentence length SD: 67.9079524062 57.8364921388 117% => OK
Chars per sentence: 113.3 119.503703932 95% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.4 23.324526521 92% => OK
Discourse Markers: 2.85 5.70786347227 50% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
Paragraphs: 4.0 5.15768463074 78% => More paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => 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: 0.183996185683 0.218282227539 84% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.047539811689 0.0743258471296 64% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0455150208653 0.0701772020484 65% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.102350183616 0.128457276422 80% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0609425969905 0.0628817314937 97% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.2 14.3799401198 99% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 41.7 48.3550499002 86% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.7 12.197005988 104% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.4 12.5979740519 106% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.47 8.32208582834 114% => OK
difficult_words: 130.0 98.500998004 132% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 11.1389221557 93% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 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.