“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 time period, most of the complaints received from viewers were concerned with our station’s coverage of local and weather news. In addition, local businesses that used to advertise during our late-night news programs have just cancelled their advertising contracts with us. Therefore, in order to attract more viewers to the program and to avoid losing any further advertising revenues, we should restore the time devoted to weather and local news to its former level.”
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.
The writer explains about a news station and he concludes that they should restore the time allocated to weather and local news to its former level in order to avoid losing any further revenues through advertising; however, this conclusion cannot be accepted as it is in that it rests on a number of erroneous premises all of which can be challenged in one way or another.
Let start with consideration of the writer’s flawed assumption, he/she assumes that the increased number of complaints is directly relates with the short time that they devoted to the weather and local news, but maybe there are some other reasons that affects the audiences, and that was not a consequence of this shortness, maybe the poor quality of their performance on this part of the news has influenced people in a bad way, or maybe they don’t have a good sense about any other parts of the news that were added to it. Also the writer didn’t give any strong evidences and statistical information about the number of complaints.
Another problem with this argument is that the writer wrongly assumes that there is actually a connection between the shortness of the weather and local news parts with the reduction of the number of advertisements that local businesses used to want them to advertise during they program. However there is no evidence to definitely prove that this is the case. Maybe these local businesses found another program that they should pay less amount of money, or maybe they realized that they can use internet for advertising their product, as it is cheaper and more effective.
A third problem with the argument is that the writer assumes that they can gain profits and bring back their revenues by allotting more time to the weather and local news and make the program like its previous format, But he/she didn’t pay attention to the fact that they lose some of their viewer and they cannot bring their revenue back easily. Maybe they should add extra parts to their program, in order to attract more people and recapture their loss of viewer.
In the final analysis, the writer’s conclusion cannot be taken to be correct and reasonable, because, as it was shown in the body paragraphs above, it depends on a number of assumptions each of which was questionable. The conclusion can only be accepted if the weaknesses already referred to are all removed.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 11 15
No. of Words: 410 350
No. of Characters: 1921 1500
No. of Different Words: 189 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.5 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.685 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.492 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 123 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 96 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 57 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 39 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 37.273 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 25.324 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.636 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.377 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.653 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.127 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
The writer explains about a news station...
^^^^
Line 2, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...n be challenged in one way or another. Let start with consideration of the writ...
^^^^
Line 2, column 426, Rule ID: IN_A_X_MANNER[1]
Message: Consider replacing "in a bad way" with adverb for "bad"; eg, "in a hasty manner" with "hastily".
... part of the news has influenced people in a bad way, or maybe they don't have a good s...
^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 2, column 539, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Also,
...arts of the news that were added to it. Also the writer didn't give any strong ...
^^^^
Line 3, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...ation about the number of complaints. Another problem with this argument is th...
^^^^
Line 3, column 294, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: However,
... them to advertise during they program. However there is no evidence to definitely prov...
^^^^^^^
Line 4, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
..., as it is cheaper and more effective. A third problem with the argument is tha...
^^^^
Line 5, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...le and recapture their loss of viewer. In the final analysis, the writer's...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, however, if, may, so, third
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 19.0 19.6327345309 97% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 10.0 12.9520958084 77% => OK
Conjunction : 18.0 11.1786427146 161% => OK
Relative clauses : 18.0 13.6137724551 132% => OK
Pronoun: 54.0 28.8173652695 187% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 55.0 55.5748502994 99% => OK
Nominalization: 12.0 16.3942115768 73% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1984.0 2260.96107784 88% => OK
No of words: 405.0 441.139720559 92% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 4.8987654321 5.12650576532 96% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.48604634366 4.56307096286 98% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.64858294511 2.78398813304 95% => OK
Unique words: 192.0 204.123752495 94% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.474074074074 0.468620217663 101% => OK
syllable_count: 615.6 705.55239521 87% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 3.0 4.96107784431 60% => OK
Article: 4.0 8.76447105788 46% => OK
Subordination: 2.0 2.70958083832 74% => OK
Conjunction: 5.0 1.67365269461 299% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 10.0 19.7664670659 51% => 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: 40.0 22.8473053892 175% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 141.914375593 57.8364921388 245% => The lengths of sentences changed so frequently.
Chars per sentence: 198.4 119.503703932 166% => OK
Words per sentence: 40.5 23.324526521 174% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.8 5.70786347227 84% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 8.0 5.25449101796 152% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 5.0 8.20758483034 61% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 5.0 6.88822355289 73% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 0.0 4.67664670659 0% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.126611223111 0.218282227539 58% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0483142358278 0.0743258471296 65% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0418637249039 0.0701772020484 60% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0727487007558 0.128457276422 57% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0422620558785 0.0628817314937 67% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 21.9 14.3799401198 152% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 39.34 48.3550499002 81% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 17.7 12.197005988 145% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.03 12.5979740519 95% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.13 8.32208582834 110% => OK
difficult_words: 90.0 98.500998004 91% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 27.5 12.3882235529 222% => Linsear_write_formula is high.
gunning_fog: 18.0 11.1389221557 162% => OK
text_standard: 18.0 11.9071856287 151% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 Out of 6
---------------------
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.