A recently issued twenty-year study on headaches suffered by the residents of Mentia investigated the possible therapeutic effect of consuming salicylates. Salicylates are members of the same chemical family as aspirin, a medicine used to treat headaches. Although many foods are naturally rich in salicylates, food-processing companies also add salicylates to foods as preservatives. The twenty-year study found a correlation between the rise in the commercial use of salicylates and a steady decline in the average number of headaches reported by study participants. At the time when the study concluded, food-processing companies had just discovered that salicylates can also be used as flavor additives for foods, and, as a result, many companies plan to do so. Based on these study results, some health experts predict that residents of Mentia will suffer even fewer headaches in the future.
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to decide whether the prediction and the argument on which it is based are reasonable. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the prediction.
The given prediction that increase in food companies adding salicylates for flavor will result in decrease in headache endured by residents of Mentia. Though, the prediction seems plausible at first sight, it is actually flawed by assumptions made by the argument, for which it fails to provide evidence. The assumptions are expounded in the body paragraphs.
First of all, the author of the argument mentions about the twenty-year study on headaches suffered by residents of Mentia. But, he fails to provide any details of the study. Like, how many residents participated in the study. How the study was done. What was the process and how reliable it is. All these questions need to be answered before we can even think about proceeding further with the argument. Multiple alternatives are possible which can call into question for the argument’s validity. For example, there is a likelihood that very few people participated in the study or residents might be getting headache because of personal stress or other disease which are cured with time. We don’t know if there is any potential role played by Salicylates in reducing it. The argument doesn’t talk about on what basis did the study conclude.
Furthermore, increase in salicylates in food product for various purposes is directly correlated with the decrease in headaches among the resident without any evidence. How do we know that salicylates was the reason that attributed to the slump in headaches? Did people of Mentia eat those food products. If yes, how consistent was the dosage. Did they eat that food when they were getting headache and felt instant relief? We don’t that for sure. As mentioned in the previous paragraph, people might be suffering from headache because of work stress or personal problems and with time those faded away as did their headache.
Even though the assumption discussed in the previous paragraphs are proved true, still concluding that increase in food products with salicylate will wane the headaches among residents of Mentia is an overstatement and must be rethought. How do we know that the new food products are preferred by residents of Mentia. What is the price of those products and can residents of Mentia afford eating those on regular basis. There can be similarly many questions that can arise and need to answered before making such a strong conclusion.
Hence, in summary, all the questions discussed in body paragraphs need to be answered before making the prediction. Otherwise, the aforementioned assumptions could be proved specious and the argument will fall apart.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
argument 1 -- not OK
argument 2 -- OK
argument 3 -- not exactly
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.0 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 26 15
No. of Words: 424 350
No. of Characters: 2115 1500
No. of Different Words: 200 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.538 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.988 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.71 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 150 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 118 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 100 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 57 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 16.308 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.989 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.385 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.286 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.475 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.13 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 7, column 390, Rule ID: AFFORD_VBG[1]
Message: This verb is used with infinitive: 'to eat'.
Suggestion: to eat
...ucts and can residents of Mentia afford eating those on regular basis. There can be si...
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, but, first, furthermore, hence, if, similarly, so, still, for example, in summary, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 24.0 19.6327345309 122% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 15.0 12.9520958084 116% => OK
Conjunction : 10.0 11.1786427146 89% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 27.0 28.8173652695 94% => OK
Preposition: 60.0 55.5748502994 108% => OK
Nominalization: 14.0 16.3942115768 85% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2196.0 2260.96107784 97% => OK
No of words: 421.0 441.139720559 95% => OK
Chars per words: 5.216152019 5.12650576532 102% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.52971130743 4.56307096286 99% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.82857074387 2.78398813304 102% => OK
Unique words: 200.0 204.123752495 98% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.475059382423 0.468620217663 101% => OK
syllable_count: 681.3 705.55239521 97% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 4.0 4.96107784431 81% => OK
Article: 6.0 8.76447105788 68% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 1.0 4.22255489022 24% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 26.0 19.7664670659 132% => OK
Sentence length: 16.0 22.8473053892 70% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 53.3338402959 57.8364921388 92% => OK
Chars per sentence: 84.4615384615 119.503703932 71% => OK
Words per sentence: 16.1923076923 23.324526521 69% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.03846153846 5.70786347227 71% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 9.0 8.20758483034 110% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 8.0 6.88822355289 116% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 9.0 4.67664670659 192% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.140004531642 0.218282227539 64% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0420419193155 0.0743258471296 57% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0522580127346 0.0701772020484 74% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0759939686337 0.128457276422 59% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0431730805288 0.0628817314937 69% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 11.3 14.3799401198 79% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 55.24 48.3550499002 114% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 9.5 12.197005988 78% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.7 12.5979740519 101% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.99 8.32208582834 96% => OK
difficult_words: 95.0 98.500998004 96% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 6.5 12.3882235529 52% => Linsear_write_formula is low.
gunning_fog: 8.4 11.1389221557 75% => OK
text_standard: 10.0 11.9071856287 84% => 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.