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 arguments states the therapeutic effects of consuming Salicylates, the headaches suffered by the residents of Mantia and thus predicted that since there will be increase in Salicylates consumption, then the residents of Mentia would suffer fewer headaches in the future. The arguments is however not logically convincing since it ignores some certain crucial assumptions.
Firstly, the argument states that Salicylates are members of the same chemical family as Aspirin, which is a medicine used for the treatment of headaches. In contrast, the author only states that salicylates have therapeutic effects and does not delineate on whether it also cures headaches. Since it can be a chemical family of aspirin and not have the same health benefits as it, and so on.
Secondly, the arguments assumes that the rise in the commercial use of salicylates may have in turn led to the steady decline in the average number of headaches reported. But failed to explain if the increased use of salicylates may have caused this. What if aspirin has also been used during this period where salicylates have increased? Then the decline in average number of headaches reported amy have not been from the increased use of salicylates.
Additionally, the argument stated that from the study concluded on the increased implementation of salicylates, then their is a prediction that the residents of Mentia would suffer less headaches in the future. However, the author fails to tell if this food-processing companies are present in Mentia. Besides what if the people of Mentia have no access to the products of this food-processing companies. Then this outrightly debunks the prediction made by the argument, and they might be no reduction in average number of headaches experienced in Mentia.
In short, the argument is not completely sound since it fails to address the assumptions raised above. Ultimately, the argument would have been strengthened if the author could provide proof that the salicylate also cures headaches, if the increase in the consumption of salicylates is the actual cause for the reduction of the average number of headaches reported, and also, if the peole of Mentia actually have access to the products of the food-processing companies that have decided to include salicylates in their products.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 4 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 7 2
No. of Sentences: 15 15
No. of Words: 369 350
No. of Characters: 1907 1500
No. of Different Words: 150 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.383 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.168 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.931 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 147 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 112 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 84 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 63 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 24.6 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 13.574 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 1 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.387 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.387 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.114 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 1 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 15, Rule ID: AGREEMENT_SENT_START[1]
Message: You should probably use 'state'.
Suggestion: state
The arguments states the therapeutic effects of consuming Sa...
^^^^^^
Line 1, column 290, Rule ID: AGREEMENT_SENT_START[4]
Message: You should probably use: 'are'.
Suggestion: are
... headaches in the future. The arguments is however not logically convincing since ...
^^
Line 2, column 107, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...ame chemical family as Aspirin, which is a medicine used for the treatment of hea...
^^
Line 2, column 237, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...salicylates have therapeutic effects and does not delineate on whether it also c...
^^
Line 2, column 260, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...eutic effects and does not delineate on whether it also cures headaches. Since i...
^^
Line 4, column 118, Rule ID: THEIR_IS[1]
Message: Did you mean 'there'?
Suggestion: there
...sed implementation of salicylates, then their is a prediction that the residents of M...
^^^^^
Line 4, column 182, Rule ID: FEWER_LESS[2]
Message: Did you mean 'fewer'? The noun headaches is countable.
Suggestion: fewer
...at the residents of Mentia would suffer less headaches in the future. However, the a...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, besides, but, first, firstly, however, if, may, second, secondly, so, then, thus, in contrast, in short
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 13.0 19.6327345309 66% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 9.0 12.9520958084 69% => OK
Conjunction : 7.0 11.1786427146 63% => OK
Relative clauses : 10.0 13.6137724551 73% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 21.0 28.8173652695 73% => OK
Preposition: 56.0 55.5748502994 101% => OK
Nominalization: 13.0 16.3942115768 79% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1946.0 2260.96107784 86% => OK
No of words: 369.0 441.139720559 84% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.27371273713 5.12650576532 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.38284983912 4.56307096286 96% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.01377190114 2.78398813304 108% => OK
Unique words: 161.0 204.123752495 79% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.436314363144 0.468620217663 93% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 630.9 705.55239521 89% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 0.0 4.96107784431 0% => OK
Article: 10.0 8.76447105788 114% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
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: 15.0 19.7664670659 76% => 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: 24.0 22.8473053892 105% => OK
Sentence length SD: 88.9276859776 57.8364921388 154% => OK
Chars per sentence: 129.733333333 119.503703932 109% => OK
Words per sentence: 24.6 23.324526521 105% => OK
Discourse Markers: 7.93333333333 5.70786347227 139% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 7.0 5.25449101796 133% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 4.0 8.20758483034 49% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 10.0 6.88822355289 145% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 1.0 4.67664670659 21% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.294957698261 0.218282227539 135% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.109349265008 0.0743258471296 147% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0843561727738 0.0701772020484 120% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.180455370358 0.128457276422 140% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0607273920349 0.0628817314937 97% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.7 14.3799401198 109% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 38.66 48.3550499002 80% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.8 12.197005988 113% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.58 12.5979740519 108% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.59 8.32208582834 103% => OK
difficult_words: 88.0 98.500998004 89% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.5 12.3882235529 117% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.6 11.1389221557 104% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 50.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.0 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.