"A ten-year nationwide study of the effectiveness of wearing a helmet while bicycling indicates that ten years ago, approximately 35 percent of all bicyclists reported wearing helmets, whereas today that number is nearly 80 percent. Another study, however, suggests that during the same ten-year period, the number of bicycle-related accidents has increased 200 percent. These results demonstrate that bicyclists feel safer because they are wearing helmets, and they take more risks as a result. Thus, to reduce the number of serious injuries from bicycle accidents, the government should concentrate more on educating people about bicycle safety and less on encouraging or requiring bicyclists to wear helmets."
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 health newsletter recommends that government should not enourage the bicyclists to wear helmets to alleviate bicycle-related accidents and their injuries. The author come to this conclusion by relying on the studies that show that the increase in the number of bicyclists who wear helmets in last 10 years in accompanied by increase in the bicycle-related accidents. Before this recommendation can be evaluated and in order to check the viability of conclusion, two question must be answered.
First of all, does the growing in feeling of safety because of helmets is the only factor that cause the increase in accidents? it's possible that due to the increase in the number of vehicles in roads lead to many accidents because of cars which get out their lanes and penetrate the bicycle lanes leading to many accidents. Also, it may be the case that number of bicylists increase the past years and government did not build enough safe lanes for them in road, hence making them ride their bicycles in the vehicles' lanes causing more accidents. If any of the above cases is true then the conclusion is weakened.
Secondly, is the number of accidents is reflecting the growth in number of serious injuries? perhaps, the present more number of accidents cause less serious injuries than the past as the bicyclists are more in the present time to use helmets than the past which help them to avoid critical injuries. Additionally, The increase in the number of accidents may caused due to the increase in the number of bicyclist only. If any of the pervious scenarios is true then the whole conclusion doesn't hold water anymore.
In Conclusion, the argument as it stands now is considerably flawed due to the reliance on several unwarranted assumptions. If the author is able to provide us with more reliable pieces of evidence that take into account the above scenarios which weaken the conclusion, Then we may consider the possibility of the argument. Otherwise, applying this recommendation without providing solid reasoning may lead to more accidents and serious of injuries.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.0 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 8 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 8 2
No. of Sentences: 12 15
No. of Words: 345 350
No. of Characters: 1708 1500
No. of Different Words: 160 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.31 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.951 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.778 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 122 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 99 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 75 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 45 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 28.75 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 14.048 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.75 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.387 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.597 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.134 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 4 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 129, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: Its
...r that cause the increase in accidents? its possible that due to the increase in th...
^^^
Line 3, column 549, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “If” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
... vehicles lanes causing more accidents. If any of the above cases is true then the...
^^
Line 5, column 94, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: Perhaps
...e growth in number of serious injuries? perhaps, the present more number of accidents c...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 420, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “If” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
...crease in the number of bicyclist only. If any of the pervious scenarios is true t...
^^
Line 5, column 487, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: doesn't
...arios is true then the whole conclusion doesnt hold water anymore. In Conclusion, t...
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, first, hence, if, may, second, secondly, so, then, in conclusion, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 12.0 19.6327345309 61% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 7.0 12.9520958084 54% => OK
Conjunction : 5.0 11.1786427146 45% => More conjunction wanted.
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 21.0 28.8173652695 73% => OK
Preposition: 61.0 55.5748502994 110% => OK
Nominalization: 9.0 16.3942115768 55% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1743.0 2260.96107784 77% => OK
No of words: 344.0 441.139720559 78% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.06686046512 5.12650576532 99% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.30665032142 4.56307096286 94% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.86145609371 2.78398813304 103% => OK
Unique words: 162.0 204.123752495 79% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.470930232558 0.468620217663 100% => OK
syllable_count: 545.4 705.55239521 77% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 4.96107784431 40% => OK
Article: 5.0 8.76447105788 57% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 14.0 19.7664670659 71% => 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: 49.2024659246 57.8364921388 85% => OK
Chars per sentence: 124.5 119.503703932 104% => OK
Words per sentence: 24.5714285714 23.324526521 105% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.0 5.70786347227 105% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 5.15768463074 78% => More paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 5.0 5.25449101796 95% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 6.0 8.20758483034 73% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => 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: 0.134008329447 0.218282227539 61% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0490734939725 0.0743258471296 66% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0607020275046 0.0701772020484 86% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0853507518845 0.128457276422 66% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0688669913887 0.0628817314937 110% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.7 14.3799401198 102% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 47.12 48.3550499002 97% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.7 12.197005988 104% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.42 12.5979740519 99% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.99 8.32208582834 96% => OK
difficult_words: 69.0 98.500998004 70% => More difficult words wanted.
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.6 11.1389221557 104% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => 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.