When Stanley Park first opened, it was the largest, most heavily used public park in town. It is still the largest park, but it is no longer heavily used. Video cameras mounted in the park's parking lots last month revealed the park's drop in popularity: the recordings showed an average of only 50 cars per day. In contrast, tiny Carlton Park in the heart of the business district is visited by more than 150 people on a typical weekday. An obvious difference is that Carlton Park, unlike Stanley Park, provides ample seating. Thus, if Stanley Park is ever to be as popular with our citizens as Carlton Park, the town will obviously need to provide more benches, thereby converting some of the unused open areas into spaces suitable for socializing.
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.
In the prompt, it is presented that Stanley Park once was the largest and the most used public park in town. But though it is still the largest park, its popularity is reduced and the author suggested that to make Standly Park more popular again, they should provide more benches for the public just like another park Carlton. However, the author’s argument relies on three unwarranted assumptions that, if not substantiated, dramatically reduced the persuasiveness of his argument.
To begin with, the author has assumed that Stanly Park is not popular now based on the video camera records of the park’s parking: only 50 cars per day were shown in the last month's recording. However, it might be possible that the people who used to go there now don’t use the parking lot but still the visiting of people is as large as before. Maybe, the visiting of the public is less on this month only and the scenario is reverse on other months. There is no actual data presented if the visit of the public is reduced or not beside this video camera recording of last month. So, the author’s assumption that the popularity is decreasing because of the shortage of seats may not be correct as there is no strong evidence that the public actually doesn’t go the Standly Park as it used to.
Secondly, the author has compared Standly Park with another tiny Calton Park which is in the middle of the business district. He asserts that more than 150 people visited Calton Park on a weekday and it is because they have more seats for the people. However, the record only shows how popular it is on the weekday, but whether it is the same for other days of the week? Maybe the citizen like to go there only on a weekday as it is middle of the district and small, but they don’t go there on other days. So, it can not be possible to assert that Calton Park is popular and its popularity is because of the ample seat.
Thirdly, the author has assumed that the increase of benches can improve the popularity of the Stanly Park and they should use the unused open areas in order to give people a chance to socialize. But it can be possible that there are other reasons for people not going to the park. Maybe seating is not an issue for them. Maybe the park could not keep its standard: it is not clean and the facilities are very little. As a result, the public is uncontented with this incompetence and showing relucted to go there. If this scenario has any merit, then the author’s argument is significantly weakened.
In conclusion, the argument, as it stands now, is considerably flawed due to its reliance on several unwarranted assumptions. If the author can provide three pieces of evidence stated above or perhaps conduct a systematic research study, then it can be possible to determine if the argument is valid or not and whether the increase of seats will increase the popularity of Stanly Park again.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 6 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 6 2
No. of Sentences: 21 15
No. of Words: 520 350
No. of Characters: 2325 1500
No. of Different Words: 206 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.775 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.471 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.392 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 159 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 111 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 61 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 28 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 24.762 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.283 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.762 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.331 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.53 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.114 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, but, however, if, may, second, secondly, so, still, then, third, thirdly, in conclusion, as a result, to begin with
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 33.0 19.6327345309 168% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 11.0 12.9520958084 85% => OK
Conjunction : 18.0 11.1786427146 161% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 39.0 28.8173652695 135% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 52.0 55.5748502994 94% => OK
Nominalization: 10.0 16.3942115768 61% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2404.0 2260.96107784 106% => OK
No of words: 517.0 441.139720559 117% => OK
Chars per words: 4.6499032882 5.12650576532 91% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.76839952204 4.56307096286 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.48803804425 2.78398813304 89% => OK
Unique words: 217.0 204.123752495 106% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.419729206963 0.468620217663 90% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 754.2 705.55239521 107% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 4.96107784431 121% => OK
Article: 9.0 8.76447105788 103% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 4.0 1.67365269461 239% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 21.0 19.7664670659 106% => OK
Sentence length: 24.0 22.8473053892 105% => OK
Sentence length SD: 52.5383349945 57.8364921388 91% => OK
Chars per sentence: 114.476190476 119.503703932 96% => OK
Words per sentence: 24.619047619 23.324526521 106% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.95238095238 5.70786347227 104% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 7.0 8.20758483034 85% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 7.0 4.67664670659 150% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.393014384935 0.218282227539 180% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.130086711103 0.0743258471296 175% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.132318553725 0.0701772020484 189% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.240066617611 0.128457276422 187% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.123043366724 0.0628817314937 196% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.8 14.3799401198 89% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 55.58 48.3550499002 115% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 12.197005988 94% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 9.99 12.5979740519 79% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.55 8.32208582834 91% => OK
difficult_words: 89.0 98.500998004 90% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.6 11.1389221557 104% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.9071856287 101% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 58.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.5 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.