The following appeared in an article written by Dr. Karp, an anthropologist.
"Twenty years ago, Dr. Field, a noted anthropologist, visited the island of Tertia and concluded from his observations that children in Tertia were reared by an entire village rather than by their own biological parents. However, my recent interviews with children living in the group of islands that includes Tertia show that these children spend much more time talking about their biological parents than about other adults in the village. This research of mine proves that Dr. Field's conclusion about Tertian village culture is invalid and thus that the observation-centered approach to studying cultures is invalid as well. The interview-centered method that my team of graduate students is currently using in Tertia will establish a much more accurate understanding of child-rearing traditions there and in other island cultures."
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.
It might seem logical, at first glance, to agree with the argument in Dr. Karp’s article that children in Tertia actually are raised by their biological parents. However, in order to fully evaluate this argument, we need to have a significant amount of additional evidence. The argument could end up being much weaker than it seems, or it might actually be quite valid. In order to make that determination, we need to know more, and then analyze from what we learn.
The first piece of evidence that we would need in order to evaluate Dr. Karp’s claims is information about whether or not Tertia and the surrounding island group have changed significantly in the past 20 years. Dr. Field conducted his observational study 20 years ago, and it is possible that Tertia has changed significantly since then.
Another piece of evidence that might help us evaluate this claim involves the exact locations where Dr. Karp’s interviews took place. According to this article, Dr. Karp and his graduate students conducted interviews of “children living in the group of islands that includes Tertia.” If we were to learn that they never interviewed a single Tertian child, it would significantly weaken the conclusion.
In order to fully evaluate this article, we would also need to learn more about the interview questions that Dr. Karp’s team used. What exactly did they ask? We don’t know, nor do we know what the children’s responses actually were. What did they say about their biological parents? The mere fact that they speak more frequently about their biological parents than they do about other adults does not mean that they are raised by their biological parents. It would significantly undermine Dr. Karp’s argument, if it turned out that, the children said things like how much they missed their parents or how their parents had left them in a communal environment. Without knowing what the children said, it is hard to accept Dr. Karp’s conclusion.
Perhaps Dr. Field did not conduct an effective observational study, but other observational approaches could be effective. In order to make such grandiose claims, Dr. Karp really needs a lot of additional evidence. Clearly, then, we need to have additional evidence in order to get a more complete understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of Dr. Karp’s article. We need to know about Tertia and the surrounding islands, whether or not they have changed over the past 20 years. We also need to know about study design (Dr. Karp’s and Dr. Field’s). And we really need a lot more information if we want to extend the results of a study about one island culture to all anthropological fieldwork.
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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: 21 15
No. of Words: 445 350
No. of Characters: 2156 1500
No. of Different Words: 190 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.593 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.845 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.647 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 137 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 103 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 72 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 45 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 21.19 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.273 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.667 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.358 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.549 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.229 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 5, column 113, Rule ID: WHETHER[7]
Message: Perhaps you can shorten this phrase to just 'whether'. It is correct though if you mean 'regardless of whether'.
Suggestion: whether
...Karp's claims is information about whether or not Tertia and the surrounding island group...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 17, column 431, Rule ID: WHETHER[7]
Message: Perhaps you can shorten this phrase to just 'whether'. It is correct though if you mean 'regardless of whether'.
Suggestion: whether
...out Tertia and the surrounding islands, whether or not they have changed over the past 20 year...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, first, however, if, really, so, then
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 10.0 19.6327345309 51% => More to be verbs wanted.
Auxiliary verbs: 17.0 12.9520958084 131% => OK
Conjunction : 14.0 11.1786427146 125% => OK
Relative clauses : 12.0 13.6137724551 88% => OK
Pronoun: 54.0 28.8173652695 187% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 59.0 55.5748502994 106% => OK
Nominalization: 13.0 16.3942115768 79% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2290.0 2260.96107784 101% => OK
No of words: 444.0 441.139720559 101% => OK
Chars per words: 5.15765765766 5.12650576532 101% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.5903493882 4.56307096286 101% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.93596609721 2.78398813304 105% => OK
Unique words: 203.0 204.123752495 99% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.457207207207 0.468620217663 98% => OK
syllable_count: 675.0 705.55239521 96% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 11.0 4.96107784431 222% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 4.0 8.76447105788 46% => OK
Subordination: 2.0 2.70958083832 74% => OK
Conjunction: 6.0 1.67365269461 358% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 8.0 4.22255489022 189% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 21.0 19.7664670659 106% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 22.8473053892 92% => OK
Sentence length SD: 56.7336938524 57.8364921388 98% => OK
Chars per sentence: 109.047619048 119.503703932 91% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.1428571429 23.324526521 91% => OK
Discourse Markers: 2.71428571429 5.70786347227 48% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => 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: 11.0 4.67664670659 235% => Less facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.180995258953 0.218282227539 83% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0679236789006 0.0743258471296 91% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0627802568453 0.0701772020484 89% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.124420362558 0.128457276422 97% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.048861945909 0.0628817314937 78% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.4 14.3799401198 93% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 58.62 48.3550499002 121% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.3 12.197005988 84% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.65 12.5979740519 100% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.56 8.32208582834 91% => OK
difficult_words: 81.0 98.500998004 82% => More difficult words wanted.
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 11.1389221557 93% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
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.