The following appeared in a letter from a firm providing investment advice for a client.
"Most homes in the northeastern United States, where winters are typically cold, have traditionally used oil as their major fuel for heating. Last heating season that region experienced 90 days with below-normal temperatures, and climate forecasters predict that this weather pattern will continue for several more years. Furthermore, many new homes are being built in the region in response to recent population growth. Because of these trends, we predict an increased demand for heating oil and recommend investment in Consolidated Industries, one of whose major business operations is the retail sale of home heating oil."
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 investment advice in heating oil looks reasonable at first glance, in that it mentions the habit of using oil for heating, the strong demand of oil due to the cold weather pattern, as well as the long lasting needs from the current population growth. However, they are made in light of unwarranted assumptions requiring further examinations.
First, it is premature to make future predictions based on tradition or precisely people’s behaviors at a certain period, because people’s behavior can be changed quickly and it is difficult to include the change unless it has happened already. For example, people may tend to use oil for heating at this moment, but with the increase of environmental awareness, it is hard to say for how long periods will people keep this habit. It is highly possible people may gradually abandon the usage of oil and seek for other greener alternatives, which definitely weakens the author's point.
Second, the author states that the cold weather pattern will continue according to the climate forecasters. This statement can be easily challenged, in that no detailed info about the forecast was revealed, such as who are the people to claim this, and how did the forecast has been done, as well as how long has the forecast been predicted, so it truly harms the credibility of the forecast of the cold weather. Further, it is no secret that the climate changes so severely and becomes really unpredictable, like the unstoppable forest fire in AU and Brazil, due to the over development of the earth, so it is questionable to believe the advice based on the climate forecasts, since dramatic changes happen all the time.
Third, it is only known from the advice that the population is growing, but what is unclear is what heating facilities and what type of energy will be installed in the newly-built houses. Though the oli is the traditional energy that is used for the area, it doesn't guarantee the future usage and design is the same. Therefore, it is dubious to claim that the demand of the oil will increase only due to the growth of the house and population, which neglects people’s tendency to change and the facts that other alternatives then oil may be used in the growing housing populations.
To sum up, it clearly shows the author’s logical flaws after examining the underlying assumptions closely. In it, the author makes inaccurate predictions based on people’s current behaviors, and leverages climate forecasters’ statement without further details to back up the credibility. Finally, specious assumption about the increasing consumption of oil resulting from the population growth.
| Post date | Users | Rates | Link to Content |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2023-09-15 | Ifthekhar | 53 | view |
| 2023-07-23 | shubham1102 | 58 | view |
| 2022-08-28 | nipuntestbig | 78 | view |
| 2022-06-12 | Ahmed.I | 58 | view |
| 2022-05-23 | anon7652 | 66 | view |
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Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 14 15
No. of Words: 437 350
No. of Characters: 2149 1500
No. of Different Words: 217 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.572 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.918 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.703 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 161 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 124 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 78 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 54 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 31.214 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 14.103 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.857 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.339 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.617 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.055 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 585, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...h definitely weakens the authors point. Second, the author states that the cold ...
^^^^^
Line 7, column 260, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: doesn't
...al energy that is used for the area, it doesnt guarantee the future usage and design i...
^^^^^^
Line 7, column 583, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...sed in the growing housing populations. To sum up, it clearly shows the author’s...
^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, finally, first, however, if, look, may, really, second, so, then, therefore, third, well, for example, such as, as well as, to sum up
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 23.0 19.6327345309 117% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 9.0 12.9520958084 69% => OK
Conjunction : 13.0 11.1786427146 116% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 27.0 28.8173652695 94% => OK
Preposition: 53.0 55.5748502994 95% => OK
Nominalization: 11.0 16.3942115768 67% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2225.0 2260.96107784 98% => OK
No of words: 436.0 441.139720559 99% => OK
Chars per words: 5.10321100917 5.12650576532 100% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.56953094068 4.56307096286 100% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.84281103362 2.78398813304 102% => OK
Unique words: 225.0 204.123752495 110% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.516055045872 0.468620217663 110% => OK
syllable_count: 684.9 705.55239521 97% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 10.0 4.96107784431 202% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 4.0 8.76447105788 46% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 4.0 1.67365269461 239% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 6.0 4.22255489022 142% => OK
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: 31.0 22.8473053892 136% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 73.7298225598 57.8364921388 127% => OK
Chars per sentence: 158.928571429 119.503703932 133% => OK
Words per sentence: 31.1428571429 23.324526521 134% => OK
Discourse Markers: 9.85714285714 5.70786347227 173% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 7.0 8.20758483034 85% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 6.88822355289 58% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.67664670659 64% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.168704023032 0.218282227539 77% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0592959972692 0.0743258471296 80% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0657424769998 0.0701772020484 94% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.100599576951 0.128457276422 78% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0661177514293 0.0628817314937 105% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 18.2 14.3799401198 127% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 40.01 48.3550499002 83% => OK
smog_index: 11.2 7.1628742515 156% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 15.4 12.197005988 126% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.89 12.5979740519 102% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.38 8.32208582834 113% => OK
difficult_words: 116.0 98.500998004 118% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 14.4 11.1389221557 129% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 Out of 6
---------------------
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.