Woven baskets characterized by a particular distinctive pattern have previously been found only in the immediate vicinity of the prehistoric village of Palea and therefore were believed to have been made only by the Palean people. Recently, however, archaeologists discovered such a "Palean" basket in Lithos, an ancient village across the Brim River from Palea. The Brim River is very deep and broad, and so the ancient Paleans could have crossed it only by boat, and no Palean boats have been found. Thus it follows that the so-called Palean baskets were not uniquely Palean.
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
Paleans are known to create a specialized woven baskets having a unique pattern which is not found anywhere else in the past, however finding the same basket in a nearby village "lithos" made archeologists to question if there are others who can make same baskets. The argument in the above article is based on the assumption that the Brim river, dividing these two villages, is deep and broad which can only be crossed via a boat and there is no sign of any palean boat, therefore, the basket found in Lithos is certainly not made by a Palean. Looking at the surface of these findings, one can assume that this is true but if we go little deep into the assumptions, we can see that this argument is weaker than it seems. I will discuss in the essay below on few assumptions which if clarified, can provide better understanding of the findings.
The most important assumption of this finding is about Brim river's density and volume. Of course, if river is deep and broad, it is nearly impossible to cross that without a proper boat mechanism, however there are other conditions which might impact the human migrations during old times including weather, mass diseases etc. It could be a possibility that there had been a drought for few years which forced paleans to migrate from their village to nearby villages for food and water. During extreme drought conditions, rivers tend to dry out and this could be a possibility that the villagers could travel without having to deal with the deep waters. It is also a possibility that Paleans might encountered a deadly disease like plague or diahorrea , as in ancient times these diseases tend to infect whole village and people had no choice but to leave their homes and migrate to nearby villages. In this situation we do not know what measures they would have taken to cross river and reach safely to other places. If this is true, we can say that some paleans did migrate to Lithos and continued their art of woven baskets for their bread and butter.
In addition to this, even if we argue that there was never any unfortunate situation with these villages, 'not finding a boat' is not a sure shot sign of whether river was crossed ever or not. We can all agree that crossing rivers and jungles were the ways to travel in past, but there is no mention of river being the only way between two villages. there could be another way through jungle which associates Palea and Lithos villages which is still unknown to archeologists. If we dig a little geological structures, there are enough proofs that earth changes the structures over decades in the form of mountains, forests and rivers. Many mountain areas have known to dissolved inside oceans and rivers owning to the changing climate conditions. There is a possibility that there was another way connecting these two villages which perhaps does not exist today or ceased to exist few thousand years back. Researches need to dig deep into this possibility to claim that river could be the only way during the civilization in these villages.
Although the above two assumptions need more evidence to say the claim is valid, I would also like to throw light on another aspect of old civilizations which includes working with limited resources. We all know, based on history and cultural studies, that in old civilizations people tend to re-use and remake stuff for their daily living. It would be interesting to think if Palean civilization was also known to re-use wodden boats by dissemble them and remake into other wooden carvings say temporary shelters used during the travel did for business. This is a far shot but very much a possibility given people had limited resources earlier and there was a trend of creating useful things by their own hands. If this is true, then it is safe to say that the boats used for crossing rivers mostly either drown inside the river or dismantled to use the wood in other ways. In any case, not able to find any traces of palean boat near the river is not a strong evidence on which the whole claim can be stated.
Finally, in conclusion, old civilizations had many aspects still unknown to modern humans and we find the newest studies on various cultural and lifestyle discoveries from the old era. There is a great possibility that archeologists haven't figured out the whole truth about the surroundings and living ways of these two ancient villages and the claim made based on the current finding is not strong enough. It is needed to look into other conditional aspects and dig deeper into civilization of Palea to find more evidences that can support the claim or provide new information otherwise.
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Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 25 15
No. of Words: 808 350
No. of Characters: 3777 1500
No. of Different Words: 337 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 5.332 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.675 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.455 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 249 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 166 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 98 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 63 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 32.32 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 11.743 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.68 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.284 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.484 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.132 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 792, Rule ID: IF_IS[2]
Message: Did you mean 'is'?
Suggestion: is
...he essay below on few assumptions which if clarified, can provide better understan...
^^
Line 3, column 752, Rule ID: COMMA_PARENTHESIS_WHITESPACE
Message: Put a space after the comma, but not before the comma
Suggestion: ,
... deadly disease like plague or diahorrea , as in ancient times these diseases tend...
^^
Line 5, column 266, Rule ID: IN_PAST[1]
Message: Did you mean: 'in the past'?
Suggestion: in the past
...ers and jungles were the ways to travel in past, but there is no mention of river being...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 349, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: There
...eing the only way between two villages. there could be another way through jungle whi...
^^^^^
Line 5, column 505, Rule ID: A_PLURAL[2]
Message: Don't use indefinite articles with plural words. Did you mean 'structure'?
Suggestion: structure
...ologists. If we dig a little geological structures, there are enough proofs that earth cha...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 234, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: haven't
... a great possibility that archeologists havent figured out the whole truth about the s...
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, finally, however, if, look, so, still, then, therefore, in addition, in conclusion, of course, in any case
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 43.0 19.6327345309 219% => Less to be verbs wanted.
Auxiliary verbs: 22.0 12.9520958084 170% => OK
Conjunction : 33.0 11.1786427146 295% => Less conjunction wanted
Relative clauses : 28.0 13.6137724551 206% => Less relative clauses wanted (maybe 'which' is over used).
Pronoun: 60.0 28.8173652695 208% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 104.0 55.5748502994 187% => OK
Nominalization: 15.0 16.3942115768 91% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 3857.0 2260.96107784 171% => OK
No of words: 807.0 441.139720559 183% => Less content wanted.
Chars per words: 4.77942998761 5.12650576532 93% => OK
Fourth root words length: 5.32989168958 4.56307096286 117% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.56016438147 2.78398813304 92% => OK
Unique words: 347.0 204.123752495 170% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.429987608426 0.468620217663 92% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 1204.2 705.55239521 171% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 13.0 4.96107784431 262% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 3.0 8.76447105788 34% => OK
Subordination: 7.0 2.70958083832 258% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 6.0 4.22255489022 142% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 27.0 19.7664670659 137% => OK
Sentence length: 29.0 22.8473053892 127% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 48.0015717621 57.8364921388 83% => OK
Chars per sentence: 142.851851852 119.503703932 120% => OK
Words per sentence: 29.8888888889 23.324526521 128% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.33333333333 5.70786347227 76% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 6.0 5.25449101796 114% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 11.0 8.20758483034 134% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 9.0 4.67664670659 192% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.109454232969 0.218282227539 50% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0325041029882 0.0743258471296 44% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.04026507353 0.0701772020484 57% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0666022316888 0.128457276422 52% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0444008144826 0.0628817314937 71% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 16.0 14.3799401198 111% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 50.5 48.3550499002 104% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.4 12.197005988 110% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.04 12.5979740519 88% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.05 8.32208582834 97% => OK
difficult_words: 152.0 98.500998004 154% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 27.0 12.3882235529 218% => Linsear_write_formula is high.
gunning_fog: 13.6 11.1389221557 122% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Write the essay in 30 minutes.
Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 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.