Private collectors have been selling and buying fossils, the petrified remains of ancient organisms, ever since the eighteenth century. In recent years, however, the sale of fossils, particularly of dinosaurs and other large vertebrates, has grown into a big business. Rare and important fossils are now being sold to private ownership for millions of dollars. This is an unfortunate development for both scientists and the general public. The public suffers because fossils that would otherwise be donated to museums where everyone can see them are sold to private collectors who do not allow the public to view their collections. Making it harder for the public to see fossils can lead to a decline in public interest in fossils, which would be a pity. More importantly, scientists are likely to lose access to some of the most important fossils and thereby miss out on potentially crucial discoveries about extinct life forms. Wealthy fossil buyers with a desire to own the rarest and most important fossils can spend virtually limitless amounts of money to acquire them. Scientists and the museums and universities they work for often cannot compete successfully for fossils against millionaire fossil buyers. Moreover, commercial fossil collectors often destroy valuable scientific evidence associated with the fossils they unearth. Most commercial fossil collectors are untrained or uninterested in carrying out the careful field work and documentation that reveal the most about animal life in the past. For example, scientists have learned about the biology of nest-building dinosaurs called oviraptors by carefully observing the exact position of oviraptor fossils in the ground and the presence of other fossils in the immediate surroundings. Commercial fossil collectors typically pay no attention to how fossils lie in the ground or to the smaller fossils that may surround bigger ones.
The passage condemns the action of commercialising fossils for three reasons, claiming that the commercialisation of ancient fossils is a loss for the public, scientific institutions and universities. What's more, the preservation of fossils will be negatively affected. However, the lecturer refutes the opinions stated in the passage in all aspects. First, the passage asserts that if fossils are often kept under private ownership, the public exposure will likely to reduce. Since private owners do not allow the public to visit their collection, people will have less opportunity to see the fossils. In this case, the public interest in fossils is likely to chute. However, according to the lecturer, the public exposure, rather than declining, tends to increase. The commercialisation of fossils provokes a thriving fossil-hunting industry, making more interesting fossils available to the public. With more choices offered on the market, museums and other institutions will be able to routinely buy fossils, allowing these remains of ancient organisms to be displayed. Second, the passage claims that scientists won't have the change to study important fossils, since these fossils are usually bought by wealthy collectors, with a huge sum of money that is hardly affordable by universities and museums. Therefore, scientists lose important sample for scientific study. But the lecturer refutes this opinion by stating that it is through the experts that fossils are valued. Before the fossils are sold, they are often given to scientists to identify their value. They are passed through the hands of scientists and carefully tested. Therefore, there is no way that the scientists actually miss any important findings. Third, the passage states that since a lot of commercial fossil collectors do not pay attention to the preservation of precious fossils when they unearth them, many fossils have been damaged before reaching the public, which is a loss for the whole scientific field. However, the lecturer does not think that the disadvantages of private collecting outweigh the advantages, since although some fossils may be partly damaged, more fossils would also be unearthed, which is better than leaving many of them undiscovered.
- Do you agree or disagree with the following statement? The extended family (grandparents, cousins, aunts, and uncles) is less important now than it was in the past. Use specific reasons and examples to support your answer. 90
- Private collectors have been selling and buying fossils, the petrified remains of ancient organisms, ever since the eighteenth century. In recent years, however, the sale of fossils, particularly of dinosaurs and other large vertebrates, has grown into a 80
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- Pterosaurs were an ancient group of winged reptiles that lived alongside the dinosaurs. Many pterosaurs were very large, some as large as a giraffe and with a wingspan of over 12 meters. Paleontologists have long wondered whether large pterosaurs were cap 80
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 202, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: What's
...ientific institutions and universities. Whats more, the preservation of fossils will ...
^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, first, however, if, may, second, so, therefore, third
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 19.0 10.4613686534 182% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 6.0 5.04856512141 119% => OK
Conjunction : 5.0 7.30242825607 68% => OK
Relative clauses : 12.0 12.0772626932 99% => OK
Pronoun: 21.0 22.412803532 94% => OK
Preposition: 43.0 30.3222958057 142% => OK
Nominalization: 6.0 5.01324503311 120% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1926.0 1373.03311258 140% => OK
No of words: 343.0 270.72406181 127% => OK
Chars per words: 5.61516034985 5.08290768461 110% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.30351707066 4.04702891845 106% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.42170481149 2.5805825403 133% => OK
Unique words: 183.0 145.348785872 126% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.533527696793 0.540411800872 99% => OK
syllable_count: 583.2 419.366225166 139% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.55342163355 109% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 3.25607064018 61% => OK
Article: 11.0 8.23620309051 134% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 1.25165562914 320% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 1.0 1.51434878587 66% => OK
Preposition: 8.0 2.5761589404 311% => Less preposition wanted as sentence beginnings.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 14.0 13.0662251656 107% => OK
Sentence length: 24.0 21.2450331126 113% => OK
Sentence length SD: 108.709217077 49.2860985944 221% => The lengths of sentences changed so frequently.
Chars per sentence: 137.571428571 110.228320801 125% => OK
Words per sentence: 24.5 21.698381199 113% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.28571428571 7.06452816374 75% => OK
Paragraphs: 1.0 4.09492273731 24% => More paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 1.0 4.19205298013 24% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 9.0 4.33554083885 208% => Less positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 4.45695364238 90% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 1.0 4.27373068433 23% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.104383159936 0.272083759551 38% => The similarity between the topic and the content is low.
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0340804480437 0.0996497079465 34% => Sentence topic similarity is low.
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0475282379132 0.0662205650399 72% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.104383159936 0.162205337803 64% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0 0.0443174109184 0% => Paragraphs are similar to each other. Some content may get duplicated or it is not exactly right on the topic.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 17.3 13.3589403974 130% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 38.66 53.8541721854 72% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 5.55761589404 158% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.8 11.0289183223 125% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 15.61 12.2367328918 128% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.97 8.42419426049 106% => OK
difficult_words: 90.0 63.6247240618 141% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.5 10.7273730684 107% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.6 10.498013245 110% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.2008830022 107% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Write the essay in 20 minutes.
Minimum four paragraphs wanted. The correct pattern:
para 1: introduction
para 2: doubt 1
para 3: doubt 2
para 4: doubt 3
Less contents wanted from the reading passages(25%), more content wanted from the lecture (75%).
Don't need a conclusion paragraph.
Read sample essays from ETS:
http://www.testbig.com/users/toeflwritingmaster
Rates: 80.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 24.0 Out of 30
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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.