The following appeared in a memo from a vice president of a large, highly diversified company.
"Ten years ago our company had two new office buildings constructed as regional headquarters for two different regions. The buildings were erected by two different construction companies — Alpha and Zeta. Even though the two buildings had identical floor plans, the building constructed by Zeta cost 30 percent more to build, and its expenses for maintenance last year were twice those of the building constructed by Alpha. Furthermore, the energy consumption of the Zeta building has been higher than that of the Alpha building every year since its construction. Such data, plus the fact that Alpha has a stable workforce with little employee turnover, indicate that we should use Alpha rather than Zeta for our contemplated new building project."
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 argument is comparing two different buildings that were built by two construction companies a decade ago. Based on data for the construction cost at that time, the maintenance cost of the two buildings last year, and the energy consumption of the buildings, the vice president reaches the conclusion that for the next construction project it is advantageous to work with the Alpha agency. However, in surmising this conclusion the author relies on certain assumptions that if proven wrong can critically hinder the conclusion.
To start with, the author assumes that both buildings work under the same circumstances. Maybe the building built by Zeta is located in a damp and cold part of the country and the other is in a more tempered region. If this is the case, the initial cost of the buildings could be completely logical regarding different environments, where buildings are located. Moreover, this difference can explain the amount of money that is put into the maintenance of the building. In addition this difference in geographical environment could also explain the difference of energy consumption between the two. Under this sort of circumstances, the difference of the costs no longer aligns with the conclusion that Alpha is the better company. If the building in region of Zeta was built by alpha it may have been much more expensive than it is now.
Another assumption that could prove unwarranted is the fact that the cost of maintenance for last year is assumed as a representative for the total cost of maintenance. It is possible that the Alpha building had to go under serious maintenance only two times in the past decade, and as it happened the second time was last year. On the other hand, the Zeta building might have had to go through four major maintenance processes, but the last one that it went through was two years ago. In such a case the maintenance cost of last year is surely not a valid evidence to use as the basis for comparison of the maintenance costs of the building, which would weaken the argument further.
One more pertinent assumption that should be considered is the fact that there are no other companies that they can hire to construct the new buildings other than Alpha and Zeta. It is quite possible that in the past decade these two have not survived the market and are no longer in business. Even if they are still around, it does not mean that they are the best organizations to construct the new building. It might very well be possible that by the passage of time, other construction companies have arised that are cheaper and provide better, safer, more efficient buildings. This assumption, that the only two options are Alpha and Zeta must be investigated further.
All and all, the argument comes to a conclusion based on questionable assumptions. It might very well be the case that all the assumptions align with the conclusion but they are not mentioned in the passage. Thus, based on the outcome of the assumptions mentioned, as the arguments stands now, it is not impeachable.
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Comments
Essay evaluation report
also need to argue:
Furthermore, the energy consumption of the Zeta building has been higher than that of the Alpha building every year since its construction.
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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: 22 15
No. of Words: 519 350
No. of Characters: 2480 1500
No. of Different Words: 205 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.773 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.778 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.763 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 147 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 120 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 93 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 73 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 23.591 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.715 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.591 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.308 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.533 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.076 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 2, column 473, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[2]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: addition,
...nto the maintenance of the building. In addition this difference in geographical environ...
^^^^^^^^
Line 4, column 122, Rule ID: ALLOW_TO[1]
Message: Did you mean 'constructing'? Or maybe you should add a pronoun? In active voice, 'hire' + 'to' takes an object, usually a pronoun.
Suggestion: constructing
...e no other companies that they can hire to construct the new buildings other than Alpha and ...
^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 1, Rule ID: ALL_AND_ALL[1]
Message: This phrase is nonstandard. Did you mean 'all in all' (=after all, nevertheless)?
Suggestion: All in all
...and Zeta must be investigated further. All and all, the argument comes to a conclusion bas...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, however, if, may, moreover, regarding, second, so, still, thus, well, in addition, sort of, to start with, on the other hand
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 33.0 19.6327345309 168% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 13.0 12.9520958084 100% => OK
Conjunction : 11.0 11.1786427146 98% => OK
Relative clauses : 22.0 13.6137724551 162% => OK
Pronoun: 42.0 28.8173652695 146% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 61.0 55.5748502994 110% => OK
Nominalization: 27.0 16.3942115768 165% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2534.0 2260.96107784 112% => OK
No of words: 519.0 441.139720559 118% => OK
Chars per words: 4.88246628131 5.12650576532 95% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.7730044521 4.56307096286 105% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.83702709149 2.78398813304 102% => OK
Unique words: 217.0 204.123752495 106% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.418111753372 0.468620217663 89% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 782.1 705.55239521 111% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 9.0 4.96107784431 181% => OK
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 3.0 1.67365269461 179% => OK
Preposition: 6.0 4.22255489022 142% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 22.0 19.7664670659 111% => OK
Sentence length: 23.0 22.8473053892 101% => OK
Sentence length SD: 43.5695748343 57.8364921388 75% => OK
Chars per sentence: 115.181818182 119.503703932 96% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.5909090909 23.324526521 101% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.13636363636 5.70786347227 108% => 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 : 8.0 6.88822355289 116% => 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: 0.257499638646 0.218282227539 118% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0809065513176 0.0743258471296 109% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0843499684889 0.0701772020484 120% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.147945106823 0.128457276422 115% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0957071783755 0.0628817314937 152% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.3 14.3799401198 92% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 56.59 48.3550499002 117% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.1 12.197005988 91% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.32 12.5979740519 90% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.88 8.32208582834 95% => OK
difficult_words: 102.0 98.500998004 104% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 11.1389221557 101% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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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.