argument165-7月27日

evonayuUID: 2185117

TOPIC: ARGUMENT165 - The following appeared in a business magazine.

"As a result of numerous consumer complaints of dizziness and nausea, Promofoods requested that eight million cans of tuna be returned for testing last year. Promofoods concluded that the cans did not, after all, contain chemicals that posed a health risk. This conclusion is based on the fact that the chemists from Promofoods tested samples of the recalled cans and found that, of the eight chemicals most commonly blamed for causing symptoms of dizziness and nausea, five were not found in any of the tested cans. The chemists did find that the three remaining suspected chemicals are naturally found in all other kinds of canned foods."
WORDS: 537          TIME: 上午 00:30:00          DATE: 2006-07-28

In this argument, the arguer reaches the conclusion that the cans of tuna from Promofoods(PF) did not contain chemicals that posed a health risk. To support this recommendation, the arguer reasons that five out of eight chemicals that most commonly blamed for the causing symptoms of dizziness and nausea were not found in the PF tested. And he also projects that the three remaining chemicals are naturally found in all other kinds of canned foods. Obviously, the argument is flawed in several critical aspects.

To begin with, the statistical reliability of the study’s results is ambiguous. The arguer fails to inform us of the sample size which may be far from sufficient and hardly represent. It is entirely possible that the tested samples were not chose at random from those eight million cans  returned for testing, for that matter, the cans that were not tested may be have the nocuous chemicals. Furthermore, although those eight million cans actually did not contain the chemicals, it might also exit in other cans that did not return to PF. After a careful analysis, the reliability of this study needs to be called into question.

Moreover, assuming that three remaining suspected chemicals certainly exit in all other kinds of canned foods and PF’s cans are not responsible for causing the symptoms, the arguer does not provide any evidence that the volume of these harmful chemicals in PF’s cans and other canned foods is the same. Perhaps, the chemicals that cause symptoms of dizziness and nausea in PF’s cans are much more than those in other canned foods. In other words, eating canned foods of PF would be harmful for our health and bring us side effect or other more serious problems while others will not. Until the measurement of the chemicals is definite, the arguer could conclude that PF’s cans are attributable to the dizziness and nausea.

Before I come to my conclusion, it is necessary to point out another fault that the arguer overlooks the possibility that the result can be caused by other factors as well. It is possible that not only these eight chemicals but also other unfamiliar ones would cause dizziness and nausea. Without ruling out these and those alternatives of causing the symptoms, the author cannot attribute the responsibility to these eight chemicals.

In sum, the argument is far from convincing. To enhance it, the arguer needs to provide clear evidence that the samples or even eight million cans are representative, the volume of chemicals in cans is definite, and these eight chemicals are the only reasons for the symptoms.

格式我已经改过 如有什么问题 请多多指教 谢谢:D

[ 本帖最后由 evonayu 于 2006-8-1 21:57 编辑 ]

kito9695UID: 209685

发帖格式错误，请参照家园规则进行修改

helenlhhUID: 2127690

尽快把你发贴格式改一下，免得贴子被删。版主也是不得已的

kito9695UID: 209685

帖子格式还是不对的...

为什么要大家发贴格式正确呢，是因为只有格式正确你的帖子才能够被搜索到，是为了大家好的~
所以请谅解~

再去看看正确的发贴格式，这个自己修改吧~改好了PM我