[a习作temp] argument47 加州海滩第五次作业 [复制链接]

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发表于 2006-7-21 21:24:04 |只看该作者 |倒序浏览

TOPIC: ARGUMENT47 - Scientists studying historical weather patterns have discovered that in the mid-sixth century, Earth suddenly became significantly cooler. Although few historical records survive from that time, some accounts found both in Asia and Europe mention a dimming of the sun and extremely cold temperatures. Either a huge volcanic eruption or a large meteorite colliding with Earth could have created a large dust cloud throughout Earth's atmosphere that would have been capable of blocking enough sunlight to lower global temperatures significantly. A large meteorite collision, however, would probably create a sudden bright flash of light, and no extant historical records of the time mention such a flash. Some surviving Asian historical records of the time, however, mention a loud boom that would be consistent with a volcanic eruption. Therefore, the cooling was probably caused by a volcanic eruption.

In this argument, the assertion that the sudden cooling weather might result from a volcanic eruption seems to be persuasive at the first glance. After all, the author provides a record about a loud boom and claims that no record on meteorite collision is provided. However, the argument is still unconvincing due to a few fallacious aspects.

In the first place, the author fails to ensure that the loud boom recorded was truly relevant to a volcanic eruption. Perhaps this was not the case that the loud boom was given rise to by some proved behavior of human being for survival. Moreover, the arguer does not show whether the time that a loud boom happened in accord with recording is far early than that the cooler weather appeared. Without certainty on this point, if the cooler weather existed before the loud boom took place, there might be no relation between them each other. In addition, even if a volcanic eruption happened in Asia, I still cast doubt on the immense and widespread influence that district volcanic eruption could bring about.

In the second place, the argument provides some vague evidence to disclose that the cooler weather was impossibly attributed to meteorite collision. Suppose that meteorite collision broke out in the day time in the mid-sixth century, of which flash could hardly be caught a sight of by ancestor at that time. For this reason, there was no record about this shocking experience.

What's more, the arguer arbitrarily rules out other factors presumably inducing the weather turning cold. As we all know, different geology periods presents different character of climate. It would probably be in the change of two periods that renders the great change on weather widespread.

In sum, the argument stays dubious because of the fallacies mentioned above. To bolster the reasoning process, the author should provide additional proof to prove that it is a volcanic eruption probably happened in Asia that caused the worldwide cooler weather. Or else, the author would be considered to be as ridiculous as his own suggestion.