argument46 发现限时太困难，请指教

陈晓辉UID：2425630

ARGUMENT46 - Although black bears are common in the eastern Canadian province of Labrador, grizzly bears-often similar in color, but much larger-were believed to exist only in the western provinces. Despite a nineteenth-century explorer's account of having startled and narrowly escaped from a grizzly bear deep in the woods in Labrador, modern scientists find no physical evidence that grizzly bears have ever lived in Labrador. But recent research into the language and legends of the Innu, a people who have lived in Labrador for thousands of years, reveals that their language has words for two different kinds of bears, and their ancient legends attribute different characteristics to the two kinds of bears. Therefore, there probably were grizzly bears in Labrador, and the explorer's account probably accurately identified the bear.

The arguer drew two conclusions above. First, there may be grizzly bears in Labrador. Second, the explorer's account probably accurately identified the bear. The reason he provided is that there are two different kinds of bears in the Innu language and the Innu ancient legends attribute different characteristics to the two kinds of bears. There are logical errors in the arguer's deducing, which makes his assertions are unreliable.

For one thing, the main reason the arguer brought forward are the language and legends. The problem is that whether the research of language is useful, or can there be any misunderstanding to the language. Because we don't know whether or not the language research was made by authorities or some one not so professional, we can not firm rely on this search result. Maybe there are some words’ meaning just like grizzly bear, or the description of some other kinds of bears which is similar to grizzly lead the arguer mistaken it as grizzly bears. The legends are neither can be used as evidence. That is only something without evidences support. The arguer seemed to deduce a conclusion with things need warranted, made a serious logical mistake.

Even though there may be grizzly lived in Labrador, no evidence show that the explorer's account is true, let alone to accurately identify the bear. For one thing need to be investigated is whether he really startled and narrowly escaped from a grizzly bear? We must make sure that there were not other reasons that may him to tell a lie. For another, is the report reliable? For it was happened in nineteenth-century, there may be some mistakes in the report which is not so accurate as our contemporary. Another case may be that the explorer had mistaken a bear just be like to the grizzly bear as the grizzly bear.

From analyzed above, we can see that the arguer’s assertions are not persuasive. He should offer more statistic evidence or study reports to give sufficient support to his conclusion, such as studies of the number of grizzly bears or researches did by authorities.

(2008-3-5 16:33:53)