argument17 背水一战小组作业

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ARGUMENT17 - The following appeared in a letter to the editor of the Walnut Grove town newspaper.

"Walnut Grove's town council has advocated switching from EZ Disposal (which has had the contract for trash collection services in Walnut Grove for the past ten years) to ABC Waste, because EZ recently raised its monthly fee from $2,000 to $2,500 a month, whereas ABC's fee is still $2,000. But the town council is mistaken; we should continue using EZ. EZ collects trash twice a week, while ABC collects only once. Moreover, EZ-which, like ABC, currently has a fleet of 20 trucks-has ordered additional trucks. Finally, EZ provides exceptional service: 80 percent of respondents to last year's town survey agreed that they were 'satisfied' with EZ's performance."
WORDS: 483          DATE: 2007-2-3

This letter recommends that Walnut Grove (WG) town should continue using EZ Disposal which has had the contract for trash collection services in WG for the past ten years, rather than switching to ABC Waste. To justify the claim, the letter's author points out that, though EZ's monthly fee is $500 more than ABC's, EZ collect trash twice per week whereas ABC only once. The author also points out that although the two companies have the same number of trucks, EZ has ordered additional trucks. Finally, the author cites a last year's survey which shows 80 percent of respondents satisfied with EZ's performance. This argument suffers from several critical fallacies.

First, the mere fact that EZ collects twice as often as ABC does not necessary imply that EZ provide better service than ABC. The author fails to provide any information about the best collection frequency. It is utterly possible that picking up trash once per week is enough and twice is a waste of money and energy without any help. If so, the collecting frequency of the two companies the author gives makes no sense to favor EZ's better service than ABC.

Secondly, the fact that EZ has ordered more trucks proves little in itself about which service would be the better choice for WG. The author does not provide the trucks condition of the two companies. Perhaps EZ's 20 trucks are out-of-date and need to be replaced, while ABC's trucks are all new and effective. Or perhaps 20 trucks are enough to serve the town and additional trucks do nothing but waste money. Besides, the author does not indicate when EZ will receive its new trucks, the later the delivery date, the less significant this factor should be in WG's decision.

Thirdly, the town survey the author cites to support the conclusion that EZ provides exceptional service open to question. On the one hand, we are told nothing about the way the poll was conducted and how well it represented the public opinions. For instance, how many people participated? Were people chosen randomly? Is the sample of the survey representative? On the other hand, the survey was made one year ago when the monthly fee of EZ did not rise, and we are not sure whether there are still so many people satisfy with EZ's service after rising. Finally, the author fails to provide any evidence about local citizens’ respondence to ABC's service. It's entirely possible that they prefer ABC's service more than EZ's

As it stands, the argument is not well reasoned. To make it logically acceptable, the author must provide specific evidence that WG would benefit from an additional trash collection per week, and the use of additional trucks would improve service to WG. To better evaluate the argument, I would need more information about the last year's town survey and WG citizens' respondence to both EZ's and ABC's service.  

[ 本帖最后由 muerghq 于 2007-2-3 23:37 编辑 ]