Argument17【0706G－CRUSADE小组】第3次作业

rose_07UID??2276843

TOPIC: 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: 518          TIME: 0:47:12          DATE: 2007-2-19

outline:
1.       there may be other reasons why the town council wants to switch to ABC waste. The recycle of the rubbishes. The contamination to local environment.
2.       the increase of EZ’s charge is not reasonable either. Maybe 500 dollars is too much.
3.       the EZ’s improvement suffers from several flaws.


The arguer claims that the residents in Walnut Grove (WG) should continue using EZ Disposal on the base that the WG's town council (TC) is mistaken to switching from EZ Disposal to ABC waste. To substantiate his claim, the arguer assumes that TC's advocacy is only owing to that EZ charges more than the past ten years and that the increase of its monthly fee is reasonable. Meanwhile, the arguer provides a series of EZ's improvement as well as a town survey to justify his assumption. The argument suffers from several logical flaws.

To begin with, the arguer unfairly assumes that the increase fee is the only reason why TC in WG advocates switching from EZ to ABC. Perhaps, with the development of WG's industry, the contamination of the industrial waste to the environment is much worse than before, owing to which it becomes urgent to find a trash collection company to deal with those waste more effectively, while the equipments of EZ Disposal is not as advanced as ABC Waste. Thus, it is wise to choose ABC to collect and dispose all the waste rather than EZ. It is also entirely possible that ABC Waste sorts the waste and does an excellent job in recycling the waste; while on the contrary, EZ just simply burns all the waste. Without considering and ruling out these and other possibilities, the arguer's assumption that the fee is the only reason for the switch from EZ to ABC is unconvincing.

Even if the capacities of EZ and ABC in disposing waste are the same, the arguer fails to provide any evidence that the increased 500 dollars is just. The twenty-five percent increase may be unacceptable to local residents. Perhaps, an increase of 200 dollars is enough for EZ to improve its service while the rest 300 dollars is totally unnecessary at all. Since the evidence why EZ needs to charge 500 dollars more than the past ten years, and how it will use the extra money in details is unavailable, we can not accept the arguer's assumption that the increased charge is reasonable.

Furthermore, the facts and the survey to support EZ's increased fee is still dubious in several respects. First, the arguer offers no evidence that people concern the frequency of collecting trash more than the fee. Secondly, we can not rule out the possibility that a 20 trucks feet is enough for WG town, which makes the additional trucks nothing than a waste of money. Thirdly, the 80 percent of respondents may be not representative of the residents in WG town, due to the limited scale of the survey. Therefore, the reasonability of the increased charge of EZ is open to doubt.

To sum up, the recommendation lacks credibility because the evidence cited in the analysis does not lend strong support to what the arguer claims. To strengthen the argument, the arguer would have to provide evidence that EZ Disposal is more competent in disposing local waste than ABC Waste, and that the increased fee is necessary and acceptable to the local citizens.  

[ 本帖最后由 rose_07 于 2007-2-19 13:06 编辑 ]

phantomrUID??2284466

个人观点：
1.TC这种缩写貌似最好不用, 我上次用了一次, 改的时候被指出了.
2.the increase fee is the only reason why TC in WG advocates switching from EZ to ABC 感觉这个是题干中的事实吧~
3.另外,回收公司怎么处理垃圾不一定是政府选择的依据,这个是回收公司自己的事情.

欢迎回拍~