Argument45 小鸡快跑 3.4

longxuUID: 2290268

TOPIC: ARGUMENT45 - The following appearedas an editorial in a wildlife journal.

"Arctic deer live on islands in Canada's arcticregion. They search for food by moving over ice from island to island duringthe course of a year. Their habitat is limited to areas warm enough to sustainthe plants on which they feed, and cold enough, at least some of the year, forthe ice to cover the sea separating the islands, allowing the deer to travelover it. Unfortunately, according to reports from local hunters, the deerpopulations are declining. Since these reports coincide with recent global warmingtrends that have caused the sea ice to melt, we can conclude that the declinein arctic deer populations is the result of deer being unable to follow theirage-old migration patterns across the frozen sea."
WORDS: 371          TIME: 0:30:00          DATE: 2007-3-4

The argument concludes that the globalwarming is the cause of the declining of deer populations. To support theconclusion, the arguer presents some evidence about the number of deeraccording to the local hunters and some resent reports. However, the assumptionsupon which the argument relies are dubious and unconvincing in some criticalaspects.

First of all, the arguer does not supplymore information about the local hunters and we cannot be certain about the numberof deer is indeed declining. It is possible that the local hunter living in anisland which is separated from the others by the melting sea and the deercannot arrive at the island, where the hunters are living, for the plants asusual. Thus, unless the arguer provides more clear evidence about the local hunterand the number of deer, we cannot accept the assumption that the number of deeris declining.


Next point, the arguer unfairly assumesthat the global warming will produce influence on the areas of the deer living.It is very likely that the ice there will be affected less than the otherareas, because the Arctic area is cold enough for ice. And, the argument doesnot demonstrate the weather condition of the areas where the deer are living.Thus, the conclusion that the ice will melt owing to the global warming is toohasty to be reasonable.

Thirdly, the assumption that the globalwarming will bring about negative effects on the existence of deer seemslogical but still cannot be interpreted. Even though the ice is melting due tothe increasing temperature, the plants, nevertheless, maybe flourish much morethan ever before. So, the deer have enough food for their life and do notnecessarily moving over the sea for sustain the plants. Therefore, theassumption that global warming will be bound to result in the declining of deerpopulations is unreasonable, if the argument cannot rule out the possibility.

Last but not least, the arguer unnecessary assumesthat the global warming is the only reason for the declining of deer populations.It is entirely possible that the declining of deer is resulted from other reasons,such as the undue hunting, the environment change or the food chain which has beendestroyed.Consequently, we are not able to believe the assumption about the causalrelationship between the decreasing of deer and the global warming.

To sum up, the argument is indeed logicalunsound with the scant information about the number of deer and the assumptionthat global warming will affect the areas the deer living. To better assess it,the argument should provide more evidence about the weather condition of theareas and the number of deer populations.

[ 本帖最后由 longxu 于 2007-3-4 22:04 编辑 ]

longxuUID: 2290268

这道题目有些诡异，一开始都没有思路；但是看下来的时候，又满眼的错误。就是时间来不及了。