Argument126 3.18 随机

longxuUID: 2290268

TOPIC:ARGUMENT126 - The following appeared in a health magazine.

"Ithas long been believed that getting at least eight hours of sleep a night isgood for health. But a recent six-year study of adult sleeping habits foundthat people who reported sleeping eight or more hours a night had a higher rateof certain health problems than did those who reported sleeping seven hours anight. People who reported sleeping five hours a night also had an increasedrate of the health problems, but this increase was slight compared to that forpeople who reported sleeping eight or more hours a night. Clearly, peopleshould try to get seven hours of sleep, and they should worry more aboutgetting too much sleep than too little."
WORDS:450          TIME: 0:30:00          DATE: 2007-3-18

The arguer claims that people should try toget seven hours of sleep, and they should worry more about getting too muchsleep than too little. To justify the conclusion, the arguer presents a recentstudy of adult about sleep. However, the assumptions and the evidence in the studyare dubious on several grounds, rendering the argument wholly unpersuasive asit stands.

First of all, the arguer unfairly assumesthat the study of adult is reliable to be informative and can supply strongevidence to the recommendation. It is entirely possible that the sex and agesof adults cannot represent diverse cross section of population. It is alsopossible that the vocations produce great influence to the study in that thephysical work need more sleep than the mental jobs. Lacking more informationabout the age, sex and vocation, it is unreasonable for us to assess thereliability of the study.

Next point, assumptions about the evidenceof sleep and health problems in the study seem logical but still cannot beinterpreted. Perhaps, the majority of the people who sleep eight hours or morehours a night are senior people who have a unsound health before the study. Orperhaps, the people who sleep five hours a nightare the young persons who are under great work pressure and cannot have enoughsleep due to the busy work. They are thereby inclined to have heath problemsthan the average people. Therefore, the assumption about the sleep hours anight and the health problems cannot be convincing, if the arguer fails topresent more information about the people in the survey.

Last but not least, the arguer fails totake into account the possibilities about recommendation which is given topeople whose ages are not at the level of adults. It is likely that childrenshould sleep more hours than the adults in thatthey are growing day by day and need more time to sleep. It is also likely thatthe senior people should have less time to sleep as the common sense tells us.Consequently, if the arguer cannot rule out the possibilities about the peoplewhich the recommendation will be supplied to, we cannot believe the recommendation can be effective in the later time.

To sum up, the argument is indeed logicallyunsound with the existing evidence about the hours a night people sleep and theflawed assumption about the health problems. Before any final conclusion, thearguer should present more information about the people in the study such asthe distribution of sex, age and vocation. To bolster it, the arguer should also clearly demonstrate the conditionof the people in which the recommendation will be applicable.