Argument48 [AWB小组]第十七次作业

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Argument 48
The following appeared in a newspaper article published in the country of Corpora.
"Twenty years ago, one half of all citizens in Corpora met the standards for adequate physical fitness as then defined by the national advisory board on physical fitness. Today, the board says that only one quarter of all citizens are adequately fit and suggests that spending too much time using computers may be the reason. But since overall fitness levels are highest in regions of Corpora where levels of computer ownership are also highest, it is clear that using computers has not made citizens less physically fit. Instead, as shown by this year's unusually low expenditures on fitness-related products and services, the recent decline in the economy is most likely the cause, and fitness levels will improve when the economy does."

经济，电脑和身体健康问题

The argument attempts to persuade us that the decline of the fitness levels dues to the decrease of the economy and to predict that the health levels will rebound with the improvement of the economy. Based on the relationship between overall fitness levels and levels of computer ownership in regions of Corpora, the argument disagrees with the opinion of the national advisory board on physical fitness that the fall of physical fitness is a result of using computers too much.

First of all, the argument fails to provide sufficient evidence to deny the board’s analysis about the root of fitness levels falling. The number of the people who have computers is the highest in regions of Corpora. It doesn’t mean that the residents there spend more time on computers than other regions. It is most likely that their average time of dealing with computers is obviously less than other districts because of the restrictions of both their traditional cultures and their working requirements, so that their overall fitness level are higher than any other regions. In order to make the argument convincing, the author should tell us how many hours the citizens in Corpora spend on computers and compared to other regions, whether it is still the highest. Then the reader could decide whether to believe the conclusion of the board.

Secondly, the argument builds a causal relationship between the economy and fitness level which is quite doubtful. What is the reason of the unusually low expenditures on fitness-related products and services this year? The argument fails to rule out the possibilities that the quality of those products and services is not as good as before, therefore people don’t want to waste their money on them. The low expenditures cannot assure that people have to save money for the sake of the not prosperous economy and as a result, they cannot get sufficient exercises so that their fitness becomes worse than before. Further more, even as the argument has told us that if the economy gets improved, and people could purchase fitness-related products and services, there is no certainty that their fitness level will increase since the health requires proper diet, sufficient sleep and other factors as well. Maybe under the huge social pressure, with the fitness-related products and services the people’s health will not as good as twenty years before. Maybe they have no time to have a meal full of nutritious or to sleep for eight hours everyday.

In sum, the argument doesn’t exclude the conclusion suggested by the board by providing persuasive evidence and a more exact comparison. The conclusion that people’s fitness level will improve with the increase of economy is not reasonable enough and is too arbitrary to think about other possible reasons for the decrease of physical fitness.

40minutes
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