【☆09GRE作文冲刺组☆】wendyhap 2.20号作业 argument38

wendyhapUID: 2526663

TOPIC: ARGUMENT38 - The following memo appeared in the newsletter of the West Meria Public Health Council.

"An innovative treatment has come to our attention that promises to significantly reduce absenteeism in our schools and workplaces. A study reports that in nearby East Meria, where fish consumption is very high, people visit the doctor only once or twice per year for the treatment of colds. Clearly, eating a substantial amount of fish can prevent colds. Since colds are the reason most frequently given for absences from school and work, we recommend the daily use of Ichthaid, a nutritional supplement derived from fish oil, as a good way to prevent colds and lower absenteeism."
WORDS: 445
TIME: 00:30:00
DATE: 2009-02-22 下午 02:22:43

In giving the advice of how to reduce absenteeism in schools and workplaces, the author of the newsletter recommends that daily use of Ichthaid, nutritional supplement extracted from fish oil is a good way by citing several facts. However, after careful scrutiny, I find the suggestion quite unwarranted and suffer from several inferential problems which I will illustrate as follows:

First of all, I give much suspicion to the causal relationship between fish consumption and the frequency of visiting doctors by patients getting cold in nearby East Meria. The author fails to provide us evidences proving that people go to visit the doctor less frequently due to their eating habits of a considerable amount of fish. Perhaps the high fish consumption happens to occur when people visit doctor less frequently but in fact there is no cause-effect relationship at all. Maybe people in East Meria do not have the habit to go to see doctors when were caught with cold which could be healed by taking pills themselves. There is also such possibility that people in East Meria consume fish because fish is very cheap so that they could only afford fish commonly or that it is just the season that fish is very commonly sold when the study was taken. Without ruling out such possibilities, the conclusion of the author is unpersuasive.

What's more, even assume that eating fish in East Meria could help prevent cold, the author falsely equates the situation in East Meria with that of the West Meria. Maybe the kind of fish in the two places are different and people's body conditions are varied too so that fish could not prevent West Meria people from getting a cold.

Thirdly, the author gives the assertion based on the assumption that absences from school and work are mainly caused by infection of colds which is lack of evidences thus render it unconvincing. Even if the assumption is reliable, the author still fails to convince us that daily use of Ichthaid could help prevent cold thus reduce the number of students and workers absent lacking adequate information and proof of the effects of such nutritional supplement.

In conclusion, the author of the newsletter fails to convince us the reliability of the study taken and the cause-effect relationship in the results of the study. Also the author makes a false analogy of two different areas and makes a hasty generalization that a daily use of Ichthaid could help lower absenteeism from school and work. In order to make his allegation more convincing, the author should offer sufficient evidences proving that eating fish could help prevent colds and the absence from school and work is mainly caused by cold.