0706G － CSMY作文互改小组-第三次作业

meichengyuUID: 2121098

TOPIC: ARGUMENT65 - The following appeared in a memo from the president of a chain of cheese stores located throughout the United States.

"For many years all the stores in our chain have stocked a wide variety of both domestic and imported cheeses. Last year, however, the five best-selling cheeses at our newest store were all domestic cheddar cheeses from Wisconsin. Furthermore, a recent survey by Cheeses of the World magazine indicates an increasing preference for domestic cheeses among its subscribers. Since our company can reduce expenses by limiting inventory, the best way to improve profits in all of our stores is to discontinue stocking many of our varieties of imported cheese and concentrate primarily on domestic cheeses."
WORDS: 349          TIME: 0:30:00          DATE: 2007-1-7

Citing several unfounded assumptions as well as some dubious evidence and presenting some simple analysis, the arguer recommends that the best way to improve profits in all of their stories is to discontinue stocking many of their varieties of imported cheese and concentrate primarily on domestic cheeses. However, we do not have to look very far to see the line of the reasoning suffers from several critical flaws which will be discussed as follows.

To begin with, obviously this assumption presents a false analogy. The author asserts that their company should concentrate on domestic cheeses because on kind of domestic cheese had a good sale last year. But he/she assumes without justification that the background condition have remain the same at different times and different locations. For instance, it is highly possible that the domestic cheeses' sales are not stable, and though it sales good last year, it also would be decrease in the coming year. So without any further evidence to guarantee the same situation will happen in the future the author's conclusion is hasty and unconvincing.

Furthermore, another point that may also weaken the logic of this argument is that although the arguer listed five best-selling cheeses were all cheddar cheeses from Wisconsin, there is still no information about the cost and profit of those domestic cheeses and the situation about the imported cheeses. It is also possible that the domestic cheeses had got a lower profit than the import cheeses because the domestic ones' cost is far higher than the import ones' even they were selling better. Thus, we could not decide which cheese will bring better profit just through its sale.

Last but not least, before I come to my own conclusion, it is necessary to point out several other flaws that undermine the argument. First, the author only provides the sales information about their newest store. Lacking data about all of other stories, we could not make any analogy that the same thing will happen in other stories because other stories may in different regions and have totally different kind of customs. Second, the survey quoted in this argument by cheese of world magazine is also doubtful. The author fails to show the details of the survey such as how many responders were surveyed, how wide is that survey taken place and can this survey represent all the national people or the local people. Until these questions are answered, any conclusion from this survey would be baseless and unwarranted.

All in all, although the argument seems to be plausible, it is neither sound nor persuasive. The conclusion lacks credibility because the evidence cited ion the analysis fails to lend strong support in the arguer's claim. To make it more logically acceptable, the author should have to provide much more specific evidence concerning the giving factors above.