ARGUMENT88 [076G飞跃小组]zengyouwen第8次作业 求拍留链必复

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TOPIC: ARGUMENT88 - The following appeared in a newsletter about health published in the country of Sauria.

"According to Sauria's leading nutritional experts, a diet high in complex carbohydrates and low in fat is optimal for good health and longevity. Because this was the diet of the people who lived in ancient Sauria, one would expect them to have had long and healthy lives. Yet the mummified remains of Sauria's ruling classes from two to three thousand years ago show the existence of many medical problems among the ancient Saurians, including dental problems, elevated blood pressure, obesity, heart disease, and early mortality. Clearly, the diet of the ancient Saurians was responsible for these problems. The high incidence of high blood pressure, obesity, and heart disease in Sauria today even among those who have tried low-fat, high-carbohydrate diets further proves that Sauria's leading nutritional experts are wrong."
WORDS: 450          TIME: 上午 12:30:00          DATE: 2007-3-3

The arguer advocates that the Sauria's leading nutritional experts are wrong for the evidence cited by the arguer, such as the findings of existence of many medical problems in the ruling  classes in the ancient times, and today's people who have tried low-fat, high-carbohydrate diets still have high incidence of such disease instead of health and longevity. The first glance of the reasoning seems logical. However, in my point of view, the argument fails as it suffers from several fallacies as follows.

The first problem that undermines the argument is the false analogy of the ancient people and current human beings. Because there have existed so much differences that it is meaningless to compare with each other. For example, the diet may be the main diet in ancient times, but that just a secondary diet for quotidian people. Further, the elements in the diet may be totally different because of the serious environmental problems existing today. Thus, the analogy of the article makes little contribution to the illustration of the argument.

Second, the new finding, that the ruling classes still have the medical problems such as dental problems, elevated blood, and so on, is still open to doubt when it is used to illustrate that the diet high in complex carbohydrates and low in fat is useless. Maybe the ruling classes did not take this kind of diet, or their diet may be harmful for their health thus caused the medical problems. In addition, the existence does not indicate that the diet is out of function. Because the diet just have the usage of lower down the risk of getting these medical problems, but it does not mean one who once taken this diet will never catch this kind of disease any more.

Third, the arguer says that the current people who have tried the diet are still high in these medical problems makes little contribution to the credibility of this argument. If the people just tried once, and never tried this kind of diet again, how can they have the chance of avoiding the medical problem when compared with the ancient people's daily diet of this kind. In addition, the one who have tried this kind of diet may have the possibility of having other kind of diet which may also do harm to their health. Thus, how would expect a good health when they just pay no attention to this.

In sum, the argument lacks credibility as it suffers the defects as it stands. To make it more convincing more information about current people who have really tried this diet and make this kind of diet become a daily must ,that can the result of the survey have the ability to make people believe the arguer's conclusion.