Argument67 by c0053 修改稿，求拍，仍希望指出不足之处。谢谢！

c0053UID: 2285120

题目：ARGUMENT67 - The following appeared in a letter to the editor of a newspaper serving the villages of Castorville and Polluxton.

"Both the villages of Castorville and Polluxton have experienced sharp declines in the numbers of residents who pay property taxes. To save money and improve service, the two villages recently merged their once separate garbage collection departments into a single department located in Castorville, and the new department has reported few complaints about its service. Last year the library in Polluxton had 20 percent fewer users than during the previous year. It follows that we should now further economize and improve service, as we did with garbage collection, by closing the library in Polluxton and using the library in Castorville to serve both villages."

正文：
In this argument, the arguer recommends that library in Polluxton should be closed due to the decline of users, and that both villages of Polluxton(PT) and Castorville(CV) should use the library in CV. To justify his claim, the arguer cites the example of the merge of garbage collection departments of PT and CV. In addition, The arguer also reasons that the library in PT had 20 percent of fewer users than during the previous year. A careful examination will reveal how groundless this argument is.

In the first place, the arguer fails to convince us that the merge of garbage collection departments of PT and CV is successful. Although few complaints are reported about the service of garbage collection department after the merge, it is highly possible that a lot of people discontent with its service didn’t present it. The longer distance from PT to the new site of garbage collection department may bring inconvenience. Further, the arguer fails to provide evidence that whether the merge saved money. It may be the case that the staff’s number didn’t decline thus the merge contributes little to reduce the costs. Lacking evidence to prove the benefits of the merge, the arguer cannot convince us that the merge is a wise decision.

In the second place, the evidence that the library had 20 percent fewer readers last year than the previous year is not convincing because the arguer does not indicate how the survey was conducted. Lacking detailed information about this survey, it is impossible to evaluate the credibility of the study results. It is entirely possible that a multitude of people who came to the library in PT are not concluded in this survey. Moreover, mere last year’s decline in the number of people who use the library in PT lend no strong support to the conclusion that less people will use it next year. It is highly possible that people have more work in the farm this year because of the drought or pest. When they have more time next year, they will probably come to the library. Thus, the survey was problematic because it does not consider the future changes in the number of people who come to the library.

Last but not least, the arguer commits a mistake of false analogy in         assuming the merge of libraries will achieve the same access as the merge of garbage collection departments does. The reasoning is problematic because similarities between the two merges may not be sufficient enough to warrant this claim. For example, people may come to libraries more frequently than garbage collection departments, thus the merge of libraries will bring them a lot of inconveniences. And the operation of merge of libraries may be more complicated than that of the garbage collection departments due to the large amount of books. Apparently, differences between the two merges outweigh the surface similarities, thus rendering the analogy untenable. The arguer’s failure to prove or even consider the comparability between A and B renders the conclusion based on it highly suspect.

In conclusion, the argument lacks credibility because the evidence cited in the analysis does not lend strong support to what the arguer maintains. To strengthen the argument, the arguer would have to provide more convincing evidence that PT will have fewer readers in the future. To better evaluate the argument, we would need more information concerning the similarities between the two merges.（569 words）