Argument117【0806G-Sunbird小组】第4次作业

toumingsenlinUID: 2344846

TOPIC: ARGUMENT117 - The following is a memo from the business manager of Valu-Mart stores.

"Over 70 percent of the respondents to a recent survey reported that they are required to take more work home with them from the workplace than they were in the past. Since Valu-Mart has not seen impressive sales in its office-supply departments in the past, we should take advantage of this work-at-home trend by increasing at all Valu-Mart stores the stock of home office machines such as printers, small copy machines, paper shredders, and fax machines. We will also increase stock of office supplies such as paper, pens, and staplers. With these changes, our office-supply departments will become the most profitable component of our stores."
WORDS: 492          TIME: 00:30:00          DATE: 2007-11-15 18:10:03

In the argument, the author comes to the conclusion that Valu-Mart stores should increase the stock of home-office machines with the trend of working at home to improve profit. A basis of the argument is that a recent survey reported the increasing trend of working at home. An additional reason in support of the argument is that the sales of office-supple department will rise if they increase the stock of home office machines. Furthermore, the author assumes that the office-supple department will be the most profitable component in the stores because of stocking more home-office appliance. A careful examination of the argument would reveal how groundless it is.

First of all, the information provided in the survey is too vague to be informative. The claim does not indicate who conducted the survey, who responded, when, where and how the survey was conducted. Lacking information about the number of people surveyed, the number of respondents, it is possible to evaluate the validity of the results. For example, if 200 persons are survey, but only 10 responded, the conclusion that people prefer working at home would be highly suspect. Because the argument offers no evidence that would rule out this alternative explanation, until the questions are answered, the results of the survey are worthless as evidence for the conclusion.

In addition, the author attempts to establish a causal relationship between increasing home-office stock and the increasing sales of office-supple departments. While increasing the stock is an important element in determining sales of home-office appliance. But it is hardly the only one. To establish a general causal relationship between them two, other factors that could results in the booming of the amount of sales should be considered and eliminated. For example, salesman must be skillful enough to promote the sales. Perhaps we should identify whether the quality of the appliance can satisfy potential consumers. Or perhaps a poor marketing strategy will lead to poor sales. The author's failure to investigate or even consider other possible explanations for promoting sales renders the conclusion based upon it highly suspect.

Furthermore, the author concludes too hastily that the increasing sales of office-supple department will bring more profit to the stores. This argument, nevertheless, is based on an oversimplified analysis. Actually, it is equally possible that the profits will fall owing to the high stock cost. Without ruling out this alternative explanation, the author can not convince me to believe that profit will rise.

To sum up, the conclusion reached in the argument lacks credibility since the evidence cited in the analysis does not lend strong support to what the author claims. To make the argument more convincing, the author should provide more information about survey. To better evaluate the argument, we need more concrete evidence that there are two causalities: one is between stock and sales, the other is between sales and profits. Otherwise, the argument will be logically unacceptable.