argument25 清凉夏日小组3组四人帮作业

cpuliuwenUID: 2203373

TOPIC: ARGUMENT25 - The following appeared in a memo from the mayor of the town of Hopewell.

"Two years ago, the town of Ocean View built a new municipal golf course and resort hotel. During the past two years, tourism in Ocean View has increased, new businesses have opened there, and Ocean View's tax revenues have risen by 30 percent. The best way to improve Hopewell's economy, and generate additional tax revenues, is to build a golf course and resort hotel similar to those in Ocean View."
WORDS: 414  (424)        TIME: 0:30:00          DATE: 2006-8-14

In this memo, the mayor recommend the town of Hopewell(H) to build a golf course and resort hotel as the best way to improve H's economy. To support his recommendation, the mayor point out the situation of town of Ocean View(OV) which has carried out this policy two years ago and have a good improvement in its economy. As it stands, the argument suffers from several critical flaws as follows.

To begin with, the arguer commits a fallacy of "after this, therefore because of this". He assume that all the positive change in these two years are due to the building of the municipal golf course and the resort hotel. As a matter of fact, many other factors can contributed to the same result. The increased tourism may be cause by other sighting scene, such as a beautiful river running through the city or a gorgeous mountain standing beside the city. It is entirely possible that people have become more interested in traveling recently and as a result tourism in OV increased. More new businesses in OV also can be caused by other reasons. For example, the municipal committee has published some policy recently to promote its business. They may grant the business free tax or other tempting condition. Furthermore, the rising tax revenues can be result from the growth of the city's increased population, or the prosperous industry in the city instead of the golf couse and resort hotel. Any of the cases, if true, would make the arguer's assumption ungrounded.

In addition, the arguer made a false analogy between the two cities. Even if the prosperity of OV is caused by the golf course and resort hotel, the arguer should not extend his assumption to H because the situation in these two town may be totally different. Maybe H does not have beautiful scenes which could attract the tourism, or its transportation system is not so convenient as OV, as a result, even if a golf course and resort hotel are built there, there would also no people willing to go to there for traveling. Maybe H should consider other method to improve its economy which is suited for itself.

To sum up, the recommendation made by the mayor in this argument lacks credibility since the evidence analyzed does not lend strong support to the proposal. To make it more convincing, the arguer should provide us with more specific information to prove the economy progress in OV is cause by its golf course and the situation in these two cities are similar.