Nature's Way, a chain of stores selling health food and other health-related products, is opening its next franchise in the town of Plainsville. The store should prove to be very successful: Nature's Way franchises tend to be most profitable in areas where residents lead healthy lives, and clearly Plainsville is such an area. Plainsville merchants report that sales of running shoes and exercise clothing are at all-time highs. The local health club has more members than ever, and the weight training and aerobics classes are always full. Finally, Plainsville's schoolchildren represent a new generation of potential customers: these schoolchildren are required to participate in a fitness-for-life program, which emphasizes the benefits of regular exercise at an early age.
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
The author of the argument assumes that opening a new franchise of Nature’s Way stores, which sells health-related products, would be very successful in Plainsville. This conclusion is based on the seemingly successful experience that other branches had in places whose people pursue healthy lifestyle, and Plainsville is one of those places _ the author assumes. To further buttress the argument the author cites cases that each can barely stand for the conclusion. The author reaches the conclusion via taking several assumptions for granted.
First, based on the reports of merchants, the author has taken for granted that the Plainsville’s people are increasingly inclined to prompt a healthy lifestyle. There are two problems with this citation: First, merchants saying that sales of sports gears are always high in Plainsville is not a reliable report; the merchants were prone to manipulate the reports in order to advertise their own sales by saying that their market is always hot. Furthermore, even if this report has any credit, the author assumes that this signifies a healthy lifestyle in the pertaining town. People who are buying these stuffs may come from other places. Even if the buyers consist Plainsville people, they may merely be motivated by the fashion to buy such stuffs.
Secondly, the author makes a hasty generalization fallacy by citing inadequate information to conclude the healthy trends of Plainsville people. Resting on the increased membership of the local health club, the author assumes that people in Plainsville are living healthy style of life. The increased membership is too vague because there are many who may only register in classes but do not attend regularly. Thereby people may not have a healthy life as the author believes.
Finally, even if the whole assumptions hold true, the writer assumes that people having a healthy style of life would be loyal customers for the Nature’s Way stores. The people might choose healthy nutrition, but in Plainsville there might already be many rival stores that have occupied the market, and left no more space for the new rivals to manifest themselves. Hence, there are other factors to consider before undergoing the enterprise of making new store in Plainsville.
In short, as discussed, the author's argument is too weak which casts doubts on the result of such a speculative investment in opening a new franchise. With each enumerated assumption being potentially unwarranted the conclusion which is based on such an inconclusive argument cannot be tenable.
Comments
please answer my two
please answer my two questions:
1) Is the merchants' report statistically reliable and trustful, to take for granted that the sales are high?
2)Is my fourth paragraph OK?
1)for any evidence, try to
1)for any evidence, try to accept they are reliable and trustful, but then find the loopholes from another angle.
2)NO. You refer something new. Argue according to the content which is the condition 3:
Plainsville's schoolchildren represent a new generation of potential customers: these schoolchildren are required to participate in a fitness-for-life program, which emphasizes the benefits of regular exercise at an early age.
flaws:
The arguments are out of topic.
condition 1:
Plainsville merchants report that sales of running shoes and exercise clothing are at all-time highs.
condition 2:
The local health club has more members than ever, and the weight training and aerobics classes are always full.
condition 3:
Plainsville's schoolchildren represent a new generation of potential customers: these schoolchildren are required to participate in a fitness-for-life program, which emphasizes the benefits of regular exercise at an early age
then here goes the argument:
argument 1:
there can be other reasons for the demand of the accessories than just for the purpose of exercise. The terrain of the area can be a possible reason for the purchase of running shoes. If the terrain of the area is hilly, then running shoes are must for the people to walk and in order to provide comfort to their feet. Moreover, if the weather is kind of an extreme cold or rainy, then track suits or running clothes are preferable.
argument 2:
Suppose the local health clubs are full, that does not mean that majority of the population is health conscious. It might well be that there are only few health clubs available in Plainsville which leads to their flooding.
argument 3:
Although children are required to participate in a fitness programs, that does not guarantee that they will use the health products of Nature's Way to stay fit. They might prefer to stay in shape by exercising daily.
Attribute Value Ideal
Score: ? out of 6
Category: ? Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 18 15
No. of Words: 407 350
No. of Characters: 2100 1500
No. of Different Words: 204 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.492 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.16 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.713 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 167 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 110 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 77 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 56 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.611 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.616 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.667 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.355 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.578 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.111 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5