The following editorial appeared in the Elm City paper. "The construction last year of a shopping mall in downtown Oak City was a mistake. Since the mall has opened, a number of local businesses have closed, and the downtown area suffers from an acute par

The author of this argument has failed to convince us that Elm city should deny the application to build a shopping mall in its area. The argument, as it stands, is based on questionable assumptions and a faulty line of reasoning, a fact which renders it over-simplistic and unconvincing.

First of all, the author does not support his argument with any figures in a specific time frame regarding the number of closed small businesses, parking space, criminal activity and arrests. The construction of the mall may have not significantly altered the inevitable decadence of Oak city. For example, how many small businesses did close after the mall construction? Is it a one or two digit figure? In addition, the parking shortage could be related with numerous other reasons. For instance, it could be related with a recent increase in car sales in the specific region or other constructions that took advantage of the free space. Furthermore, what were the rates of criminal activity before and after the construction of the mall? Is the increase in crime and vagrancy high enough to be correlated with the construction of the mall at all? The author should have provided details on this topic.

Next, the argument is based on a cause-effect assumption. The author has engaged in "after this, therefore because of this" reasoning. The only reason offered for believing that the construction of the shopping mall in Oak city caused the dire consequences is the fact that the former preceded the later. No evidence linking the two events is offered in the argument, thus leaving open the possibility that the two events are not causally related but merely correlated. This in turn leaves open the possibility that factors other than the once cited are responsible. For instance, bad economic conditions may have led to the closing down of a number of small businesses or increased vigilance in police efforts may have resulted in increased arrest of criminals in the nearby park. Therefore, while the construction of the park may have been a contributing factor, to show a clear causal connection the author must examine and rule out various other factors.

Finally, even if a clear causal connection is assumed, the autor proceeds by making an analogy assumption that Elm city should pay attention to the example of Oak city and deny the application to build a shopping mall. The presumption required to substantiate this suggestion is that the two cities are identical and what happened in the first will also happen in the second. However, the truth of the matter is that the two cities may differ significantly in their social-economic profile and therefore in the way they respond to the same stimuli. For instance, the building of a shopping mall in Elm City may create job openings thus reducing the possible unemployment or may not cause a parking problem if it is located in an area next to a subway. Hence, similarities and differences between the two cities should be seriously considered before reaching any conclusions.

To sum up, based on unsubstantiated assumptions and poor evidence, the arguer's reasoning does not provide concrete support for the stated conclusion. If the argument had included the items discussed above, it would have been more thorough and convincing.