The following appeared as a letter to the editor from a Central Plaza store owner."Over the past two years, the number of shoppers in Central Plaza has been steadily decreasing while the popularity of skateboarding has increased dramatically. Many Central

The originator of the letter to the editor recommends prohibiting skateboarding in Central Plaza. This step ought to return business to former high levels. This prediction is based on evidence which should be carefully scrutinized in order to give a comprehensive estimation of the soundness of the prediction.

To begin with, we are told that during a two-year span the number of purchasers in Central Plaza has steadily fallen while the number of users of skateboards has increased significantly. Although owners of shops believe that the reason of their hardships is the skateboarders, this claim seems to be questionable because some other reasons may cause the change, for instance, people may shift their attention to other novel or more modern stores or they start to buy items and clothes on-line via the internet. What is more, the decline in sales may be caused by economic stagnation in the state. In other words, the real cause of the decline in business may be the third, unstated event or combination of events. Additionally to it, the probability exists that skateboarders may have a positive effect on sales, for instance, many of users of skateboards are adolescents who visit such malls with parents, consequently, those teenagers may encourage their parents to visit the plaza and therefore the skateboarders perhaps rather attract new clients than spooky them.

Secondly, the author asserts that with increase in number of skateboarders, the amount of litter and vandalism has considerably skyrocketed. The actual reason may be unrevealed by the author, for instance, owners of the Central Plaza may decide to reduce their expenditures by paying less money to a cleaning company which takes garbage not every day as it used to be but once a week. Furthermore, we may have a deal with correlation/causation mistake. Vandalism does not lead to the decline in sales but instead the decrease in profits is induced the vandalism. To illustrate an idea, Central Plaza used to be full of people and no one could commit a violation but today there is almost no body and thus offenders may breach the law.

Finally, the author of the argument claims that the introduction of the policy will revitalize the Plaza and sales will be as high as previously. This statement is highly questionable because the impact of the increase in the number skateboarders is unclear as we have demonstrated above. But even if the author's belief that skateboarders are the root of the problem is accurate, we still have no evidence that the negative trend will be reversed because of the introduction of the policy. In fact, the former shoppers may find a new more convenient way to do their purchases or Central Plaza may form a negative attitude to it. In both cases, the endorsement of the policy will not increase the sales automatically.

In conclusion, the author's prediction is based on weak and infirm evidence and the connection between the number of skateboarders and the decline in number of purchasers is not proved, in fact, other unstated reasons may lead to the decline. As a result, the introduction of the policy may not bring expected results.