The following appeared in a letter to the editor of the Parkville Daily newspaper."Throughout the country last year, as more and more children below the age of nine participated in youth-league sports, over 40,000 of these young players suffered injuries.

The author of the statement above enumerates seemingly several disadvantages of the children in youth-league sports for the children under the age of nine to conclude that it is better to discontinue the Parkville organized athletic competition. The author makes this conclusion via several unsupported assumptions. With each assumption being potentially unwarranted, the whole conclusion is questionable.

First, the author assumes that 40,000 injuries are significant in quantity and in gravity. We do not know what fraction of the competitors injured in those competitions and also how serious the injuries were. It is possible that such 40.000 injuries happened among 4 million young players. If this is the case, then only one percent of the competitors damaged physically. With this ratio, the number of injuries would not be bold enough to be recognized as a serious disadvantage. Furthermore, the intensity of injuries is not known. May be most of the children suffered minor injuries which can be ignored. It is naturally in that age that the playful children get a little scratch on their legs, for instance. If the injuries are not that serious, the issue raised by the author would not be veritable.

Secondly, assuming that both the numbers and intensity of the injuries are significant, the author further assumes that it is due to attending all forms of sports that such injuries occur. It is possible that the injuries are frequent in certain kinds of aggressive sports and they are scarce in the other form of sports. Therefore, there would be no reason to cancel the whole fields of competition for the children since the risk of getting injured can be much less in the other fields. Moreover, the author cites the psychological pressure on the children to win in some soccer games, as another disadvantage. This may not be generalized to what happens in the Parkville competition. The competition might have so much fun for the students instead of any psychological pressure.

Thirdly, of course that a long-time of sport cessions can take away the time that should be dedicated to the education of the children. The problem is that the author hastily assumes that it takes a long time for each student to be involved in the Parkville competition. However, we do not know yet that how much the competition takes time. It might take quite a short time for each student to involve in this competition. If this is the case, there would be no limitation on the time of education by going to the athletic competition in Parkville.

In short, the author makes a conclusion via taking for granted several unsupported assumptions. As the assumptions are not buttressed with any evidence, the author’s argument cannot be tenable.