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.
In this argument, the author recommends that Nature’s Way (NW), a chain of health stores selling health foods and health-related products, should open a new franchise in Plainsville. To support this view, the author cites the following facts about Plainsville: (1) sales of exercise shoes and clothing are at all-time highs; (2) the local health club is more popular than ever; (3) the city’s schoolchildren are required to participate in a fitness program. However, close scrutiny of each of these facts reveals that none of them lend sound support to the recommendation.
First, strong sales in exercise clothing do not necessarily indicate that Plainsville residents would be interested in exercising or NW’s products. Perhaps exercise outfits are inexpensive compared to other types of clothing and thus are favored by the middle-class families, which is also the majority of Plainsville citizens. Perhaps sports apparel is comfortable, or fashionable and prevailing among all ages. For that matter, perhaps the stronger-than-ever sales are due to increasing sales to tourists. In short, without ruling out other possible reasons for the strong sales, the author cannot convince me that Plainsville residents are exercising regularly, let alone that they would be interested in buying NW’s health products.
Secondly, the popularity of local club and its training classes accomplishes nothing toward bolstering the recommendation. Perhaps the club is of a very small scale, such as a max capacity of 20 people, so a slight increase in club members can easily fill up the classes. Or perhaps the club’s primary appeal is as a single meeting place and its members actually have little interest in exercising. Besides, even if the members are sufficient in number and would patronize a healthy lifestyle, the new NW store may be far away from the club, which makes potential customers less likely to shop.
Thirdly, the fact that fitness programs are mandatory for schoolchildren in Plainsville does not ensure NW’s profit in the future. Mandatory participants in programs cannot indicate children’s genuine interests, or even more egregiously, students would be averse such obligation against their wills and as well as exercising. Besides, many years must pass before those children will be mature enough to make their shopping decision when it comes to health foods and other health-related products. Their habits and interests might change radically over time. For example, when they grow up, they might prefer unhealth lifestyle, e.g. eating junk food, living a sedentary life or staying up late – as contrary to the healthful habits imposed upon them now.
Finally, even assuming that Plainsville residents are strongly interested in eating health foods and other health-related products, the recommendation also relies on two additional unwarranted assumptions: (1) people in Plainsville prefer NW over any other merchants that sell similar products, and (2) this interest would continue in the foreseeable future that are long enough for NW to make a profit. Until the author substantiates both assumptions I remain suspicious of the lucrative prospect of NW.
To sum up, the author fails to justify his/her recommendation that a NW franchise in Plainsville would be successful because the evidence cited does not constitute logically invulnerable support. To be more convincing, the author should provide more information – perhaps by way of a local survey – to justify his/her assumption that Plainsville citizens are fond of exercising and likely to buy health foods and health-related products at a NW store.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
argument 1 -- OK
argument 2 -- OK
argument 3 -- OK
argument 4 -- OK
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 5.5 out of 6
Category: Excellent Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 21 15
No. of Words: 565 350
No. of Characters: 2979 1500
No. of Different Words: 290 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.875 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.273 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.993 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 231 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 173 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 129 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 81 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 26.905 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 11.9 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.667 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.302 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.564 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.115 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 6 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 470, Rule ID: CLOSE_SCRUTINY[1]
Message: Use simply 'scrutiny'.
Suggestion: scrutiny
...ticipate in a fitness program. However, close scrutiny of each of these facts reveals that non...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 438, Rule ID: ADJECTIVE_IN_ATTRIBUTE[1]
Message: A more concise phrase may lose no meaning and sound more powerful.
Suggestion: sufficient
...ising. Besides, even if the members are sufficient in number and would patronize a healthy lifestyle...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 401, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “Until” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
...re long enough for NW to make a profit. Until the author substantiates both assumptio...
^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, besides, e.g., finally, first, however, if, may, second, secondly, so, third, thirdly, thus, well, for example, in short, such as, as well as, to sum up
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 23.0 19.6327345309 117% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 16.0 12.9520958084 124% => OK
Conjunction : 19.0 11.1786427146 170% => OK
Relative clauses : 16.0 13.6137724551 118% => OK
Pronoun: 34.0 28.8173652695 118% => OK
Preposition: 68.0 55.5748502994 122% => OK
Nominalization: 9.0 16.3942115768 55% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 3102.0 2260.96107784 137% => OK
No of words: 566.0 441.139720559 128% => OK
Chars per words: 5.48056537102 5.12650576532 107% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.87757670434 4.56307096286 107% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.12506564503 2.78398813304 112% => OK
Unique words: 301.0 204.123752495 147% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.531802120141 0.468620217663 113% => OK
syllable_count: 932.4 705.55239521 132% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 4.96107784431 40% => OK
Article: 10.0 8.76447105788 114% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 4.0 1.67365269461 239% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 7.0 4.22255489022 166% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 21.0 19.7664670659 106% => OK
Sentence length: 26.0 22.8473053892 114% => OK
Sentence length SD: 74.6875881768 57.8364921388 129% => OK
Chars per sentence: 147.714285714 119.503703932 124% => OK
Words per sentence: 26.9523809524 23.324526521 116% => OK
Discourse Markers: 8.0 5.70786347227 140% => OK
Paragraphs: 6.0 5.15768463074 116% => OK
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 17.0 8.20758483034 207% => Less positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 6.88822355289 58% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 0.0 4.67664670659 0% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.290065774477 0.218282227539 133% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0815538977772 0.0743258471296 110% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.112056869899 0.0701772020484 160% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.152565069801 0.128457276422 119% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0755429990095 0.0628817314937 120% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 17.9 14.3799401198 124% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 45.09 48.3550499002 93% => OK
smog_index: 11.2 7.1628742515 156% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.4 12.197005988 110% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.8 12.5979740519 117% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.11 8.32208582834 109% => OK
difficult_words: 150.0 98.500998004 152% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.4 11.1389221557 111% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.