GRE Argument写作范文赏析(2)

　　Argument 47

　　The nation of Claria covers a vast physical area. But despite wide geographic differences, many citizens are experiencing rising costs of electricity. A recent study of household electric costs in Claria found that families who cooled their houses with fans alone spent more on electricity than did families using air conditioners alone for cooling. However, those households that reported using both fans and air conditioners spent less on electricity than those households that used either fans or air conditioners alone. Thus, the citizens of Claria should follow the studys recommendation and use both air conditioners and fans in order to save money on electricity.

　　In this argument, the arguer recommends that Claria should advise its citizens to install both air conditioners and fans for cooling in order to reduce the cost of electricity. To justify this claim, the arguer provides the evidence that many citizens of Claria suffer from the rising costs of electricity. In addition, he cites the result of a recent study that using fans alone costs more than using air conditioners alone, and that using both air conditioners and fans costs less than either using fans or air conditioners alone. A careful examination of this argument would reveal how groundless the conclusion is.

　　In the first place, the arguer fails to take into account the geographical factors in the analysis. While we are informed that there are wide geographical differences in the nation of Claria, and that many citizens are experiencing rising costs of electricity, the arguer fails to make clear the exact number of those citizens or their percentage in the national population, as well as the geographical distribution of these citizens. If only a small portion of the whole population are experiencing the rising costs of electricity while most families do not have similar experience, then the reason might be that the former do not use electricity sparingly. In this case, the rising costs of those families have nothing to do with what kind of electric appliance they use to cool their houses. Or if only families living in hot areas are spending more money on cooling, then it is unwise to require citizens living in temperate and frigid zones to install both fans and air conditioners. In the absence of all this information, it is impossible for us to evaluate the recommended policy that is intended to help every household nationwide to reduce their electricity cost.

　　In the second place, the comparison in this argument is incomplete a

nd selective. The arguer discovers that using fans alone is more cost effective than using air conditioners alone, and that using both fans and air conditioners are the least expensive way of cooling. However, the arguer fails to provide any information regarding the actual amount of time for using, respectively, fans alone, air conditioners alone, and both fans and air conditioners in those three groups of surveyed families. It is very likely that these three groups of families are located in three very different climatic regions of Claria, and hence the amount of days of the year during which they need to cool their houses varies significantly. Families living in cooler areas of the nation certainly cool their houses for fewer hours and hence use less electricity than families living in hot areas, no matter what cooling appliance they use. Unless we are certain that the surveyed families live in the same climatic region, or that they need to cool their houses for the same amount of hours in the same year although they live in different regions, which is very unlikely, we have every reason to doubt the trustworthiness of this comparative study. Furthermore, the arguer ignores the possibility that the families who are spending more on electricity may be using more electricity for purposes other-than cooling. Unless the arguer also takes this factor into consideration, the comparison is unconvincing.

　　To sum up, the conclusion lacks credibility because the evidence cited in the analysis does not lend strong support to what the arguer maintains. To strengthen the argument, the arguer would have to provide more evidence concerning the percentage of the affected families and their geographical distribution. To better evaluate the argument, we would need more information regarding the electric expense relevant to the actual amount of time for cooling among, respectively, the three groups of households and the amount of electricity used for other purposes in all three groups of families under survey.