TOPIC: ARGUMENT2 - The following appeared in a letter sent by a committee of homeowners from the Deerhaven Acres to
all homeowners in Deerhaven Acres.
"Seven years ago, homeowners in nearby Brookville community adopted a set of restrictions on how the community's
yards should be landscaped and what colors the exteriors of homes should be painted. Since then, average property
values have tripled in Brookville. In order to raise property values in Deerhaven Acres, we should adopt our own set
of restrictions on landscaping and housepainting."
WORDS: 405 TIME: 01:03:38 DATE: 2008-2-20 16:04:36
In this argument, the arguer claims that people in Deerhaven Acres should adopt their own set of restriction on
landscaping and housepainting in order to raise property values in their area. The conclusion is based on the fact
that average property values tripled in nearby Brookville seven years after homeowners living there adopted a set of
restriction on landscaping and housepainting. A careful examination of this argument would reveal the conclusion is
unconvincing for several flaws.
In the first place, there is no clear evidence establishing a causal relationship between these restrictions and
raise of property values. Commonly speaking, the determination of property values is always a combination of many
factors. For instance, the population and houses number are important factors; more population means more demand of
house, and more houses means more supply. Another factor is average income in the area; it determines how much
people can afford of house price. Moreover, CPI (known as Consumer Price Index) should be taken into account. There
might be many other factors that should be considered when tracing the raise of property values. Tripled property
values in Brookville might caused by many factors, not only these restrictions. Further more, these restrictions
might have nothing to do with the raise of property values, they just happened by coincidence. Without clear
evidence, these restrictions lead to property values' raising is unwarranted.
In the second place, the arguer rest on the assumption that factors contributing to property values in Deerhaven
Acres are analogous to these in Brookville. Even assuming that rise of property values is caused by restrictions on
landscaping and housepainting, this analog might be weak. Although Brookville is nearby Deerhaven Acres, there are
points of comparison between them, there might be much dissimilarity as well. If prospective house buyers do not
like these restrictions, these actions might be harm to the property values in Deerhaven Acres. Another
consideration is that, it is different time for Deerhaven Acres while Brookville took these restrictions seven years
ago. When time changes, these restrictions might cause different or opposite result.
To sum up, the conclusion lacks of credibility because the fact stated in the argument dose not strong support what
the arguer maintains. To strengthen the argument, the arguer would have to provide more evidence concerning the
causal relationship between these restrictions and property values' raising. And to better evaluate the argument,
more analog conditions of Deerhaven Acres and Brookville should be compared.
看了别的同学写的Argument，感觉我的正文的point有所欠缺，希望大家多提意见，我好改出一个适合自己的Argument模板来。
