Archive 161: January 16, 2009

In this argument, the arguer concludes that the respondents in the first study had misrepresented their reading habits. To support the conclusion, the arguer points out that a follow-up study shows that the book most frequently checked out of each of the public libraries in Leeville was the mystery novel, not the literary classics as Leeville respondents claimed before. This argument suffers from several critical fallacies. First of all, the arguer fails to provide the details of the respondents. How did the researchers find these respondents? The author assumes that the first respondents may represent the whole Leeville citizens. In fact, with no solid evidence, this assumption is weak. Maybe, there are many dissimilarities between the respondents and the Leeville residents. In addition, the arguer fails to rule out the possibility that the most frequently checked out books may not be the type of book citizens preferred. It is possible that there are more mystery novels in these libraries in Leeville than other types of books. Thus, it has much more probability of being checked out. Finally, the argument omits several other concerns that should be addressed. For example, which group of people lived nearby the public libraries, and how long did the next study continue? To conclude, this argument is not persuasive as it stands. Before we accept the conclusion, the arguer must present more facts to prove that the two studies have an utterly clear link. To solidify the argument, the arguer would have to provide more evidence concerning the details in these two studies.