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Argument 15
The following memorandum is from the business manager of Happy Pancake House restaurants.
"Recently, butter has been replaced by margarine in Happy Pancake House restaurants throughout the southwestern United States
. This change, however, has had little impact on our customers. In fact, only about 2 percent of customers have complained, indicating that an average of 98 people out of 100 are happy with the change. Furthermore, many servers have reported that a number of customers who ask for butter do not complain when they are given margarine instead. Clearly, either these customers do not distinguish butter from margarine or they use the term 'butter' to refer to either butter or margarine."
Write a response in which you discuss one or more alternative explanations that could rival the proposed explanation and explain how your explanation(s) can plausibly account for the facts presented in the argument.
In this argument, the business manager concludes that either these customers do not distinguish the butter from margarine or they use the term 'butter' to refer to either butter of margarine. The conclusion is based on that when the butter has been replaced by margarine in Happy Pancake restaurants, there is only 2 percent of customers have complained. and many severs who ask for butter do not complain when they are given margarine instead. At first glance, the conclusion seems to be somewhat intriguing. The argument is not logically persuasive, however, since it relies on the numerous shaky assumptions for which no evidence has been given.
To begin with, the manager just assumes that this change has had little impact on the customers, which is based on the mere fact that only about 2 percent of customers have complained. Obviously, the manager hastily draws the conclusion because the 2 percent customers have complained that does not mean the rest of the 98 percent customers are happy with the change. This is a fallacious reasoning because the manager does not consider the other potential possibilities. For example, many customers would not like to express their discontent with the change for being involved in the unnecessary trouble, so they do not complain to the server. However, they use the practice to represents their views, that is, they will never go to the restaurants again. So even if the complainants are not much, the customers may become less and less, which will bring about the decline in the revenue of the restaurants.
In addition, the manager also overlooks the other possible cases. The second fact the manager provides to us is that a number of customers who ask for butter do not complain when they are given margarine instead. It does not follow that they can distinguish from the butter from margarine. For example, maybe they think the tastes of them are similar, so they do not express their feeling to the server. However, if this phenomenon happens many times and they discover the margarine is not as delicious as the butter, they may not brook the undesired substitutes. So the manager has no reason to enjoy their temporal tolerance longtime. Or perhaps, they think your restaurant may are in absence of the butter then, so they have no need to be captious on the service. In short, there is no evidence for us to demonstrate the customers do not care whether it is butter. So the manager can not view the responding as the case that they can not distinguish them, or even they use the term 'butter' to refer to either butter or margarine.
In conclusion, the manager claims that either these customers do not distinguish the butter from margarine or they use the term 'butter' to refer to either butter of margarine is not logically unsound. There also have so many potential explanations for the customers' behavior. If the manager can give us more evidence to rule out these possible explanations and show that is the real feeling of the customers, the conclusion would become substantially stronger. Without additional evidence, we are wary of accepting the truth of the conclusion. |
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发表于 2012-8-9 22:57:08
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