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沙发
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发表于 2010-4-1 14:34:49
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给自己顶下,好像我都没有format好。又改了下,哪位朋友帮着给点意见吧。谢了。
题目 "The following appeared in a newspaper editorial: “As violence in movies increases, so do crime rates in our cities. To combat this problem we must establish a board to censor certain movies, or we must limit admission to persons over 21 years of age. Apparently our legislators are not concerned about this issue since a bill calling for such actions recently failed to receive a majority vote.” "
The argument advocates two actions to control and reduce crime rates in the cities: (1) to establish a board to censor certain movies, and (2) to limit violent movie access to people over 21 years old. To support this proposal, the arguer cites his observation that the city crime rates increase in parallel with the rising violent content in movies. Additionally, the arguer criticizes the indifference of legislators for not passing the bill which calls for the above two actions. At first glance, the proposed crime control measures appear to be legitimate, but close examining reveals that the rationale behind them is beset with logical flaws.
Most conspicuously, the argument rests on the gratuitous assumption of “more movie violence, more city crimes”. In the first place, that these two phenomena occur or are observed at the same time does not provide any evidence proving that the increased movie violence is conducive to the city crime rate change. May the former be one of the causes of the latter, many other reasons could be attributed to crime rate increase, such as economic slump, massive demographic change, or loosened law system. Unless it rules out the other factors, the argument cannot conclusively assert that movie violence gives rise to higher crime rates. Before such a crucial assumption is closely scrutinized and seamlessly proved, the proposed solution remains suspect.
In addition, even if we assume the problem is solely brought about by movie violence, the argument is still too flawed in the following two aspects to be convincing. First, there is no proof in the report testifying who commits the crimes. If the criminals are all above 21 years old, allowing them to have violent movie access equates with giving green light to crimes. Second, whether the increased crimes fall into the violence category is unclear. Had it not been violent crimes (for instance, economic crimes), censoring the movies in question does not offer an applicable roadmap to improve the situation. Hence, without understanding the nature of the problem, the recommended solution is futile.
Last but not least, the arguer’s criticism towards the legislators is groundless. Once again, he commits a similar fallacy of causal oversimplification by attributing the failure of a bill to the unconcern of legislators. As is known to all, passing a bill calls for a complex and justifiable process in any lawful society; the fact that the bill has not been endorsed may suggest that the proposed actions comprising the bill are flawed. We do not have to go far to realize that this evidence actually undermines the statement.
In conclusion, the argument is hardly sound or persuasive because it leaves several key issues unaddressed. Instead of directly voicing solutions, the argument should carefully analyze the causes of the crime rate increase, dissect the nature of this problem, and cite compelling evidence before proposing actions and criticizing. Only in this way, the argument can be substantiated. |
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