Arg-170
题目：
The following appeared in a memo from the vice president of a company that builds shopping malls throughout the country:
"The surface of a section of Route 101, paved two years ago by Good Intentions Roadways, is now badly cracked and marred by dangerous potholes. In another part of the state, a section of Route 40, paved by Appian Roadways more than four years ago, is still in good condition. Appian Roadways has recently purchased state-of-the-art paving machinery, and it has hired a new quality-control manager. Because of its superior work and commitment to quality, we should contract with Appian Roadways rather than Good Intentions Roadways to construct the access roads for all our new shopping malls."
范文：
The vice president of a company that builds shopping malls argues here that the company should hire Appian rather than Good Intentions to build access roads for the company. To support this argument the vice president points out that a certain area of Route 101 that Good Intentions repaved two years ago has deteriorated significantly, while a certain stretch of Route 66 that Appian repaved four years ago remains in good condition. The vice president also points out that Appian recently acquired new state-of-the-art paving equipment and hired a new quality-control manager. The argument seems very convincing at first but does, in fact, require a closer look.
First of all, it is unfair to conclude, based solely on the comparison between the two stretches of highway, that Appian does better work than Good Intentions. The conclusion relies on the assumption that the comparative quality of two contractors' work, rather than some other phenomenon, was responsible for the comparative condition of the two stretches of pavement. Perhaps the stretch that Good Intentions repaved is located in an area whose extremes in climate or high traffic volume serve to erode and damage pavement very quickly. For that matter, perhaps soil or other geological conditions in that area were primarily responsible for deterioration of the pavement along that stretch. In short, without showing that all other conditions in the two areas have been essentially the same, the vice president should not make a determination about the quality of work.
Secondly, it is unfair to conclude based on Appian's recent equipment acquisition and personnel decision that Appian will do a better job than Good Intentions. Perhaps Good Intentions has also acquired the same type of equipment. Moreover, perhaps Good Intentions’ quality-control manager is far more experienced than Appian's new manager, and as a result Good Intentions’ product is likely to be better than Appian's. Besides, equipment and on-site management are only two of many factors affecting the quality of work. There are more factors to consider: the experience and competence of other workers, paving material used and so on. Without showing that the two firms are similar in these and other respects, the vice president cannot justify his recommendation of Appian over Good Intentions.
Finally, the vice president's recommendation rests on the unlikely assumption that the company has only two alternatives—Good Intentions and Appian. In all likelihood there are many more competitors, some of whom might be able to offer more competitively priced products of equal or greater quality. So, in this argument, the recommendation isn’t just over Good Intentions but over all other companies.
In sum, the vice president has not convincingly argued that the company should hire Appian. To strengthen the argument the vice president must provide clear evidence linking quality of work to each company. The vice president must also provide better evidence that Appian's new equipment and new manager will enhance, or at least maintain, the quality of Appian's overall work at a higher level than Good Intentions’ overall work. Finally, to better assess the argument an audience would need to know what other paving contractors the company could hire, the quality of those contractors' work and the overall cost in comparison to the two companies mentioned above.