TOPIC: ARGUMENT45

TOPIC: ARGUMENT45 - The following appeared as an editorial in a wildlife journal.

"Arctic deer live on islands in Canada's arctic region. They search for food by moving over ice from island to island during the course of a year. Their habitat is limited to areas warm enough to sustain the plants on which they feed, and cold enough, at least some of the year, for the ice to cover the sea separating the islands, allowing the deer to travel over it. Unfortunately, according to reports from local hunters, the deer populations are declining. Since these reports coincide with recent global warming trends that have caused the sea ice to melt, we can conclude that the decline in arctic deer populations is the result of deer being unable to follow their age-old migration patterns across the frozen sea."

WORDS:380 TIME:00:50:46 DATE:2008-7-10 21:45:00

This statement asserts that the declining of arctic deer is caused by recent global warming trends, which results to the sea ice to melt and apparently blocks the deer's age-old migration patterns across the frozen sea. However, the opinion cannot be accepted due to some obviously logical fallacious.

First, the statement mentioned that according to reports from local hunters, the deer populations are declining, which is not convincible in statistic. As a common practice, the arctic deer may spread in mass area in the arctic region of Canada. In the mean time, we also have insufficient information of those hunters' location, thus, we can reasonable assume that it is possible in one small area, the arctic deer is declining, but they are increasing in the whole region.

Second, the reports it selves is too vague to be informative. The time when the reports are been surveyed is unknown. It is possible that the arctic deer are under migrating while the reports are been made, thus the reports will show a inaccurate stat that the deer are declining. According to this, the judgments of local hunters are lack of credibility.

Third, the statement obviously ignored that there are mass of environmental factors, except the mentioned global warming trends, will contribute to this species' declining. The habitant of this deer is in arctic region where the UV protect layer, a layer that keeps creatures on earth from harming ray from space, is sharply attenuating and the whole arctic area is overdose exposed under the UV, which can damage the creature's reproductive organ. Therefore, it is reasonable to believe that the UV may play a important role in this species' declining.

In addition, the recent research shows that some poisonous chemical, for example, DDT, is accumulating in the arctic creatures. Those poisonous chemical may also have a negative effect on their reproduction, then declining their species as a result. The statement does not consider these possibilities, thus the conclusion is doubtful.

In sum, the statement cannot be trusted due to a failure of credible in the reports and a ignorance of other possible factors. To make this result convincible, the statement should provide the coverage area of those hunters and when the reports are been made. The other possible factors are also necessities.