2. 外语
  3. The following appeared in a memo from a vice president of a large, highly diversified company. "Ten years ago our company had tw

The following appeared in a memo from a vice president of a large, highly diversified company. "Ten years ago our company had tw

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问题 The following appeared in a memo from a vice president of a large, highly diversified company.
"Ten years ago our company had two new office buildings constructed as regional headquarters for two regions. The buildings were erected by different construction companies—Alpha and Zeta. Although the two buildings had identical floor plans, the building constructed by Zeta cost 30 percent more to build. However, that building’s expenses for maintenance last year were only half those of Alpha’s. In addition, the energy consumption of the Zeta building has been lower than that of the Alpha building every year since its construction. Given these data, plus the fact that Zeta has a stable workforce with little employee turnover, we recommend using Zeta rather than Alpha for our new building project, even though Alpha’s bid promises lower construction costs."
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
选项
答案 In this memo, the vice president of a large company recommends using Zeta instead of Alpha for their newly proposed building project. The vice president insists that Zeta is a better choice despite Alpha’s more competitive bid because of buildings Alpha and Zeta constructed ten years previously. Although Zeta’s construction costs were higher than Alpha’s, its building’s maintenance costs and energy consumption have been lower than those of the Alpha-constructed building. Moreover, the vice president cites Zeta’s stable workforce and low turnover rate in hopes of proving Zeta’s competency. Although this argument may seem quite convincing at first glance, the vice president does not conclusively justify his/her endorsement of Zeta. More evidence is needed in order to fully assess the vice president’s recommendation. To begin with, more information about maintenance costs and energy consumption of the two buildings is needed. This is because the vice president implies that the difference in maintenance costs and energy consumption is due to Zeta and Alpha’s work quality. This could be wrong, however, because environmental factors can also affect both maintenance costs and energy consumption. For example, the building Alpha erected may be located in a region with a cold, harsh climate and frequent extreme weather, which would result in higher maintenance costs due to weather damage and more expensive energy bills due to higher heating demands. If the evidence suggests this, the vice president’s argument will be considerably weakened. On the other hand, if evidence indicates a close similarity between the two regions in terms of natural conditions, the vice president’s comparison is more reasonable. Even if higher maintenance costs and energy consumption are the direct result of Alpha’s construction, it is unclear whether the Alpha-constructed building’s total costs are higher than the building erected by Zeta. By the total cost, I refer to the sum of construction costs and subsequent operation costs. The vice president mentions that the Zeta building’s construction costs were higher so it is possible that Zeta’s building was more expensive in terms of total cost. However, a lack of quantified information prevents detailed evaluation. We certainly need the exact construction costs and operation figures over the past ten years to determine which company actually offers a better economical solution. What is more, even if the Zeta building’s overall cost is lower than the Alpha building’s, whether or not Zeta should win the contract remains questionable because cost should not be the only factor considered. Besides cost, factors such as building quality, safety standards and speediness of construction ought to be taken into consideration. If Zeta’s building, though cheaper, is very shabby or contains high levels of toxic materials which pose a serious health threat to its inhabitants, it would be dangerous to give Zeta the project. On the contrary, a report from a certified independent quality-control agency endorsing the Zeta building’s overall quality would certainly boost the vice president’s recommendation. Additionally, the author mentions that Zeta has low employee turnover and thus has a more stable workforce. However, it is not clear whether a company’s workforce stability is equivalent to its service quality. Alpha’s allegedly higher turnover rate (though this has not yet been established) could result from strong intra-company competition which results in the dismissal of underperforming employees. In this case, Zeta’s superiority over Alpha is hardly proven. Feedback from the two company’s previous clients regarding employee performance would allow for a more comprehensive assessment of the true quality of each company’s employees. In conclusion, although the vice president provides some information to support his/her argument, there are still some problems with his/her lines of reasoning. Zeta may indeed be a good candidate, but we cannot logically draw this conclusion based solely on the information provided by the vice president. More evidence is needed to determine whether Alpha or Zeta should be selected as the new project’s contractor. (641 words)
解析     涉及两个对象做比较的Argument题目，如这道题目，在题库中并不少见。很显然，对于两方比较类的题目，最基本的思考切人点在于“究竟现有信息能否判断孰优孰劣”。对本文而言，由于写作指令限定了要从证据出发，因此上述的问题变成“需要什么样的信息才能帮助我们判断A和Z哪家公司更好”。
    本文有一个疑点在最后一句“Alpha’s bid promises lower construction costs.”是否需要讨论。但注意，作者自己的结论是支持Z而反对A，因此我们要看的是现有证据能否推导出Z比A好，如果不能的话，还需要什么证据。对此，A的成本更低并非支持Z的证据，所以我们后续讨论过程中不用围绕这一点展开(但在文章中简单提及一句是可以的)。与之类似的一句话是“Although the two buildings had identical floor plans, the building constructed by Zeta cost 30 percent more to build.”这里，因为我们不需要对作者的结论本身发表意见，所以我们没有用这个事实来反驳作者立场。注意：作者不一定对不代表其一定错，我们要用更客观的视角来看待问题(见第三段“The vice president mentions that the Zeta building’s construction costs were higher so it is possible that Zeta’s building was more expensive in terms of total cost.”)。
    (A以前造的大楼的维修成本比Z造的楼高+A以前造的大楼能耗比Z造的高)→Z造的楼比A好+(Z公司的人员流动不那么频繁→Z公司更可靠)→新项目应该由Z来负责
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