GRE作文范文 Argument-35

“The country Myria, which charges fees for the use of national parks, reports little evidence of environmental damage. This strongly suggests that for the country Illium, the best way to preserve public lands is to charge people more money when they are using national parks and wilderness areas for activities with heavy environmental impact. By collecting fees from those people who overuse public lands, Illium will help preserve those lands for present and future generations.”

嘉文博譯Sample Essay

In this argument, the arguer states that the country of Myria charges fees for the use of national parks and reports little evidence of environmental damage. The arguer cites this as a strong indicator that the country of Illium should charge people more money for activities with heavy environmental impact when they are using national parks and wilderness areas. The arguer further states that by collecting fees from people who overuse public lands, Illium will help preserve those lands for present and future generations. This argument is unconvincing because it suffers from a lack of evidence and problematic reasoning.

To begin with, there is no supporting evidence that the countries of Myria and Illium have the same types of national parks or that they are comparable in any other manner. It is possible that Myria is a sparsely populated country with very few visitors to its national parks, while Illium may be heavily populated with millions of visitors to its national parks. For example, it is possible that Myria’s national parks are not attractive to its own residents or tourists while Illium’s national parks may be wildly popular with visitors. With few visitors to Myria, it is unlikely that there would be much evidence of environmental damage. Furthermore, the arguer states that the country of Myria reports little evidence of environmental damage, whether to its national parks or otherwise. There may actually be tremendous environmental damage in Myria that the country simply does not report for political or economic reasons, for example.

In addition, there is no mention of how much the country of Myria charges as fees for the use of national parks. Their fees may actually be dramatically lower than what Illium is already charging as fees to use its national parks. The simple fact that Myria charges a fee for using its national parks does not suggest that Illium should charge more money when using national parks and wilderness areas for activities with heavy environmental impact – this is not logical reasoning. Moreover, Illium may already be charging a very high fee for this type of park use – simply charging more may not make any difference as far as how the areas are used.

Finally, the most glaring flaw in this argument lies with the reasoning in the last sentence. The arguer states that by collecting fees from people who overuse public lands, Illium will help preserve those lands for present and future generations. The fact of the matter is that simply collecting fees from people who overuse public lands will do nothing to preserve the lands – the fees must be used in some constructive manner to actively protect those particular environmental areas. The argument is fatally weakened by merely calling for the collection of such fees without indicating how those fees will be spent to safeguard the future of the national parks and wilderness areas of Illium.

In summary, the arguer bases his or her argument on scant evidence and a false analogy between two possibly very different countries. Very little factual information is included in the argument to persuade the reader that charging park users more money for activities with heavy environmental impact will prevent environmental damage in the country of Illium. Furthermore, proposing that simply collecting higher fees from people who overuse public lands will conserve such lands critically weakens the argument. Without presenting concrete evidence that shows a direct correlation between collecting higher park usage fees and the country’s ability to preserve its national parks and wilderness areas, the argument fails to deliver on its premise and should be rejected.

(603 words)

參考譯文

對(duì)使用國(guó)家公園實(shí)施收費(fèi)政策的Myria國(guó)，據(jù)稱幾乎找不到毀壞環(huán)境的跡象。這有力地表明，對(duì)于Illium國(guó)來(lái)說(shuō)，保護(hù)公共土地的最佳方法是，當(dāng)人們使用國(guó)家公園和野地從事某些會(huì)帶來(lái)沉重環(huán)境后果的活動(dòng)時(shí)，就應(yīng)該向這些人收取更多的費(fèi)用。通過(guò)向那些過(guò)度使用公共土地的人們征收費(fèi)用，Illium國(guó)將能為目前和未來(lái)的人類后代保護(hù)好這些土地

在本項(xiàng)論述中，論述者稱，Myria國(guó)對(duì)使用國(guó)家公園實(shí)行收費(fèi)，且?guī)缀醪淮嬖诃h(huán)境遭毀壞的跡象。論述者將此援引為一種強(qiáng)有力的標(biāo)志，說(shuō)明Illium國(guó)應(yīng)該向人們收取更多的費(fèi)用，以同意人們?cè)谑褂脟?guó)家公園和荒郊野地時(shí)可從事某些會(huì)產(chǎn)生沉重環(huán)境后果的活動(dòng)。論述者進(jìn)一步稱，通過(guò)向那些過(guò)度使用公共土地的人們征收費(fèi)用，Illium國(guó)就能為目前和未來(lái)的人類后代保護(hù)好這些土地。以上的這番論述難以令人置信，因?yàn)樗鼮樽C據(jù)的缺乏和成問(wèn)題的邏輯推理所累。

首先，沒有任何佐證性證據(jù)能表明，Myria國(guó)和Illium國(guó)擁有相同類型的國(guó)家公園，或者這兩個(gè)國(guó)家在任何方面具有可比性。情況有可能是，Myria國(guó)是一個(gè)人口稀少的國(guó)家，前往國(guó)家公園游玩的游客寥寥無(wú)幾，而Illium國(guó)則有可能人口眾多，有數(shù)以百萬(wàn)計(jì)的游客會(huì)去游覽國(guó)家公園。例如，Myria國(guó)的國(guó)家公園可能對(duì)本國(guó)居民或旅游者不具吸引力，但I(xiàn)llium國(guó)的國(guó)家公園卻可能廣受游客們的喜愛。由于Myria國(guó)游客稀少，毀壞環(huán)境的跡象自然就不太可能出現(xiàn)。此外，論述者稱，Myria國(guó)據(jù)報(bào)道幾乎沒有任何環(huán)境遭破壞的證據(jù)，無(wú)論是對(duì)其國(guó)家公園還是對(duì)于其他地方。實(shí)際上，Myria國(guó)可能發(fā)生過(guò)巨大的環(huán)境破壞，只不過(guò)出于諸如政治或經(jīng)濟(jì)的原因而沒有將其公諸于眾罷了。

此外，文中沒能提及Myria國(guó)對(duì)使用國(guó)家公園究竟收取了多少費(fèi)用。它所收取的費(fèi)用可能要比Illium國(guó)早就在收取的國(guó)家公園使用費(fèi)遠(yuǎn)低得多。Myria國(guó)對(duì)使用國(guó)家公園收取費(fèi)用，這一事實(shí)本身并不意味著Illium國(guó)就應(yīng)該收取更多的費(fèi)用，以同意人們?cè)谑褂脟?guó)家公園和荒郊野地時(shí)可從事某些會(huì)帶來(lái)沉重環(huán)境后果的活動(dòng)。如果這樣的話，這絕不是一種合乎邏輯的推理。除此之外，Illium國(guó)有可能對(duì)這類公園用途早就在收取一種非常高昂的費(fèi)用。純粹收取更高的費(fèi)用，無(wú)論土地如何被使用，均無(wú)法顯示出任何差別。

最后，這段論述中最為突出的漏洞在于最后一句中的邏輯推理。論述者宣稱，通過(guò)向過(guò)度使用公共土地的人征收費(fèi)用，Illium國(guó)將有助于為目前和未來(lái)的人類后代保護(hù)好這些土地。整個(gè)問(wèn)題的關(guān)鍵事實(shí)在于，單純向過(guò)度使用公共土地的人征收費(fèi)用對(duì)于保護(hù)土地而言無(wú)濟(jì)于事——這些費(fèi)用應(yīng)該以某種富有建設(shè)性的方式積極用來(lái)保護(hù)這些特定的環(huán)境區(qū)域才會(huì)有益。如此看來(lái)，這項(xiàng)論述受到了致命的削弱，因?yàn)樗鼉H僅號(hào)召去征收這些費(fèi)用，卻并不表明，這些費(fèi)用將如何被用來(lái)保護(hù)Illium國(guó)的國(guó)家公園和荒郊野地的未來(lái)。

總而言之，論述者將其論點(diǎn)建立在極為貧乏的證據(jù)和兩個(gè)可能是迥然有別的國(guó)家之間的某種虛假類比之上。論述中幾乎不含有任何事實(shí)性的信息來(lái)使讀者相信，向使用公園者收取更多的費(fèi)用，以同意他們從事某些帶有沉重環(huán)境后果的活動(dòng)，這樣做就可以防止Illium國(guó)的環(huán)境遭到破壞。此外，論述者所提出的建議，即僅靠向過(guò)度使用公共土地的人們征收更高的費(fèi)用將有助于保護(hù)這些土地，又極其嚴(yán)重地削弱了此項(xiàng)論述。如果不拿出確鑿的證據(jù)來(lái)證明，收取較高公園使用費(fèi)與該國(guó)保護(hù)其國(guó)家公園和荒郊野地的能力之間存在著直接關(guān)聯(lián)，那么，這一論述便無(wú)法論證其命題，故應(yīng)予擯棄。