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16 Oct 2013, 04:01
Dear experts,
Kindly grade my essay. Your feedback is much valuable and highly appreciate. Thanks and kudos in advance!
The following appeared in a science magazine:
“The “Space Race” of the 1960’s between the USA and Russia was very expensive but it yielded a tremendous number of technological advances. These advances have provided many economic and humanitarian benefits. The benefits have more than paid for the effort and money spent during the Space Race and therefore the government should make allowances within the budget to pay for a manned Mars landing by 2020.”
Discuss how well reasoned etc.
In the passage above it is argued by the author that although the "Space Race" of the 1960's between the USA and Russia was very expensive but it yielded a tremendous number of technological advances. The author states that the benefits have more that paid for the effort and money spent during the Space Race and therefore the government should make allowances within the budged for a manned Mars landing by 2020. However, on a deeper analysis, it becomes apparent that certain relevant and important aspects have not been taken into account, leading to a number of mistaken assumptions and logical flaws.
One such flaw is the author's assumption that the Space Race yielded a 'tremendous' number of technological advances. This statement is a stretch as the author has not supported it with any valid data. 'Tremendous' is a subjective word and leaves much to the readers imagination. This ambiguity leaves space for subjective inference by individual readers. The argument could have been much clearer if the author had mentioned what the advances are. Also, the author claims that these advances have provided 'many' economic and humanitarian benefits. Here, again, the author fails to provide any valid data to support his/her view. The argument could have been much clearer if the author had given the exact benefits derived out of the Space Race.
The author claims that the benefits of Space Race have more than paid for the effort and money spend during the Space Race. This is again a very weak and unsupported claim as it fails to establish any correlation between the costs and benefits. In order to prove the worthiness of the Space Race the author needs to mention the facts and figures about the Space Race. For example, if the author had mentioned the cost was $5 billion whereas the benefits were equivalent to $8 billion, it would have justified the claim that benefits outweigh the costs. If the argument had provided exact facts and figures the argument would have been a lot more convincing.
The author also wrongly assumes that the Space Race which proved beneficial in the 1920's will also prove beneficial in the 2020's. The author has failed to take into account various other factors that must have changed over a span of 100 years. For example, there could be factors such as changes in government policies, restrictions on space travel, availability of space shuttles, availability of skilled astronauts etc that will affect the outcomes of a manned Mars mission in 2020, as things are more than likely to change over a century. This conclusion is based on flawed assumptions. The flaw is in this assumption is that the author fails to indicate which government, US, Russian or both, should launch the mission to mars.
In conclusion, the argument is flawed for the above mentioned reasons and is therefore unconvincing. It could be considerably strengthened if the author mentions all the relevant factors that decide the benefits and advantages of a space mission. In order to assess the merit of a particular situation it is essential to have full knowledge of all the contributing factors. In this case, valid data depicting the 'tremendous' advances from the Space Race, correlation between cost and benefit of the Space Race and changes in the environment over a span of 100 years that will affect the manned mission to Mars in the year 2020. Without this information the argument remains unsubstantiated and open to debate.