AWA #3. Visual art TV channel

"In a recent citywide poll, 15 percent more residents said that they watch television programs about the visual arts than was the case in a poll conducted five years ago. During these past five years, the number of people visiting our city's art museums has increased by a similar percentage. Since the corporate funding that supports public television, where most of the visual arts programs appear, is now being threatened with severe cuts, we can expect that attendance at our city's art museums will also start to decrease. Thus some of the city's funds for supporting the arts should be reallocated to public television."


Any input or critics on this essay is welcomed and appreciated!

The argument concludes that the city should funds public television to support arts. To achieve this conclusion, this argument, based on the coexistence of 15 percent increase in the number of residents watching visual arts and a similar percentage increase in the number of people attending the city’s art museums, attribute the former to the later. Stated in this way the argument fails to mention several key factors, on the basis of which it could be evaluated. The conclusion relies on assumptions, for which there is no clear evidence. Therefore, the argument is rather weak, unconvincing, and has several flaws

First, this argument considers one of the two coexisting events a cause for another without solid evidence to prove the causal effect relationship. That watching visual art TV channel leads to attending museums is not always true. This relationship can be reversed: the more people visit museums, the more they love to watch visual art channel. Thus, visiting museums is actually a cause for watching art channel. Thus, the cause-effect relationship in this situation is unclear. It would have been more convinced if the argument could demonstrate and give more explanation on this basis.

Second, this argument would have been more clear and persuasive if the author described in detail the samples of the two surveys. The argument only mentions that the result from a recent city poll shows a 15 percent increase in residents watching art channel, but it does not inform readers that whether those surveyed people are the one that participated in the survey of people attending museum – even not indicate whether the two results are from one poll or two one? If residents answering TV channel question are adults whereas people attending museums are teenagers and students, the correlation will be rather weak. Moreover, the sample chose recently is not the same sample chose five years ago. Hence, if the author provided the brief description of participation characteristic, the argument would have been more solid.

Third, the ground of this argument is that watching art related channel will lead to visiting museum. This ground is likely to be debatable because it eases out other substitute channel leading to visiting museum such as internet. What if because of the booming in the internet world, people now have more chance to search for and understand art objects than they did five years ago. So those searching for art on internet will be motivated to go to museum to see and touch the real artifacts there. Ignoring other substitution of TV channel is likely to make the conclusion of this argument fragile. Instead of allocating fund to TV channel, why doesn’t government invest more on internet so that people can immediately access to visual art information and search best to suit their interest? Therefore, this argument would have been more persuasive if the author offered more thoughtful evidences on TV substitution and more comprehensive of market evaluation.

In short, the argument is flawed and therefore unconvincing for the above-mentioned reason. It could be considerably strengthened if the author clearly mentioned all the relevant facts. In order to assess the merits of a certain situation, it’s essential to have full knowledge of contributing factors. Without this information, the argument remains unsubstantiated and open to debate.