GMAT Essays (AWA)

"Without new ideas, any society will stagnate. New ideas can only be introduced in a society that permits freedom of expression. Therefore, if a society is to thrive, all limits on freedom of expression should be eliminated."

Discuss how well-reasoned you find this argument. In your discussion, be sure to analyze the line of reasoning and the use of evidence in the argument. For example, you may need to consider what questionable assumptions underlie the thinking and what alternative explanations or counterexamples might weaken the conclusion. You can also discuss what sort of evidence would strengthen or refute the argument, what changes in the argument would make it more logically sound, and what, if anything, would help you better evaluate its conclusion.



"With great power comes great responsibilty". Although freedom of expression is necessary for a communicating one's ideas, unrestricted freedom can have its ill effects and may lead to uncivilized behaviour on part of the people. Hence,it is important to have some restrictions on the way in which ideas can be expressed.

In the preceding statement the author states that freedom of expression should be unrestricted for ideas to be discussed and that helps the society to grow. Although author's claim may have merit, author's poorly reasoned argument is based on several questionable premises and assumptions, and solely on the basis of evidence provided in the argument, author's conclusion can not be accepted as valid. Mentioned below are the issues with the argument.


Firstly, the author states that new ideas can only be introduced in a society where there is freedom of expression. However, the author fails to provide any explaination for this. Societies that are restricted in freedom of expression are still capable of developing. Many communist countries like erstwhile Soviet Union were considered restricted in terms of the fressom of expression that the people. There were even restrictions on what the media can report. But even then the society of the Soviet Union was growing at a good pace. Soviet Union was the second only to United States in fields such as olympic sports, space technology etc. This clearly shows that even with restrictions in freedom of expression a society can grow and thus undermines the argument that ideas can only be introduced in a sociiety permiting freedom of expression.


Secondly, the argument doesn't provide any explaination on what is considered a limit on freedom of expression. For person living in India any Islamic country may be seem to be a nation which has curbs on freedom of expression as the ladies are required to be wear clothes like " Burkha" which cover their entire body when they are in public. But for a person living in such countries like UAE it is very natural and he may feel that India is a country which is too liberal. Therefore, the restictions or lack of it are based on the culture of the the society.


While, there are key issues with argument's premises and assumptions, it is not to say that it is wihout a base. In a society like Germany during Hitler's period was under a dictatorship and had no freedom of expression whatsover, this led to uncivilized behaviour and inhumane conditions for people to live in. Freedom of expression becomes very critical in such situations.


In sum, author's illogical argument is based on unsupported premises and unsubstantiated assumptions which render his conclusion as invalid. For the author to influence the thinking of his readers he has to largely restruture his argument, fix the flaws in his logic, provide evidentairy support for his assumptions and , expricate the premises.Without these, he is unlikey to convince many people with his argument.

I am using the template I found in this forum...will it hurt my score if I pick sentences directly from a template? or should I modify them to make it my own?

A few thoughts on your essay; first, you used the template pretty well. However, on an AWA Argument essay, you don't need to support the author's thesis at all. In the paragraph where you talk about Germany under Hitler, you don't point out any flaw in the argument, and that's a mistake. You could still use the example of Nazi Germany (it's a good one) to support the explanation of another flaw. In addition, your first paragraph doesn't really contribute anything to the essay overall, and it's a little confusing-- I went back and re-read the prompt to make sure that it was supposed to be an Argument essay, not an Issue one, because that seemed like an Issue opening paragraph. As far as grammar and usage go, you might want to review the use of the definite article; there are several points where you need it and don't have it.
Finally, to answer your question above, using the template for structure and organization is great, but it wouldn't hurt to adapt it to your own purposes a little more. When I was an essay grader (not for the GMAT), I got pretty sick of reading the same opening and closing sentences over and over, and tended to give students more credit for their content and writing if it seemed more personalized.

Thanks a lot Andrea...I will work on the weaknesses suggested by you. I will post my next essay soon. Also, it would help me if you can rate my essay so that I know where I stand.

I'd probably give this a 4. Tightening up the organization a little and discussing a third flaw would probably boost this to a five; you do have good examples and your general structure is fine, but that first paragraph and the body paragraph about Germany both bring you down a bit.

Hi Andrea, please review second argument essay. I have tried to incorporate the changes you had suggested.

The following is a recommendation from the manager of Family Friendly Restaurant:

" Family Friendly Restaurant needs to improve its facility to remain competitive in our city ' s restaurant market. Mega-Family Restaurant, recently opened in a suburb of our city, offers a video arcade, fine wood furniture, and seven big-screen televisions. Due to a recession in our town, people report having less discretionary income for eating out. Therefore, if we are to hold our share of a shrinking restaurant market, we need to offer at least all of the features of Mega-Family Restaurant. "

Discuss how well-reasoned you find the above argument. In your discussion, be sure to analyze the line of reasoning and the use of evidence in the argument. For example, you may need to consider what questionable assumptions underlie the author ' s thinking and what alternative explanations or counter-examples might weaken the conclusion. You can also discuss what sort of evidence would strengthen or refute the argument, what changes in the argument would make it more logically sound, and what, if anything, would help you to better evaluate its conclusion.



In the preceding statement author states that Family Friend Restaurant needs to provide all the services that Mega-Family Restaurant is providing. Although authors claim may have merit, his poorly reasoned argument is based on several questionable premises and assumptions and based solely on the evidence provided in the passage, author's conclusion can not be accepted as valid.Below mentioned are the issues with the argument.

Firstly, author compares the facilties of Family Friendly Restaurant with those newly opened Mega-Family Restaurant. But in order to conclude that similar facilities need to be provided by Family Friendly Restaurant as those are being provided by Mega-Family Restaurant, author should provide information regarding the success of Mega-Family Restaurant. Since Mega-Family Restaurant is newly opened there is no indication of the fact that it has been able to attract many customers. In that case author's reasoning of comparing these two restaurants is flawed.

Secondly, author mentions that recession has reduced the amount of money people are willing to spend on the food they eat outside. By increasing the services the Family Friendly Restaurant provides the price per food item will also go up. As the cost of such services that improve the ambience of the restaurant will have to balanced by increasing the price of the food items. In that case the Family Friendly Restaurant will become even more costlier to eat out and this will discourage people from visiting the outlet often. Also, comparision is valid only if Mega-Family Restaurant and Family-Friendly Restaurant are competing for same customer base. It could be possible that Mega-Family Restaurant is for elite class and Family Friendly Restaurant caters to only middle class income group of the population. While the rich people can afford these services middle class people may not be able to do so.Hence, this undermines the author's view that in order to hold the share of shrinking restaurant market more services are needed.

Thirdly, there could be different reasons for Family Friendly Restaurant not being competitive. May be its food quality is really bad or it's located in a difficult to reach place. All this if true would need a different solution to improve the Family Friendly Restaurant competitiveness then those suggested by the author.

While there are several key issues with the premises and assumptions of the argument it is not to say that its without a base. One of the way of attracting consumers is by giving more facilities and improving ambience. But it should be done in a cost effective manner and ensure that the price per dish actaully decreases. For example, the Family Friendly Restaurant could provide one big-screen television instead of seven.At the same time introduce some new "Combo" offers which give customer more variety for less price. Since this will attract more customers the Family Friendly Restaurant will soon recover its investment in the one television. Once it increases its market share and profits it can think of adding new services depending upon customer feedback.

In sum, author's illogical argument is based on unproved premises and unsubstantiated assumptions, which render his conclusion invalid. In order to convince readers about his argument author needs to provide evidence regarding the success of Mega-Family Restaurant and how it is comparable to services offered by Family Friendly Restaurant.