Please rate my essay - Analysis of an Argument

[pandeyvineet24]

“Each generation of Americans has lived longer that the ones preceding it, as the national life expectancy has approached 80 years old in recent years. The progress of medical technology shows no sign of abating. Therefore, we can confidently predict that most children born in America in the next decade will live past the age of ninety.”

The author in the above argument concludes that most of the children born in America in the next decade will live past the age of ninety. To support
his conclusion he cites 2 claims. Firstly, he takes the help of a past trend, that is since for past few decades the current generation is living long than the preceding ones, so will the next generations. Secondly, since the medical technology is on a rise, therefore it will continue to improve the healthcare and prolong an average human life. Even though both the evidences seem to support conclusion, but a deeper analysis shows that only these 2 evidences are not good enough to reach the conclusion. There is indeed a need for more analysis and more research to reach the conclusion.

Firstly, the author assumes that trend of current generation living long than the preceding one will continue in the future. Will it continue to rise for ever ?. The answer is NO. Take for instance this claim. 80 years is the highest limit for span of human life and there is no further increase possible. This claim certainly hits the conclusion hard. Earlier increments to human life could be attributed to the fact to begin with the human span of life was very low and hence it continued to increase over a period of time, but now we have reached the threshold and no more increase is possible.

Similarly, as an another evidence, author states that the medical advancements are continuously increasing and those will prolong the life. This evidence is not as convincing as it sounds, though for sure it helps the conclusion a lot deal. Medical researh is generally done on the things and factors know to effect the human life, but its very difficult nearly impossible to work on some thing unknown to affect human life. There are a lot of factors governing a human life which may not come under the purview of the medical advancements such as the sudden emergence of a mysterious diseases, AIDS in 80's and 90's is a good example, another factor which has a high impact on human life is the continuous rapid changes to the weather, another factor could be the eating habits of people. They all and many more others have an effect on the age to which a human being lives.

As it sums up in the end, author could have made it a stronger argument by putting in more concrete evidences apart from those it already has. Key
figures like the maximum span of a human life would have supported his first evidence. Is the maximum life span of a human greater than 80? would be a worthy question to answer. Also, the argument would have been ably supported if it gave an insight about how the medical advancements will improve the living conditions of people, from the factors which are not prevalent now but will be in future.