“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.” Discuss how well reasoned . . . etc.
The author concluded that a part of city's funds for supporting arts should be allocated to public television.The author's line of reasoning is based on the information that corporate funding for television is under threat and this has a direct effect on art's museum attendances.The speaker assumes that if the percentage rise in visual arts viewership on television and in art's museum attendances is same, then museum attendances will decrease if corporate funding for television decreases. This argument is unconvincing for several reasons.
Firstly, the author cites that corporate funding caused the increase in the patronage of visual arts on television. It doesn't provide evidence that the cause for the increase in art's museum patronage is also due to the corporate funding. The increase in the number of people attending the museum might be due to other reasons such as schools and other institutions might have made it mandatory to visit art's museum for their students or the museum might have advertised effectively or conducted shows to attract more crowds to the museum.Thus there is not enough support in the argument to believe that the decrease in corporate funding has a direct effect on the art's museum's patronage.
Secondly, the speaker makes a questionable assumption that since visual arts viewership increased at the same rate as that of attendances of art's museum, attendance for museum will decrease if there is decrease in funding for television. There is no evidence cited by the author to oppose the fact that if there is a decrease in visual arts programs on telivision, people who like arts might switch to alternate sources of watching and thus there is actually a chance of more people attending the arts museum
The argument would have been better if it had provided enough evidence to believe that correlation exists between visual arts viewership and art's museum patronage and corporate funding is the key behind the rise in the tv viewership and a decrease in funding would directly effect museum patronage. To support the argument it would be better to study the demographic interests of the people, what motivates people to attend the museums and what media is more effective to pull crowds to museum.
In conclusion, the argument is unconvincing as it lacks supportive data to interpolate television viewership and art's museum patronage. On the whole, it provides no evidence to convince the reader that city's funds should be allocated to television to avoid a reduction in museum patronage.
The author concluded that a part of city's funds for supporting arts should be allocated to public television.The author's line of reasoning is based on the information that corporate funding for television is under threat and this has a direct effect on art's museum attendances.The speaker assumes that if the percentage rise in visual arts viewership on television and in art's museum attendances is same, then museum attendances will decrease if corporate funding for television decreases. This argument is unconvincing for several reasons.
Firstly, the author cites that corporate funding caused the increase in the patronage of visual arts on television. It doesn't provide evidence that the cause for the increase in art's museum patronage is also due to the corporate funding. The increase in the number of people attending the museum might be due to other reasons such as schools and other institutions might have made it mandatory to visit art's museum for their students or the museum might have advertised effectively or conducted shows to attract more crowds to the museum.Thus there is not enough support in the argument to believe that the decrease in corporate funding has a direct effect on the art's museum's patronage.
Secondly, the speaker makes a questionable assumption that since visual arts viewership increased at the same rate as that of attendances of art's museum, attendance for museum will decrease if there is decrease in funding for television. There is no evidence cited by the author to oppose the fact that if there is a decrease in visual arts programs on telivision, people who like arts might switch to alternate sources of watching and thus there is actually a chance of more people attending the arts museum
The argument would have been better if it had provided enough evidence to believe that correlation exists between visual arts viewership and art's museum patronage and corporate funding is the key behind the rise in the tv viewership and a decrease in funding would directly effect museum patronage. To support the argument it would be better to study the demographic interests of the people, what motivates people to attend the museums and what media is more effective to pull crowds to museum.
In conclusion, the argument is unconvincing as it lacks supportive data to interpolate television viewership and art's museum patronage. On the whole, it provides no evidence to convince the reader that city's funds should be allocated to television to avoid a reduction in museum patronage.
