Example Of Argumentative Essay On Mars
Writing and Reading (II)
Argumentative Essay
Michael Cheng
96501001 Jennifer Kao
Apr. 25, 2009
It is not worth the expense and risk to make a manned flight to Mars A human mission to visit and land on the planet Mars has long been an attractive subject and a debatable issue. In terms of expense, risk, worth, and morality, proponents and opponents of whether it is necessary to send manned missions to Mars never come to a compromise. Even though proponents has brought up many excuses seemed reasonable to support the Mars mission, here are more important reasons concerned about human’s selfishness, the imperialism, the morality, the expense, and the risk of human life for proponents to think twice. It is not worth the expense and risk to …show more content…
make a manned flight to Mars.
It may be true that the exploration of Mars can do good for human beings on Earth: Mars could serve as a new world to live in, solving the overload of population; the mission may help us research our own planet Earth due to their similarity; and it might bring us unknown worth. Humans seem to take Mars as an excuse to research and understand Earth more deeply because Mars is the most similar planet to Earth among the solar system. While read between the lines, Mars is actually aimed to be a probable “new garbage can” to load with the booming population from Earth and their garbage thanks to proximity between Earth and Mars.
The second paragraph is talking about the selfishness, but there are not enough arguments about defeating the opponent’s viewpoint. Maybe there need more evidence or authoritative data.
Still, in “You Decide: Manned Mission to Mars” by Melissa Joulwan (2004), an American freelance writer on the KQED website, “regaining the top position in science and technology” is listed as “another reason to support a Mars mission.” Mars mission, especially the manned mission, is considered to lift people’s mood and enhance the fame of the nation where the manned mission is designed. However, there is no need for America to fight to be the leader of the exploration of Mars, for they can leave some opportunities for other countries to develop space science and technology. It’s quite exhausting for America to work hard to satisfy their imperialistic appetite. Moreover, it is unnecessary to send spacecraft to Mars no matter by the US or any other country, not to mention manned spacecraft.
The last sentence opens a new issue instead of supporting the idea of imperialism. Besides, this paragraph is not clear enough how does imperialism influences the Mars mission and the quotation not supportive. Maybe you needed to talk about this idea more deeply and specifically. In terms of morality, the exploration to Mars by manned spacecraft could also be an invasion. It is predictable what people will do to Mars, because according to human’s history of exploration, men will not visit a new world without depriving of everything valuable. We should notice that Mars is not human’s property. Supposedly, it might have been occupied by some species we cannot observe, and the consequence of human’s invasion could be far beyond we can imagine.
Citation needed here. With out evidence, this argument might just be the writer’s own imagination. Look back to reality, the manned mission to Mars is an enormous expense. According to a news from NewScientist,
The president will ask Congress for $800 million in seed money for 2005 and an additional five per cent of NASA 's approximately $15 billion annual budget over the next five years, reports United Press International. A human mission to Mars is expected to cost $40 billion to $80 billion. (Maggie McKee, Jan.9, 2004)
It is not necessary to invest billions of dollars to search an unknown world without certainly knowing how valuable it is.
The large cost can be saved to improve people’s daily lives, to lower down the tax, to subsidize welfare, and to promote national prosperity. Still, without the mission to Mars, the condition that Gregg Easterbrook (2004), an American writer, lecturer, also an editor of The New Republic, states will be avoided: the Mars proponents may compete for money and lead to the decrease of the cost of such civil rights as education, health insurance or national defense. Still another concern is the unworthy risk of human life due to manned mission to Mars. Astronauts ever died of space mission in 1967, 1986, 2003, and especially died the most in 2003’s mission. The shuttle was almost back to Earth but it exploded just 37miles from Texas in the air and took seven astronauts’ lives. After that disaster in 2003, according to The New York Times, NASA presented “a 400-page report” and “the report’s goal, NASA officials said, is to provide a guideline for safety in the design of future spacecraft.” (John Schwartz, Dec. 30, …show more content…
2008)
This quotation does not show the dangerous part of the mission so that it does not really support the argument mentioned in this paragraph-risk. More statistic should be added to let the reader know how harmful the Mars mission is. For example, how many people die because of this mission or something like that.
Even though the spacecraft technique has been developed for decades, the shuttle is not safe enough, and astronauts still take high risk practicing missions.
If manned spacecraft succeed in landing on Mars, such researches as analyzing rocks can be done by robot well, human can only appreciate the scene and give some waves to the camera. Though it may be considered a proof of a nation’s ability and meanwhile enhance its fame, there is no need to do so minor a job with so high the risk of human life. All in all, it is not worth the expense and risk to make a manned flight to Mars. It is much wiser to throw the selfishness away, save time and energy competing in outer space, and forget the impracticable dream of Mars. We would better accept our destination of mortality one day, live and die on this land as an ecological generation, giving up the hope of everlasting occupation in this world. What we should do now is to take good care of our homeland Earth. Human beings don’t have to, and shall not send the manned flight to Mars.
A brief summary of the point mentioned above should be inserted into the conclusion paragraph. And it will be better to comprehend if it is in the order as the above paragraphs
are.
As a whole, the structure of this essay is pretty clear. But too many arguments are mentioned but too vague to support the point. Maybe you can choose three to four points to talk about them deeper. More evidences should be required.
Jessie and Cindy
Score: 83
References
Easterbrook, G. (2004). Why we shouldn’t go to Mars: Someday people may walk on the planet, but not until it makes technological sense. Time, 2004(51).
Joulwan, M. (2004). You decide: Manned mission to Mars. KQED. Retrieved May 13, 2004 from http://www.kqed.org/topics/news/youdecide/pop/mars/index.jsp?flash=true.
McKee, M. (2004). Bush to announce manned mission to Mars. NewScientist. Retrieved April 25, 2009 from http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn4551-bush-to-announce-manned-mission-to-mars.html.
Schwartz, J. (2004). Report on Columbia Details How Astronauts Died. The New York Times. Retrieved April 25, 2009 from http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/31/science/space/31NASA.html?_r=1.
Argumentative Essay
Michael Cheng
96501001 Jennifer Kao
Apr. 25, 2009
It is not worth the expense and risk to make a manned flight to Mars A human mission to visit and land on the planet Mars has long been an attractive subject and a debatable issue. In terms of expense, risk, worth, and morality, proponents and opponents of whether it is necessary to send manned missions to Mars never come to a compromise. Even though proponents has brought up many excuses seemed reasonable to support the Mars mission, here are more important reasons concerned about human’s selfishness, the imperialism, the morality, the expense, and the risk of human life for proponents to think twice. It is not worth the expense and risk to …show more content…
make a manned flight to Mars.
It may be true that the exploration of Mars can do good for human beings on Earth: Mars could serve as a new world to live in, solving the overload of population; the mission may help us research our own planet Earth due to their similarity; and it might bring us unknown worth. Humans seem to take Mars as an excuse to research and understand Earth more deeply because Mars is the most similar planet to Earth among the solar system. While read between the lines, Mars is actually aimed to be a probable “new garbage can” to load with the booming population from Earth and their garbage thanks to proximity between Earth and Mars.
The second paragraph is talking about the selfishness, but there are not enough arguments about defeating the opponent’s viewpoint. Maybe there need more evidence or authoritative data.
Still, in “You Decide: Manned Mission to Mars” by Melissa Joulwan (2004), an American freelance writer on the KQED website, “regaining the top position in science and technology” is listed as “another reason to support a Mars mission.” Mars mission, especially the manned mission, is considered to lift people’s mood and enhance the fame of the nation where the manned mission is designed. However, there is no need for America to fight to be the leader of the exploration of Mars, for they can leave some opportunities for other countries to develop space science and technology. It’s quite exhausting for America to work hard to satisfy their imperialistic appetite. Moreover, it is unnecessary to send spacecraft to Mars no matter by the US or any other country, not to mention manned spacecraft.
The last sentence opens a new issue instead of supporting the idea of imperialism. Besides, this paragraph is not clear enough how does imperialism influences the Mars mission and the quotation not supportive. Maybe you needed to talk about this idea more deeply and specifically. In terms of morality, the exploration to Mars by manned spacecraft could also be an invasion. It is predictable what people will do to Mars, because according to human’s history of exploration, men will not visit a new world without depriving of everything valuable. We should notice that Mars is not human’s property. Supposedly, it might have been occupied by some species we cannot observe, and the consequence of human’s invasion could be far beyond we can imagine.
Citation needed here. With out evidence, this argument might just be the writer’s own imagination. Look back to reality, the manned mission to Mars is an enormous expense. According to a news from NewScientist,
The president will ask Congress for $800 million in seed money for 2005 and an additional five per cent of NASA 's approximately $15 billion annual budget over the next five years, reports United Press International. A human mission to Mars is expected to cost $40 billion to $80 billion. (Maggie McKee, Jan.9, 2004)
It is not necessary to invest billions of dollars to search an unknown world without certainly knowing how valuable it is.
The large cost can be saved to improve people’s daily lives, to lower down the tax, to subsidize welfare, and to promote national prosperity. Still, without the mission to Mars, the condition that Gregg Easterbrook (2004), an American writer, lecturer, also an editor of The New Republic, states will be avoided: the Mars proponents may compete for money and lead to the decrease of the cost of such civil rights as education, health insurance or national defense. Still another concern is the unworthy risk of human life due to manned mission to Mars. Astronauts ever died of space mission in 1967, 1986, 2003, and especially died the most in 2003’s mission. The shuttle was almost back to Earth but it exploded just 37miles from Texas in the air and took seven astronauts’ lives. After that disaster in 2003, according to The New York Times, NASA presented “a 400-page report” and “the report’s goal, NASA officials said, is to provide a guideline for safety in the design of future spacecraft.” (John Schwartz, Dec. 30, …show more content…
2008)
This quotation does not show the dangerous part of the mission so that it does not really support the argument mentioned in this paragraph-risk. More statistic should be added to let the reader know how harmful the Mars mission is. For example, how many people die because of this mission or something like that.
Even though the spacecraft technique has been developed for decades, the shuttle is not safe enough, and astronauts still take high risk practicing missions.
If manned spacecraft succeed in landing on Mars, such researches as analyzing rocks can be done by robot well, human can only appreciate the scene and give some waves to the camera. Though it may be considered a proof of a nation’s ability and meanwhile enhance its fame, there is no need to do so minor a job with so high the risk of human life. All in all, it is not worth the expense and risk to make a manned flight to Mars. It is much wiser to throw the selfishness away, save time and energy competing in outer space, and forget the impracticable dream of Mars. We would better accept our destination of mortality one day, live and die on this land as an ecological generation, giving up the hope of everlasting occupation in this world. What we should do now is to take good care of our homeland Earth. Human beings don’t have to, and shall not send the manned flight to Mars.
A brief summary of the point mentioned above should be inserted into the conclusion paragraph. And it will be better to comprehend if it is in the order as the above paragraphs
are.
As a whole, the structure of this essay is pretty clear. But too many arguments are mentioned but too vague to support the point. Maybe you can choose three to four points to talk about them deeper. More evidences should be required.
Jessie and Cindy
Score: 83
References
Easterbrook, G. (2004). Why we shouldn’t go to Mars: Someday people may walk on the planet, but not until it makes technological sense. Time, 2004(51).
Joulwan, M. (2004). You decide: Manned mission to Mars. KQED. Retrieved May 13, 2004 from http://www.kqed.org/topics/news/youdecide/pop/mars/index.jsp?flash=true.
McKee, M. (2004). Bush to announce manned mission to Mars. NewScientist. Retrieved April 25, 2009 from http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn4551-bush-to-announce-manned-mission-to-mars.html.
Schwartz, J. (2004). Report on Columbia Details How Astronauts Died. The New York Times. Retrieved April 25, 2009 from http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/31/science/space/31NASA.html?_r=1.