The following memorandum is from the business manager of Happy Pancake House res

taurants.
"Recently, butter has been replaced by margarine in Happy Pancake House restaura
nts throughout the southwestern United States. This change, however, has had lit
tle impact on our customers. In fact, only about 2 percent of customers have com
plained, indicating that an average of 98 people out of 100 are happy with the c
hange. Furthermore, many servers have reported that a number of customers who as
k for butter do not complain when they are given margarine instead. Clearly, eit
her these customers do not distinguish butter from margarine or they use the ter
m 'butter' to refer to either butter or margarine."
Write a response in which you discuss one or more alternative explanations that
could rival the proposed explanation and explain how your explanation(s) can pla
usibly account for the facts presented in the argument.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------The manger here says that the changing of butter to margarine has little impact
on there customers. This conclusion is based on faulty assumptions. First the st
atement that only 2 percent of customers have complained is questionable. Since
author doesn't give the source of this data, or how the this information was gat
hered. Whether this information considered a representative group of customers t
hroughout the southwestern United States, or customers from just two-three resta
urants. Also if the customers had visited Happy Pancake House before, or was it
there first time. If a particular customer is first time then its unlikely that
he/she will complain about margarine.
Author also says that 98 percent of customers were happy. This argument is rife
with holes. Other the credibility of the statement and its source, it also assum
es that if a customer doesn't complain it means he is happy. That is not essenti
ally true. He might just be neutral or resigned. This might his first time, and
could already have classified this restaurant as 'one of the restaurant where I
won't eat again'. Many first time customers won't complain with use of margarine
instead butter because they are less likely to know how the dish with butter ha
d tasted.
The second argument is, the servers report that number of customer who ask for b
utter do not complain when they are given margarine instead. Author does say man
y servers, but how many, from how many restaurants? Again this fact is vague and
doesn't provide concrete evidence and source. Author also doesn't mention much
about the customers who were served margarine instead of butter. Like how many d
istinct customers were there, were they the same set of customers asking for but
ter again in there different visit. Customers might just have resigned and accep
ted the butter. Author should given these details about the servers and customer
s to make his argument more cogent.
Well the change of butter to margarine might not have affected much to the custo
mers of Happy Pancake House. A more well detailed argument with proper sources o
f the fact and concise survey will help make this argument cogent. Also asking f
or customer about how they feel about the change would be a much clear way of kn
owing how its affecting the customers.