TOPIC: ISSUE7 - "The video camera provides such an accurate and convincing record of contemporary life that it has become a more important form of documentation than written records."
WORDS: 519 TIME: 00:45:00 DATE: 2008-8-1 13:46:55
Has the video camera that can provide an accurate and convincing record of contemporary life become a more important form of documentation than written records? In my opinion, the speaker to some extent overstates the advantages of video camera while overlooks some merits of written records.
Admittedly, video camera has some advantages that written records can not match with such as it can give a vivid reproduction of what happened before. A visual representation can arouse people's direct feeling and sense of the things recorded. For example, a true record of a battle in World War Two can show us the fierceness and cruelty of that battle and clearly indicates how brave our soldiers were that time. This kind of records does greatly help people to remember that war between justice and evil in history. Besides, a living video camera record of a football game is so wonderful that people who see this record are just like they are experiencing the game by themselves？有这样的说法么. Furthermore, a video record of a crime or an accident is the best evidence for law use because it is difficult to fabricate such a record.
However, written records do contribute greatly to record of our daily life, which video camera can not achieve. Given that written records are general, profound and accurate in statistics, it is usually used in records of contracts, laws and reports. Take laws as an example. Laws are marked with its preciseness and distinct for which written records are the very appropriate choose as a way of recording them. And written records of laws are convenient to resort to when in need. Apart from that, one part and parcel of written records' use is in the realm of literature？contemporary life. Due to the special characters of it, works and articles usually choose written records as the representation. Written records of literature provide readers with enough space to imagine and think by themselves, which is one of the most important interactivities between readers and authors. All these advantages of written records put this kind of records in a vital important place in our daily life.
Nowadays we usually record a thing or an event by using both the video camera and written records, combining the advantages of the two ways with video camera showing the exact scene of the thing or event and written records commenting on them. A look of today's news reports would illustrate this point. Journalists record the whole process and the results of the events and critics comments on them with written records, which cooperate with each other to contribute to a better understanding of the event of people. Conversely, recording an event with video camera only would leave nothing profound but some skin-deep phenomenon to people while written records without vivid representation would be too bored.为什么
To sum up, both video camera and written records play vital roles in our daily life because the former can offer us vivid representations of things and events while the latter, being more convenient, reveal us some profound meanings and leave us enough space to imagine.
TOPIC: ARGUMENT235 - The following appeared in a memorandum from the general manager of KNOW radio station.
"Several factors indicate that radio station KNOW should shift its programming from rock-and-roll music to a continuous news format. Consider, for example, the number of older people in our listening area has increased dramatically, while the total number of our listeners has recently declined. Also, music stores in our area report decreased sales of recorded music. Finally, continuous news stations in neighboring cities have been very successful, and a survey taken just before the recent election shows that local citizens are interested in becoming better informed about politics."
WORDS: 500 TIME: 00:30:00 DATE: 2008-8-1 14:46:21
The speaker draws a conclusion that the radio station KNOW should shift its programming from rock-and-roll music to a continuous news format. And the conclusion relies on some facts and a survey taken just before the recent election. It is enticing to accept the conclusion considering the given facts. However, a cautious examination of the conclusion would reveal that actually it suffers from some unsubstantiated assumptions and logical flaws and is unpersuasive as a result.
