Evaluating the Argument: Earth's Significance in the Universe Essay

This essay provides a comprehensive analysis of an article that discusses Earth's significance in the universe. The author's argument, which posits Earth's insignificance due to its size compared to other celestial bodies, is carefully examined. The essay breaks down the author's reasoning, identifyin...Read More

Valid and Sound
Arguments

1. The particular topic is about comparing Earth with whole universe. This article is about
space and our size in this whole universe. The jungle is used as a metaphor for space and
ants as human beings; where ants are swarming around and under the umbrella of a tree.
The author is just making a philosophical essay for the purpose of filling up space; let's
look at the size of our Earth compared to that of some of the most famous planets and
stars that we know of. In this given essay am going to do present author’s argument and
show the reasoning and identify premises, sub conclusions and the main conclusion
hidden in the reasoning. Finally, the main objective is to identify whether arguments are
valid and sound or not. The author is arguing that Earth is insignificant in the Universe by
putting question and other argument made by the author is in whole Universe alone earth
doesn’t make any sense. Major premises are Earth and Minor premises are human
beings; but both premises have been compared with space in the context of size. Both
premises are fictional and do not carry any real fact with real life. The sub conclusion
made on the basis of premises is that; compare to other planets in the Universe; Earth is
nothing but a dwarf planet. The main conclusion based on the premises are based on
human; as we thinks that we are powerful like creator, producer, minister and other
things, but actually we are insignificant compare to whole space. Because if Earth is
nothing but small dust of Sun, then Human beings obviously insignificant.
2. The author is arguing that earth is the smallest planet in whole the universe; and if in case
we compare the size of the Earth to the size of the most important divine bodies we have
discovered so far, it makes us feel like most of us just pile up in our underground insect
toilet under the shade of a tree, in which we accept its importance, make our mistakes on
a daily basis, go to work regularly, and so on we are ready to eat and drink and never
contemplate the scope of the wild nature that surrounds us. Controversial Premise: The
given article is said to be controversial because exact truth cannot be concluded from
given premises. Hence it has controversial premises which can be counter argued by
some reasonable facts (Sundt, 2014). Counter argument: I am not agree with the
argument present by author because in this case; deciding the significance which is only
based on size cannot be accepted. As Earth is smaller in size but it has all the facilities

and futures which no other planet have. And also no other planet has lives there; even for
human beings are also not able to live on other planets. Only Earth is the planet where
life can be possible, hence Earth cannot be called insignificant (Choi and et.al., 2010).
3. The soundness of the argument is not much or it can be said that author has failed to
produce strength in argument because the comparison is invalid and doesn’t make any
sense. Comparison should be done between equal things like if the author tried to
compare our Sun with another stars or our Universe with other spaces then it could
produce a valid argument but in this case no such reasonable comparison has done by
author. Both premises which is Earth and human beings are not related in any way; as
human beings are just part of Earth but alone Earth doesn’t represent only Humans; other
things like river, mountains, water and other living organisms are also part of it. And
other planets in the space like Jupiter, Saturn and Sun are just creating balance between
each other.
4. The overall quality of the article is not good and has many pitfalls in it which makes it
irrelevant and no use in practical life. If taking author’s conclusion valid then other than
Earth there is no other planet where life exists and it has no use of space then. The first
premises is Insignificant of Earth and another premise is alone Earth in the space is
wastage. Adding both premises together we can conclude that Human beings alone are
insignificant in whole space because we don’t cover enough space. But here both
premises are falls because logically space is very vast and increasing in size every
second; and at the same time from the point of view of human (as a counter argument)
the other things in the space except Sun and other nine planets have no use for us. Hence,
the conclusion from argument is not valid.
5. The main conclusion of author was about human beings; as human beings are
insignificant and no use from the point of view of space consideration. The quality of the
argument is not good because the comparison is not valid.

References
Sundt, T.M., 2014. Sound arguments, true premises, and valid conclusions. The Journal of
thoracic and cardiovascular surgery, 148(5), pp.2070-2071.
Busse, R., Good, Valid and Sound Arguments.
Choi and et.al., 2010. Examining arguments generated by year 5, 7, and 10 students in science
classrooms. Research in Science Education, 40(2), pp.149-169.