ARGUMENT 36 - 40

36. The following appeared as part of a recommendation made by a faculty member to the president of a large university.

"Never once in our 150-year history as a university have we clarified our objectives. How, then, can we hope to adapt as an institution to the new challenges facing higher education. As a first step in this evolutionary process, therefore, we should send out questionnaires asking faculty members why they teach, asking students what they want from this university, and asking former students what they gained from their own education here. When the replies come in, we can tabulate them and formulate an official statement of our educational mission. This will surely result in improved programs at our university."

37. There is a general idea that a translation always fails to preserve some of the qualities that distinguish the original work — i.e., that 'something always gets lost in translation.' Writers, critics, and the general reading public unthinkingly accept this clichè. But this belief is unwarranted: translators are sometimes distinguished authors themselves, and some authors may even translate their own works. As the translator pointed out in the preface to an English version of Dante's works, the violin and the piano make different sounds, but they can play what is recognizably the same piece of music.

38. There is a general idea that waiters and waitresses are more likely to receive larger gratuities from large groups of people. A recent research study suggests this is not true. The researchers examined the relationship between the size of tips in restaurants and the number of meals charged on the bill. They found that, while most tips were around 15 percent, the minimum percentage considered appropriate, people dining alone tipped consistently more (19 percent) and those dining in groups of four or more tipped considerably less (13 percent) than this 15 percent standard. These results strongly suggest that people dining in a group are less likely to feel personally responsible for leaving an adequate or generous tip.

39. Statistics collected from dentists indicate that three times more men than women faint while visiting the dentist. This evidence suggests that men are more likely to be distressed about having dental work done than women are. Thus, dentists who advertise to attract patients should target the male consumer and emphasize both the effectiveness of their anesthetic techniques and the sensitivity of their staff to nervous or suffering patients.

40. The citizens of Forsythe have adopted healthier lifestyles. Their responses to a recent survey show that in their eating habits they conform more closely to government nutritional recommendations than they did ten years ago. Furthermore, there has been a fourfold increase in sales of food products containing kiran, a substance that a scientific study has shown reduces cholesterol. This trend is also evident in reduced sales of sulia, a food that few of the healthiest citizens regularly eat.