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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: neolib who wrote (171818)	10/3/2005 7:31:05 PM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Neo, thanks for the explanations. On the GPA, stanford.edu I can see how there could be a negative correation between SAT score and GPA outcome. GPA is simply examination results. I'd want to see the data because claims like "negative correlation" are often made based on some "scientific research" which is dodgy at best and obviously wrong at worst. But lack of data is never a reason for me not to take a guess at "Why?" GPA is nearly all a "learning" result. I've spent plenty of time in education and outright memorizing is always a big deal. Thinking is a trivial part of the result. There is a minimum level of thinking ability needed to get the results, but mostly it's learning that's needed. People play to their strengths. When they find they aren't getting results after some effort at something, they generally try something else, often ending up on dope and booze because aiming at the gutter is something we all can achieve when we don't like or fail at other options. So, learners and rememberers are gung ho for studying and learnings screeds of stuff and getting A+. Those who have a bit of a battle with learning reams of material do something else. Excellent thinkers achieve a lot with a little data and their brains barely light up, whereas sloggers have brains blazing away sorting through screeds of material trying to come up with an answer. Some people are both excellent learners and thinkers. I guess they are top of the pops in the Stanford GPA stakes. The negative correlation I dare say is in the lower scores where slog can lead to success and where simple remembering matters more than the ability to think. I can see that in GPA results, Google would do well, but Google is not really a thinker. On the sexual selection, you left off hermaphrodite as an option. Given all that purposeful complexity you described, it would be very surprising if female and male brains behaved the same. They don't. Mqurice

To: neolib who wrote (171818)	10/3/2005 11:01:33 PM
From: cnyndwllr	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Neolib, re: "But first you must define intelligence. That is why I gave some results that seem to contradict each other. SAT scores vs. college GPA at Stanford. They both are reasonable measures of intelligence, or many people are wasting lots of money. How could there be a negative correlation? Heck, even a poor positive correlation is IMO an indictment against one or the other." It's a sad fact of life in America that admission to our best schools and our best graduate schools are weighted heavily toward grades. If you consider what it takes to achieve grades in most classes, especially social science classes, it's the ability of the student to tell the professor what the professor already knows. If a student processes the professor's knowledge, changes it to suit his own thinking and returns it, he risks that the professor will find it unrecognizable. Pure learners don't make that mistake. I'm an agnostic but I can bet that if Jesus and the 12 disciples were in a class together the 12 disciples would all get As, and Jesus wouldn't. More directly on your Stanford grade comment, recent studies indicate that the accepted wisdom that we use only 10% of our brains is incorrect. It seems that our brains may be fully utilized. If memorizing occupies a certain number of brain cells then maybe there are too few left for creative, innovative thinking. Or maybe smarter people understand that getting a 3 pt. GPA at Stanford won't cost them much as opposed to working harder and getting a 4 pt. so they just bag it, party and learn about people? Other studies reveal that the brain can get better at one or the other, depending upon what it's asked to do, but the cost of getting better at one may mean losing something somewhere else. As Maurice points out, however, there may be some people who are great learners and great thinkers. They may also be strong right brained and strong left brained. They call people like that De Vinci, I suspect. Ed