From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Thu Jan 08 2004 - 17:21:54 GMT
Hi Steve,
> I have been at a loss to understand what you meant by quantifying values
> until this post on determining and ranking the greatest people. You seem
> to want to create hierarchies among societies, ideas, people, etc and would
> like a formula for evaluating the same. Was Phaedrus wrong about undefined
> Quality? Maybe he could have written a computer program to feed his
> student's papers into for grading?
Seems you have some objection to creating hierarchies among societies,
ideas, people, etc. Do you not grade your students? Is there something
wrong for men to grade women (or vice versa) on a scale of 1 to 10? Can we
not agree that Shakespeare stands head and shoulders above other
playwrights? Is not E=mc2 a better idea than E=squat?
> Being a math/statistics teacher, I am very aware of a tendency for non math
> types to seek objectivity by assigning numbers to their subjective
> judgments and then doing some calculations on them. The output of such
> calculations is still subjective, of course. Its a sort of SOM alchemy
> that is being attempted.
In one sense, the output of all calculations are subjective, so I'm not
sure of your point. Nor do I understand what you mean by "SOM alchemy."
> In this case, as far as I can tell, the researcher is using "objective"
> measures. But it is also important to note that the output depends
> entirely on what we've chosen to measure. Such choices of what to measure
> tend to be made based on what is most easy to measure.
I see no evidence that Murray picked what was "most easy to measure."
> In my experience
> the results of such formulas tend to have less correspondence with people's
> ideas of what's better and worse than before all the math. At that point
> what do you trust? The numbers or your own judgment?
Again, I miss your point. You'll have to excuse my density.
> Here's how the method goes: First decide who is great, then find
> measurements that correspond with our ideas of who we already know is
> great. When the numbers that work in most cases don't fit our ideas of what
> is great in other cases, we need to add some other measures to our model.
> Ideally at the end of this process we get a mathematical formula that
> produces rankings that match the judgments that we decided on in advance to
> make the model. Have our subjected judgments become objective at this
> point? Of course not. If we had made different judgments from the start,
> we could have come up with a different set of measures to match our
> judgments
I find no evidence that Murray used the method you suggest. But, I admit
to not having read his book. It's on order.
> To me, an important point of ZAMM was to help us get rid of the distaste
> for our own taste-the whole subjective/objective problem. What is good and
> what is not good? Do you really need a number to tell you?
No. But in this number-happy SOM intellectual environment we find
ourselves in (SOM alchemy?), a legitimate method of applying numbers to
values may--I say may--help move the MOQ along in the minds of some. Just
by establishing that objectively some things are better than others, a
step forward will be accomplished.
Regards,
Platt
> I'd also like to suggest that the case of attempting to measure
> intellectual value is where the postmodernist claim that truth is context
> dependent is important. Some statements are better than others, but
> statements can only be compared within particular contexts. Since we
> compare inorganic values within narrowly defined contexts we can create
> hierarchies, but until we agree on the particular context, we will not be
> able to decide whether, for example, polar coordinates are better than
> rectangular coordinates any more than we can ask without a context whether
> the number one is better than the number three. In the context of the
> answer to the question "what is one plus two?" we can say which is a better
> answer. Without a context, we can't.
>
> Thanks,
> Steve
>
>
> > Just as I was about to give up on the possibility for a numerical
> > accounting of value at the intellectual/aesthetic level, accepting DMB's
> > judgment that values at the third and fourth levels are difficult to
> > quantify because "they are more dynamic and therefore exhibit a much less
> > consistent pattern of preferences," I happened across a review of book by
> > Charles Murray titled "Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in
> > the Arts and Sciences from 800 B.C. to 1950."
> >
> > Murray's approach is numerical and mathematical, listing 4,002
> > significant individuals over 2,750 years who comprise humanity's all-star
> > team by reviewing 167 respected encyclopedias, biographical dictionaries,
> > and other references, tallying up the size, frequency, and content of the
> > entries on specific individuals, then crunching the numbers.
> >
> > Using something called the Lotka Curve, Murray established a pattern of
> > excellence based on Lotka's observation that most contributors to
> > scientific journals write only one article while a tiny few --the
> > giants-- write dozens. As example of the validity of the Curve, consider
> > golf. More than half of all the professionals have never won a
> > tournament, and of those who have won, a majority have won only one. But
> > Jack Nicklaus won eighteen majors. As Murray notes, you can come up with
> > as many postmodern theories about social construction of reality as you
> > like: It won't change the fact that Jack Nicklaus was a much better
> > golfer than most great golfers. This pattern tends to hold true for
> > science, art, literature, philosophy and every other realm of the human
> > pursuit of excellence.
> >
> > Murray makes two factual assertions. The first is that his numbers
> > reflect the definitive consensus among those who know what they are
> > talking about. His second claim is that this consensus of opinion
> > reflects objective fact. Behind these assertions is the his basic
> > assumption that excellence (value) in art, science and philosophy exists
> > and therefore can be measured.
> >
> > This is what I was seeking--an "objective" measure of value at the upper
> > levels based on an application of mathematical methods that have been so
> > successful at the lower levels. Whether you agree or not with Murray's
> > approach, you have to give him credit for pushing boundary that others
> > had pretty much given up on.
> >
> > What Murray has accomplished IMO is objective proof of Pirsig's basic
> > assumption that "some things are better than others" and that betterness
> > is NOT just a matter of "whatever I like."
>
>
>
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