Circular reasoning... - Edit 1
Before modification by Shannow at 06/02/2011 07:05:35 PM
Before I address your points, let me state that I find it very telling that you ignore every bit of evidence I gave in my post. You don't address the Traveling issue, you don't address RJ's statement. You just reject the overall implications because they go against your list.
RJ says flatly that 37.5% of women fall below Dagian.
Yes...
Ok...
YES! Thank you for finally figuring that out. But remember, this is the average strength woman. This is absolutely not the average strength Aes Sedai. The average strength Aes Sedai is not much above Daigian, because their highest strength in a thousand years has been Cadsuane. They have had absolutely no representation of the higher echelons.
You're ignoring another major factor. Age. The Aes Sedai don't want women over 18, usually. Another factor is running away. Another is women being put away because you're a coward (either for the Accepted or AS test, which is exclusively skewed to remove stronger women. Which is why women like Reanne were thrown out).
I doubt the latter two reasons lost the AS many strong women (though the mutterings about Nicola give some doubt to this), but the age factor certainly has. How many women who're weaker than Sharina, but definitely stronger than the likes of Moiraine have been turned away because they had the misfortune of not coming to the Tower before they were 18? The reaction to Sharina, where she's around only because Egwene is Amyrlin, shows pretty clearly how very skewed the whole AS process is.
Look at Nicola too. She's stronger than all the AS except Cadsuane, but she had no idea of going to the Tower.
The vast majority of women like Nicola and Sharina would fall around the average female strength, which is around the strength of Myrelle or Sheriam. If the Tower had included all of them, its average would undoubtedly go up. But it doesn't. Instead, it adds yet another constraint! You must want to become Aes Sedai to get the chance.
These 1000 women are barely .4% of the channeling population of the Westlands. And they already have three restrictions to entering their sample. Using them to prove anything is laughable.
If they make the journey to Tar Valon.
No. People weaker than Daigian are still allowed to be Novices.
Look at this simple fact. In the past 600 years, three women went to the Tower who were stronger than Moiraine.
In the past two years, when the Tower recruited more actively, it found Egwene, Elayne, Bode, Nynaeve, Nicola and Sharina! Six women stronger than Moiraine were found in two years, but only three came to the Tower in a 600 bloody years.
Age, interest in going to the Tower, cowardice. Those aren't random exclusions. Strength is not the only criterion on which the AS choose candidates.
YES! What you're missing is that strength is not the only selection criteria for Aes Sedai.
At the worst, you have to take RJ at his word, and assume that the Pattern had something to do with only weaker women entering the Tower. But you don't even need that rationalization! Just look what happened when the Tower in exile opened its Novice book:
Egwene says they got around a 1000 fresh Novices. She also says only about 200 will be strong enough to be Aes Sedai. Leaving aside the astounding fact that the Tower added a fifth of its population in half a year, this is still a skewed sample because 80% are too weak to be AS in this 1000. There should have been 625 women capable of being AS in a truly RANDOM sampling of 1000 women, but that isn't the case here.
There seems to be a clear correlation between being weak in the Power and wanting to be Aes Sedai, which is why women like Nynaeve and Sharina are such outliers to the system. Add to this the possibility that most sparkers are stronger channelers, and 1/4th of them die and the others are rejected as wilders, and you cannot help but conclude that the Aes Sedai are an absurdly skewed sample.
Not at all. A huge proportion of them are considered to be "strong" by Aes Sedai, but the Aiel themselves seem to disparage AS strength. A woman like Aviendha is considered an outlier among the Aiel. But among the AS, even women like Moiraine are "strong".
That's four we've heard of among 6000. How do you know there aren't more?
IF she comes to the Tower and IF she isn't too old and IF she isn't a coward.
Of course Nynaeve is rare! But there should still be around 10 more of her strength. But what about the likes of Moiraine? Is she also very rare. Is she, in fact, just 5 times more common than Nynaeve (since we have five of that strength to one of Nynaeve's)? Hardly.
There should be thousands of women of Moiraine's strength in the world. The Tower has just missed them all.
RJ didn't say Aes Sedai follow a bell curve strength (impossible since they exclude 37.5% of the population anyway).
And if the levels between Verin and Moiraine are the top 37.5%, what are women like Cadsuane and Egwene? 0%?
Yet, that is exactly what we see when we get a fresh 1000 women who want to be AS. There is a downward skewing.
But what if the Aes Sedai went recruiting like the Asha'man? Are you going to argue that the average Asha'man is as strong as Verin, when Verin seems to be among the weakest AS who can Travel, whereas a huge proportion of the Asha'man can Travel? Can you seriously argue this given what we know about men and women being equal?
RJ says flatly that 37.5% of women fall below Dagian.
Yes...
That means 12.5% of women fall between Dagian and the average strength woman. Only 12.5%. Think what that means. THINK about it, don't just post a knee jerk response. Forget everything else we've debated about. Register the fact that only 12.5% of all channelers fall between Dagian and the average woman.
Ok...
What that means is that in relative terms, the average strength woman is not much stronger than Dagian.
YES! Thank you for finally figuring that out. But remember, this is the average strength woman. This is absolutely not the average strength Aes Sedai. The average strength Aes Sedai is not much above Daigian, because their highest strength in a thousand years has been Cadsuane. They have had absolutely no representation of the higher echelons.
Regarding the representative sample issue:
The only reason why the Aes Sedai would not be a representative sample of the ENTIRE channeling pool, would be if their selection methods somehow influenced the exclusion of a large part of one side of the spectrum.
Well, as it turns out, it does just that. And in a major way. 37.5% of the entire channeling population are automatically excluded from becoming Aes Sedai. Because they are too weak.
So immediately, more than a third of ALL CHANNELERS on the weak side of the average are DELIBERATELY excluded from the sample. This immediately skews the sample to the stronger side, moving the mean up past the average woman's strength.
The only reason why the Aes Sedai would not be a representative sample of the ENTIRE channeling pool, would be if their selection methods somehow influenced the exclusion of a large part of one side of the spectrum.
Well, as it turns out, it does just that. And in a major way. 37.5% of the entire channeling population are automatically excluded from becoming Aes Sedai. Because they are too weak.
So immediately, more than a third of ALL CHANNELERS on the weak side of the average are DELIBERATELY excluded from the sample. This immediately skews the sample to the stronger side, moving the mean up past the average woman's strength.
You're ignoring another major factor. Age. The Aes Sedai don't want women over 18, usually. Another factor is running away. Another is women being put away because you're a coward (either for the Accepted or AS test, which is exclusively skewed to remove stronger women. Which is why women like Reanne were thrown out).
I doubt the latter two reasons lost the AS many strong women (though the mutterings about Nicola give some doubt to this), but the age factor certainly has. How many women who're weaker than Sharina, but definitely stronger than the likes of Moiraine have been turned away because they had the misfortune of not coming to the Tower before they were 18? The reaction to Sharina, where she's around only because Egwene is Amyrlin, shows pretty clearly how very skewed the whole AS process is.
Look at Nicola too. She's stronger than all the AS except Cadsuane, but she had no idea of going to the Tower.
The vast majority of women like Nicola and Sharina would fall around the average female strength, which is around the strength of Myrelle or Sheriam. If the Tower had included all of them, its average would undoubtedly go up. But it doesn't. Instead, it adds yet another constraint! You must want to become Aes Sedai to get the chance.
These 1000 women are barely .4% of the channeling population of the Westlands. And they already have three restrictions to entering their sample. Using them to prove anything is laughable.
On the upper side, there is no such restriction. In fact, stronger channelers, wherever they are found, are much more likely to become Aes Sedai and far more quickly too, than weaker channelers.
If they make the journey to Tar Valon.
If some stronger channelers are missed out, it is randomly done, and will be balanced out by all the middling strength and weak Aes Sedai level channelers that are ALSO missed out on a random basis.
This is completely different from the deliberate, blanket exclusion of the 37.5% of weakest channelers.
THAT is why so many of the novices are so weak, because most of the channelers who are still out there have fallen through the net because they form part of this 37.5% weaker than Dagian.
This is completely different from the deliberate, blanket exclusion of the 37.5% of weakest channelers.
THAT is why so many of the novices are so weak, because most of the channelers who are still out there have fallen through the net because they form part of this 37.5% weaker than Dagian.
No. People weaker than Daigian are still allowed to be Novices.
Look at this simple fact. In the past 600 years, three women went to the Tower who were stronger than Moiraine.
In the past two years, when the Tower recruited more actively, it found Egwene, Elayne, Bode, Nynaeve, Nicola and Sharina! Six women stronger than Moiraine were found in two years, but only three came to the Tower in a 600 bloody years.
How could there possibly be enough women in the top 37.5% out there who have somehow been RANDOMLY missed in sufficient numbers to balance out the 37.5% weakest channelers who were DELIBERATELY excluded?
Age, interest in going to the Tower, cowardice. Those aren't random exclusions. Strength is not the only criterion on which the AS choose candidates.
The answer is, statistically it is impossible. For every incredibly strong channeler out there who has not been found due to random selection errors, there will be a matching weak woman who was NEVER FOUND either. I'm not talking about having been found and rejected due to being too weak. I'm talking about never found in the first place, just like the stronger woman who never was found.
YES! What you're missing is that strength is not the only selection criteria for Aes Sedai.
At the worst, you have to take RJ at his word, and assume that the Pattern had something to do with only weaker women entering the Tower. But you don't even need that rationalization! Just look what happened when the Tower in exile opened its Novice book:
Egwene says they got around a 1000 fresh Novices. She also says only about 200 will be strong enough to be Aes Sedai. Leaving aside the astounding fact that the Tower added a fifth of its population in half a year, this is still a skewed sample because 80% are too weak to be AS in this 1000. There should have been 625 women capable of being AS in a truly RANDOM sampling of 1000 women, but that isn't the case here.
There seems to be a clear correlation between being weak in the Power and wanting to be Aes Sedai, which is why women like Nynaeve and Sharina are such outliers to the system. Add to this the possibility that most sparkers are stronger channelers, and 1/4th of them die and the others are rejected as wilders, and you cannot help but conclude that the Aes Sedai are an absurdly skewed sample.
What's more, the Aes Sedai strength trend runs perfectly through the Aiel as well. Most Wise Ones who can channel are of Aes Sedai strength.
Not at all. A huge proportion of them are considered to be "strong" by Aes Sedai, but the Aiel themselves seem to disparage AS strength. A woman like Aviendha is considered an outlier among the Aiel. But among the AS, even women like Moiraine are "strong".
We hear of only 4 who are stronger than Moiraine, namely Therava, Tamela, Viendre and Someryn. And they include ALL their channelers, even the weakest ones, in their selection.
That's four we've heard of among 6000. How do you know there aren't more?
The point is, EVERY woman in the bottom 37.5% are automatically excluded from selection. But any woman who is found in the top 37.5% will be accepted with open arms.
IF she comes to the Tower and IF she isn't too old and IF she isn't a coward.
Meaning that the reason there are no Nynaeve's etc. is because they are so incredibly rare. There are very few of them to be found, as opposed to the many thousands of women in the bottom 37.5%.
Of course Nynaeve is rare! But there should still be around 10 more of her strength. But what about the likes of Moiraine? Is she also very rare. Is she, in fact, just 5 times more common than Nynaeve (since we have five of that strength to one of Nynaeve's)? Hardly.
There should be thousands of women of Moiraine's strength in the world. The Tower has just missed them all.
So how do you make this Bell Curve work? Only by accepting that Dagian is not far below the average strength woman at all (remember, only 12.5% of women fall between her and the average strength), and that the top 37.5% that balances out the bottom 37.5% is in fact represented by the bulk of Aes Sedai between say Verin's strength and Moiraine's strength.
RJ didn't say Aes Sedai follow a bell curve strength (impossible since they exclude 37.5% of the population anyway).
And if the levels between Verin and Moiraine are the top 37.5%, what are women like Cadsuane and Egwene? 0%?
Statistically the average Aes Sedai MUST be stronger than the average woman. You cannot get away from the upward skewing of the sample caused by the DELIBERATE exclusion of the bottom 37.5% of the ENTIRE POPULATION.
Yet, that is exactly what we see when we get a fresh 1000 women who want to be AS. There is a downward skewing.
But what if the Aes Sedai went recruiting like the Asha'man? Are you going to argue that the average Asha'man is as strong as Verin, when Verin seems to be among the weakest AS who can Travel, whereas a huge proportion of the Asha'man can Travel? Can you seriously argue this given what we know about men and women being equal?
Firstly, I don't know how to address individual points, because I can't make the quote function work. Meaning I don't know how to make specific parts of your post appear in green while I post replies inbetween.
Regarding your overall argument, let me start by showing what you agreed with, and then what this implies.
When I state that the average woman is not much stronger than Dagian, you say the following:
"YES! Thank you for finally figuring that out. But remember, this is the average strength woman. This is absolutely not the average strength Aes Sedai. The average strength Aes Sedai is not much above Daigian, because their highest strength in a thousand years has been Cadsuane. They have had absolutely no representation of the higher echelons."
You say that you agree that the the average woman is not much stronger than Dagian, and then you say that the average Aes Sedai is not much stronger than Dagian either.
Well sorry to burst your bubble, but Dagian is only about half as strong as the average Aes Sedai. And the average Aes Sedai is by definition exactly in the middle of the Aes Sedai spectrum.
So I don't understand what point you are trying to make.
But once you agree that the average woman is not much stronger than Dagian,then you are stuck, because in a Bell Curve, the average woman is EXACTLY half as strong as the strongest possible woman.
So, if the average woman is only about 50% stronger than Dagian, then it means that the strongest possible woman is only
3 times as strong as Dagian, making Moiraine the strongest possible woman. So there goes your entire argument.
As for your closing argument, it is a classic case of circular reasoning.
You say that you don't know why only weaker woman are willing to become Aes Sedai, but it clearly MUST be so because they are all weak!
Weak by your standards. I say, they are not weak, they are in fact a complete representation of the entire population.
You say there are thousands of invisible women above Moiraine's strength level. I say there are some, but there are equal numbers of invisible women weaker than Moiraine.
You say the undiscovered strong ones outweigh the undiscovered weak ones, but you cannot prove why. You fall back on saying it simply HAS to be so because the strong ones aren't there.
Perfect case of circular reasoning. I say prove that the strong ones are somewhere else, and you say they MUST be somewhere out there, because they aren't in the Tower.
That's like saying that aliens MUST be out in space because they clearly aren't here on earth.
Sorry, but that is very weak reasoning.
To pull it all together: You say that there are more women stronger than Moiraine out there, undiscovered, than there are weak women out there, undiscovered. You say the reason they are undiscovered is not clear, but it must be so if your Bell Curve is to hold water.
I say, your Bell Curve just doesn't hold water.