You said that the Tower doesn't restrict women of higher strength. But the sample population of the Tower, ie. the thousand channelers we see, are skewed towards the center, with no one of very great strength or very great weakness. Which means Moiraine is not very far above the average of 50, and Egwene is clearly above it while Nynaeve and her ilk are far above it and closer to the upper end of the range.
It works really well if you make increments of 4.75. That gives us 21 levels, and you can place strong Aes Sedai like Anaiya or Myrelle or Sheriam at 50, and the list is quite good, in that case.
Edited to add... RJ never spoke of any relative strength scale. He said channeler strength is distributed over 21 levels, and that the channeling population follows a bell curve. Both statements refer to no mysterious relative scale.
The conclusion is rather inescapable... given the bell curve, a woman like Moiraine will have an effective strength greater than 50, but not much so.
And I'd like to know why this seems impossible. RJ made many comparisons between OP strength and actual strength. If you look at actual strength, the average man is likely to be half as strong as the strongest man. And that gap is still huge, still good enough to explain the great differences we see between the strongest and weakest channelers.
It works really well if you make increments of 4.75. That gives us 21 levels, and you can place strong Aes Sedai like Anaiya or Myrelle or Sheriam at 50, and the list is quite good, in that case.
Edited to add... RJ never spoke of any relative strength scale. He said channeler strength is distributed over 21 levels, and that the channeling population follows a bell curve. Both statements refer to no mysterious relative scale.
The conclusion is rather inescapable... given the bell curve, a woman like Moiraine will have an effective strength greater than 50, but not much so.
And I'd like to know why this seems impossible. RJ made many comparisons between OP strength and actual strength. If you look at actual strength, the average man is likely to be half as strong as the strongest man. And that gap is still huge, still good enough to explain the great differences we see between the strongest and weakest channelers.
One: Why would the Tower restrict themselves to the middle? They won't stop anyone who is too strong from joining them. But they do stop people who are too weak from joining them. 37.5% of all channelers, in fact.
The truth is that Sharina isn't representative of the majority of channelers who are never found. For every one Sharina that is found, there are hundreds of Kin or other women who could learn, who are WEAKER than the average Aes Sedai. There are only 6 women stronger than Nynaeve, but there are thousands of female channelers. So people of that level are simply very rare, and VERY far above the average woman in strength.
There is no sensible reason why the White Tower would restrict stronger channelers from joining them. The reason that Cadsuane is the strongest modern channeler, is because a woman of her strength is exceedingly rare. Not because the Tower are deliberately excluding stronger channelers. But they are deliberately excluding weaker channelers.
I challenge you to provide a mechanism by which stronger channelers are excluded from the Tower.
No, logic says someone like Cadsuane is far above average strength.
Two:
Even if, as you suggest, Moiraine is close to average strength, that means that Moiraine is above 50 in strength. And since we know that Egwene is stronger than Moiraine and Melaine combined, that means Egwene must be at 100 strength or more.
That means Egwene is stronger than the strongest woman, Lanfear, who is at 100. How do you explain that in your quirky model?
This message last edited by Shannow on 18/12/2009 at 09:39:25 PM
The One Power Bell Curve: Proof that it is not centered on 50% of the strongest channeler's strength
18/12/2009 08:37:55 AM
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I always thought the curve was one sided
18/12/2009 01:17:32 PM
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The Curve only refers to the channeling population, not to non-channelers.
18/12/2009 01:56:25 PM
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I would say that your sample is flawed.
18/12/2009 05:02:02 PM
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It doesn't matter...
18/12/2009 10:02:38 PM
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But, it sort of does.
18/12/2009 10:43:08 PM
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So you're saying that no modern Aes Sedai are even of average strength?
18/12/2009 10:51:01 PM
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The Tower is restricted to the middle...
18/12/2009 05:35:03 PM
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Two things...
18/12/2009 09:28:25 PM
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The culling theory...
18/12/2009 09:36:34 PM
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The culling theory applies to the ENTIRE population, not just Aes Sedai...
18/12/2009 09:42:31 PM
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Several more things...
18/12/2009 11:26:19 PM
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You don't understand your own model...
18/12/2009 11:38:05 PM
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So RJ was wrong about Bell Curve distribution?
19/12/2009 06:03:24 PM
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So, Aviendha trumps RJ? A woman who, as late as tGS, doesn't know what she's doing with the OP?
19/12/2009 06:12:42 PM
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Age-Related Sample Bias
18/12/2009 06:41:03 PM
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I have no problem with that...but it implies that the average woman today isn't at 50% of Lanfear...
18/12/2009 09:46:00 PM
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Partially agreed...
18/12/2009 10:13:46 PM
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Well, the Aes Sedai are the only group that we have detailed strength info about...
18/12/2009 10:26:48 PM
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Sharina is AS ... she'd be dead in a few years if she hadn't gone to the Tower *NM*
28/12/2009 01:08:20 AM
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A thought that occured to me, and I'd like your opinion...
18/12/2009 07:38:29 PM
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Is it just my bad memory or is one of the wondergirls not a sparker?
18/12/2009 10:12:59 PM
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Easier sulution, and real example.
18/12/2009 10:03:20 PM
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And that is indeed the solution I feel most comfortable with...
18/12/2009 10:08:40 PM
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Re: And that is indeed the solution I feel most comfortable with...
19/12/2009 11:39:31 AM
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Dude, Seriously?
18/12/2009 10:19:25 PM
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Indeed, and that's why I propose that...
18/12/2009 10:31:23 PM
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So RJ used two separate scales, one actual one relative, to explain the same thing?
18/12/2009 11:33:20 PM
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Yes, "Bell Curve" does not mean Gausian. Or normal distribution.
19/12/2009 11:24:10 PM
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I'm sorry, but I've never heard of a non-Gaussian bell curve. Can you prove its existence? *NM*
20/12/2009 03:24:22 AM
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Maybe people in my field just use the term in a non-technical way. We do things with ...
21/12/2009 07:24:43 PM
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That's because outliers in IQ tests are excluded form the curve. *NM*
18/12/2009 11:31:23 PM
- 405 Views
Re: The One Power Bell Curve: Proof that it is not centered on 50% of the strongest channeler's stre
19/12/2009 06:02:34 PM
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Mathmatically this is very close to the system I proposed in another thread
27/12/2009 01:23:51 AM
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Re: The One Power Bell Curve:
27/12/2009 10:05:33 PM
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What makes you think Alviarin is "middling"?
27/12/2009 10:28:13 PM
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