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False quantification to the nth degree
Read, Dwight ANTHRO (Read@ANTHRO.SSCNET.UCLA.EDU)
Tue, 14 Jun 1994 11:43:00 PDT
Salovesh has commented on the "irrationality" of GPA's etc. But consider:
GPA's are measured on a metric scale; grades are a ordinal scale. Any means
for converting a metric scale to an ordinal scale leads to disjunction
between metric distance and ordinal distance (i.e., 2.999 is .001 from
3.000, but the grade B+ is not .001 from the grade A-). The reason for the
metric scale is because ordinal values cannot be "averaged," only metric
values. So ordinal values must be converted to metric values, averaged, and
then converted back to ordinal values. If we did not use an ordinal scale
in the first place, the disjunction would not arise. Thus it is not a
mathematical problem/issue, but one that stems back to why we use an ordinal
scale in the first place.
D. Read
READ@ANTHRO.SSCNET.UCLA.EDU
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