You can choose between studying for a test and goofing off. You choose to goof off and decide to wing it on the test. You get a high grade. What was it (if anything) that was lost in that exchange?
What was traded for the high numerical value of the grade? I’m not talking about the value of the grade as a whole, such as how someone might value a hard earned C over an easily earned A. I want to know what was traded for the high numerical score, and what (if anything) makes that different from what would have been traded if you had received a low score instead.
I think what you are looking for is game theory. But I’m not sure how to apply that to the paradigms you’ve presented because game theory is rooted in value assumptions.
So, how do you value what is gained from goofing off vs. what is gained from getting a good grade? And how do the results of those two influence other things which you also value? And what about the intangibles associated with them?
Studying hard so you can get a job where you earn lots of money is one thing. But what if you are part of the aristocracy (and America has an aristocracy, make no mistake) and your performance in school doesn’t really matter provided you get a degree?
There are a lot of intangibles in questions like this. For an American from suburbia, a GRE and community college represents damnation to the worst sort of poverty. For an American from the ghetto, those same elements represent their best hope of bettering their condition and the condition of their descendants.
So, what is the context in which we are considering the evaluation and how does the evaluator view the situation?
For example, it doesn’t further my career any, but tonight I’m going out clubbing and I’m going to have a fantastic time. I value that more than any advancement in my field. There is a straight-laced dude in my department who totally wants to advance in the field and that is it. Lots of luck to him. Nobody likes him, but, eh, what can you do? I’m not always well received either because I’m at the other extreme.
But that brings an extra dimension into it. It isn’t merely about the values of any given individual but also the values of the culture(s) they find themselves in. And sometimes the cultural influence is counter-intuitive. I’ve got a buddy who is a born academic, and he’s doing quite well for himself within that sphere. But his family, ehh, it isn’t that they don’t support him but they also clearly thought more highly of him when he was earning an “honest wage” in a dead-end job as a video-store clerk.
There is a lot to consider in a question like this, but the variables need to be defined.
I completely agree that the value of what is obtained and what is lost can vary between perspectives and situations.
However, that is not what I am concerned about here.
Let’s say that the test is multiple choice and I decide that my approach to it is that I will simply bubble in answers at random.
In one hypothetical situation, my randomly bubbled answers are correct and I get a high numerical grade. In another hypothetical situation, my randomly bubbled answers are incorrect and I get a low numerical grade.
What, if any, difference is there between what is exchanged for the literal numerical value of the grade in the first situation and the second?
What you gave up was “security” by taking risk/chance. The more risk you take, the more certain your failure and thus you are less secure by every risk you take. Of course, the final result in your example would be that even if you made it all the way through college, you would then be in a situation of having to pretend to know things you don’t until you eventually get caught - high risk, very low security.
That depends on which perspective you are evaluating. From the “God perspective”/determinacy, the opportunity to fail is a failure. But from the “human perspective” of having limited knowledge, an opportunity is a choice. You can either take the risk path or not. You must decide and either increase your risk rating or reduce it.
There are a variety of different ways of expressing the dilemma that you are presenting. I think the “internal” and “external” good divide covers it, though the language may vary from culture to culture. Internal goods detail cases of actual excellence, so in this case actually filling in the bubbles that correspond to the correct answers because you know the correct answers. External goods are the grade you get for the class. Because of the external representation, external goods are to a large extent entirely random. If you answer all the questions correctly because you know the actual answer, but at one point skipped a question on the scantron, your grade will be a failing one. If you answered all questions “ABBACADDABBA” in that order for no reason other than aesthetics and received a 100%, that is likewise due to the capricious nature of fate.
Confucius said that wealth and high station are what men desire, in keeping with external virtues. He didn’t denigrate them. But he also thought that they were largely a function of fate and that if unrighteous earned they ought be spurned. That is in keeping with Aristotle’s notion of the Mean.
Good questions, old questions. So, turn to old answers
“Yes you get the high grade, but you lose motivation to do work/study in the future.” (Assuming you received a high grade in this hypothetical situation)
What you gained was a high grade (even by chance of randomly bubbling in answers), but what you lost (perhaps unwillingly or unknowingly) was the motivation to study in the future.
I’m not sure you would completely lose that motivation. Maybe if you filled in the random answers and got a high grade more than 50 % of the time, However one would almost certainly conclude from just one test that it was shear luck, and the odds of this happening again are low. I mean view the situation from your own perspective. Suppose you take a test, fill in answers at random, then get an A. You could try it next time, but if you ask yourself, whats the probability of this happening again? Realistically speaking probably not very high.
