Re:Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions...
by colinmhayes on Monday March 28, 2022 @07:56PM
(#30837026)
> I didn't say the 5 gives you 4ish bits of information. I said it gives you 1.4 bits of information.
Which is obviously wrong. The self-selection does provide a lot of information. Students who believe themselves unlikely to score well are unlikely to take the test, which is why so many students get a 5.
From the point of view of MIT, admitting you has a significant downside: they have to turn down someone else, someone who might have been able to do better research than you do and donate more as an alumnus. But from the point of view of an individual person, more education is always better, because your alternative to education is not admitting someone better; your alternative to education is ignorance.
(Schooling may not be the best way to get that education, however... far too many people opt for ignorance after their schooling.)
I didn't say the 5 gives you 4ish bits of information. I said it gives you 1.4 bits of information. That's only 35% of 4, not very 4ish at all. It's barely in the order of magnitude centered on 4 (1.26 to 12.6).