Revised Paragraph

Original: Before tackling the question of from where intelligence is derived, it is necessary to define what it means for an individual to be intelligent. One objective measure of intelligence for individuals is standardized testing, a practice that Davidson heavily criticizes for its rigidness. She argues, “If you measure narrowly, you see results just as narrowly” (Davidson 61). There are types of intelligence that cannot be measured by a standardized test, such as creativity and curiosity. Yet, as Johnson shows in his “Pandemonium” example, one should not completely rule out this definition of individual intelligence. In Pandemonium, individual “demons” are responsible for recognizing certain shapes as part of a text recognition software, who then send their results to a “master” demon who compile their results and grade each demon on its performance (Johnson 207). Should a demon receive a low grade, it is immediately removed from the system and replaced with another, better demon, leading to a highly optimized system. This objective method of grading the demons' intelligence, while too limited in scope to cover the breadth of human intelligence, is nevertheless necessary for Pandemonium to be efficient. Performance is interchangeable with intelligence here. Davidson's view of intelligence arises from an inquiry-based education approach. According to her, “It is not about answering test questions. It is about knowing that, when tested by the most grueling challenges ahead, you have the capacity to learn what is required to succeed” (Davidson 67). Thus, an intelligent individual is one who has the will and ability to learn whenever necessary. Lethem, however, would disagree with this notion, saying all that there is to be learned is already available in the public commons to be pulled out like an encyclopedia; there is no skill involved in learning. Rather, the true intelligence lies in being able to take seemingly unconnected works from the sea of “undiscovered public knowledge” and finding connections where there were none before, as did Dr. Swanson when attempting to analyze Raynaud's syndrome (Lethem 223). In other words, the ability to form a web between unrelated elements is the essence of intelligence. Note that, among all the examples given above, the common theme is the ability to solve a problem. Whether it be a standardized test, text recognition, being “tested by the most grueling challenges” (Davidson 67), or medical research, the intelligent individual is one that can overcome a challenge. Thus, problem-solving can be used as a working definition for intelligence in individuals.

Revised: By defining both individual and collective intelligence to mean the capacity to apply skills to solve a problem, it becomes easy to see how individual agency is reflected in the collective intelligence. In their texts, Davidson, Lethem, and Johnson offer examples suitable to discussing what constitutes intelligence. One objective measure of intelligence for individuals is standardized testing, a practice that Davidson heavily criticizes for its rigidness (Davidson 61). She argues that there are types of intelligence that cannot be measured by a standardized test, such as creativity and curiosity. Yet, as Johnson shows in his “Pandemonium” example, one should not completely rule out this definition of intelligence. In Pandemonium, “demons” are graded on their ability to recognize text, and if they are not up to standard, they are replaced by different demons to optimize the system (Johnson 207). This objective method of grading the demons' intelligence, while too limited in scope to cover the breadth of human intelligence, is nevertheless necessary for Pandemonium to be efficient. Performance is interchangeable with intelligence here. Lethem, however, would disagree with this notion, saying true intelligence lies in being able to take seemingly unconnected works from the sea of “undiscovered public knowledge” and finding connections where there were none before, as did Dr. Swanson when attempting to analyze Raynaud's syndrome (Lethem 223). In other words, the ability to form a web between unrelated elements is the essence of intelligence. In contrast, Davidson's view of intelligence arises from an inquiry-based education approach. According to her, “It is not about answering test questions. It is about knowing that, when tested by the most grueling challenges ahead, you have the capacity to learn what is required to succeed” (Davidson 67). Thus, an intelligent individual is one who has the will and ability to learn whenever necessary. Note that despite the different views on intelligence the authors present, the common theme is the ability to solve a problem. Combining these examples with this common theme, it seems that intelligence, for both the individual and the community, is simply the ability to apply one's skills to solve a problem. It therefore follows that a community's ability to solve a problem is inherently tied to the members' abilities to solve problems, leading to the logical conclusion that the collective intelligence depends entirely on its constituents in order to solve problems.

 

The most glaring issue with my original paragraph, as my peer pointed out, is that it did not add much to the thesis of my paper. It was merely a definition of intelligence to be used in later paragraphs to support the thesis then, and as a result, it seemed like the paper took a major diversion initially before getting back to the point. In order to alleviate this, I changed the topic sentence and added additional sentences in the end that would tie the conclusion back to the thesis (while the paragraph still conflicts with my current thesis, I plan on changing it, which will be easier with these extra connections).  Now, the paragraph also serves as a better transition to the next paragraph, where the new understanding of intelligence can be used to defend my thesis. Within the paragraph, I felt it was more logical to switch it so Lethem's example was before Davidson's, because Davidson's inquiry based learning more closely matches the common theme addressed immediately after. Finally, I tightened the paragraph by trimming down summary and removing the accidental repeated quote from Davidson.