5 ms·

70% is the bottom of C grade range. (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_grading_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_grading_in_

70% is the bottom of C grade range. (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_grading_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_grading_in_the_Unit...) Honestly I think this can explain a large part of D-K. People just aren't calibrated to imagine getting a 25% let alone a 0% even in something they are truly terrible at.

humanrebar 7y ago
In an eating contest, it's rare to finish eating less than one bite. It's not insane to imagine that last place is significantly better than 0.
dragonwriter 7y ago
> 70% is the bottom of C grade range 70th percentile doesn't correspond to a 70% score, and when it does, it's almost certainly not on a (common, but very far from universal) grading scale where it is true that 70% is the bottom of the C range, just like 50th percentile is very rarely failing, though 50% is in (and not even the top of) the F range on the same scale. > Honestly I think this can explain a large part of D-K. It almost certainly doesn't explain any of the high-end part of the effect, and an explanation where the low-end and high-end effects are unrelated coincidences is, while possible, the kind of explanation that a preference for parsimony would prefer avoiding in the absence of evidence demanding separate effects.
- cwyers 7y ago
  Where are you getting this from? The actual test scores in the graph in the article don't correspond with the percentiles; I don't think the scales on the x and y axis are the same, which is what you seem to be contending.
- haberman 7y ago
  I just looked at the original paper again and I see that in some of the tests the researchers asked participants to estimate the raw number of questions they got correct, in addition to the percentile relative to their peers. Even in raw numbers the bottom quartile overestimated their ability significantly. So I'm less confident in my theory than I was before.
naniwaduni 7y ago
Even for percentiles, it makes sense to calibrate to above average: people are rarely ranked on tasks they're not good at.

humanrebar 7y ago

In an eating contest, it's rare to finish eating less than one bite. It's not insane to imagine that last place is significantly better than 0.

dragonwriter 7y ago

> 70% is the bottom of C grade range 70th percentile doesn't correspond to a 70% score, and when it does, it's almost certainly not on a (common, but very far from universal) grading scale where it is true that 70% is the bottom of the C range, just like 50th percentile is very rarely failing, though 50% is in (and not even the top of) the F range on the same scale. > Honestly I think this can explain a large part of D-K. It almost certainly doesn't explain any of the high-end part of the effect, and an explanation where the low-end and high-end effects are unrelated coincidences is, while possible, the kind of explanation that a preference for parsimony would prefer avoiding in the absence of evidence demanding separate effects.

cwyers 7y ago
Where are you getting this from? The actual test scores in the graph in the article don't correspond with the percentiles; I don't think the scales on the x and y axis are the same, which is what you seem to be contending.
haberman 7y ago
I just looked at the original paper again and I see that in some of the tests the researchers asked participants to estimate the raw number of questions they got correct, in addition to the percentile relative to their peers. Even in raw numbers the bottom quartile overestimated their ability significantly. So I'm less confident in my theory than I was before.

naniwaduni 7y ago

Even for percentiles, it makes sense to calibrate to above average: people are rarely ranked on tasks they're not good at.