In a more serious vein, I would argue that creativity is like wisdom. It is correlated with intelligence, but not strongly. We all know intelligent people who do "stupid" things (e.g. Bill Clinton). What we really mean here by stupid is unwise. The fact that we use a world for lack of intelligence for lack of wisdom, shows how the two are related.
I think the same sort of thing holds for creativity. For example, Beethoven is usually considered as one of the three greatest Western composers, along with Mozart and Bach. The last two of these were certifiable geniuses, whereas Beethoven was not. His creativity was off the scale and that puts him at the top, while Bach performed feats of genius (like compose fugues in his head) that were far above ordinary mortals. Beethoven's manuscripts were heavily emended, while those of Mozart were mostly free of edits, as if he composed them in head and when he had what he wanted, just wrote it down.
As another former high school debater, I also decided to look at the topics. The November/December ones are not as bad as the January ones you cited - wealth tax for LD, military support of Taiwan for PF, and intellectual property rights for Policy. Wealth tax is a particularly fun one for LD I think, lots of opportunities to fight over value/value criterion.
I also hadn't heard about Big Questions before now (not sure if I'm getting old or if it's just not a thing in my area). What is the idea behind that? The NSDA site says, "Big Questions is a form of debate designed to open students’ minds and encourage them to engage in life discussion that may not align with their previously held beliefs" - isn't that, like, all of debate?
Value and value criterion were always such confused ideas. Your decision procedure will generally be a *moral theory* while most criterions were just random goods. And then the value was always just a synonym of good.
I disagree, I think it helps provide a helpful structure. If one debater is saying "vote aff to save 100 lives" and the other debater is saying "vote neg to save the government $1B", they need to give the judge some way to decide which is more important. Sure, they will probably read a definition from Mill about Justice that they will barely engage with, but if they have some idea what they are doing, they will then explain why maximizing lives or quality of life or protecting the social contract or whatever is the most important way to achieve it.
(So I guess I sort of agree - the value is pretty some interchangeable intangible good thing, and the VC is how the debater wants to measure it. But judge a PF round and you will appreciate the added coherency it provides!)
I would argue that creativity is the 'force' behind evolution, and most of what has been wrought by evolution has occurred without much intelligence and intelligence is a product of creativity. I state this to say I believe creativity to be more powerful than intelligence, but would also assert that the sample sizes of the two phenomena are too dissimilar to really compare. Now, if the topic is supposed to refer to human intelligence and human creativity, than yes, I agree that creativity is a function of intelligence and the topic is rather null.
Anthropomorphizing poor Mr Theodore out of sheer kindness - just because he is so old and blind - or because he made a few very niche, but instant cult classic watches is a serious misunderstanding. Not to mention it assigns all the credit to him, yet it's obviously a family business! (Look at how much effort little Entropy puts into it. You think it's a cakewalk fiddling with all those nucleotides every day to make number go up?)
So, I guess we get into a very complex discussion about what is at work in the universe with abiogenesis and evolution. I think the fact that matter is combinatorially non-trivial, and what goes on as life evolves forms a figure and ground situation that is more than the sum of its parts. This is the 'creative force' as I see it. It is creative, and admittedly inelegant, but immensely powerful.
We should simply automatically assign a loss to any debater who engages in semantics until they stops doing so. Everyone knows that the force of sophistry in debate is currently stronger than the force of reasoned argument anyways.
I'm finding some confusion in regard to the definition of "intelligence" that you accept (which is still the definition most widely accepted by most psychologists.) The testable "intelligence" that's assessed by "IQ" tests is actually more like a subset skill. It's commonly called "abstract reasoning", and superior performance in the tests is considered proof of "higher reasoning"--the improved ability to follow an increasingly complex linear chain of deduction by following a set of diagrams or described functions, using a sequence of changes to predict the next logical step. I contend that's only one facet of intelligence. In my view, it's most certainly NOT the common substrate of intelligence that IQ assessment quantifiers claim it is. Upon examination, what's measured by the tests is more like the faculty where Artificial Intelligence excels: focused calculation. But AI isn't even thinking! It's merely demonstrating superior commend of its (indisputably superior) specialized functions of memory recall and calculation in strict obedience to preprogrammed settings. Within those bounds, AI works nearly flawlessly--and it does so amazingly quickly and practically effortlessly. But for all the uncanny level of performance, AI is entirely reactive--because it doesn't think for itself. AI is as inert as a garden rake, in terms of possessing an autonomous faculty of consciousness. Any expression formulated by AI that resembles an Idea will be found on closer scrutiny to be a reactive response to the human programmer--the actual source of every Idea that informs AI. So abstract reasoning is only one component of Intelligence. I agree that it's a necessary component: some amount of it--some "quotient"--has to be present in a functioning human brain, in order for it to function at all intelligently. But that ground rule does not necessarily lead to the conclusion that the more skill at abstract reasoning, the higher the intelligence of the human being. It's a feature that loans itself to testability. Furthermore, there are some problems and problem sets that rely on abstract reasoning almost entirely. But when scrutinized, that exclusive set of mental challenges constitutes only a few specialized fields of knowledge. Fields where calculators and algorithms happen to excel--even in the absence of consciousness (much less self-aware consciousness.) Creativity, however, is a different form of Intelligence. Not a subset. Abstract reasoning applies formal rules to predict the ordained shift of elements to provide the "correct" answer to a Raven's Progressive Matrix test question. Creativity is more concerned with other priorities than following the pre-channeled path; it may instead be busying itself with choosing which diagram has the most pleasing and balanced composition to serve as a template for a patchwork quilt design. Creativity insists on the freedom to think for itself, outside of the dictates of the predictable sequence and the confines of linear definition. 2 + 2 = 5 may no longer be a simple--and incorrect--numerical denotation. It might instead indicate a pair of cobras wheeling around a narrow passageway that shelters a seahorse on the other side. Think about it. That's a creative interpretation that requires some abstract reasoning ability in order to formulate--but there's more involved in the process than that. Abstract reasoning capability is necessary, but not sufficient.
Matt writes "...it would seem false that, say, Tolkien is more creative than George R. R. Martin"
Brace yourselves...
https://youtu.be/XAAp_luluo0?t=12
In a more serious vein, I would argue that creativity is like wisdom. It is correlated with intelligence, but not strongly. We all know intelligent people who do "stupid" things (e.g. Bill Clinton). What we really mean here by stupid is unwise. The fact that we use a world for lack of intelligence for lack of wisdom, shows how the two are related.
I think the same sort of thing holds for creativity. For example, Beethoven is usually considered as one of the three greatest Western composers, along with Mozart and Bach. The last two of these were certifiable geniuses, whereas Beethoven was not. His creativity was off the scale and that puts him at the top, while Bach performed feats of genius (like compose fugues in his head) that were far above ordinary mortals. Beethoven's manuscripts were heavily emended, while those of Mozart were mostly free of edits, as if he composed them in head and when he had what he wanted, just wrote it down.
As another former high school debater, I also decided to look at the topics. The November/December ones are not as bad as the January ones you cited - wealth tax for LD, military support of Taiwan for PF, and intellectual property rights for Policy. Wealth tax is a particularly fun one for LD I think, lots of opportunities to fight over value/value criterion.
I also hadn't heard about Big Questions before now (not sure if I'm getting old or if it's just not a thing in my area). What is the idea behind that? The NSDA site says, "Big Questions is a form of debate designed to open students’ minds and encourage them to engage in life discussion that may not align with their previously held beliefs" - isn't that, like, all of debate?
Value and value criterion were always such confused ideas. Your decision procedure will generally be a *moral theory* while most criterions were just random goods. And then the value was always just a synonym of good.
I disagree, I think it helps provide a helpful structure. If one debater is saying "vote aff to save 100 lives" and the other debater is saying "vote neg to save the government $1B", they need to give the judge some way to decide which is more important. Sure, they will probably read a definition from Mill about Justice that they will barely engage with, but if they have some idea what they are doing, they will then explain why maximizing lives or quality of life or protecting the social contract or whatever is the most important way to achieve it.
(So I guess I sort of agree - the value is pretty some interchangeable intangible good thing, and the VC is how the debater wants to measure it. But judge a PF round and you will appreciate the added coherency it provides!)
I would argue that creativity is the 'force' behind evolution, and most of what has been wrought by evolution has occurred without much intelligence and intelligence is a product of creativity. I state this to say I believe creativity to be more powerful than intelligence, but would also assert that the sample sizes of the two phenomena are too dissimilar to really compare. Now, if the topic is supposed to refer to human intelligence and human creativity, than yes, I agree that creativity is a function of intelligence and the topic is rather null.
What's the creativity in brute force?
Anthropomorphizing poor Mr Theodore out of sheer kindness - just because he is so old and blind - or because he made a few very niche, but instant cult classic watches is a serious misunderstanding. Not to mention it assigns all the credit to him, yet it's obviously a family business! (Look at how much effort little Entropy puts into it. You think it's a cakewalk fiddling with all those nucleotides every day to make number go up?)
So, I guess we get into a very complex discussion about what is at work in the universe with abiogenesis and evolution. I think the fact that matter is combinatorially non-trivial, and what goes on as life evolves forms a figure and ground situation that is more than the sum of its parts. This is the 'creative force' as I see it. It is creative, and admittedly inelegant, but immensely powerful.
We should simply automatically assign a loss to any debater who engages in semantics until they stops doing so. Everyone knows that the force of sophistry in debate is currently stronger than the force of reasoned argument anyways.
Is von Neumann an example of intelligence or creativity?
I'm finding some confusion in regard to the definition of "intelligence" that you accept (which is still the definition most widely accepted by most psychologists.) The testable "intelligence" that's assessed by "IQ" tests is actually more like a subset skill. It's commonly called "abstract reasoning", and superior performance in the tests is considered proof of "higher reasoning"--the improved ability to follow an increasingly complex linear chain of deduction by following a set of diagrams or described functions, using a sequence of changes to predict the next logical step. I contend that's only one facet of intelligence. In my view, it's most certainly NOT the common substrate of intelligence that IQ assessment quantifiers claim it is. Upon examination, what's measured by the tests is more like the faculty where Artificial Intelligence excels: focused calculation. But AI isn't even thinking! It's merely demonstrating superior commend of its (indisputably superior) specialized functions of memory recall and calculation in strict obedience to preprogrammed settings. Within those bounds, AI works nearly flawlessly--and it does so amazingly quickly and practically effortlessly. But for all the uncanny level of performance, AI is entirely reactive--because it doesn't think for itself. AI is as inert as a garden rake, in terms of possessing an autonomous faculty of consciousness. Any expression formulated by AI that resembles an Idea will be found on closer scrutiny to be a reactive response to the human programmer--the actual source of every Idea that informs AI. So abstract reasoning is only one component of Intelligence. I agree that it's a necessary component: some amount of it--some "quotient"--has to be present in a functioning human brain, in order for it to function at all intelligently. But that ground rule does not necessarily lead to the conclusion that the more skill at abstract reasoning, the higher the intelligence of the human being. It's a feature that loans itself to testability. Furthermore, there are some problems and problem sets that rely on abstract reasoning almost entirely. But when scrutinized, that exclusive set of mental challenges constitutes only a few specialized fields of knowledge. Fields where calculators and algorithms happen to excel--even in the absence of consciousness (much less self-aware consciousness.) Creativity, however, is a different form of Intelligence. Not a subset. Abstract reasoning applies formal rules to predict the ordained shift of elements to provide the "correct" answer to a Raven's Progressive Matrix test question. Creativity is more concerned with other priorities than following the pre-channeled path; it may instead be busying itself with choosing which diagram has the most pleasing and balanced composition to serve as a template for a patchwork quilt design. Creativity insists on the freedom to think for itself, outside of the dictates of the predictable sequence and the confines of linear definition. 2 + 2 = 5 may no longer be a simple--and incorrect--numerical denotation. It might instead indicate a pair of cobras wheeling around a narrow passageway that shelters a seahorse on the other side. Think about it. That's a creative interpretation that requires some abstract reasoning ability in order to formulate--but there's more involved in the process than that. Abstract reasoning capability is necessary, but not sufficient.