Paragraph Revision Paper 2

This peer review process was very enlightening and encouraged me to focus on my ideas more than trying to force the quotes in my paper. One paragraph that one of my peers told me should be revised was my second body paragraph which read:

     Only systems that are formed by collaboration can truly be considered intelligent. “Intelligence” is having an abundance of knowledge and being able to apply it in new and productive ways. There is no way for one single person to know everything, so if people in a system were required to all conform to one way of thinking, or one method of learning, then the amount of knowledge in such a system would be limited. The only way to gather all of the information we can is through collecting and processing the ideas of others. Lethem recognized that, “…substantially, all ideas are secondhand, consciously and unconsciously drawn from a million outside sources…” (Lethem 225). This proves that it is impossible to be completely original, so we should just accept and expand existing thoughts. Crowdsourcing, or getting information from the public instead of from an expert, is an example of a collaborative system that builds intelligence. Davidson admired crowdsourcing solutions from all over because she knew that this method increases everyone’s collective knowledge. She said, “No matter how expert we are, no matter how brilliant, we can improve, we can learn, by sharing insights and working together collectively” (Davidson 51). Sharing ideas and collaborating with others can lead to new ideas, new policies, and new systems. In this age, we are presented with so many different opportunities to obtain new information that it would only be “intelligent” to draw new connections and solutions using resources that are publicly available. The key to collaboration is having people and ideas work together.

As you can see, the quotations were a little awkward and needed to be reorganized and explained more thoroughly. I ended up moving this paragraph farther down in my essay and added more analysis to it. This paragraph will most likely go under further revision before being part of my final draft, but as it stands, it now reads:

Only systems that are formed by collaboration can truly be considered intelligent because these systems follow repeated patterns of connecting several ideas which, in turn, will increase knowledge.  If people in a system were required to all conform to one way of thinking, or one method of learning, then the amount of knowledge in such a system would be limited. The only way to gather all of the information we can is through continuously collecting and processing the ideas of others. “Crowdsourcing,” or getting information from the public instead of from an expert, is an example of a collaborative system that builds intelligence. Davidson admired crowdsourcing solutions from all over because she knew that this method increases everyone’s collective knowledge. She said, “No matter how expert we are, no matter how brilliant, we can improve, we can learn, by sharing insights and working together collectively” (Davidson 51). Sharing ideas and collaborating with others forms connections, which can lead to new ideas, new policies, and new systems. As this process is repeated, the knowledge available in a community will only grow. In fact, connecting the ideas of others may be the only way of learning new insights. Lethem recognized that, “…substantially, all ideas are secondhand, consciously and unconsciously drawn from a million outside sources…” (Lethem 225). This proves that it is impossible to be completely original. We must accept and expand existing thoughts in order to evolve as a community. In this age, we are presented with so many different opportunities to obtain new information that it would be in everyone’s best interest to discover new connections and solutions using resources that are publicly available. Clearly, the key to collaboration is having people connect and build off each other’s ideas

This revision contributes to my thesis because, now, the paragraph flows better and focuses on the benefits of collaboration instead of trying to define "intelligence." The reason patterns are discussed is because I added a few paragraphs before this one that discuss feedback loops and intelligence.