Could anyone please tell me how I did on this essay? Thanks so much in advance!!
SAT Prompt:
Is knowing facts as important as understanding ideas and concepts? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position… yak yak.
Humankind has often used various lines of reasoning in understanding various ideas and concepts. Some try to intuit them and then use logical reasoning to prove to themselves as to why a certain “truth” holds. Others just build off of logical examination of facts without any preconceived ideas as to what the result of it might be. Various examples show that this line of reasoning in which knowing facts is as important as concepts is effective, including the evolution of mathematics and chemistry.
Initially, mathematics was a field devoted to counting. In its primitive days it was usual for counting things: how many sheep a farmer owned or how many silver coins did a person have. The facts were that, for example, a sheep in a primitive civilization cost 5 gold coins. Soon, in this example, a farmer wanted to buy the maximum number of sheep with a certain number of coins that he had. As a result, the concept of division was invented in historical scenarios like this, where a person had to count the maximum number of times a certain quantity could fit into another quantity. Keep in mind that in this historical example, where there was no concept of division, the fact that there were two quantities and that one quantity was larger than another, coupled with the need to fit the smaller quantity inside the larger one led to the creation of the now-ubiquitous concept of division. Many more examples occurred where knowing facts led to new mathematical concepts including derivatives and integrals.
Another science that shows that knowing the facts is more important than knowing concepts is chemistry. Initially, ancient chemists thought that materials were made up of four ancient elements: earth, wind, fire, and water. However, modern-day chemistry has disproved this theory by proving the existence of unique elements, with each element being composed of a unique atom. The concept that atoms existed arose out of the fact that radioactive waves were reflected at different vibrations for each type of element. This was impossible by the “Earth, Wind, Water, and Fire theory.” Thus, chemists were forced to reconsider their conception of elements, and as a result, the modern concept of an atom arose.
Knowing concepts is nice, but only if they are backed up by facts. There is a limit as to the number of concepts discovered by pure intuition without facts. Thus, the examples of the evolution of math and chemistry prove that knowing facts is more important as facts lead to concepts while concepts don’t necessarily lead to facts.
I’m about to look at the other link you sent me!