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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;physics-fan3.14, post: 4129139, member: 19165&quot;]Some good points there, geek. </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Yes, I believe anyone who looks at coins regularly will see overgraded and undergraded coins. I think the majority of them are properly graded, but there are outliers. </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>In my opinion, this is a good thing. I also think the education and discussion around grading in these threads is valuable. Someone can say to themselves - I would grade this coin EF-45! Or, I would grade this coin MS-68! That doesn&#039;t make it right. It means they need to learn more about the grading process. The more we all learn about grading, the better - and the more consistently accurate our grades will be. </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>That is one perspective, I agree. However, and this is a discussion that several of us have had many times over the past couple of years: the fact is that grading has evolved. If someone grades the same way they did in 1960, they are not going to have an easy time in the modern collecting world. I wouldn&#039;t say they are pessimists, necessarily, but I would sometimes say they may have old fashioned ideas about grading. Again, I don&#039;t want to offend anyone with these threads - but the fact is, NGC and PCGS are the current standard in our hobby. To retain some objectivity in this study, I have to use their grade as the standard that I&#039;m comparing CoinTalk to. </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>As I mentioned earlier, I don&#039;t actually think this would significantly impact the outcome. Because NGC and PCGS are the standard, I think many collectors have already somewhat aligned with the way they grade. Many, if not most, collectors will generally tend to fall within one point plus or minus of the TPG grade (as is evidenced by these polls). You then have some outliers (significantly more than usual in this thread) that will affect the average. I understand that, and that&#039;s one of the drawbacks of grading from photos. </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Those types of threads are also highly educational. They can make for fantastic threads, if approached as a learning tool instead of a vendetta (as they sometimes do). However, I am trying to determine how accurate CT is - and my theory is, the wisdom of the crowds will tend to produce, on average, a correct answer more often than not. In order to do that, I need to know what the correct answer is for comparison - and I&#039;ve selected NGC and PCGS grades as &quot;correct answers.&quot; </p><p><br /></p><p>If you had a hundred people guess the weight of a cow, but everyone had a different opinion of how it should be measured, you wouldn&#039;t get a very good result. The cow is put on a scale and weighed, and that&#039;s the answer. The wisdom of the crowds comes in by averaging all these guesses. Someone might guess 900 lbs, but someone else might guess 300. Well, if the cow weighs 600, then the average guess is probably going to be pretty close to correct.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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