Sorry about your rejection.
I think you misunderstand when I say "I don't want to want it." Of course I want to get in. The last 3 years of my life has been dedicated to trying to improve and to try again. Sure maybe you were able to handle the crushing defeat a bit better than I did. But it's not as easy for everyone to regroup and apply again without it possibly affecting other areas of their lives, so the re-application process can vary immensely. Seeking jobs in the intermittent time between applications would have exhausted recommendation / reference resources. (This is an example of how the experience would be different for some people. It might be absolutely necessary to get a salary.) Eventually professors will get sick of your pestering.
The program didn't officially tell me I need to retake. It was sort of 'inside-info' that it wasn't high enough. And no, I do not think I could do a whole lot better. I might improve verbal a bit, but quant would suffer more than the verbal improvement. The master's program and the lab research don't really require anything more than basic algebra. I feel I'm too out of practice to even match what I got in Quant before.
The difference between applying to one program and ten is how much I have to bug people to write recommendations, which is already a delicate situation (see above.) And to be honest, it seems like you're downplaying the value of strong recommendations, or maybe I wasn't clear as to how weak they probably were. My focus is on quality, not quantity. I played the quantity game the first time around (if 8 programs count as quantity.) Additionally, it's really not a 1:1 ratio in terms of investment/reward. I hope you're not submitting the same personal statement to every program--it needs to be tailored to each one, including knowledge of what type of research is going on at each and who you might be interested in working with (probably not required for all programs.)
As for the GPA, the masters courses are essentially 2/3 of the total courses required for the Ph.D program--the exact same courses. The point is being able to show them that I can handle that level of work and maintain a GPA above what they ask for Ph.D students (3.0+)
"I keep wandering if I was edged out by some twerp who only applied on a whim, and accepted the offer because why not?, and a year from now he, or she, is not going to be interested anymore."
So essentially you're saying that if you're not sure you want it, you shouldn't accept? What's the alternative to accepting and deciding a year later that you don't want to do it? Not accepting then applying again if you realize you do want it? This is kind of a bitter attitude. I don't have stats to quote you, but I get the feeling that the large majority of people who start grad school, end up finishing it, and I highly doubt that they all enter with 100% conviction that they want to do it. You can't really blame people for keeping their options open.
Valid for 5 years according to the program I'm interested in.
It sounds like you haven't really experienced what the job market is like for Bio degrees. I do not see it as prolonging the wait for career searching. It's preparation for a better career and also gaining sense of accomplishment--the latter is more important to some than others, which is one of the main reasons I want to do it. Lots of people go to grad school simply because they feel like it's the next logical step and they finish just fine. The people who whine about it and drop out are a loud minority on the internet.
Thanks for this. I kind of tried to explain the same thing above, but not as eloquently.