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and how much different is the committee's poll than the AP????

Various polls however contrived are not going to differ that much unless they are done by an algorithm, are early in the year, or are weird to get noticed and clicks.
We've done polls here fairly often and they end up looking about like the AP/UPI/BCS whatever.  I still think the committee invests quite a bit more than 5 minutes on that fourth team, as the first three are usually clear cut.
Today, I think nearly every has Bama, Clemson, ND 1 2 3.  Michigan might make 4 at the moment, but OU has a stake in there. LSU has three impressive wins and a tough road loss.  So, right no, #4 is debatable.

looking at the Peach Bowl (UCF/Auburn) and the CFP (Georgia/Bama final)

the AP poll may have been more accurate.

the cfp poll is pre-bowls, the ap is post. for the pre-bowl ap, the top 8 were identical to the cfp poll.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_NCAA_Division_I_FBS_football_rankings

the cfp poll is pre-bowls, the ap is post. for the pre-bowl ap, the top 8 were identical to the cfp poll.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_NCAA_Division_I_FBS_football_rankings

Thank you for that clarification.  I assume it was an accidental error in the first place.

I prefer to be Gaussian myself, in a magnetic personality kind of way.

We don't get a "final CFP poll", interestingly, so you can't claim your team finished say 6th in any CFP poll.

All I know is that a long list of undefeateds followed by a long list of 1-loss teams isn't going to be accurate.  Some 3-loss teams would beat some 1-loss teams.

A true, genuine (impossible-to-know) ranking of teams would seem like a mish-mash of teams with varying records.



But that doesn't "seem" correct, so the voters act in a safe, sheepish manner.

Hayden Fry was right, "Never schedule a loss"

That bit of info would have come in handy when I was dating

Most of the time, an 11-1 team will beat a 9-3 team.  Of course, SOME of the time there would be an upset for various reasons.

And SOME of the team the 9-3 team really is better than the 11-1 team.

But it is easier and faster just to line up the P5s by number of losses and jiggle a few up and down.

Well and there's also the question of whether you're ranking the outcomes/resumes, or ranking them as a power poll. 
There are a lot of times a team finishes 9-3 because of a bad beat or two, and an 11-1 team caught a lucky break, and the 9-3 team *should* be above the 11-1 on a power poll. But if the polls rank a 9-3 over an 11-1, people will lose their ish...
2015 Iowa was clearly a paper tiger. They barely beat Pitt, Wisconsin, Indiana and Minnesota. Wins against Illinois and Nebraska weren't exactly blowouts. They only ranked team they faced was Wisconsin at 19. They didn't exactly have a world-beating resume, but they were undefeated. So they were 3rd in the coaches poll, and 4th in the AP and the CFP polls, heading into the B1G CCG. And then they got absolutely dismantled 45-16 in the Rose by Stanford--and if I remember correctly, it was 35-0 at some point and those 16 points were basically garbage time scores. 
And the 11-1 MSU they faced in the CCG got absolutely smoked by Bama in the CFP semifinal. That team barely beat Oregon, beat Michigan on one of the more fluke endings in CFB history, squeaked by terrible Rutgers and Purdue teams that year, and lost to a Nebraska team that finished the regular season 5-7 and had to get an exemption to go to a bowl. Their resume was better than Iowa's but not by much, and it showed when they were shut out 38-0 by Alabama.
Did anyone really think that Iowa was roughly on par with the rest of the CFP top 10? No. They simply did not have the top-to-bottom talent on their roster. Ferentz is a good coach, but he's neither great nor innovative. We all know what Iowa is. A good team that caught some lucky breaks and a mediocre strength of schedule to get to 12-0. 
This is the problem with the polls. Everyone knew Iowa wasn't that good. But they were undefeated [in a P5 conference], so of course they're overranked.