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John Wilkins is an eternal student, who thinks philosophy of biology is at least as interesting as politics or sport and twice as important. He has a PhD from the University of Melbourne and worked at the University of Queensland, in Australia, before taking up a research fellowship at the University of Sydney. After a varied career, involving factories, gardening, civil service, publishing, graphics, public relations but not, unfortunately for the CV, driving a truck, John finally completed his thesis on species concepts in 2004, which he has worked into two books.

This blog ~~is designed~~ evolved to host any random thoughts that happen to be passing through my forebrain at a given moment. So there will be errors...

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The attractive and clever Evolving Thoughts...

Category: Humor • Politics
Posted on: April 27, 2007 11:39 PM, by John S. Wilkins

Following Scientific American's blog's description of Shelley at Retrospectacle, in the context of the the Wiley situation, as "seems to be attractive and avian-friendly", I now want it to be known henceforth that your favourite albino silverback is "obviously witty, attractive and good with children and pets". See Zuska's post for more on this.

Did you like this post? If so, please click on the "Share this" link above and add it to your favourite social bookmarking service, or submit it to the Open Laboratory 2009 via the link on the left bottom of the page. Many thanks. John.

Comments

This just isn't Shelley's week, is it?

Posted by: Eamon Knight | April 28, 2007 1:21 AM

Good with children and pets, eh?

Um, perhaps I've been reading too many wine labels.

Bob

Posted by: Bob O'H | April 28, 2007 3:24 AM

Last time I looked, we remain a sexual species with great gobs of our history devoted to honing our skills in that endeavor. Trying to suppress that with mere socialization is a doubtful enterprise. Calling me studly and wolf-pack friendly is, somewhere in my hind-brain, still gonna trip a circuit.

The proper response to this slip-up is not pitchforks and torches but discreet pointing and giggling, such as you might have at an ill-timed erection. It comes from the same recesses of our nature.

And, Bob ... don't forget the fava beans.

Posted by: John Pieret | April 28, 2007 7:19 AM

If I were sitting opposite Shelley over dinner, I might think and make comment that she was attractive. But when I'm reporting on written text and an event in which she has been involved, it has no relevance at all and is just an insult and, as Zuska says, a denigration of her as a woman. It is just wrong to mention it.

Posted by: John Wilkins | April 28, 2007 7:46 AM

I'm not saying it wasn't wrong. We should be able to control our erections or at least excuse ourselves from polite company before scaring the horses. I'm just trying to decide where it ranks correctly among crimes against humanity.

For what it's worth, Shelley herself linked to the offending article without mentioning that she felt insulted or denigrated. But this kind of conversation is going on over there so maybe she'll comment eventually.

Posted by: John Pieret | April 28, 2007 9:45 AM

Mr. Wilkins, why do you hate Shelly? Why do you insist a woman has to be ugly to be of any worth? Why the insistence that complimenting a woman on her appearance means one is belitting and demeaning her? Or is it misogyny that inspires you?

Shelly looks good. Shelly writes good. I hope Shelly has a good life and does well in her chosen profession. But you? May you PC your line into extinction.

Posted by: Alan Kellogg | April 29, 2007 12:45 AM

Suppose you had (i) a cowlick, and (ii) a lisp. If I referred to you in the context of discussing your argument in favour of, say, preventing AIDS by the use of condoms as "the cowlicked lisping Alan Kellogg", would you see that as an attempt to denigrate you and your argument or not?

It is a standard line amongst those who tend to use sexist language that "PC" is somehow inhumane. But it is not. It is an attempt, no matter how it may go off the rails occasionally, to show people respect where it is due. Shelley's involvement in the Fair Use Scandal, or Wileygate as it shall be known, has nothing whatsoever to do with her gender, appearance or pet choices. So bringing it in here is in a sense patronising and prejudicial: "Aww... it happened to an attractive wee lassie"...

And if we are going to play the game of pretending to compliment others, call me "Dr" Wilkins please. It happens to be a lot more relevant to my activities on this blog than my appearance.

Posted by: John Wilkins | April 29, 2007 1:13 AM

John, isn't it a bit disingenuous to tie this to an ad homen argument? Whether the complementing is wrong or right it's certainly a different kind of rhetoric than ad homen.

Posted by: Clark Goble | April 29, 2007 9:19 PM

It's not an ad hominem to mention that which is relevant to the argument being presented (or rather, there the ad hominem aspect is not fallacious). But that was not what I am saying is in play. Shelley's argument, and the outcome of this matter, in no way depends on what she looks like, or what her pets are. To introduce them, then, in a journalistic context, has some other motivation.

Journalists like "colour", as it is called, in their stories. Human interest makes the person being reported more "alive" and so it keeps the reader's interest. But the problem with introducing these issues is that the motivation for so doing is often unconsciously malign.

Suppose we are reporting a major political meeting between two world leaders. One is a male, the other female. If the report noted that the male was dressed in an Italian handmade suit, that would be in some manner to imply that the leader was, I don't know, a rich playboy. So journalists do not mention these things unless they have a connotative intent. But they routinely mention the dresses women wear. The connotations do not disappear simply because it is conventional, nor because the subject of these connotations does not mind it. [Suppose the SciAm blogger had said "Shelley, who looks like a bit of a cow, actually"...]

So I repeat - if Shelley were modelling or in a film, or just attending a night out, then a mention of her appearance might be salient and relevant. But to mention it in this context is denigrating, no matter what he intended and no matter what Shelley thinks about it. She may even be complimented - it doesn't matter. It is sexist.

Posted by: John Wilkins | April 29, 2007 9:31 PM

John, but is this purely about the argument or is it also about the arguers? Put an other way, to add color to a story in journalistic terms. Now whether one agrees with the degree of color in journalistic stories (and I think it tends to be excessive) I don't think you can say that adding color has some nefarious motivation as you suggest. Indeed it seems to be ubiquitous in journalism.

One can debate how well this particular example fits. And of course just because one adds color to make the players "humanized" doesn't make it right. Further I do agree that within journalism it can be a way to introduce subtle bias into stories. But to suggest it is always "degrading" is just silly in my view. (Which once again, to be clear, is different from saying it is appropriate)

But the point is that to note that someone is attractive is clearly a whole lot different from your example of "cowlicked lisping Alan Kellogg." That is clearly ad homen whereas the Scientific American blog example isn't ad homen at all. It may be inappropriate, but for differing reasons.

Posted by: Clark Goble | April 29, 2007 11:47 PM

That monkey is ...
a.) an atheist
b.) chewing tobacco
c.) a bit bloated
d.) all of the above

Posted by: Scholar | April 30, 2007 1:00 AM

Monkey? There's no monkey on this page!

Posted by: John Wilkins | April 30, 2007 1:55 AM

A little bed of thorns. I'm going to make a couple of short comments, then shut up about this issue.

Firstly, I'd like to note that the SciAm blog entry had a very informal, chatty tone. The same comment that would be very ill-considered and in poor taste on, say, the front page of the NYT (or even in the editorial pages) seems somehow much more innocuous when placed in this context. Blogs in general tend to be informal and chatty, and to blame undue emphasis on this one instance seems to be a bit overboard.

In that sense, then, I see this the way I see "In God We Trust" on US currency, or "under God" in the pledge of allegiance -- yes, they are a subtle endorsement of a particular religious faith that has no place in a secular society, but there are much bigger fish to fry for secular freethinkers in this society. Thus, any atheist/agnostic who throws out strong invectives against these things similar to the level of vitriol Zuska used against the SciAm blogger is easily perceived as going way overboard on the rhetoric, and weakens the whole movement. Yes, the SciAm blogger could have used other "flavor" to describe Shelley. But is it really worth getting into a screaming match over?

One issue here, I think, is that so many commenters on these issues are male. Were the SciAm blogger female, commenting on "the handsome and trim Chris Mooney", I doubt we'd see this kind of firestorm. In other words, it's not so much that Shelley was described as attractive, but that Mooney and Wilkins and PZ are not described similarly.

Finally, I'd like to point out that we are no longer really discussing the Fair Use doctrine, but a one-phrase parenthetical in one of the blog posts talking about this issue. I know Blogsylvannia is the kind of place where comment threads are harder to herd than wet cats, but can we focus on the substance just a bit?

Posted by: Daniel Harper | April 30, 2007 2:22 PM