…and this is a 
The ghost of Larry Summers (I know! And he isn't even dead yet!) has risen again, with John Tierney of the NY Times "daring" to consider the notion that maybe women aren't as mathy as men. There's a lot to object to in his story, from the title (Sorry, John, but it isn't daring to promote a stereotype at all) to the feeble caveat at the end, where he says he willing to consider "possible social bias against women" in the sciences. "Possible"? Really? Say it ain't so, John!
But no, let's cut straight to the heart of the issue. The problem here is sneaky sleight of hand.
Here's what everyone in society, in academia, and in the sciences wants: we want to employ the best people with the best aptitude for the job, and with the greatest possibility of success. The universities want to hire people who are really, really good at science. Agreed?
Now here's the problem: there is no clear marker or metric for success in science. It's a complicated task, with lots of variables and lots of different strategies for doing well. It's not like looking for the person who runs the 100 meter dash the fastest, in which we could just line up the applicants, fire a starting gun, and give the job to the first person who crosses the finishing line. So what do we do? We use proxy metrics.
The best proxies are measurements that most closely approximate performance in science. We look at publication records, grants awarded, recommendations of colleagues, the sort of thing we'd expect our new scientist to continue doing. It's not perfect — maybe the applicant is a neurotic living on the edge who's about to break down, or maybe they have an abrasive personality that will affect the performance of other faculty — but it's a good start. It's what most committees should evaluate most highly in the hiring process.
There are other proxies, too. Did they get good grades in their college courses? That indicates some discipline. In their teaching, did they get good student evaluations? Student evals are fraught with problems, but an unbroken record of negatives is a warning sign. Do they score well in IQ tests, SATs, GREs? That's a proxy, too. It would indicate that they're pretty smart, which is an extremely important property if you're going to be a scientist.
All of those things are still just proxies for the constellation of properties you want in a scientific colleague. We have to balance them to get an idea of the potential of an applicant: it would be insane to hire someone with no experience, no publications, and no grants just because they got straight As in high school and college. But for some reason, in this tedious argument about the suitability of women to do science, all that gets mentioned is a gender difference in performance on standardized tests.
Even if we concede a genuine gender difference in performance on standardized math tests that is independent of social factors (which I don't yet), gender is a proxy for intelligence (and a very poor proxy, too), which is a proxy for scientific aptitude. We're getting pretty damned far from actual substance of the job requirements.
So I have two proposals, both of which still use the handy shortcut of a simple numeric proxy which the advocates of these ideas favor beyond all reason, but additionally, get away from these inflammatory, socially loaded issues of gender and race (let's not even get into that one, but skin color is another proxy used to estimate intelligence). It might help defuse the tension that talking about judging people on their sex always causes if we simply used a different proxy.
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Let's just use a different indirect metric; I suggest wealth. We already know that this one works out surprisingly well, as this chart shows.
Obviously, rich people are inherently smarter than poor people. Tierney points out that the right tail of the SAT math test distribution has about a 3:1 boy:girl difference; I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn, though, that the rich:poor difference is even greater.
Tierney has a wonderful quote in his article. The sex ratio at the right end of the distribution hasn't been changing much, so he reports that
The Duke researchers report in Intelligence, "Our data clearly show that there are sex differences in cognitive abilities in the extreme right tail, with some favoring males and some favoring females."
The researchers say it's impossible to predict how long these math and science gender gaps will last. But given the gaps' stability for two decades, the researchers conclude, "Thus, sex differences in abilities in the extreme right tail should not be dismissed as no longer part of the explanation for the dearth of women in math-intensive fields of science."
[By the way, that double-negative in the sentence is hopelessly confusing — it should mean that sex differences should be dismissed as part of the explanation, but in the context they're saying exactly the opposite. Must have been written by a man, with their poorer verbal skills.]
By the same reasoning, we can also argue that wealth differences in abilities should not be dismissed, since they tend to be perpetuated over many generations. We can just stop wasting time and money trying to educate poor children or correcting the inequities of poverty in our schools, because the data clearly says that it's highly unlikely that any of them will succeed in science.
So here's my specific proposal: every scientist should report on their CV the approximate amount of money their parents were making while they were attending college. It's a simple, single number with a wide range, allowing us to easily place everyone on a scale of potential performance. If you come from parents on the left side of that chart, you are less likely to be a competent scientist, and you should admit that fact; if you're on the right side, employers ought to be able to use the information that you've had definite advantages and a leg up on the job.
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Wait — we're still using a proxy for a proxy. Let's cut straight to it and use SAT/GRE scores directly. Forget everything else, let male and female faculty report their scores right on the CV, and we'll sort them out for matters of tenure, promotion, rank, etc. right from the value being argued over.
You see, there's a shifty little game that proponents of gender discrimination are playing. They argue that high SAT scores are indicative of success in science, and then they say that males tend to have higher math SAT scores, and therefore it is OK to encourage more men in the higher ranks of science careers…but they never get around to saying what their SAT scores were. Larry Summers could smugly lecture to a bunch of accomplished women about how men and women were different and having testicles helps you do science, but his message really was "I have an intellectual edge over you because some men are incredibly smart, and I am a man", which is a logical fallacy. Even if we accept his premise, we don't know that any individual man is smarter than any individual woman — unless we get full disclosure. It's as if I went up before a WNBA team and lectured them on how men were on average taller and stronger than women, and therefore play a better game of basketball, and didn't have to do a little one-on-one on the court — where I'd be humiliated despite my membership in the testosterone club.
If these scores are really so important, let's go for it and rank scientists work by their math SAT scores. The NIH can use it to prescreen grant applications — those from scientists with scores below 750 go in a pity pile for funding if there's left-over money, those with scores over 750 get priority ranked by the usual methods, with the math SAT used as tie-breaker for applications on the edge of the funding level. We'll resolve scientific debates that way, too: for instance, isn't the one thing you need to know to figure out what side of the group selection debate you should be on is the relative SAT scores of David Sloan Wilson and George C. Williams? Why aren't these numbers available?
The real advantage, though, is amusement. Suddenly all the men who had been arguing that being in the elite top 0.001% of was so essential to great scientific success, but who are not themselves quite that high, would find themselves arguing that science is an enterprise with many parameters and no single simple number can encapsulate the entirety of the process, and say, shouldn't you all be looking at my publication record, my grants, my contributions to scholarly discussions?
Lest you think I'm being self-serving here, I will admit that under proposal 1, I'd have to get demoted — my parents' economic status was way, way over to the left. I'd do much better under proposal 2, because I've always done phenomenally well on standardized tests. Either way, I don't care, and if either of my schemes were actually implemented I'd be arguing against them, anyway.
The problem is fundamentally one of hitch-hiking on others' reputations. We get these waves of articles touting the statistical superiority of males because some people want their club, the Men's Club, to have that prestige of being better than the Women's Club, despite the fact that their individual performance may not be better than the performance of individuals in that other, 'inferior' group. "Men" is a proud and meaningless association of human beings — it is a granfalloon. Seriously, the fact that Stephen Hawking happens to be in Club XY with me does not in any way bestow upon me the intellectual luster of Hawking. Nor are Carolyn Porco, Lisa Randall, Shirley Ann Jackson, or Pardis Sabeti somehow less likely to succeed in science because they don't have a Hawking-like penis. Yet somehow we end up going around and around this irrelevant argument about the statistics of a granfalloon all the time.
Comments
Posted by: Dianne
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June 12, 2010 10:01 AM
Sorry dudes, but the math achievement differences are all cultural. You're not really, as a group, in any way better than women. On the up side you're no worse either.
Posted by: Blake Stacey
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June 12, 2010 10:05 AM
"Our data clearly show that there are sex differences in cognitive abilities in the extreme right tail, with some favoring males and some favoring females."
Which matters, obviously, because (a) science requires one and only one cognitive ability, and (b) the technical professions draw their membership from the extreeeme! right tail alone. Clearly. Oh, and it's not like whether the variance is larger for men or for women depends on which group you're looking at, oh no.
It's time to face facts, you librul Gouldian Marxists: Larry Summers knows what he's talkin' about, when he's talkin' about hard science. You can trust an economist who moved into administration, god dammit. You'll never get anywhere in science if you don't have a throbbing cock of Brobdignagian proportions.
Posted by: PZ Myers
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June 12, 2010 10:09 AM
But the authors of that paper are all women! And women aren't as good at math as men! Therefore, they must have made a math mistake.
Posted by: Mel Dahl
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June 12, 2010 10:10 AM
I don't understand anyone to be a proponent of sex discrimination, or even saying that women are inferior to men at math and science. What I understand them to be saying is that we don't know if women are inferior to men in math and science because nobody has done the empirical research to find out. And I'm sorry, but I'm having a hard time understanding why "we don't know because we haven't done the research, and until we do the research the possibility can't be ruled out" is such an outrageous position.
And candidly, PZ is guilty of the same logical fallacy as someone who actually did say that women are inferior to men in math and science, which is that he's allowed his conclusion to be determined by his world view rather than by any hard data.
I would hope that if the research actually were done it would show social factors rather than innate inability as the cause. But I'm not going to rule out biology until someone's actually done the necessary research.
Posted by: Wednesday
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June 12, 2010 10:17 AM
I was actually told the opposite, long ago, by my elementary school science teacher. He claimed girls were able to focus and analyze data better than boys.
The boys were insulted, but I think in the long run the girls didn't get to hear that very often.
Fun times, my brother is a dancer, and I plan to be a scientist. Gender determined career = fail.
Anyway, where exactly in the cock does this manly intellegence reside? Does smaller cock = less smart? What about castration, foreskin removal, etc?
Maybe sexism also can magically exist in male genitalia.
Posted by: Ronald
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June 12, 2010 10:17 AM
PZ, this sentence...
"...sex differences in abilities in the extreme right tail should not be dismissed as no longer part of the explanation for the dearth of women in math-intensive fields of science."
....is not really an example of a "double negative," at least as linguists understand them (we call it "negative agreement"). It's fine as is, although, of course, like you I disagree with it.
Posted by: Blake Stacey
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June 12, 2010 10:17 AM
Nobody's done the empirical research to find out whether people who ingest massive doses of 2,5-dimethoxy-4-ethylphenethylamine to fuel their bisexual orgies every Thursday afternoon are more likely to get published in top-tier journals. We can't rule it out until we've gathered the data, people. I humbly volunteer for the not-control group. ("Materials and Methods: Robert Sean Leonard, Olivia Wilde . . .")
Posted by: Dan Tappan
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June 12, 2010 10:18 AM
The most amusing thing to me about these arguments is that you have Social Scientists, which are not inherently a "hard math" set of fields, arguing that "Woman are inferior in Math" is a valid explanation. Even though it doesn't explain the sex ratios in their own fields. For "Woman are bad in math" to be the correct cause then either:
- all woman are _much_ worse in math than all men (which is not what they argue)
or
- women attempt to enter each scientific field, in the same ratio as do men and with the same relative math skills, and fail because they aren't up to the level of each field. So female mathematicians are better at math than other women, but not as good as male mathematicians. Female economists are ... etc.
Neither model makes any sense.
Posted by: MosesZD
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June 12, 2010 10:24 AM
Ohhh! Ohhh! There are a lot of Granfalloons in my family. DAR. SAR. The Republican Party (well, not me, I'm one of the Democrat/Independents). Country Club X. Country Club Y. All of which is to feed into the family myth of greatness.
And they wonder why I reject them.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, Quel Dommage
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June 12, 2010 10:24 AM
I read this and was getting all ready to have an economics discussion. I forgot that Summers, who holds some silly economics ideas, also made some silly remarks about women.
*Wanders off dejectedly, looking for someone to argue about regulating the derivatives markets*
Posted by: attorney
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June 12, 2010 10:25 AM
If they are really basing the conclusion on the persistence of the gaps, that "double-negative" sentence would read: "Thus, sex differences in abilities in the extreme right tail should not be dismissed as part of the explanation for the dearth of women in math-intensive fields of science." The original sentence had the phrase "no longer," which was redundant of "dismissed," but which made it sounds as if the sentence said the opposite of what it actually meant.
For example, if a student were "dismissed as no longer part of the class," that would mean dismissing the idea that she was no longer part of the class, and thus she WOULD be part of the class. The "no longer" turns the whole thing around.
PZ had it exactly the opposite, as he left out the "not." That leaves it with the conclusion he seeks (that the gap is not part of the explanation), but it's not what the original sentence means, especially as it is labeled as taking the persistence of the gaps into account.
Posted by: HenryS
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June 12, 2010 10:28 AM
SAT/GRE scores directly. Forget everything else, let male and female faculty report their scores right on the CV, and we'll sort them out for matters of tenure, promotion, rank, etc. right from the value being argued over.
*********
That would be age discrimination. IIRC, the SAT "curves" have been "re-normalized" at least twice since I took the SAT in 1961 so SAT score "inflation" would penalize me. I guess the "powers that be" had to make today's SAT score coincide with all of the graduates with 4.5+ GPAs.
Posted by: FossilFishy
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June 12, 2010 10:32 AM
Screw it, I've nothing useful to say so:
The lyrics alone don't do this song justice. Back in the day if you played it a party usually the women would end up around the stereo laughing and the men would end up in the kitchen hiding 'til it was all over. Oddly, there's nothing about math in it.
Penis Envy
by Uncle Bonsai
If I had a penis I'd wear it outside
In cafes and carlots with pomp and with pride
If I had a penis I'd pamper it proper
I'd stay in the tub and use me as a stopper
If I had a penis I'd take it to parties
Stretch it and stroke it and shove it at smarties
I'd take it to pet shows and teach it to stay
I'd stuff it in turkeys on thanksgiving day
I'd rival my buddies in sportscars and stickshifts
I'd shower my spire with girlies and gifts
I'd peek around corners
I'd aim at my toilet
I'd poke it at foreigners
And soap it and oil it
If I had a penis I'd run to my mother
Comb out the hair and compare it to brother
I'd lance her, I'd knight her, my hands would endulge
Pants would seem tighter and buckle and bulge
(chorus)
A penis to plunder, a penis to push
Cause one in the hand is worth one in the bush
A penis to love me, a penis to share...
To pick up and play with when nobody's there
I'd sit like a guy, I'd straddle the chair
I'd play with my fly, albeit with care
I'd dip it in chocolate, I'd stick it in sockets
Go to the movies with hands deep in pockets
I'd stick it in vacuums on vacant verandas
Gas-guzzling bottles and poodles and pandas
And puddles and drain pipes and doggies and ditches,
Poolhalls and potholes and bottles and bitches...
Zucchinies and zebras, tomatoes, tomatoes,
And pineapple pumpkins, and gulches and grottos,
And melons and marshmallows...
Gloves and gorillas
Slurpies and slippers
Chinooks and chinchillas...
(chorus)
If I had a penis, I'd climb every mountain
I'd force it on females
I'd pee like a fountain...
If I had a penis I'd still be a girl,
But I'd make much more money and conquer the world.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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June 12, 2010 10:32 AM
If this thread isn't going to be hijacked by some MRA loon, it'll be a day to remember and celebrate forever...
also, thanks for the paper in #1; I shall have to read it later today :-)
Posted by: Fern
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June 12, 2010 10:42 AM
Mel Dahl #4 -
One of the many problems here is that the statement assumes, as the default position, that "women are inferior to men in math and science." If you must reduce the issue to a simple dichotomy, why isn't the statement "we don't know if Sex A is inferior to Sex B?" The burden of proof seems to be on women to prove that they're not inferior.
Posted by: Samantha
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June 12, 2010 10:43 AM
Even if we accept that there is a sexual difference in "cognitive abilities" and standardized test scores, that STILL doesn't mean that women are worse at science/math. The standardized tests that we use were all written by white men coming out of a traditional Western schooling system. They wrote tests to best measure intelligence and ability that they were familiar with. Who's to say that the "different cognitive abilities" women (and other races, for the kooks who want to play that card) aren't actually BETTER for careers in science and math and it's just the poor measurements of the current standardized tests that are keeping them out of the field?
Now, I don't believe any of this, but it's as valid as anything this Tierney guy is suggesting.
I've shared my experiences as a math student before, but I have to reiterate them here. I was insulted, ignored, segregated and even lost marks just because I was a female. I was lucky that this happened to me in university rather than high-school, but I can't see how this sort of attitude could not be the largest variable in measuring why females "don't perform well" on the various standardized math and science tests. Unless they're able to figure it all out on their own, having a teacher who refuses to explain a concept that you don't get because "you're just a girl, you don't have to know this because girls don't do math" is definitely going to affect the scores of even the smartest students.
Also, I wonder how this Tierney would react to my school, where almost all of the strongest Math and Science students are foreign students from South-East Asia and the Middle-East, with a scattering of 1st, 2nd and 3rd generation Canadians who immigrated from the same areas. Would he be willing to say that those races/cultures/whatever biologically/genetically produce stronger mathematicians and scientists, seeing as the sort of data he would get would be strikingly similar to what he's got to support his theory? (I fully expect that the answer would be no, of course)
Posted by: sabend
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June 12, 2010 10:43 AM
"If this thread isn't going to be hijacked by some MRA loon, it'll be a day to remember and celebrate forever..."
Yes, very much agreed!
I wrote my women's studies final project on the sex disparity in science, although that wasn't actually what I wanted to write it on (I wanted to write it on the ways that gender bias leaks into "scientific" reporting, essentially what this post is about!). As a female scientist, I really get tired of this really stupid bias that says I'm not as smart as a dude. And the most annoying part, besides the fact that the pipeline in biology ends after I get my PhD, is that so many people, men AND women, like to abuse science to "prove" sex differences.
But as this post shows, and as so many of us argue constantly, the scientific methods and analysis are completely faulty and, quite frankly, unscientific. Good science means not associating correlation with causation. It means creating a testable hypothesis. It means not interpreting your results beyond the scope of the study.
I'm lucky to work in a lab of mostly women, with a female boss who's a rising star in her field, and a female PI and director of research. Not only is everyone completely capable and brilliant, but I'm happy to be in a supportive scientific environment with great mentors. And honestly? Based on my women's studies final project, I've found that THAT'S more likely to correlate with scientific success than whether or not I have man-parts or lady-parts.
Posted by: Carlie of the lacy, gently wafting adjectives
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June 12, 2010 10:45 AM
The real crime is that people with such poor critical thinking skills as Tierney have jobs where they get paid to opine about things in media outlets that are supposed to be the gold standard of journalism. Or at least, you know, reputable. Or hey, at least better than the National Enquirer. And that their editors also apparently are able to keep their jobs as editors at said media outlets, despite their lack of being able to be a decent editor.
Posted by: Joshua Zelinsky
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June 12, 2010 10:46 AM
Boing Boing covered Tierney's remarks a few days ago. They did a nice job collecting the responses of various female scientists:
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/06/11/women-scientists-on.html
Posted by: Mattir-ritated
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June 12, 2010 10:47 AM
When I was taking psych assessment in graduate school (intelligence, aptitude and personality testing), my professor told us something interesting about intelligence overall, which suspect would be true of mathematics ability as well. There are some occupations in which intelligence is associated with success - administrative assistant/secretary is one such. Then there are some where intelligence appears to have no bearing on success, and physics was his example. The idea is that once you get to that particular occupation, you already possess the minimum requisite intelligence (or math abilities) and that success is determined by other factors (creativity, ability to work well with others, self discipline, etc.)
Also, EO Wilson admits to not having the raw mathematical genius that is apparently so admired by Mssrs. Summers and Tierney. In his elegant language, he explains why this is irrelevant:
In other news, John Tierney was an odious troll when he was the voice of conservativism on the NYT op-ed page, and he remains, for the most part, an odious troll now that he's moved to the science page.
Posted by: shoshidge
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June 12, 2010 10:55 AM
I don't see why the suggestion that women, in general, tend not to be as 'mathy' as men has to be seen as sexist.
It's not a question of 'inferior or superior' as high math skills are often associated with cognitive deficiencies in other areas, like social skills.
I'm not an expert on this, but I believe that very high, savant-level math talent is a trait often associated with autism and Aspergers, which are conditions seen mostly in males,(in about a 3 to 1 ratio).
If this is true, than it would be irrational to expect a 50/50 distribution between men and women in the area of high math skill.
In "The Sexual Paradox" by Susan Pinker, she makes this case and while some may disagree with her conclusions, she does not come off as someone out to defend the status quo of sex discrimination.
Posted by: William
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June 12, 2010 10:57 AM
End of thread
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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June 12, 2010 10:59 AM
because no one ever asks the question the other way 'round. no one ever suggests that women might be "biologically" better at math; because that just doesn't conform to our prejudices and stereotypes.Posted by: Silič O'Nopolitanopoulos, Färschdbischuf Beesknees aus Ulm und Klein Elguth, Elector Pharynguline.
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June 12, 2010 11:00 AM
Einstein needed help with his maths. Darwin and Faraday knew near to no maths at all.
Emmy Noether proved the Noether Theorem (I presume). Sofia Kovalevskaya was the driving force getting Weierstass' work published.
Posted by: Mel Dahl
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June 12, 2010 11:01 AM
"One of the many problems here is that the statement assumes, as the default position, that "women are inferior to men in math and science." If you must reduce the issue to a simple dichotomy, why isn't the statement "we don't know if Sex A is inferior to Sex B?" The burden of proof seems to be on women to prove that they're not inferior."
To the limited extent that I've assumed that, it's because PZ presents that as being the position of Larry Summers and John Tierney. I suspect that's not an accurate representation of either Summers' or Tierney's views, but I'm responding to the question as PZ presented it.
Here's what I think the real problem is: For centuries it was assumed, with little if any hard evidence, that women were inferior to men in a whole variety of endeavors, and people just accepted that theory as being indisputable and beyond cavil. Today, people assume egalitarianism, but also with little to no hard evidence to back it up. We've simply shifted from one unproven world view to another.
I am prepared to assume that there are at least some biological differences between the sexes beyond the obvious anatomical ones, but what they are we don't know. I suspect they won't matter much from a policy-making standpoint, since each individual should still be judged as an indidividual whatever group differences there may be. But perhaps biology shouldn't be written off out of hand until someone actually does the work. (Assuming, in this politically correct climate, that work could actually be done.)
Posted by: misha_vargas#9ae7a
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June 12, 2010 11:02 AM
It's funny that everyone wants to argue about whether or not there are statistical differences between groups of people, when the best point that PZ made was that the two groups have huge overlap.
That means any differences found are useless in deciding how to treat any single person. Discrimination will not be justified by finding such differences. The stakes are relatively low.
I plan to sit back, let them study sex differences, and do nothing more than raise an eyebrow at any results that come my way.
Posted by: Susan
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June 12, 2010 11:02 AM
Thank you, PZ! Not to mention, this is exactly the sort of thing I've been hearing all my life. It's not new, it's not "controversial" or "edgy" or politically incorrect, or even helpful. It's status quo non-analysis by some dude with a conservative agenda and a forum. Same crap, different day.
Posted by: Mel Dahl
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June 12, 2010 11:05 AM
And by the way, if biology were indeed to show that men are superior to women in math and science, I suspect it would also show that women are superior to men in other areas. I think there's a reason two sexes evolved.
Posted by: Scott Hatfield, OM
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June 12, 2010 11:05 AM
Excellent post. Colorful, provocative and thoughtful. It's why I keep coming here.
Posted by: Mackam
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June 12, 2010 11:06 AM
The Blank Slate?
Why not say that one gender may be predisposed on average to perform better at a particular cognitive skill AND IT DOESN'T MATTER when choosing individuals. People should be selected on individual merits, not the averages of their group. If 99% of group A performs terribly at a skill, but an individual if group A performs awesomely, who wouldn't accept the individual? Arguing passionately the gender differences arise from culture or environment sets up failure if empirical studies end up indicating average inherent differences.
TL;DR Group differences can exist WITHOUT justifying discrimination. Individuals, not groups, are chosen.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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June 12, 2010 11:08 AM
it's not so much an assumption as a conclusion based on the many instances where the "the sexes are different" arguments have fallen flat on their face. At this point, a random initial distribution of potential (which is then altered during a person's time growing up) is a sort of default hypothesis until solid evidence to the contrary shows up. And at the moment it can't, because we don't have means to study the biology, without interference from the culture; there are no non-patriarchal societies to use as controls, and people young enough to not have absorbed any cultural bias yet are too young to communicate their preferences particularly well.Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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June 12, 2010 11:10 AM
because there's no evidence for it. why make an assumption when it's not warranted?Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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June 12, 2010 11:13 AM
uh... yes... the reason is because sexual reproduction works better in many environments than asexual reproduction. wtf does that have to do with math/science?Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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June 12, 2010 11:15 AM
meh... not even 50 posts in, and we already have several "separate but equal" trolls. I have work to do, someone else can argue with them
Posted by: shoshidge
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June 12, 2010 11:32 AM
-because no one ever asks the question the other way 'round. no one ever suggests that women might be "biologically" better at math; because that just doesn't conform to our prejudices and stereotypes-
No, we don't ask that because it would be a silly question to ask in light of the fact that men have been dominant in math and science.
No one has ever suggested that men are always better at math and science, there are female math geniuses out there, but it's possible that they aren't as common due to biological as well as cultural factors.
Part of the problem is the use of loaded words like 'inferior' and 'superior'.
Being talented at math only makes you 'superior' at math, it does not suggest overall superiority.
As suggested earlier, such a talented person may also be 'inferior', in other respects.
I don't think it is a coincidence that genius seems to so often come with glaring personality defects.
Personally, I don't think I would wish extremely high math talent on either of my kids, boy or girl.
Posted by: SEF
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June 12, 2010 11:41 AM
Are SAT scores (or whatever) not public information such that one could put in some sort of national data request and actually perform PZ's "resolve scientific debates" test? What's the point of the "this is going on your permanent record, young man/lady" threat (as seen on American TV shows!) if said record can't then be referenced?
Posted by: bpesta22
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June 12, 2010 11:42 AM
This is a no-win situation for people who research the area because of ill-informed comments from people who should know better.
There is serious under-representation of women and minorities in STEM. I believe society is morally obligated to correct this problem, and doing so will undoubtedly increase human well-being. But, before we can correct the problem, we should invest scientific effort into understanding its cause.
And so people research the area. We now have a massive literature on group differences in cognitive ability (and what follows in terms of group outcomes from these differences). The effects are well-replicated, and the articles are easily accessible, even to people at science blogs.
Despite a massive literature, we know only that gaps exist, but not what’s causing them. In fact, no simple explanation—whether environmental or biological—will do. Some type of elephant model is needed. And so we press on.
It’s odd, though, that outsiders think they have the problem solved after five minutes of reflection (witness PZ’s insightful appeal to income differences). The implication is that people who research these areas are babbling idiots. It never occurred to us that maybe discrimination or income/opportunity differences might explain this. Thanks, though, PZ, for that astute observation. Gee, maybe we should include measures of these things in our research. Oh, wait, we do! Drats, I was ready to move on to some other area of science, figuring PZ had set us straight (the analogy to creation science logic is compelling, especially given PZ’s refusal to even read the science here. PZ: If I gave you a list of recommended readings, would you invest some time perusing them?)
Worse, anyone doing research exploring explanations for the gap must conclude “discrimination” or “lack of opportunity,” otherwise they’re immediately labeled sexist junk scientists. For example, the relationship between hormones / sex and spatial ability is fascinating and compelling (spatial ability varies with the menstrual cycle!). But, let’s no go there, because others will assume a paper on this implies the authors believe: (1) Men are superior (although gaps exist favoring females on verbal abilities) (2) We should kick women out of science programs. (3) We should stop educating non-white males. (4) You should make me a sandwich. Yup, this is my motivation for doing the research.
And again we see some hypocrisy here. Some people have used evolution to advance hate-filled agendas. I bet PZ has a blog somewhere where he argues that’s irrelevant to whether evolution is true.
PZ can I recommend 4 or so articles for you read and critically review? Understood that you get these requests daily and are time-limited, so might say no.
p.s. I can’t remember my SAT scores, but they were average at best. My GREs were in the 500s, though I did score 92% on the logic section (woot for me). My 9 month salary is $94,000. My parents were lower-middle class at best in terms of income.
Posted by: Egnu Cledge
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June 12, 2010 11:44 AM
I may have told this story before, but my girlfriend, who now has a doctorate from Yale and is a researcher in molecular biology, spent a couple years as a physics major. There were less than ten people in the program, and only two of them were women, including her. In that time, the director of the department could never be bothered to learn the names of the female students, instead referring to them as "the blond one" and "the brunette one". It was also expected that she and the other woman would TA, but that the men in the program wouldn't because they presumably had more important things to do.
Posted by: Hurin, Nattering Nabob of Negativism.
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June 12, 2010 11:46 AM
@ Mel Dahl #4
Such research would be counterproductive. Science has its own performance-based system of determining who is and isn't good enough to go to grad school, maintain funding, get tenured etc. It seems to work just fine, and additionally science benefits most from having the largest pool of plausibly qualified individuals striving to produce good research.
Even under the assumption that one gender is on average better at science, the emergence of brilliant scientists of both genders is a well documented phenomenon. So there is really no point in telling all the little girls who want to be astronomers when the grow up that they should write poetry and do housework instead. Its a good way to dissolution the next Franklin or Curie.
Posted by: Weed Monkey
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June 12, 2010 11:52 AM
Susan #27, well that link was disgusting. What were they thinking?
Now I'm off to fight rape apologists at our largest daily newspaper's website, they appeared immediately after this piece of news came out:
Today in Finland, such an act is considered rape only if the victim was rendered defenceless by the assailant, e.g. giving her/him sleeping pills. If the victim drunk her/himself senseless, it's a lesser crime called sexual abuse.Posted by: alex.asolis.net
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June 12, 2010 12:13 PM
I thought the purpose of the article was to explain why there might be more men in the top academic positions at universities, not to say that because the best of the best are more likely to be men that women can't succeed.
Regardless, the whole thing is stupid. Maybe height or hair color somehow correlate with intelligence, but we don't talk about people in those terms (as much). It's just as silly to talk about individuals in terms of their gender. As P.Z. said, "men" is a granfalloon. "Women" is "a proud and meaningless association of human beings" as well, though.
Posted by: ckitching
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June 12, 2010 12:14 PM
If women are worse at math, why is it that this trend only appears in some countries? In Iceland, females score higher than males on standardized math tests, and in Sweden, the gap is relatively tiny (although boys score very poorly in the reading tests compared to girls in both these countries).
Perhaps we should investigate why men are so overrepresented in fields requiring well developed reading and writing skills, because in virtually every country, boys score far below girls in the standardized tests. Looking at the raw test scores, there should be two or three women per man in fields like journalism. Why isn't this the case?
Posted by: Brian, Defender of Tone Trolls
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June 12, 2010 12:15 PM
Obviously, rich people are inherently smarter than poor people.
Republicans everywhere will be pleased with this analysis. Even the poor ones, because one day they they'll be rich and intelligent too.
Posted by: Hurin, Nattering Nabob of Negativism.
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June 12, 2010 12:16 PM
What informs your assumption that the simplistic categories of "man" and "woman" are meaningful enough to inform good biological research? Recall one of the points PZ made in the post above:
And it is - because of the incredible diversity within the groups "man" and "woman".
And futhermore there are a lot of gray areas in gender. There are people who strongly feel that they are the sex opposite of their physical anatomy and those who change their physical anatomy, there are people with extra sex chromosomes. Where do these people fit into your brilliantly defined research scheme?
Posted by: Carlie of the lacy, gently wafting adjectives
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June 12, 2010 12:19 PM
Name one field that women have been dominant in, besides those traditionally considered servile (maid, secretary, etc.). Go ahead, we'll wait.
Oh look, there aren't any. Because women haven't been allowed to be in any fields until recently, and are still swimming against a tide exemplified by the post by Egnu at 38. So what makes you think there might be something magical and innate about math and science, compared to every other field? Especially when you see studies like the one linked to in the very first comment that show any differences we see in the US not existing in countries that are more egalitarian?
At some point, it becomes clear that anyone positing that women aren't as good as men in certain subjects has a dearly-desired answer that is in search of anything that might support it.
Posted by: Ranger Rick
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June 12, 2010 12:24 PM
I remember reading about this controversy when it first started. I also remember quite clearly that Summers did NOT say that women are innately inferior to men when it comes to math and science. He simply proposed the idea that women MIGHT, due to biological differences, be inferior to men when it comes to math and science, and that it might be worth researching. See: this article from when the controversy was fresh.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2005/01/17/summers_remarks_on_women_draw_fire/
Suppressing this sort of questioning is not going to help anyone. Let's say it turns out that there is in fact some sort of difference between men and women when it comes to math and science. If we research it instead of disclaiming the mere suggestion as sexist, we could target extra math and science education to girls (or boys, if it turned out they were the disadvantaged ones). Maybe people of certain ethnicities are more prone to lung cancer than people of other ethnicities; we could target extra anti-smoking campaigns at those groups, but we can't do that if we stick our fingers in our ears and say that the mere possibility of that difference is racist.
You cannot possibly have science or a reasoned conversation if you're going to scream about sexism/racism/[insert bias here] whenever someone proposes a HYPOTHESIS that you don't like, let alone actual results. And I'm sorry to say, PZ, this post strikes me as basically that.
Posted by: Aaron Baker
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June 12, 2010 12:24 PM
I remember an interview with Julian Stanley (of the Benbow-Stanley test, which has long been a weapon in the hereditarian arsenal re women & math), towards the end of his life, in which he said that the gap observed in his test(s) in the 60s had declined to the point that he thought the average differences were most likely environmental in origin. I've since been unable to rediscover this interview. Would anyone here know whether I'm hallucinating or remember this correctly?
Posted by: Ben Goren
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June 12, 2010 12:27 PM
I wonder what Justin Kruger and David Dunning might have to say on the subject.
Let me start with the fact that my own SAT scores qualify me for membership in MENSA.
Now, let me continue with the observation that I have known people smarter than me. Many of those people have been women.
Finally, let me conclude that, aside from the observation that these people have been smarter than me, I couldn’t really tell you how much smarter they are, except perhaps in a vague fuzzy sense.
Of those people whose intelligence I feel not-completely-unqualified to judge, I have noticed no difference between men and women. Then again, I haven’t been looking for one, and I certainly haven’t been attempting any sort of rigorous study of the topic.
So, I would suggest first that almost nobody contributing to this topic is qualified to do so, and second that, if there do happen to be statistical differences in cognitive abilities that can be associated with gender, they’re so trivial as to be insignificant. If they were to show up in the real world, it would amount to no more than an observation that there were a few more PhD holders nationally of one gender, and that would be the extent of it.
Instead, what I generally observe is people who I don’t think are as anywhere near as smart as me claiming that women who are much smarter than either of us are dumber than the smartest men. Make of that what you will, but I have no trouble labeling that dumb-fuck ignorant (and arrogant) sexism.
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 12:30 PM
Just to head off the MRAs who show up to whine about how durn terrible it is that anyone who even dares to innocently and sweetly consider that there might be differences in intelligences between men and women (or whites or blacks) gets lambasted, I'm going to first ask them to consider what a difference in IQ actually means.
If it means little with respect to two people's actual ability to understand a concept, then I have to wonder what your point is. Means nothing in the real world? Then, so what?
But, if it actually means something, and someone with a higher IQ is more likely to understand some particular concept than someone with a lower one, then I'm going to warn you in advance: I know what my IQ is, and you've got a pretty small chance of having a higher one. And you're wrong. You're just wrong. (I daren't say I should feel the need to explain why to a trog who's unlikely to understand.) So, unless you've got a genius-level IQ or higher, don't fucking bother arguing with me. You're wrong.
And, if you happen to have a lower IQ and still somehow think that you're capable of pointing out any errors in logic I'm making here, then again I have to ask:
Why do you think any measured differences mean anything then?
Posted by: Brian, Defender of Tone Trolls
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June 12, 2010 12:32 PM
The following public announcement from the BBC cuts to the heart of the matter :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LS37SNYjg8w
Posted by: Brian
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June 12, 2010 12:33 PM
FossilFishy@13: HA, oh man. I haven't heard that song in ages.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 12:35 PM
I see Ben Goren and I have made similar claims, and we're both 'smarter' than a great many most people.
So, either such differences mean little, in which case feel free to tell us we're wrong, or such differences mean a lot, in which case: shut the fuck up, moron. What makes you think you're at all qualified to argue on par with us?
Posted by: PZ Myers
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June 12, 2010 12:36 PM
Some people just don't get it.
Let us assume there is a detectable, real, biologically based difference between men and women that can be measured statistically -- as the proponents of this idea are fond of claiming, let's even assume that it's because the distribution of the cognitive ability in question is broader on the left and right sides of the distribution.
Now what?
You've got a man and a woman applying for the same job in research. Does that statistical distribution inform you at all about which one should be hired? Only if you're a bigoted ignoramus. You are looking at a small sample, and you can't assume that the distribution of abilities will follow that of the larger population.
Assume further that one of the two is way out there in the far right tail of the distribution, freakishly intelligent with a brain like a supercomputer -- if it makes you feel better, imagine that it is the male. Does that automatically mean that you should hire him for the job? Is that all you need to be a great scientist, is a whipcrack smart brain like a laser? Or do you think maybe you should look at the breadth of both applicants' talents?
EVEN ASSUMING THAT THE BIOLOGICAL BIAS HYPOTHESIS IS TRUE, there is no reason that the phenomenon should affect educational, academic, or scientific policy. It's too small.
And of course, the fact that the bias seems to shrink over time as more people study it, or is easily tweaked by complex socioeconomic factors that cannot be controlled for, suggests that using it in any way to influence any kind of policy is foolish.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 12:51 PM
More than that, PZ, any measured statistical differences between the two groups doesn't even tell you anything about which of your two applicants is smarter or better at math, regardless of whether being smarter or better at math makes one a better hire.
The Dutch may be the tallest average nation in Europe and the Portuguese the shortest, but that doesn't at all mean that applicant Van Rijn is going to be taller than applicant Souza.
*Sigh* Of course, it's entirely unreasonable of us to assume the less intelligent here are at all capable of grasping that. Differences mean something, dammit!
Posted by: PZ Myers
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June 12, 2010 12:55 PM
Yes, of course women are also a granfalloon. It's just a granfalloon that some men buy into as valid, and use to justify oppression to varying degrees.
Posted by: jay.sweet
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June 12, 2010 12:56 PM
Drat, PZ just said much more "stridently" @53 what I was going to say. But I'll say it anyway:
It seems plausible to me that there is a cognitive difference at the extreme right tail of the curve -- after all, there is clearly a physical difference at the extreme right tail of the curve, and since all our cognitive function arises from physical properties of our bodies, it's not too much of a stretch to think there might be cognitive differences too.
So fucking what?
PZ's analogy to the WNBA is perfect. We pretty much know for certain that there are gender differences at the extreme right tail of "basketball skill". Because sports is an artificial competition, we have created two separate leagues in the interest of fairness. Whether you agree with that division or not, it still ought to be plain to see that if your task is to assemble a basketball team from people you know, using gender as a proxy is going to be a dumb idea. You *might* end up with more men than women on your team (depending on who you know), but if you said, "Gee, PZ " (or James) " is a dude, he must be better at basketball than that other woman," you're going to EPIC FAIL.
So let's say -- and we don't even know this the way we do with basketball, but let's just say -- that there are cognitive differences at the extreme right tail. This has no bearing on university admissions, it has no bearing on hiring, and it has very little bearing at present over whether social gender bias is creating a difference of opportunity. Where it might be useful information is if, in some distant future, when universities and such were doing an excellent job at providing gender equality of opportunity, and the graduates coming out where pretty well balanced -- and yet some Nobel Prize topics tended to be dominated by one gender or the other. Then it might be useful to ask, "Is there a cognitive difference at the right tail that is causing this? Or is the Nobel committee just a bunch of sexists?"
I don't really object to the Duke researchers' work per se. There oughtn't to be anything taboo about investigating the possibility of innate gender differences, as long as people are sticking to the science. But Tierney's use of that research to inform an opinion piece is just stupid. It doesn't have any bearing on his old white man ramblings.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 12, 2010 12:57 PM
As much as I would enjoy another few rounds of What Larry Summers Really Said (since even his supporters, e.g. #46, don't know), I know from experience that nobody cares; Summers is just the saddle on the hobbyhorse.
But whatever he said, I am pretty sure that PZ's summary (which bears zero relationship to what was said) is not, in fact, what was meant, at all.
While that may (or may not) be true of Tierney, it's bullshit to suggest that the general area of sex differences in brain function is studied solely to prop up teh patriarchy. There are legitimate scientific questions here, hard ones to answer scientifically, but even harder in the face of the often irrational blankslate opposition.
PZ, keepin' it PC. How a well-educated biologist who has actually taught human physiology and development could make such a stupid, stupid claim is beyond me. I mean, I get what he's saying; it's dumb to think of one's sex or gender as a club to which one belongs in competition with other clubs. Fine, I agree with that.
But Dr. Myers knows full well that males and females are biological, not sociological, groups.
Hello? Sex-hormone effects on developing brains?
Which reminds me, every comment that laughs at scientists who think having a cock makes you smarter hahaha is idiotic.
and I will excuse myself from the discussion
Posted by: ktesibios
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June 12, 2010 12:57 PM
PZ, the Tierneys, Dahls, Pestas and all their ilk were explained back in 1936 by the great sociologist Robert Benchley:
Posted by: Algernon, elle sans chapeau
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June 12, 2010 1:00 PM
This is a philosophical position whereby one is arguing that all things belong in paired sets which compliment each other in their ability and inability.
It has nothing to do with sexual reproduction.
It has nothing to do with ability in math either.
There is no fair and balanced here, even the idea that math is some how something one needs to compensate with a "feminine" counterpart has fuck all to do with evolution and everything to do with human perception of sex and gender.
And as some one who faced the stereotype of "women are bad at math" and let it derail her from things she cared about the consequences are simple.
There will be fewer good mathematicians because women who have the aptitude can be discouraged or driven out by the protected sexism, while men who aren't actually as good will be kept on and in because they are more socially accepted. We all suffer for our bigotry and intolerance.
At the end of the night popularity is at least as important if not more important than talent.
And no, telling me I'm better at-- what exactly is it you have in mind for these "feminine" talents anyway-- is a shitty consolation.
Posted by: Ben Goren
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June 12, 2010 1:02 PM
PZ, I’ll see your point and raise you one.
The stereotype is that women are dumber than men, but have better “soft skills.” But those “soft skills” are even more important to so much of science than raw intelligence.
Sure, the braininess of a Darwin to give us Natural Selection or a Curie to give us a theory of radioactivity or an Einstein to give us Relativity — that’s what gets all the headlines. But it’s the “stamp collecting” where most of the advancements are to be made. Craig Venter didn’t sequence the genome and synthesize a cell because he’s especially smart; he did it because he’s a formidable administrator. And what is teaching but the ultimate of nurturing feminine “soft skills”?
So, if you buy into the bullshit of the stereotypes, you should be demanding that women be hired in preference to men.
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
Posted by: Aaron Baker
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June 12, 2010 1:04 PM
Brownian Motion wrote: "I see Ben Goren and I have made similar claims, and we're both 'smarter' than a great many [most] people . . . .
But, if it actually means something, and someone with a higher IQ is more likely to understand some particular concept than someone with a lower one, . . . ." und so weiter.
I have zero sympathy for hereditarian arguments; but I'm not sure I understand the value of this line of discussion. The proponent of a hereditarian position (probably) has a lower IQ than you, Brownian, so what follows exactly? I think you're saying that he's more likely (on average) to be wrong, or to be less able to pick out the merits and demerits of a given argument. I suppose so, but I don't think this probability is relevant here (and we're skating over the manifest fact that high-IQ people remain very fallible (Summers may be an example)). All that's relevant are the merits and demerits of the given argument. So I would say: put your IQ back in your pants and stay with the merits.
Posted by: Aaron Baker
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June 12, 2010 1:10 PM
"If I had a penis I'd still be a girl,
But I'd make much more money and conquer the world."
Well, I'm male, and I laughed out loud when I read that several years ago.
Posted by: jay.sweet
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June 12, 2010 1:13 PM
Or, more succinctly:
Keep your naive teleology out of my public policy, please.
Posted by: Pierce R. Butler
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June 12, 2010 1:14 PM
It should never be omitted, when the topic includes Larry Summers, that he's made a major ass of himself on numerous topics beyond gender.
Reportedly, Pres. Clinton signed the financial deregulation bill which directly produced most of our current economic woes at the specific urging of Summers. (That LS should have returned to the White House now qualifies as evidence that Obama, just as the teabaggers have been trying to tell us, is out to destroy America.)
In a society with any ethical standards to speak of, Summers would have been transferred to employment where the primary numeric question involves quantities of French fries after his 1991 memo in the World Bank where he promoted the dumping of poisons in Africa because, "I think the economic logic of dumping a load of toxic waste on the lowest-wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that." After all, the air and water quality in some third-world nations are "vastly inefficiently" high, and the economy works best when those whose lifetimes are shortened are those with the lowest per capita incomes to start with.
Tierney's a schmuck and deserves everything that's being flung at him, but he's a mere piker compared to his role model.
Posted by: RigorousBastard
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June 12, 2010 1:15 PM
What about dumb luck? The tests scores come from giving the SAT to 7th graders. I know there is a penalty for guessing but that only works on average. If you are talking about the top 1 in 10,000 scorers, many of them may be the tail of the distribution of lucky guessers. And since being a know-it-all show off is much more common in boys, they would be more likely to guess. Has anyone tried giving the hot shots another test to see if the high score is reproducible? Also note that being in the top 1 in 10,000 sounds great, but how big was the actual performance difference (number of right answers)between the top 1 in 10,000 and the top 1 percent? Answer those questions before you start drawing conclusions about half the human race.
Posted by: bpesta22
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June 12, 2010 1:16 PM
Jesus Christ, PZ, do you just make shit up and assert it authoritatively so people will believe you know what you're talking about?
Your whole reply in 53 simply ignores gobs of research showing what group differences mean in terms of over or under representation on outcome variables (irrespective of their cause--EVEN ASSUMING THAT THE ENVIRONMENTAL HYPOTHESIS IS TRUE).
I feel like I am talking to the high school emailer you beat up the other day.
The questions you ask have been answered almost decades ago. I will spoon feed you, because arrogance from ignorance in an ugly trait.
Google search top down selection / validity co-efficient / taylor russell tables (1939, btw).
Then try: schmidt hunter utility.
The look at Lubinski's work to see how too small effects lead to massive outcome differences, and why even at the extreme tail of cognitive ability, more is better.
We don't know the cause, for sure, but to dismiss the gap with feel-good ignorance is most fundie-like. It's practicing science without a license...
Posted by: Mel Dahl
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June 12, 2010 1:17 PM
At ktesibios, No. 58:
"PZ, the Tierneys, Dahls, Pestas and all their ilk were explained back in 1936 by the great sociologist Robert Benchley . . ."
Now hold on there just a minute. All I said, in its entirety, is that we don't know the answer to the question because we haven't done the work. From that, you have somehow concluded that I think I know the answer and the answer is that I'm superior.
Disagree with me if you like, but at least be honest about representing what I actually said. What I said is that I'm agnostic on the question because the data isn't there. (Not that PZ has honestly represented what Summers actually said, so I suppose you're in good company.)
Posted by: Thanny
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June 12, 2010 1:18 PM
First, the comment about the "double-negative" phrase is flat out wrong. The statement as written is perfectly grammatical, and means exactly what the writers intended.
Second, I really think PZ is missing the point here.
I don't see anyone saying we should find out exactly what the aptitude differences are (and they exist, regardless of how small - the probability that men and women are exactly the same is nil), then use that to filter individuals at the hiring level. At least, not in this article. I'm sure such idiots exist, but they are strawmen, for this discussion.
This is a response to those people who are fond of totting up the number of women and men in a given job, pointing to a discrepancy, and saying it must be sexism. If there's a difference in average ability (or even average interest - ability means nothing if those able don't want the job), then in a perfect world without a hint of sexism, you must expect a difference in the sex ratio of jobs or positions that depend on that ability.
Anyone who thinks the correct sex ratio for any field is 50/50 is being sexist, because such a person is elevating the importance of sex inappropriately above aptitude or interest. Some fields are naturally skewed towards more men, and some towards more women. That's reality.
That doesn't mean that sexism is no longer in force. All it means is that you can't use percentages to claim sexism in any given field, unless you can tease out what those percentages would be without sexism. And that requires the kind of research being discussed here.
Posted by: Mel Dahl
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June 12, 2010 1:22 PM
"And that requires the kind of research being discussed here."
Actually, Thanny, that requires the kind of research being shouted down here, with accusations of sexism and troglodytism being leveled at anyone who dares suggest that objective data might be relevant.
Thank you for articulating my own viewpoint much, much better than I did.
Posted by: Aaron Baker
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June 12, 2010 1:23 PM
Pierce R. Butler:
I wondered if maybe you were joking, so I looked it up, and, Sweet Jesus, he actually wrote that! Well, he may have a high IQ, but a high IQ has never had trouble associating with evil (Hermann Göring comes to mind).
Posted by: JustShowMeTheData
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June 12, 2010 1:28 PM
One test score on one subject going to be enough to determine the value of an applicant?
Being a scientist requires:
- imagination
- hard work
- teamwork skills(much research has teams)
- perseverance after set-backs
- analysis skills(using math and like systems)
- the ability to break new ground
+ others
Against this preliminary matrix of "what is a good scientist," how would John Tierney of the NY Times rate?
FAIL- imagination, the ability to break new ground
We have had generations of this "mis-measure of man" Much of it has been focused in a reductionist method of ONE method of measurement that HAPPENS to fit the desired bias.
As for there still being a difference at the extreme tail-end, any progress by women just using superior math skills can be swamped by bias and intolerance.
A pro-science people, we have to open science up to every young person by not reducing it to one number. That is just a method of FAIL when there are so many ways to succeed in science - as a scientist or as a citizen.
Posted by: https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawmVT1LBhwmO9ej9LNg7a5e9d-AVJ8ezfmE
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June 12, 2010 1:28 PM
Granted, my psych degree is from the 1980s but the "Social Sciences", uh, aren't. Has someone come along and fork-lifted intellectual underpinnings? Oh, hello? Still working on the blank slate?
Posted by: Ben Goren
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June 12, 2010 1:29 PM
Aaron Baker, the point is the one that I hinted at when I made the reference to the work of Messrs. Dunning and Kruger.
Intelligence is a very complicated phenomenon. Without a certain amount of it — whatever “it” is — you are unable to give it any meaningful consideration. Generally, it’s only those who are much, much smarter than the average human who are demonstrably up to assessing the intelligence of others and of the actual significance of intelligence.
If you’re smart enough to understand something about intelligence, you’re also smart enough to understand that it’s of limited use in accomplishing real-world goals. And, you’re also smart enough to realize that arguments that men are smarter than women are proxy arguments that men are better suited to hold positions in academia (and elsewhere) than women.
As such, the fact that it’s the smart people stating in no uncertain terms that the whole topic is bullshit, and the average-to-dumb people plus the misogynists who’re advancing the proposition, is more than apropos to the discussion.
When a bunch of amateurs tries to shout down the pros on the subject that the pros are best at, it’s generally best to ignore the amateurs and trust the pros. This doesn’t always hold true, of course; the military might accurately inform you of the best way to accomplish a military goal, for example, while downplaying an alternative that’s worse for the military but better for the ultimate diplomatic goals. And it might even be the case that the suboptimal military tactic will be so suboptimal that it will also be detrimental to the diplomatic goals…but, well, the subject at hand isn’t anywhere near as complex or subtle.
Short version: if a bunch of people a lot smarter than you are telling you that your ideas about people smarter than they are are worng, you should pay attention.
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
Posted by: gerard-harbison.myopenid.com
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June 12, 2010 1:31 PM
So let's say -- and we don't even know this the way we do with basketball, but let's just say -- that there are cognitive differences at the extreme right tail. This has no bearing on university admissions, it has no bearing on hiring, and it has very little bearing at present over whether social gender bias is creating a difference of opportunity.
What data we have suggests that physics Ph.D.s in the US fall mostly above the upper 2-sigma tail in IQ. It's probably not a bad inference that physics Ph.D.s hired by top-20 schools as assistant professors fall even further up the tail. So it does seem the extreme right tail does have some bearing on some hiring.
Posted by: Algernon, elle sans chapeau
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June 12, 2010 1:37 PM
Are you dense?
What is being shouted down is that this evidence actually accounts for the discrepancy, that it is not the excuse it is constantly being touted as.
Evidence in men that math ability is linked some how to male hormones or sexual development would be a lot more convincing than yet another sociological study that says "yup wimmins do worse at math."
Posted by: gerard-harbison.myopenid.com
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June 12, 2010 1:38 PM
As such, the fact that it’s the smart people stating in no uncertain terms that the whole topic is bullshit, and the average-to-dumb people plus the misogynists who’re advancing the proposition, is more than apropos to the discussion.
Steven Pinker is pretty smart. It's his field. And while I wouldn't want to speak for him, I don't believe he would characterize the whole topic as bullshit.
it matters, not for the puerile argument that 'boys are smarter than girls', but because if we're going to make the argument that disparate gender ratios in a profession are prima facie evidence of gender discrimination in that profession, we had better rule out alternative explanations. And 'it's all very complicated' won't cut it.
Posted by: amphiox
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June 12, 2010 1:40 PM
Also, the reverse stereotype, "women are better at language, etc" is almost never presented independently in a similar fashion. It is almost always only mentioned in the context of the other - as in "Boys are better at math, and, oh yeah, girls a better at language, too" like some kind of consolation prize afterthought.Which brings us to...
Clearly, PZ was mistaken here because he's a man, and males are inferior at language.
Posted by: Algernon, elle sans chapeau
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June 12, 2010 1:44 PM
Because although "women are better at language" is muttered it is not sincerely meant. Women are not considered better at law, writing, or politics. These fields which rely heavily on language and communication, I would think, would be dominated by women if it were the case.
Women are better at language is only meant to imply that women are better at chitchat, socializing, and talking to babies. Not that women have any actual expertise or employable talent arising from that aptitude.
Posted by: Aaron Baker
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June 12, 2010 1:44 PM
Ben Goren wrote: "Aaron Baker, the point is the one that I hinted at when I made the reference to the work of Messrs. Dunning and Kruger."
I think I got your point; but I find it less compelling than you do. Confronted with extreme, but obviously intelligent, hereditarians like Arthur Jensen or some of the folks at Gene Expression, I'm not convinced it's a simple fact that "it’s the smart people stating in no uncertain terms that the whole topic is bullshit, and the average-to-dumb people plus the misogynists [is this a catch-all to account for non-dumb hereditarians?] who’re advancing the proposition."
That, plus the self-congratulatory tone rubbed me a little bit the wrong way.
Posted by: bpesta22
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June 12, 2010 1:45 PM
Lots of strawmen here. Anyone show me peer-reviewed articles that argue women should not hold academic positions, or that being female means being bad at math, or that females can't do highly-impactful science?
Also seem to be confusing the data with possible explanations for the data.
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 12, 2010 1:46 PM
OK, for all the dumbasses in the comments saying "the work hasn't been done" and "we just want to ask the question"... shut the fuck up. The work HAS been done, and it shows that both women and men over-value the intelligence/accomplishments of men- look at the Swedish study where the top 20% of women were given the same "competency" rating as the bottom 20% of men. You'd know this if you actually researched any of this.
You want to do research on sex hormones affecting the brain? Fine, dandy, sounds cool enough to me. No one is saying that science needs to hire EXACTLY 50% women to be equal- what we ARE saying is that all the available data shows that the lack of female participation in science has fuck-all to do with brain chemistry and lots to do with discrimination.
Maybe in la-la land when all discrimination is gone science would be 70/30 in one direction or another, but that's not the world we live in so WHY THE FUCK DOES IT MATTER.
/rage
Posted by: amphiox
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June 12, 2010 1:47 PM
Historical factoid:
Prior to the electronic revolution, the term "computer" referred not to a machine, but a person, hired to do all the tedious number crunching needed in a variety of fields by hand (and pencil, paper, slide rule, and brain, of course). In short, a profession specializing in doing all the hard, complicated math.
Upwards of 95% of all computers hired by university science departments to do all the hard science related math work, were women.
(This is, in fact, how women broke into science as a professional activity in large numbers in the first place, back when major discriminatory barriers still existed that prevented most women from even getting into the field by the traditional avenues).
Yep. When male scientists couldn't or didn't want to do the really hard math, they got women to do it for them.
Posted by: bpesta22
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June 12, 2010 1:47 PM
#79
Yes, please solicit the gene expression guy's opinion here. He does not seem to be so easily dismissed as a troll / sexist, etc.
Posted by: Algernon, elle sans chapeau
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June 12, 2010 1:48 PM
Put another way if language were not seen as the opposing and complimentary skill to math, no one would *ever* say such things.
Posted by: gerard-harbison.myopenid.com
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June 12, 2010 1:49 PM
Because although "women are better at language" is muttered it is not sincerely meant. Women are not considered better at law, writing, or politics. These fields which rely heavily on language and communication, I would think, would be dominated by women if it were the case.
Our English Department has 28 women and 22 men on the faculty. That's not domination, to the extent, say, that physics departments are dominated by men, but it is definitely a pretty disparate ratio.
Posted by: Algernon, elle sans chapeau
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June 12, 2010 1:54 PM
Do you think that the math or physics faculty approach a ratio of 1.3 to 1?
Posted by: johnlil#0a224
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June 12, 2010 1:54 PM
We honestly don't know why certain differences appear to exist between sexes, races, etc.
It is almost impossible to separate genetics from environment.
And there is no ethical way to perform a useful double-blind test on human beings.
Unless and until someone can identify specific genetic markers for things like intelligence (whatever that is), these speculations are pointless.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 1:55 PM
To be fair, not all of the on-average-more-intelligent men are aware of the history of anthropology (and specifically anthropometry), in which work was conducted for decades by researchers with the intent of proving the superiority of white males through objective metrics.
But no, aside from that the research just hasn't been done, and it's unfair to those highlighting its absence to call them on that fact. By the way, has anyone ever considered that the Jews might actually be running the world? I think there's lots of room for innocent research into that.
Posted by: Algernon, elle sans chapeau
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June 12, 2010 1:56 PM
Thank you, not to mention destructive.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 12, 2010 2:00 PM
Nobody thinks putative sex differences are "genetic". The topic of putative racial differences would be pretty much OT here, I think.
shit, I excused myself...
shutting up now
Posted by: Aaron Baker
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June 12, 2010 2:00 PM
"Unless and until someone can identify specific genetic markers for things like intelligence (whatever that is), these speculations are pointless."
I find nothing to disagree there.
Posted by: bpesta22
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June 12, 2010 2:02 PM
75, please read this study:
http://www.bio.psy.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/papers/CycleMRTmh.pdf
It's one of many.
Posted by: Ben Goren
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June 12, 2010 2:06 PM
Ah, amphiox, but don’t you see? Those wimmin weren’t really doing math; they were just doing simple arithmetic. Real math is that hard stuff that only male geniuses can actually understand, and is composed of cryptic symbols instead of ordinary numbers.
Ah, damn. There I’ve done it again, misplaced my barf bag. Anybody seen it?
But beth.cimini really has the perfect summary of the topic. Male domination of the “hard” sciences is all out of proportion with even the most sexist of the hard published numbers. It’s entirely consistent with “good ol’ boy network” discrimination. We know why women are underrepresented, and it has nothing to do with the abilities of the job applicants.
Not only is it unfair to women, it’s detrimental to the sciences themselves and, by extension, to society as a whole. It’s a certainty that there have been brilliant women who would — nay, should — have significantly advanced the state of human understanding of the universe with their contributions to science. And the only reason we’re collectively that much dumber is a direct result of gender discrimination.
Think of all the fields that are a decade away from bearing fruit. If women had been in their rightful place, there in the trenches alongside the men, we’d easily be there already.
If that thought doesn’t make you furious, you’re even dumber than average.
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
Posted by: gerard-harbison.myopenid.com
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June 12, 2010 2:15 PM
Goren:
So explain why the biological sciences are much less male dominated than physics. Are biologists just more enlightened than physicists? And is that hereditary, or environmental?
Posted by: Vene
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June 12, 2010 2:20 PM
"We have to balance them to get an idea of the potential of an applicant: it would be insane to hire someone with no experience, no publications, and no grants just because they got straight As in high school and college."
That must be why I'm having problems getting hired, I wasn't able to get working experience while in college (largely due to where I lived). How the fuck am I supposed to enter the field?
Posted by: Haltz
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June 12, 2010 2:22 PM
Because any random paragraph from either Natalie Angier or Carl Zimmer is worth more than a whole year's worth of comment by either Tierney or Brooks in the NY Times, I don't waste my time reading either of the latter two any more. They are pretentious dolts.
Posted by: Aaron Baker
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June 12, 2010 2:28 PM
While we're on the subject of "controlling for" socio-economic factors, and the issue of black-white average differences in IQ has been mentioned more than once (believe me, I wouldn't have the temerity to bring it up on my own),
non-scientist and non-statistician that I am, I'd like to ask:
how do you control for a centuries-long history of race-based slavery and/or racial caste systems, plus the continued survival of racism, in the absence of being able to compare two otherwise very similar societies, one like 21st c. America (or Great Britain, Australia, or New Zealand) and one from which all that nasty history (and current nastiness) has been absent? I doubt the latter kind of society (i.e. BOTH racism-free AND very similar to modern Anglophone societies) exists.
I'll leave it to others, not necessarily more intelligent than I am, but more versed in social statistics, to explain if there's a way for hereditarians to get around this, to me, completely daunting problem.
I also think this problem holds good for alleged average male-female differences. Women's emancipation is a VERY recent phenomenon, by no means complete. Female-dominated societies exist nowhere but in science fiction, and societies with complete male-female equality are still some ways around the corner.
For this reason, and some of the others stated above, I think the most charitable thing that can be said about hereditarianism is "not proven." Less charitable things do come to mind.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 2:34 PM
Have you met physicists? (Or mathematicians for that matter?)
No, there's no old boy's club there.
Posted by: Samantha
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June 12, 2010 2:37 PM
@ #94:
If I may, even though I'm not the one you directed your question to:
From my experience and what I hear from my cousin (a Master's student in biology), most people up until graduate studies think of Biology as the "softest" of the "hard" sciences, followed by Chemistry and then Physics. Even undergrad Biology profs seem to think that the biology they are teaching isn't science in the typical sense, in that there isn't a lot of math involved.
Now, most young women are discouraged from going into Math and Science programs starting very early on. The fact that there exists far less pressure against Biology undoubtedly leads many "science-minded" women into the program because it fulfils their desires without seeming to be a "man's" subject.
Also, I have heard from SOME people that Biology is more open to women because it's viewed as essentially just handling plants and animals and women are now viewed as being "superior" at handling animals (all that relating and being caring stuff, presumably). So a woman studying biology might get fairly far into her graduate degrees without being told that she's in the wrong field just by working more behind the scenes as a handler for the animal test subjects.
As an interesting note to the whole "women are better at language" offshoot of the whole issue: from my observations, women professors/lecturers tend to heavily outnumber men only in Language/Literature programs. In Rhetoric and Communication programs, men tend to be equally represented (with a little wiggle room either way). It just enforces what Ol'Greg said in #78: women are "better at language" only when it isn't considered to involve real communications skills so much as just reading something and blathering on about it like in book clubs.
Posted by: amphiox
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June 12, 2010 2:39 PM
How many of those women initially had interests in math and science, only to be discouraged by the discrimination, and end up choosing to apply their generalizable talents to a more welcoming field?
If you have a roughly equal pool of talented applicants, and one group is excluded by systemic barriers from one group of fields, do you think they will all just disappear? At least some of them are going to end up, almost by default, in other fields. An imbalance will accrue naturally that has nothing at all to do with innate affinities, and everything to do with discrimination in the other field.
Specifically, all those intelligent, talented young women dissuaded from careers in math, physics and other male-dominated sciences didn't just give up, drop out of university, and went home to get married and have babies. Some of them found other fields to apply their skills to.
Posted by: PZ Myers
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June 12, 2010 2:45 PM
Man, this subject is always great for bringing the bio-deterministic wankers out of the closet. And if you said, "we just want to be able to ask the questions" or "there has to be some reason men outnumber women in physics" or "here's study X that showed men are better than women by Y% at task Z," you're one of them.
Nowhere in my post did I suggest that any of these questions are off-limits. I'd even encourage more research in sex differences in the brain, and even racial differences. They're there. They're real. The issue is whether they're significant enough to justify widespread discrimination. The evidence is that they're not.
I believe that a woman thinks differently than I do. I also believe that other men think differently than I do. The question is whether differences between sexes are sufficiently large to swamp out expected differences between individuals, and no they do not.
I've said it repeatedly here. The statistical differences associated with different sexes, even given that they might hold up, do not justify the disparities between men and women in the sciences. Especially given the social differences that hammer women hard from a very early age: it is simply impossible to dissociate biological and cultural effects in humans at the level of resolution claimed.
As for all those papers that measure specific quirks of behavior and find statistical differences: they're out there. I don't think the authors cheat. I just find them unpersuasive and irrelevant. There are also papers out there that use very sophisticated statistical techniques to find differences according to what sign of the horoscope you're born under. Scientists are not pure and objective: it's really easy to find all kinds of statistical predispositions to phenomena, especially if there is a cultural bias to nudge your subjects in a particular direction. So, yes, please show me something robust and significant...not in a statistical sense, but in the sense of actually making a substantial difference in the lives of individuals.
Posted by: https://me.yahoo.com/a/sLcDBasBwPfDDfP26ZrYQkmF26oo#6cc71
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June 12, 2010 2:45 PM
@23
The question is phrased "are women inferior" because there are fewer women in math. You are correct, it should be "is there any measurable difference".
Nonetheless, PZ's position seems to be that such an assumption is inherently ridiculous. Furthermore, he proposes that since there isn't a clear marker for success in science, the question should not be brought up.
However, science requires much more background preparation than math. Math is not a science. There have been many math prodigies; few if any comparable science prodigies.
Posted by: Ben Goren
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June 12, 2010 2:46 PM
gerard-harbison.myopenid.com wrote:
Sure thing, just as soon as you explain why women make up just 17% of the United States Senate, but 40% of the Arizona State Senate. Is it that Arizona is more than twice as enlightened as the country as a whole? And is that hereditary, or environmental?
Oh, and do be so kind as to take your thinly-veiled misogyny and shove it up your ass sideways, Okay? Thanks.
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
Posted by: JHS
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June 12, 2010 2:58 PM
The top five in my high school were four women and me. (Pretty sure I was no. 3 or 4). The top 10 may have had one other guy. And every one of those gals sure as shit kicked my ass in math/science. It's absurd to judge aptitude by gender...didn't that idea disprove itself a few millennia ago? (Hypatia, anyone?)
Posted by: realinterrobang
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June 12, 2010 3:04 PM
Don't confuse "woman" with "female," either. Gender, that sociopolitical construct that we're required to perform, is not necessarily equivalent to sex, which is people's biology. That's what PZ meant by "women are a granfalloon." Of course they are, because "woman" is an artificial construct of culture, the same way "man" is. Female and male aren't, but conflating the two is where you run into trouble. (Given what this culture says about "women," who'd want to be one anyway?)
The problem with separating sex from gender is that gender socialisation starts very early. I remember reading about a study where participants treated the same newborn babies differently depending on whether they were dressed in pink or blue, and another where adult study participants got hostile when they could not determine the sex (and therefore the "appropriate" gender treatment) of the baby. According to another study I've heard about, cognitive differences in girls and boys start showing up in about 75% of each by about the age of four...but to put that in context, where I come from, four years of intensive training is an honours undergraduate degree. So until you can stop raising kids as though they've got a bachelor's of gender by the time they start school, you're never going to get rid of that confounder.
Posted by: Azkyroth
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June 12, 2010 3:06 PM
My personal bias and experience has been that the best teachers tend to get scathingly negative reviews for their remedial courses and good reviews for higher level courses.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 12, 2010 3:06 PM
But, see, right there is the silly oversimplification and weird PC spin. Choosing the word "justify" instead of "explain" is the tell. I'm going to suggest yet again that the people who are actually researching the legitimate scientific questions here are NOT lackeys of the patriarchy trying hard to come up with scientific "justification" for existing discrimination. There are empirical differences in the sex ratios for certain professions, and people are trying to understand the causal reasons for them, not justify their existence.
Nobody--not even Summers, in his controversial remarks--thinks that biology is the only cause of the observed gaps, nor even the most important of several factors. The hypothesis is that biological difference might contribute to the gaps, which everybody--again, including Summers--agrees is largely due to social history.
True. And that's precisely why the position of denying any and all biological factors and assuming at the outset that all is cultural is so clearly ideologically, and not scientifically, motivated.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 3:14 PM
Worth a try, Samantha, but the race and gender 'realists' tend to mistake environments that propagate differences as symptoms of those differences.
Must be because they satisfy themselves with belonging to groups that appear to have higher-than-average IQs rather than having higher-than-average IQs themselves.
How terrible it must be to be shouted down and discouraged from pursuing an interest. Why, it must be just awful.
In fact, it's practically a fucking crime that the PC meanies on this blog are preventing you from showing that ratios of men to women in various fields of science demonstrate underlying and meaningful genetic differences in ability, rather than systemic environmental discrimination.
Too bad you're not a women trying to become physicist. Why, that'd be a fucking cake-walk compared to arguing here.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 12, 2010 3:20 PM
Raise high the flag of false dichotomy. Wave it!
Posted by: Ben Goren
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June 12, 2010 3:21 PM
You know, I gotta question even the basic premise.
If I were to pick the three most important historical (that is, dead) computer scientists of all time, they’d be Charles Babbage, Ada Lovelace, and Alan Turing (in chronological order). (And Hedy Lamarr and Grace Hopper would be in my top-ten list.)
And that’s one straight man, one woman, and one gay man. Where, exactly, is the male dominance in this oh-so-mathematical field?
Oh, that’s right. It’s in the Ol’ Boy’s Network of academia and business.
Bloody fucking hell.
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 12, 2010 3:21 PM
@Sven #107
And that's precisely why the position of denying any and all biological factors and assuming at the outset that all is cultural is so clearly ideologically, and not scientifically, motivated.
Your strawman is just as flammable as the one you're arguing against.
As a general rule, people who believe that gender/racial/pick-your-favorite-minority-classification differences have roots in biology stop looking for other explanations. I believe in my post before that I said that it is certainly possible that the "true" ratio based on ability and interests is likely to not be 50:50. The people we're angry at JUST want to look at the biology- don't get me wrong, I'm a biologist, I love me some biology- and often want to or end up ignoring the harder, more morally sticky cultural questions once they have their "oops, brain chemistry, nothing in my behavior or culture needs to be modified" answer.
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 12, 2010 3:23 PM
The first sentence of my last paragraph applies to people who believe that the PRIMARY roots are in biology- again, I certainly agree that biology is likely one factor among many.
Posted by: Ing: PhD Trollologist
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June 12, 2010 3:25 PM
"I think there's a reason two sexes evolved."
Yes there is. We have two sexes because specializing one gender to make high mobile gametes and the other to make low mobile but high energy gametes is better than generalizing. The reason is not "So one sex can make the other a sammich"
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 3:26 PM
Yeah, yeah. So, let's not worry about the large-scale factors, and instead focus on the minor ones.
I get this from communities in my public health job all the time.
"Why are we getting cancer?"
"Well, because you smoke, you eat shit, and you don't exercise."
"No, no...I mean, why aren't you investigating the tailings ponds a hundred kilometres away that those oil companies are filling with chemicals? Or, what about these cell phones?"
Gee, I wonder why.
It'd be nice if research was completely devoid of ideological bases, but then it wouldn't be research by humans on humans.
Tell you what: once we've eradicated the systemic biases in our cultures (and that includes getting rid of the bigots who'll jump on every tiny, measured difference to justify their bigotry), then we'll happily go around thin-slicing everyone's brains to find out if and why blacks prefer grape soda.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 3:29 PM
Sure thing, Sven, as long as you lower your "I wish the PC police would stop persecuting us for asking questions" banner.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 12, 2010 3:30 PM
You're talking about social policy, and I'm talking about scientific questions of empirical reality. If you want to talk about social policy, I agree with you 100%.
But it's not what I was talking about, and replying to me as if I was means that you're not paying attention. And you're not paying attention because you're busy pushing your political/social agenda. Rock on, but maybe contribute to the relevant conversation instead of the one I'm trying to have.
Posted by: Ing: PhD Trollologist
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June 12, 2010 3:30 PM
For reference the ONLY good study I can remember learning about (someone please point me to others if they exist) on mental abilities between the sexes was the rats in the aquatic maze experiment. They put female and male rats in a pool with outside visual guides on how to find the edge.
If I'm remembering right the female rats were actually better at the spacial navigation than males.
Clearly we need to make 90% of our airforce and navy recruits females.
Posted by: xyx
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June 12, 2010 3:31 PM
PZ, no serious person argues that statistical differences in the distribution of some ability between males and females justifies discrimination. Everyone agrees people should be evaluated on their own abilities and that the effect of gender is far too small to be a useful proxy for judging an individual's ability. All serious people also agree that social factors play a very substantive role in causing different outcomes between groups.
The relevant policy question is the extent that we should use data on the gender composition of in various fields to justify affirmative action policies. If some percentage of the disparity is biological, then that would seem to weaken the justification for such policies, at least according to some of the many arguments given for affirmative action. Accepting that some of the disparity may be biological does not even entail ending the policies, just that perfectly proportionate representation need not be the end goal. For this reason, these questions have policy implications even if gender differences aren't big enough to be relevant in the lives of individual people.
You say: "The statistical differences associated with different sexes, even given that they might hold up, do not justify the disparities between men and women in the sciences."
This seems entirely compatible with what Sumners got in trouble for saying (he never denied that social factors played a major role). It seems at most you disagree about the maximum plausible biological effect; i.e., you're arguing over a few percentage points. That hardly seems to justify the notion that everyone on the other side is a biological determinist.
Posted by: Ing: PhD Trollologist
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June 12, 2010 3:34 PM
Ok, here's a better question for the article and those who defend the study. It's the same question I ask theists/creationists
"Why do you think this question is even valid?"
Why WOULD you think it's a possibility that women have a inherent mental handicap to men in certain areas?
Posted by: bpesta22
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June 12, 2010 3:39 PM
Thanks, PZ, for #101 we are getting there. Sincerely.
Let's review effect size. It's a statistical concept; we can apply it to anything (not just sex differences).
It's the mean difference between two groups divided by standardized error. It basically shows how much the two bell curves overlap. The scale is standard deviation units (z scores). According to Cohen:
d = .20 is a small effect,
d = .40 is medium
d = .60 is large.
Even with a large effect, there would be tons of exceptions (cases where the people in the lower group do much better than people in the higher group).
The exceptions, though, are irrelevant to whether the mean difference exists. It's the person-who fallacy. Grandpa smoked 3 packs a day and lived to 97, therefore smoking doesn't cause cancer.
I mention this because people often claim the group difference implies ALL or NONE, or think that pointing out dumb male / smart female combos invalidates the existence of a group difference.
The sex difference on spatial ability is the largest, d = 1.0 (where 0.60 is large). If there is a sex difference on global IQ, it's very small (d=.20). I did cite an article showing very large links between paper-and-pencil spatial test scores and success in STEM.
Your claim seems to be the effects are too small to matter or explain real-world under-representation.
That's a purely mathematical argument and you're wrong. The problem comes when we aggregate individuals to groups (i.e., to societal effects).
Here's one example:
the correlation between an individual's IQ and having kids as a teenager is a meager -.19.
That's only 4% of the variance in teen pregnancy rates explained by IQ. 96% is squarely not.
Even I wouldn't advocate IQ testing kids and handing condoms out to the low scorers.
But, it's not a trivial effect when we aggregate to society. The correlation between IQ for the 50 U.S. states and Teen Pregnancy rates across the states is -.70! 50% of the variance explained.
Take any small effect and aggregate it, and soon you will have a 1.0 correlation (obviously, the cause fallacy comes to play here too). The point is, a small gap in test scores *might* indeed parsimoniously explain under-representation in STEM. Even suggesting that's a possibility, though, leads to attacks. And, even if we did demonstrate this, one would still have to figure out why. That's what I thought science is all about.
This article by Lubinski illustrates the point. It's 8 pages. Please think about reading it:
http://www.vanderbilt.edu/Peabody/SMPY/Seeingtheforest.pdf
Posted by: Ben Goren
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June 12, 2010 3:39 PM
Sven DiMilio blathered:
See, that’s just it. By focusing all the attention on a minor side-issue that “just happens” to (allegedly) support the basis of harmful discrimination, while ignoring the elephant in the room of the actual root cause of the discrimination…
…anyone…?
…yes, that’s exactly right. By doing that, Sven is demonstrating himself to be a sexist bigot.
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 12, 2010 3:40 PM
@Sven
Your strawman is still burning.
NO ONE, let me repeat NO ONE, said that studies should never be done. Multiple people, PZ included, said they SHOULD. What we're saying is that we need to examine the "empirical reality" of dumb asshats like XYZ (don't worry, I'm getting to you) don't say that those studies should affect social policy.
I'll repeat what I've said twice already: I think that the "true ratio" is not 50/50. I have no problems with studies being done. We can agree on that. Can you agree to telling people that those studies have NOTHING to do with the fact that women have to be over twice as qualified as men to be hired?
Posted by: Chgo_Liz
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June 12, 2010 3:40 PM
FossilFishy @ #13:
THANK YOU for that memory....how did I ever forget that? You've made my day.
Just a few examples among a lifetime's worth in (n=1) test subject....
Mid-1970s SAT: one question wrong in the math section, yet not a single teacher or counselor at my high school recommended that I go into math or science. A Calculus teacher who didn't think girls should take the BC version of the AP test...and did all of the well-known gender-based stereotypical teaching manipulations, like tell a girl simply that she was wrong but a boy would be talked through to the right answer if he got it wrong at first. I can still remember my second grade teacher pulling me aside and saying "I know you know all the answers, and you know it too, so won't you please let little Scottie win the math contest? It upsets him so to lose to a girl."
I wish I were making it up.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 3:43 PM
Oops. You'd better send off your memo (Subject line: "We're jus' bein' objective") to people like xyx. Apparently, s/he's not contributing to the relevant conversation either, Sven:
But of course, it's our cautions that are misplaced.
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 12, 2010 3:46 PM
XYZ:
The relevant policy question is the extent that we should use data on the gender composition of in various fields to justify affirmative action policies. If some percentage of the disparity is biological, then that would seem to weaken the justification for such policies, at least according to some of the many arguments given for affirmative action. Accepting that some of the disparity may be biological does not even entail ending the policies, just that perfectly proportionate representation need not be the end goal.
The point of affirmative action is not to get to 50-50, and if you think so you're hopelessly naive. The point of affirmative action is the fact (yes, fact) that given a white male vs not white male equally qualified candidate, under current hiring structures the white male is more likely to be hired. Fact. When the studies stop showing that identical resumes come back more highly rated with a man's name on them than with a woman's (or whites vs blacks), I'll preside over the death of affirmative action myself. You have my word.
Posted by: xyx
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June 12, 2010 3:48 PM
Obviously this has nothing to do with actual data, but I would give two a priori plausible reasons to suspect their might be mental differences. First, the profits from division of labor can be massive, and given that you evolve complex and expensive mechanisms to differentiate males and females for reproductive purposes, it seems wasteful not to use these mechanisms to further differentiate skills for the economic gains that come from division of labor. There are obvious examples in nature; i.e. the social insects. And physical differences between genders in humans supports this.
Second, there's just the fact that man and women are chemically and genetically different, and these differences are not incidental but have clear biological function. The notion that none of these differences have any mental effects is unlikely given what we know about genes and hormones from more clear-cut cases.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 3:52 PM
I'm sorry, I'd love to continue to discuss this issue with people who may or may not score as high as I do on measurable metrics like IQ as if those differences only matter when we're talking about other people, but I've got a Pride Parade to attend.
(I recall some research that suggested that gay men's brains are biologically more similar to women's in that they're less apt in areas such as spatial orientation, and I worry that if they don't have a few of us heteros on hand to point 'em in the right direction they're liable to march right into the river.)
Posted by: Mel Dahl
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June 12, 2010 3:53 PM
"Male domination of the “hard” sciences is all out of proportion with even the most sexist of the hard published numbers. It’s entirely consistent with “good ol’ boy network"
Whether people hire their friends is a separate issue from sex discrimination. If people hire their friends, the practical results will look an awful lot like sex discrimination (and race discrimination too), but in fact that's just another application of who you know being more important than what you know. If that's the case, then rather than waste time on sex discrimination maybe the solution is to try to find more objective hiring methods.
At Brownian, #108: The fact that I don't have to resort to name-calling and hysterics tells me I have a better case than you do. That said, being both openly-gay and ex-military, I know a thing or two about discrimination and prejudice. If the necessary data shows that women are excluded from science out of pure sexism, I'll be the first to call for an end to it. I'm just not convinced -- yet -- that the data is there.
And if that makes me a bio-deterministic wanker, I've been called worse. I believe PZ is himself bio-deterministic in other contexts, so not sure why this context changes anything.
Posted by: Ben Goren
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June 12, 2010 3:53 PM
Ing wondered:
Thank you. That’s exactly the point I’ve been trying to get across.
The basic premise is bullshit, at least on the proposed scale.
But, even if it were perfectly sound, it still would be completely irrelevant, except that it might express itself as a subtle bias in a very large statistical sample.
In other words, at absolute most, it should be no more than a minor curiosity, and one that should never be readily apparent without careful study.
You know? Like the sort of thing you pull out as a bar bet? “Did you know that there are 1.8% more women in top academic positions in math-oriented fields than men, and that that corresponds closely with a 2.1% genetic difference in the population at large?” “Hmpf. I had no idea. Who would have guessed? Wonder who thought to do the study. Hey, I know — did they compare left- and right-handed people to see if there are any similar discrepancies?”
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
Posted by: otrame
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June 12, 2010 3:53 PM
PZ said
THIS is the real point. It doesn't matter if, on average women are not as capable as men in math. Or even if the difference is because of genes or discrimination. When you are choosing someone for a job you are not dealing with averages, you are dealing with an individual. When people quit discriminating against women we might find out that--whoops--men on average really ARE better at math (or the other way around). And it still won't matter because what matters is not the average it's the individual.
The only time it matters is when you want to use any average discrepancy as an excuse for discrimination.
Posted by: xyx
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June 12, 2010 3:55 PM
You have to be more specific in terms of field for me to make sense of this statement. Certainly in some areas of life it is not the case that white males have an inherent advantage given equal resumes; e.g. for any given SAT score it is much easier for a black person to be admitted to a competitive college. And I think that the desired outcome of at least some affirmative action proponents is indeed somewhere near proportional representation.
Posted by: Neil
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June 12, 2010 3:56 PM
Brian, defender of tone trolls@#43
Obviously, rich people are inherently smarter than poor people.
A bit off topic perhaps, but that is the clearest, most concise explanation for the existence of the Republican base I've ever read. Well done!
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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June 12, 2010 3:56 PM
Yeah. We get that from the creationists too.
It shouldn't tell you anything. But, whatever helps you sleep at night.
Posted by: Mel Dahl
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June 12, 2010 4:00 PM
"Ok, here's a better question for the article and those who defend the study. It's the same question I ask theists/creationists
"Why do you think this question is even valid?"
"Why WOULD you think it's a possibility that women have a inherent mental handicap to men in certain areas?"
Because in my experience, (1) everyone is handicappd relative to everyone else in one area or another; nobody is strong at everything; and (2) different areas of strength or weakness tend to be found more highly concentrated in certain demographic groups. None of which means that a particular gifted individual should be excluded from something because of demographics.
That does not, standing alone, mean that men are better at math and science than women, nor do I personally believe that men are better at math and science than women. It does mean the question isn't completely outrageous.
And by the way, the purpose of the question is to stifle dissent. "Obviously you're a sexist pig or you wouldn't even be asking the question."
Posted by: Mel Dahl
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June 12, 2010 4:05 PM
Brownian, No. 133:
"Yeah. We get that from the creationists too.
It shouldn't tell you anything. But, whatever helps you sleep at night."
I suppose you think it shouldn't tell me anything either that I've now explicitly given you the opportunity to back up your opinion with facts rather than mockery, and you haven't been able to. That's OK; I prefer talking to grownups.
Posted by: eeanm
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June 12, 2010 4:06 PM
I think your strawmanning a bit, because isn't the issue really whether or not we should be concerned about women not taking the higher-paying math-heavy jobs. When looking at percentages and statistics, not at a particular individual. Is it society or biology?
Personally I think its clearly society. I can't believe any difference in 'raw ability', if it exists at all, probably just isn't a major factor compared to gender roles. Considering IQ inflation, its hard to say how much raw ability even exists.
Not really sure who or what is to blame. It's a bit too easy to just point at folks like Larry Summers.
Posted by: pteryxx
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June 12, 2010 4:12 PM
Re Samantha @99:
Check out the gender ratios in veterinary medicine. Vet school's said to be even more intellectually demanding than medical school because of all the different species' quirks. Veterinarians also make far less money than physicians. But the veterinarian profession is becoming female-dominated, very quickly too; females just became the majority in 2009. This seems to be both the result and the cause of fewer men entering the field, because the more female-dominated a profession is, the less likely males are to see it as a desirable career.
Animal work gets divided up in interesting ways by gender, probably because gender standards are changing so quickly here. In my personal experience: the lowest paid animal techs, who handled cage washing and such, were about 2:3 male:female (and often immigrants). Veterinary techs and management, about 1:8. Grad students and postdocs, about 1:1. Researchers, about 3:2. In veterinary medicine, apparently small animal and pet work is becoming female-dominated, while food animal medicine remains male-dominated.
There's an article in Veterinary Practice News here that touches on a whole stack of factors: lucrative careers, differing salaries, spousal support, flexible schedules, stereotyping and perception.
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 12, 2010 4:21 PM
MelDahl and XYX:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v442/n7099/full/442133a.html (and references therein, for some reason my VPN isn't letting me into the article so I can't pull them up for you directly)
http://www.brown.edu/Administration/Provost/Advance/hopkins.html- just the 2nd slide in the powerpoint if you're short on time.
Women's intelligence is devalued, and they often don't get hired even when they're more qualified than men. Fact.
And XYX, that assertion about being easier to get into college if you're black? While not granting that it is true, because I haven't seen the data, if it is true it is almost certainly as a result of affirmative action. Do a pubmed search on "workplace discrimination" and you can find studies on implicit racism, sexism, agism, and how they affect hiring and promotion.
Posted by: Tulse
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June 12, 2010 4:27 PM
Anyone advocating the biological aspects of IQ has to explain the Flynn effect, where overall IQs have increased in many countries by 7 points per decade. Beside such increases, any suggested male-female difference is negligible. Do we really believe that, on average, the male physicists of thirty years ago were significantly stupider than those today?
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 12, 2010 4:28 PM
@XYX again
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0DXK/is_9_20/ai_104521293/
Still think there's reverse discrimination?
Posted by: Mel Dahl
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June 12, 2010 4:30 PM
Beth, I just attempted to access both of the links you cited. The first one wants me to pay $18 for the article and the second one is giving me a "page not found" error.
I'll go on google and see if I can find the first one for free somewhere else. Not only am I a misogynistic neaderthal jerk, I'm also cheap. ;-)
Posted by: pteryxx
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June 12, 2010 4:32 PM
Sheesh, I just bet someone is going to tackle xyx @131 faster than I can, but just in case:
Why is it easier for a POC to be admitted with a lower SAT score? Because of specific policies making it so. Why are the policies there? To compensate for social factors, including the proven bias against POCs in personal interviews. Don't claim that the existence of ladders disproves walls.
Posted by: Mel Dahl
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June 12, 2010 4:33 PM
For the record, not only am I a Member of Mensa, I'm a member of Mensa's national board of directors, and I'm becoming less and less convinced that IQ is predictive of much of anything. We have Mensans who are nuclear physicists, and we also have Mensans that I wouldn't send to the store for a quart of milk.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 12, 2010 4:37 PM
Brownian, I don't speak for xyz, and vice-versa. And I didn't mean to imply that mine was the only relevant conversation, just that it was the relevant conversation for what I was talking about, which, as implied, I think is quite different from what you were talking about.
I'm not sure what to make of your mocking an attempt to be objective about questions that can, in principle, be answered objectively. It's called "science"? I care about whether male and female humans differ in mathematical aptitude in exactly the same way (though less acutely) that I care about sexual differences in metabolic rates in turtles. Because it implies interesting biology.
Public policy is a whole diferent thing, and, as mentioned, I agree with you about it. Nothing pisses me off more than the use of science as an ideological battering ram, by anybody about any question.
Not sure that's a fact.
I will say, that in the only direct experience I have, which is hiring biologists, it's unquestionably not a fact.
But sure: I will state my opinion that whatever the true differences in aptitude between females and males as populations, they are and should be entirely irrelevant to individual hiring decisions.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 12, 2010 4:41 PM
Hi, Ben. Bite me, asshole.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 12, 2010 4:46 PM
The fuck?
I'm flouncing.
Posted by: https://me.yahoo.com/a/sLcDBasBwPfDDfP26ZrYQkmF26oo#6cc71
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June 12, 2010 4:53 PM
@123 Comments are scary.This in the 70's? I was in HS then, but we didn't have counselors.
Cultural bias still overwhelms any gender difference. So, people should be judged on their abilities, not what group they are from.
And in PZ's example, wealth does matter. I've always thought that one of the principal components of the success of the US was public schooling which gave poorer students more opportunities than in other countries. [That was then, not so much now.]
Posted by: HertfordshireChris
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June 12, 2010 4:55 PM
PZ says:
I think he is saying that what we studying are people who good at playing the “scientific rat race game” who select projects which conform with the views of the establishment hierarchy who vet publications, award grants, etc. Such an approach rigorously excludes original thinkers who are capable of asking fundamental questions about the foundations on which establishment scientific fashions are based.
I believe I was a victim of the rush to become first in the scientific rat race. My background (school, university and first job as a scientist) led me to believe that the most important thing about science was to start by asking the right question. You then critically worked through the possible answers, and finally did not pre-judge the answer by prematurely rushing to be the first in the race. Of course I was a fool to ever thing getting the right answer was more important than being first.
In 1967 (with less than 2 years experience of computers) I found myself in the forward planning department of a small but imaginative computer company. The enormous rush to exploit “electronic super calculating machines” after the war – and the “miracles” of many successful applications – had by this time clearly demonstrated that the “stored program computer” philosophy must be the best possible ....
My analysis was that priority one was human-machine communication – with a particular need for an information processing system to be able to explain what it was doing in terms acceptable to the user. Priority two was to recognise that the world was always changing and any solution should be dynamically flexible. As a novice to computers I had not been brainwashed into what computers can and can't do and came up with a simple solution – which included ditching the need for pre-defined programs for a wide range of applications from commercial data processing to artificial intelligence.
The marketing, research and electronic engineering sections of the company loved the idea and supported a research project which demonstrated that the basic idea could work, and also took out patents. The software side said it must be rubbish because we wouldn't need so many very clever and highly paid people writing software if things were that easy. Of course to demonstrate the idea I simulated the process as a program,, and when the department was closed down as a result of a merger my work was assessed by software experts who couldn't understand it – and I was declared redundant, despite the fact that I had achieved every goal in the original proposal.
I struggled on with the idea in what proved to be a very unsuitable university department. I was unable to get research grants and the process was rather as if, 150 years ago, I was trying to get a grant to build a helicopter, and the research grants were being given out by railway engineers. I was regularly being asked questions equivalent to “How does your helicopter negotiate points” and being shown the door when I try to explain my helicopter doesn't run on rails.
Following years banging my head against a brick wall, a family suicide and a bullying head of department, I decided to throw in the towel.
The problem was not in whether my idea would work – but was due to the new “Religion of the Computer.” The inside of a computer is a deep and almost incomprehensible number processor – far from the understanding of mere mortals. It is hidden from view by layers and layers of computer software written and maintained by high priests called software engineers, the cleverest guarding the inner sanctums. The underlying philosophy is that if “A” wants a computer to do a task it requires a much more intelligent “high priest” to design and implement an all embracing a priori definition of the task,
If anyone thinks that the stored program computer is a good starting point for understanding how people think they presumably accept that in the same way that programmers are needed to CREATE programs, GOD was needed to CREATE human thought.
My approach started by the idea that humans understand sets (A “dog” is a “mammal” which is an “animal” etc.) and my proposal involved describing information in terms of recursively defined sets. My “discovery” was that if the sets are structured in an easily understood way, it is possible to design a processor (which could have been build with 1970's computer processor technology) which works simply by comparing sets, regardless of the tasks in hand. As the information processor directly uses the identical sets to the user it can easily explain, step by step, in the user's own terms, how it gets any answer. The system also works incrementally – if new situations arises the user simply add news sets – effectively applications can evolve as the requirements change. While I would no make monumental claims it is clear that such an approach is far more compatible with an evolutionary model of human intelligence that the stored program creationalist model.
I eventually abandoned all work on the idea over 20 years ago, in part from sheer exhaustion, but also because the opposition was getting stronger. When I started it was easy to find people who understood what I was doing – on one I suddenly realised I was likely to “blow” the patent when describing what I was doing to the Vicar. The trouble is that once someone has been brain washed to believe that programming a computer is something best left to clever people, or even worse have been taught to program at school, they find it difficult to think about an electronic information processing box that doesn't need programming ... Surely, they say, you need someone to CREATE the program.
So back to PZ's initial observation. I am sure that there is no significant difference in the ability of men and women to think “science”. However there may be differences (undoubtedly social rather than genetic) that mean that men are better “Rats” in the scientific rat race.
Posted by: xyx
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June 12, 2010 4:55 PM
Some of the references in the Barres article are quite interesting (didn't have time to read all of them, but I found the Wennerås & Wold 1997 methodology convincing), but I think Barres himself makes a pretty large error: he assumes there must be only one cause of lack of female advancement in a given field. With complex biological/social systems we expect there to be multiple causes, and interactions between causes. There is very strong evidence for discrimination against women in some fields. But that need not be the full story.
Yes, that is the point. The goal of affirmative action is to counter the effects of at least discrimination, and (depending on who is advocating it) possibly other social factors as well. That's why it is important to quantify the various biological and social factors that go into determining group outcomes. Objective studies with good methodologies are the right way to go, but that requires a willingness to listen to arguments that biological factors may be relevant in some cases without caricaturing the position of the arguer.
Posted by: skeptifem
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June 12, 2010 5:00 PM
Real genius science breakthroughs are rare. We are screwing ourselves over by doing anything to reduce the possible pool of people who can excel in math and science. We have no idea what we missed out on in excluding everyone but rich white dudes for so long, but I am positive that it is big. Exceptional minds never got the chance to ponder the big questions. Its a shame.
Posted by: pteryxx
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June 12, 2010 5:07 PM
xyx: Given that gender bias exists and has significant effects, why should we specify a biological difference before enacting policies to address it?
Posted by: Peter Ashby
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June 12, 2010 5:12 PM
The problem with Summers' original comment was he committed a statistical fallacy: that because on average men are better at maths than women (on average they are also worse remember, we get more geniuses but also more dullards) that means NO woman is better than any given man.
This enrages me not just because I am an only son with 3 sisters and have two daughters and no son but because my wife has a degree in maths. Her only female lecturer tried desperately to get her to a PhD and uphold the place of women, but for my wife maths was primarily there to support her other degree, in compsci. Though she does and did enjoy much of it too, just not enough.
As someone who did a PhD because I loved the subject I cannot conceive how hard and horrible doing one you don't want to do must be.
Anyway I have met this wilful statistical blindness in too many powerful men who damn well should know better to think it an easy mistake for an intelligent, numerically literate man to make. I am a Biologist for goodness sake and alright I'm a Physiologist so I am sort of numerate but if I can get it so can they.
So I agree with PZ, it is shameful drawbridge raising.
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 12, 2010 5:17 PM
@MelDahl, for the second article the dash I used got incorporated into the html- just delete it off the end. Again, for some reason my VPN won't let me at the Nature article, or I'd send it along myself.
@Sven, if you can, please look at the nature article I linked in 138 (if you're not also behind a paywall). It's lovely that you don't have personal experience with discrimination against women, but that's definitely not the full story.
@xyx, I will say to you what I did to Sven- there is not a subject out there that I would say NOT to study unless the study itself was illegal, immoral, or harmful, which I don't think studying male vs female differences is. I am all for looking at both cultural AND biological factors.
From my comment to him at 122:
"I'll repeat what I've said twice already: I think that the "true ratio" is not 50/50. I have no problems with studies being done. We can agree on that. Can you agree to telling people that those studies have NOTHING to do with the fact that women have to be over twice as qualified as men to be hired?"
Population differences should never be applied to individuals, and we shouldn't be biological determinists any more than we should be cultural determinists.
Posted by: xyx
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June 12, 2010 5:18 PM
It's a quantitative issue and a resource allocation issue. Plausibly, a small discrimination effect justifies a small-scale remissive policy while a large discrimination effect justifies a large-scale remissive policy. That's not to say we need to know everything before implementing policy, just that, as I said earlier, we shouldn't caricature the views of people who think biological factors have x percent more weight that we do.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 12, 2010 5:28 PM
Jeez, it's not about my personal experience of discrimination (I am as privileged as they come), and I wasn't questioning the existence of discrimination, for chrissakes. I was questioning the quantitative assertion that "women have to be over twice as qualified as men to be hired."
I doubt it's true, quantitatively, in math and physics (which is what we're actually, supposedly, talking baout), but I know damn well it's not true in biology.
And now the re-flounce.
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 12, 2010 5:31 PM
@MelDahl,
Apparently my VPN started working again- if you'd like the article, email me my handle @gmail.com and I'll send it along, along with the study that generated the male vs female perceived competence graph.
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 12, 2010 5:36 PM
@Sven-
Look at the Wenneras and Wold 1997 study cited in the Barres editorial- I can email it to you if you need it. It is about discrimination in biomedical research in Sweden, which is usually considered a pretty enlightened country. If their figure doesn't make your eyeballs pop out then nothing on this topic will.
Posted by: Azkyroth
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June 12, 2010 5:49 PM
If that were what was really being said, and was what all the rest of the available evidence indicated was actually meant by the people saying it, and there wasn't already both 1) an extended body of sound research suggesting the possibility should atleast be regarded with extreme skepticism if not precisely ruled out and 2) a massive track history of junk science, confirmation bias, and often outright fabricated "results" offered to support "the possibility" by people who really, really, REALLY, want it to be true, it wouldn't be.
Posted by: Knockgoats
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June 12, 2010 5:54 PM
See: this article from when the controversy was fresh.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2005/01/17/summers_remarks_on_women_draw_fire/ - RangerRick
I am completely gobsmacked that anyone can read this article and not conclude that Summers is almost certainly a sexist. The "I'm going to provoke you" crap, for a start. Oh Larry, how brave of you to dare the wrath of the feminist establishment. The drastic fall in the number of women appointed to senior academic positions during his tenure. The crap about how if it were discrimination that led to few women being hired, any non-discriminatory department would have an advantage. (Well sure they would, if and only if there was no discrimination in publication, grant awarding, etc. - is he really too thick to see that?) The non sequitur that because autism is now thought to have a strong genetic component, that makes it more likely sex differences do (no, Larry, that doesn't follow). The claim that "we" would "prefer" that the differences were purely social in origin (no, Larry, you don't get away with simply asserting that you're not a sexist and expecting us to take it on trust). I could go on - and this is an article pointed to by the "defence"! Sheesh.
Posted by: Sasha
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June 12, 2010 6:23 PM
Ok, I'm going on a personal rant here....
When my youngest daughter was in 2nd grade, she complained to me that she was bored when it came to math. I mentioned this to her teacher, who being a smart & kind woman scheduled a few math aptitude tests with the G&T coordinator. The G&T coordinator, a woman with a master's degree no less, told me that my daughter was gifted in math AND then went on to say how unusual it was for girls to be good in math. WTF? I was flabbergasted to say the least! How could this woman be in charge of curriculum for young girls (& boys) with that bias? I'm not a pushy parent, but the kid was bored and we decided to let her work to her potential. Bored kids often become turned off to school. Well, the youngest graduated from HS with college credit through Calc 4 and is off university to do a double major - in math and fashion - in fall. I think she got burned out on the math, but the problem solving used can be applied to so many things. And... the kid is pretty darn good at designing her own clothes.
The point is, we all should have the opportunity to explore and discover ourselves without being subject to ignorant stereotypes. The girls are good and this and boys are good at that bias cuts both ways and neither sex benefits from being forced to conform stereotyped roles.
Posted by: Ben Goren
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June 12, 2010 6:26 PM
Wow…I missed that Boston.com article RangerRick linked to that Knockgoats just quoted. I now remember that from when it happened.
Larry Summers is, beyond doubt, a sexist bigoted asshole.
What’s especially telling is how those in this thread insisting that women are (or may be) dumber than men come across so much like Summers did, though maybe not quite so obnoxiously blatant.
If you stink like an asshole, you just might be one.
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
Posted by: pteryxx
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June 12, 2010 6:38 PM
xyx, next question:
"It's a quantitative issue and a resource allocation issue. Plausibly, a small discrimination effect justifies a small-scale remissive policy while a large discrimination effect justifies a large-scale remissive policy."
Your answer doesn't clarify what "small-scale" and "large-scale" actually mean, but given your discussion around the @124 mark, I assume that by "large-scale" you mean "causes the gender ratio of scientists to approximate 50:50", is that correct?
But why is the prospective endpoint relevant? The point of remissive policy should be to reduce gender bias, however much it is, to effectively zero. Why should a policy be any different as long as gender bias is measurable?
Posted by: Kirk
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June 12, 2010 7:09 PM
This article by PZ cleared something up for me.
When I was about to graduate the first time round from college, I took the GRE and nailed it, and was therefore offered a scholarship, etc.
And a decade later I took the GRE masters test as part of an application for a position I wanted, and my results were in the middle of the pack.
And now I know why. In the intervening ten years, unbeknownst to myself, I had turned into a woman. I wonder how my wife is going to take this.
Posted by: gerard-harbison.myopenid.com
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June 12, 2010 7:50 PM
Oh, and do be so kind as to take your thinly-veiled misogyny and shove it up your ass sideways, Okay? Thanks.
Ah, rational debate.
Have a great life, Ben.
Posted by: gerard-harbison.myopenid.com
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June 12, 2010 8:06 PM
Look at the Wenneras and Wold 1997 study cited in the Barres editorial- I can email it to you if you need it.
Interesting study. Even more interesting when people started asking for their raw data.
Dig a little further.
Posted by: a_ray_in_dilbert_space, OM, A little FUCKING ray of sunshine
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June 12, 2010 8:11 PM
I think PZ's point that math ability, etc. are just proxies. Ultimately, what makes me a good scientist may be very different from what makes you a good scientist. I happen to be pretty good at math, but if someone asked me the most important factor in my success as a physicist, I'd say it's because I play well with others.
My wife, also a scientist, is every bit as good at math and an even more logical and intuitive thinker.
Personally, if someone asked me for a single proxy to pick out as a creterion for whether someone will succeed in science, I'd have to say curiosity--a trait that really knows no gender specificity as near as I can tell. However, I don't know of a test to measure that.
Posted by: The Countess
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June 12, 2010 8:13 PM
Cripe, did this moron channel Father's Manifesto for his "facts" about SAT scores? Father's Manifesto is a misogynistic, racist, and anti-semitic organization from the mid 1990s that insisted that single mother homes caused drops in U. S. SAT scores over several decades and that's a good reason to support father-only custody. To give you an idea how bad this group was, supporters wanted to repeal women's right to vote, saying that women (esp. single and divorced custodial mothers) caused most social problems and taking away their power - and giving it back to men where it belonged - would fix society. Father's Manifesto was the first group to promote the idea that social failures like low SAT scores, alcohol and drug abuse, teen pregnancy, teen suicide, rise in school dropout rates, juvenile crime, etc., are caused by "fatherless homes" (read: single and divorced mother homes) and in the mid '90s that kind of thinking was considered fringe and nutcase. Now, thanks to groups like the National Fatherhood Initiative and LOTS of media propaganda over the past twenty years, that kind of thinking is mainstream.
Posted by: Carlie of the lacy, gently wafting adjectives
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June 12, 2010 8:13 PM
Check out how many dead cats they have left in their wake?
Posted by: Azkyroth
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June 12, 2010 8:13 PM
[Citation needed]
Posted by: Ben Goren
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June 12, 2010 8:14 PM
gerard-harbison.myopenid.com again blathered:
You mean, like “hinting” that, but for their lack of a penis, women would only be as underrepresented in physics departments as they currently are in biology departments?
I’m tryin’ to, but it’s the misogynist bigots such as yourself that’re keeping so many of our most valuable resources from contributing to the common good.
If it weren’t for you and your spiritual brethren, we’d have fusion powerplants by now (or at least know that it’s a dead end). And instead of saving up for a photovoltaic array for the roof, I’d be able to spend my disposable income on toys (because energy would be almost too cheap to meter). And, of course, with that much energy, most of the geopolitical woes of the day would vanish (perhaps to be replaced by other woes, but that’s an experiment worth conducting).
So, yeah. Fuck you too.
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
Posted by: Azkyroth
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June 12, 2010 8:18 PM
PS: BINGO!
Posted by: a_ray_in_dilbert_space, OM, A little FUCKING ray of sunshine
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June 12, 2010 8:30 PM
Sven, I do have direct second-hand experience of sexism in science. I had a colleague in grad school who was driven out of physics--and ultimately suicide--by an asshole who actually physically sabotaged her work to keep her from getting a prestigious fellowship. The perpetrator, btw is still working in the field. My friend is dead.
My wife was also a victim. She had a supervisor who started to come on to her, making lots of suggestive comments, asking her out... When she brushed these aside, he got nervous and hung her out to dry on a doomed project, gave her poor performance evaluations and ultimately drove her from the lab.
Want me to go on? A woman scientist has to deal with all this crap AND perform at a level that is at least commensurate with her male colleagues. So, yes, given all of that AND dealing with societal expectations, family... I'd say twice as good is not a gross exaggeration.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 12, 2010 8:58 PM
You will find that I have never questioned the existence of "sexism in science." That would be stupid. The question was explicitly about "getting hired".
I'm really sorry to hear about that.
No. Thanks for asking.
Exactly correct.
Directly contradicted by the exactly correct sentence that preceded it.
Posted by: https://me.yahoo.com/a/sLcDBasBwPfDDfP26ZrYQkmF26oo#6cc71
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June 12, 2010 9:03 PM
@152
"on average men are better at maths than women (on average they are also worse remember"
????
Posted by: a_ray_in_dilbert_space, OM, A little FUCKING ray of sunshine
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June 12, 2010 10:34 PM
Sven, do you really think that all the personal shit women have to go through does not compromise their performance and advancement?
I have another colleague who is lesbian. She's been hit on by two other colleagues (both male) even though they know 1)she's lesbian and 2) she's married. You don't think that puts a strain on her relationships with male colleagues, whom she needs to succeed in her career?
My concern is that I think we are driving a lot of very good women out of the field, and even if the best of the best stay in, we aren't getting the best out of them that they could. Even if acheiving gender equality in the sciences is not a priority for you, you should care about this issue because it is robbing us of the efforts of some of our most creative people.
Posted by: Epikt
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June 12, 2010 11:08 PM
Aaron Baker:
The Putnam math competition for undergraduates is a big deal for mathematicians in training. It's been going on since 1938. Putnam fellows are those who finish among the top five of the typically several thousand bright people who take the exam. Let's look for female Putnam fellows.
1938? None.
1939? Uhuh.
...
1950? Nope.
...
1962? Nary a one.
...
1976? Zero
...
1988? Nada.
...
1996? We have a winner.
2002? Another.
2003? Yup.
2004? Again.
Hmm. It looks like either females suddenly became better at math, or there have been externalities that prevented them from demonstrating what they're capable of.
Anecdata? Yeah. Meaningless? I don't think so. Obviously it doesn't disprove the existence of gender-related differences in abilities. But the sudden emergence of female fellows correlates well with the onset of more liberal attitudes toward women.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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June 12, 2010 11:12 PM
nope. to achieve the same of better results under more difficult/adversarial circumstances indeed requires one to be better.Posted by: skeptifem
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June 12, 2010 11:57 PM
I will go ahead and stick my neck out and say I don't think that the differences are worth studying. You know why? Because we don't understand how things like math and science ability actually works in the human brain, so there is no frickin way that proving a biological difference based on sex is anywhere NEAR being possible. We can't be sure that social bias doesn't CAUSE some kind of biological issue, if there is one. The studies will just be used to justify sexism until then. I think this should really wait until we know what the hell we are actually studying.
And sven- it is cute that you think you have some kind of profound knowledge of what lady brains do differently because of your personal experience, but ya don't. Your impression doesn't impress me, and considering how your impression could make for sexism on your behalf I would suggest that you cut it out. Your personal experience doesn't make something reality, that is what science is for, and as I pointed out we are a REALLY long way from concrete conclusions on this extremely complex and not well understood matter. If you don't know you should be able to admit it instead of being so insistent that anyone gives a crap that you noticed something in your department (regarding women in general, anyway).
Posted by: PZ Myers
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June 13, 2010 12:08 AM
Yeah, bottom up is the way to go. For instance, we know that there are sex differences in the organization of the nucleus magnocellularis basalis in mice & rats & birds -- robust differences that we can measure consistently. We don't know what they mean. Show me how physical differences in the brains of male and female mice relate to behavior first, then we can talk about humans. As it stands now, it's the pursuit of murky epiphenomena with no mechanisms and no understanding of the process.
Posted by: skeptifem
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June 13, 2010 12:11 AM
Oh and sven, sexism is really distracting at work. You get pissed off having to work with knobs who hate you just for existing in your current form. You get angry about having no recourse. You get depressed about having to deal with it. You worry about your job or retaliation.
These things make it harder to concentrate on work when you are exposed to this crap all the time.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 13, 2010 12:11 AM
skeptifem, I have to admit that I have no idea what you are talking about. Somebody said "women have to be twice as good to get hired" and I replied that it's not true in my experience, comprising many hiring decisions in, as it happens, six different biology departments. To clarify, I claim that there is no overt hiring bias in biology, and I cite extensive experience as evidence. That's it.
Whatever else people are reading into my comment is unwarranted.
Posted by: PZ Myers
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June 13, 2010 12:18 AM
I agree that there is little overt bias -- and we also have all kinds of protocols in place to prevent it.
The real problem is deeper than at the hiring level of universities. It's a pattern of educational and social discouragement of women that cuts across all levels.
I think universities are actually fairly good (but far from perfect) in giving women a fair shake at employment. The thing is, it's harder to get women in the pipeline, and retention is tough, even in colleges. Just the issue of the expectation that the women will somehow magically manage to combine tenurable work and raise a family without a hiccup is a real obstacle.
(Which can't be blamed on just the university, either -- it's also a wider cultural problem that women are handed the greater burden of child-rearing.)
Posted by: bpesta22
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June 13, 2010 12:21 AM
Pz: As it stands now, it's the pursuit of murky epiphenomena with no mechanisms and no understanding of the process.
Me: Agreed, unless, say, you actually bother to read a large literature in the area before claiming what we know and what we don't.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 13, 2010 12:28 AM
To clarify yet clearer, the statement to which I responded was this:
'twice as qualified'. OK?
ray changed it to 'twice as good as' and I continued to think in terms of 'qualified'. I apologize for my half of the misunderstanding.
I am well aware of the challenges faced by female scientists; I have been married to two and friend, colleague, student, and mentor of many more. I apologize for whatever I said to give people an impression to the contrary.
Calling me a 'sexist bigot' is like the most ridiculous thing ever and even my ex-wives would back me up on that. So that pissed me off.
So there's my apology comment; in the next one I go back to being a contrary pain the ass.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 13, 2010 12:41 AM
Well, I mean, as you know, we know a little; location and density of hormone receptors and stuff like that. But it is true that we're a long, long way from understanding how any brain works. Still, the idea that:
is kind of problematic. I can't think of any examples of a detailed mechanism being worked out before interesting emergent properties were recognized at higher levels. (hmmm, maybe RNAi?) Reductionism is the usual 'way to go'; you need a phenomenon to explain before causal mechanisms can even be hypothesized. Usually.
Of course. This is exactly right.
For the record, I have 3 undergrad research students this summer, all women.
And a daughter who is going to be pretty amazing at something, for certain.
Posted by: a_ray_in_dilbert_space, OM, A little FUCKING ray of sunshine
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June 13, 2010 1:11 AM
Sven, Congrats on your daughter--and on the undergrads. Although I am not in academia, mentoring is important in my profession, and I'm good at it. I am currently the unofficial mentor for my entire research group, since we lost most of our experienced folks.
Of the two women among those I am mentoring, one was a natural--she took to mentoring by me and anyone else who would help her out. The other was a challenge. She had never learned how to be mentored. Eventually, we developed a very good working relationship, but it was challenging. She's now a star.
Succeeding in science is not a straightforward proposition. It involves a very subtle set of learned behaviors over an inate curiosity and raw talent. I've seen a lot of talent wasted because no one was available to train it.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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June 13, 2010 1:29 AM
that's grand. and sort of irrelevant, since the bias we're discussing is for the most part covert/subconscious. the "twice as qualified" was at least partially a reference to the article linked above that noted that women's accomplishments are devalued, while men's accomplishments are overvalued, in comparison; in hiring situations, that means that a female name will have to come with more impressive qualifications to be perceived as equally qualified as a male name with fewer and/or less impressive qualifications.you can argue the precision of "twice as", but not the gist of it
Posted by: xyx
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June 13, 2010 1:41 AM
pteryxx:
What actual policy are you thinking of that has no scale? Affirmative action measures don't counter discrimination directly, but seek to compensate for it. For example, precisely how should you weight the test scores of one group differently than another in determining how qualified an applicant is? You want the weighing to reflect the magnitude of the social ill the policy is meant to address, and that requires quantitative measurement.
There are other policies which don't require precise measurement. It might be a good idea to make review processes of all sort more transparent. But for affirmative action in particular I don't see how you can design an appropriate policy without a sense of the scale of the problem you are trying to address.
Posted by: Peter Ashby
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June 13, 2010 3:43 AM
@174
When you compare the standard distributions for IQ for males and females you find the male curve is broader and flatter than the female curve. So us guys get more really bright guys than the women do, but we also, at the other end of the graph get more guys who lucked out in the smarts department. The women's curve is taller but iirc it does still reach the male extremes which is where Summers' fallacy comes in, as explained.
Now we can argue forever about the basis of the differences in the curves, but that is not the point.
Posted by: Joakim
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June 13, 2010 5:22 AM
@165
Interesting study. Even more interesting when people started asking for their raw data.
Dig a little further.
(in reference to the Wenneras and Wold 1997 study)
I was attempting to dig a little further but the only support for this statement I can find seems to be an article in the March 2008 issue of The Journal of the American Enterprise Institute. I do not know this journal from before and I am not quite ready to take their work for it. I also noted that Wikipedia describes the AEI as a "conservative think tank".
Since you were referring to people (in plural), could you help me by directing me to some more information on this?
Posted by: Joakim
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June 13, 2010 5:37 AM
Just to clarify: I interpreted the remark as a statement that there was something questionable about the raw data, or the authors willingness and ability to share it. If this was not the intended implication of your statement, please disregard my query.
Posted by: CobraCom
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June 13, 2010 6:01 AM
I'd say it's more than a significant possibility that there is a cultural bias present in the data. After all, who is considered in the study? Just Americans? Or people worldwide?
Study another country and you'd get very different results. Iran, for example, has had a very dominant female role in education: both in terms of performance and sheer number. Further, these women particularly shine in the areas of mathematics, sciences, and technology, really dwarfing the males in those areas. However, they still only account for a small fraction of Iran's work force. In this case, the reason is obvious: the Iranian regime has an overt ideology of misogyny and limits to the freedoms of women. But, even the US may have similar limits, even if they are not to the same extreme, or overtly spoken. This is especially likely considering that worldwide, women can perform as well as or better than men. Where women don't receive the same or equal benefits for their abilities as men, it's pretty clear that some artificial bias is at work, even in our "evolved" American society. For all our "progress," we're still sorely lacking in some basic elements of human equality. We've made good progress (certainly better than Iran), but we've a long way to go yet. It's a shitty idea to stop short of that goal.
Posted by: Gerald Snit
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June 13, 2010 6:48 AM
@128: "The fact that I don't have to resort to name-calling and hysterics tells me I have a better case than you do."
Anyone wishing to invoke biology in explaining social differences between women and men should be a little more careful about using a word like "hysterics".
Posted by: a_ray_in_dilbert_space, OM, A little FUCKING ray of sunshine
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June 13, 2010 6:54 AM
Ah! The American Enterprise Institute--aka The Lying Sacks of Shit!
Posted by: Knockgoats
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June 13, 2010 7:07 AM
When you compare the standard distributions for IQ for males and females you find the male curve is broader and flatter than the female curve. So us guys get more really bright guys than the women do, but we also, at the other end of the graph get more guys who lucked out in the smarts department. - Peter Ashby
You've made the apparent assumption there that IQ is an objective measure of how "smart" you are. It isn't (it's not even a well-defined measure, as different IQ tests can give markedly different results for an individual or population). Most relevant in this case is that IQ tests are designed so that the sexes have equal means, but not so they have equally humped distributions.
Posted by: John Scanlon FCD
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June 13, 2010 8:48 AM
Well obviously it has no relevance in a 1-vs-1 hiring situation. Yes, to assume it did would be bigoted. But also, PZ, to argue against that bigoted position would be a strawman argument, because I've never seen anyone defend it. Anywhere around here, anyway.
If there happens to be a difference in variance (stipulating means to be exactly equal) then the highest (and lowest) percentiles have unequal gender composition. So if hiring decisions were completely impartial with respect to gender, but the variance in whatever 'test-score' they are based on is higher among males, then the pickiest faculties would end up with the most male-skewed gender ratios.
Of course the right-tail effect (which is nobody's fault, not even the Romans') probably isn't the relevant explanation for many actual cases of unequal gender representation within fields and faculties. There's discrimination against prospective members from within some groups (sexism and racism in here!), and also discrimination among established groups and fields by prospective members (individual choices... may also be sexist/racist), both of which may perpetuate composition biases. And there are probably still also parents/teachers/peers practicing discrimination for the sheer hell of it just because they're shitstains who don't question conservative stereotypes, and that's where the most difference can be made, negative and positive.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 13, 2010 9:42 AM
This gets oh-so-tiresome. The bias I was discussing, in that comment, was the one I explicitly quoted. "more than twice as qualified to get hired". OK? This is hyperbole at best, and just plain wrong in academia. (Women in math and science, right? that was what "we were discussing"?) If two faculty-job candidates are of roughly equal qualifications, the woman will get the offer every time. (As, I'll add, in my opinion, is generally appropriate.) If you have data or observations to the contrary let's see 'em.
But I can, in the context of hiring decisions in math and science.
PZ's right, the problem is way, way before that.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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June 13, 2010 9:50 AM
should read "If two faculty-job candidates of different sexes have roughly equal qualifications,..."
Posted by: DesertHedgehog
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June 13, 2010 9:51 AM
Can't hiring decisions be made on the basis of three key variables: attractive, amusing, interesting? Then we can all get back to the business of doing just enough work to avoid being fired and spend mornings trying to get free donuts.
Posted by: Mackam
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June 13, 2010 10:02 AM
Perhaps the pipeline loss issue may not be entirely discriminatory or cultural. Is it possible that women on average prefer other fields of study to math and science on average? If policies demand a 50/50 goal, would this unfairly pressure women who would prefer to do something else into math and science? You can't force someone to like science, right?
Posted by: JBlilie
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June 13, 2010 10:12 AM
I love that one! Perfect!
Posted by: Cerberus, unnatural product of en-OMnomnom-ification
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June 13, 2010 11:46 AM
Yeah, it's as old as fuck this dance, from its origins assuming women and blacks lacked the intellectual ability to even be literate to the ever-shrinking gap that "must be there, damnitt".
The refutations are everywhere. The obvious social biases, the fact that the gap is always shrinking from what the "rebel types" claim it to be, the fact that inter-group variance is vastly dwarfed by huge orders of magnitude by intra-group variance. There is also the fact that the largest inter-group variance is "financial class of parents" in most of the metrics we use, which kind of neatly demonstrates the artificiality and cultural basis. I mean, parent's financial status isn't a biological mark and shows that quality of education determines the majority of advancement. Given the tiny and absent "gaps" we've been reduced to and that they are all smaller than the financial gap, means that the biology theory of separation is very unlikely to be more accurate than the null theory of separation.
Then there is the other crap. The whole trans people don't change in intellectual capacity, the fact that races once assumed to be worse had to be corrected by the racists to be "better" because of increased opportunities and cultures that stress academic performance creating the "positive stereotype".
And of course the huge freakout any time the "them" end up doing better than the "better" group. Whenever a tiny gap forms in the other direction, with women doing better scholastically than men, suddenly all the people "just asking questions about natural gaps", freak the fuck out. Suddenly things need to change and all sorts of social programs need to encourage men, because this tiny variance in the other direction must be an aberration that needs correcting.
What's worse is the way men will often flee and demote disciplines that become female dominated. This is how the humanities have been assumed to be meaningless and lacking in intellectual rigor due to many of the disciplines seeing more equal and even female dominated classes and teacher ranks.
If a woman can be good at it, it must be easy goes the bias to all of our detriments in the cultural devaluing of education for the sake of the old biases.
It's an old fight, constantly repeated until we take the patriarchy and the continued echoes of cultural racism and white supremacy and strangle them in the backyard.
And as a side-note to Sven, trans people can confirm the bias and while twice as good isn't measurement accurate, it's a useful hyperbole for the noticeable separation one's exact same work and qualifications are regarded when they presented as male as when they presented as female.
Really, the difference is quite stark in how one's exact same qualifications are regarded simply by switching the gender.
Tests have confirmed the "hiring and regard bias" by presenting resumes or work of the exact same people but changing names to look like they came from the other gender or a different race and there is a measurable reliable difference in how the exact same work and qualifications are regarded.
The hyperbole goes "twice as good", but the difference is noticeable and reliable and of a degree in the general range as "twice as good".
Posted by: co
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June 13, 2010 11:52 AM
Peter, I suspect the question marks on the "on average" comment refer explicitly to the *on average* bits of it. We understand that you meant to say that the SPREAD of the Gaussian distribution is higher for men than for women (i.e., the std deviation is higher). The averages have only one value, and you can't have both higher and lower averages :)
Of course, it remains to be shown that these "curves" are approximately Gaussian, or Poissonian, or bi-modal, or something very much more complicated.
Posted by: windy
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June 13, 2010 11:58 AM
As beth.cimini mentioned the source of this claim is the 1997 Swedish study. It was a study of post doctoral fellowships granted in a single year by a single agency, the Medical Research Council of Sweden. It's certainly strongly suggestive that similar problems exist elsewhere but (aside from the possible methodology issues) it clearly does NOT justify a blanket assertion that "women have to be over twice as qualified".
Posted by: Azkyroth
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June 13, 2010 1:45 PM
This is blatantly false, as there is no such thing as a "conservative think tank."
The American Enterprise Institute is a conservative "react tank." As I recall, their primary purpose is to support economic anarchy and the "let them eat cake" school of social policy.
Posted by: Azkyroth
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June 13, 2010 1:49 PM
It's "possible," at least in the sense that "square circles" aren't.
WHAT'S YOUR EVIDENCE THAT IT'S TRUE?
Posted by: SEF
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June 13, 2010 2:10 PM
@ Mackam #200:
Where's your evidence they wouldn't love science and maths (and engineering etc) if they weren't continually being smacked down and ripped off over it? Because persistent abuse is certainly known to turn people off stuff (in all sorts of areas). Religion (and the patriarchal system as a whole) trades on that.
Maybe, just maybe, the reverse - of actively turning people on to science - could actually be possible too. Would that then be so terrible? What would the disastrous consequences (aside from the ethical mind-control issues, which we already know the existing abusers don't care about!) of millions of girls suddenly finding a great fondness for doing maths and science be?
Posted by: Epikt
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June 13, 2010 2:18 PM
Mackam:
It might make sense to ask that question if opportunities were truly equal. They aren't. It doesn't.
Posted by: Chgo_Liz
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June 13, 2010 2:34 PM
The current Atlantic Monthly (July/August 2010) has a number of pieces on the subject of women's stereotypical strengths overtaking men's stereotypical strengths these days:
The End of Men
Are Fathers Necessary?
She's the Man
Posted by: beth.cimini
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June 13, 2010 4:04 PM
For the record, the "twice as qualified" number comes from that same study, which said that women had to have 2.5x the number of "impact points" to achieve the same competency rating. Hence, twice.
That study is going on 15 years old now, so I would hope to god the gap has shrunk some, but I promise that wasn't a number I pulled out of my ass.
Posted by: windy
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June 13, 2010 5:17 PM
But if opportunities were truly equal, it wouldn't make sense to ask that question anymore, because we'd already know the answer. However I think the data on the leaky pipeline may suggest answers already:
Mackam mentioned "pipeline loss", but he and you seem to be talking about something a bit different, because the leaky pipeline refers to women that were already on the path to a science career but dropped out of it. Nowadays the leak often takes off after the PhD stage, so it's unlikely that these are women that were never encouraged to do science, but also unlikely that these are women that never were that much into science in the first place. Would it really take until the completion of a PhD to realize that?
Posted by: SEF
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June 13, 2010 5:42 PM
@ Windy #211:
In your diagram it's not really happening after the PhD stage but before. The women might not be willing to be kicked out of the system before they have at least graduated. They'll hang on in against the cumulative abuse for the thing they've already started, in order to at least finish it (albeit possibly undermarked while the males around them get overmarked). However, fewer of them even get selected for PhD opportunities and, if they do, the abuse and intellectual theft from male colleagues (cf Rosalind Franklin) really ramps up after that, so more of them eventually decide it really isn't worth their while putting up with it any more.
Posted by: windy
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June 13, 2010 6:14 PM
No, if you look at the more recent curves from 2005 in this data set, there are about equal numbers of men and women going into PhD programs and the steepest drop is after the PhD stage.
What's your evidence that abuse "ramping up" is the reason for the leaky pipeline? Admittedly this is anecdotal, but it hasn't been my experience at all.
Posted by: SEF
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June 13, 2010 6:57 PM
@ windy #213:
Rubbish! The drop-off (-ve gradient) for women is clearly before the PhD stage as marked on your diagram. It used to be even worse in 1966(?) but is still strongly there in 2005.
Posted by: SEF
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June 14, 2010 4:48 AM
Abuse and intellectual theft.
"Abuse" includes the belittling of a woman's achievements, qualifications or participation in any project and the bigging up of the man's. This is far less possible in the earlier stages where exams are now mostly graded anonymously. Although teachers can still be a very destructive influence - alongside peers and family and society of course. But after that semi-anonymous level, there's nothing much at all to stop humans judging and treating each other in an unfair and biased manner.
It's one of those situations where the mechanism is all too obvious. The indicative evidence of there being an effect from that mechanism is in the data - including your own choice of data. Narrowing down to any other (relatively miniscule?) cause would require removal of the existing gross injustice (by controls or whatever).
Posted by: Carlie of the lacy, gently wafting adjectives
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June 14, 2010 6:58 AM
There is also this.
"As Caroline Simard writes, however, "The problem with the biology argument that "boys are just more likely to be born good at math and science" isn't that it's not "politically correct" -- it's that it assumes that we can take away the power of societal influences, which have much more solid evidence than the biology hypothesis." This evidence comes from hundreds of scientific studies that continually reach the same result: when stereotyped innate differences between groups are emphasized in the context of academic performance testing, the group that is supposed to perform worse always does. "
Posted by: https://me.yahoo.com/a/S8pO0dgN3vZCcp6GFuJzIu14IBqIw1hq7Kw-#24131
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June 14, 2010 3:20 PM
I think the notion that any discrepancies in mathematical abilities between sexes is the result of cultural conditioning makes a nice null hypothesis. Let's definitively disprove that one before we start talking about men being "better" at anything.
Especially since western civilization has a long history of social conservatives discouraging women from becoming mathematicians and scientists.
The findings suggesting that sex hormones affect performance in certain cognitive tasks is certainly interesting, but such findings are a long way off from "boys are better than girls at math." One commenter mentions spatial reasoning changing with the menstrual cycle...well, fine, but there are types of math that don't have much to do with spatial reasoning, unless you transform the problem into a problem that DOES have to do with spatial reasoning. In which case, someone who has trouble with spatial reasoning can transform it back, right? Furthermore, spatial reasoning could be a paucity rather than an advantage in a field like differential geometry, where spatial reasoning is as likely to mislead you as to get you to a valid confusion.
In fact, I tend to think of mathematics as a language or metalanguage as much as a field of study. Does this mean women's "clear advantage" in verbal and linguistic reasoning makes them better at math than men?
Despite our culture's love of standardized tests, very little of the field of mathematics resembles anything like the short, simple drills that make up the material on most such tests. The more difficult of the two math SAT IIs is still oriented towards simple mechanical calculations that require memorized algorithms rather than any sort of mathematical literacy. Mathematics itself is much more expansive and more, dare I say, literary than the impression most people get in secondary school.
So what is the specific nature of the discrepancy? That testosterone makes one better on average at mindless repetitive tasks? That might even be true, but it's a long way from there to "men are better at math." So even for those of you actively researching in this field, there's no need for sexist language and there's no cause to interpret preliminary empirical results as reinforcing long-standing prejudices. Of course, that won't get you as many headlines or make as much blog noise, but that's irrelevant to the science anyway, right?
Posted by: windy
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June 14, 2010 5:09 PM
I said the drop off is STEEPEST after the PhD stage in the newer data, how is that rubbish?
No, you're just asserting that your mechanism is behind the effect.
No, I would separate other, including 'structural' forms of injustice from direct abuse. For example, if women apply for jobs as often as men, and their credentials are as good, but they fail to get as many jobs because their applications are judged more harshly, it's incorrect to say that they've decided it's not "worth their while putting up with it any more". Some women would like to have a career in science but are culturally saddled with too many responsibilities at home. It's imprecise to attribute all that to "abuse and intellectual theft".
Posted by: SEF
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June 14, 2010 7:03 PM
@ windy:
You referred to the leak taking off after the PhD step and only later tried to patch that by claiming that the steepest drop was what mattered. That's what's rubbish.
There's already significant alienation in progress before that (measuring from the initial start point) and, while some do stick it out through a PhD as well, many of them would soon recognise that they're never going to be taken seriously or given the credit or opportunities they deserve - hence partly accounting for the final nose-dive (after smashing headlong into that near impervious glass ceiling).
I'm not merely asserting it on some whim, as you pretend, because we already know it to hold true in everything else which has ever been studied about abuse. So it would be perverse not to start with the likelihood of it also being true for science. The burden of proof (that it isn't the same as for other situations) is on you. Other people have also already presented the evidence for the basis of it being true (eg that consistent bias towards men and against women when presented with statements about them or qualifications matched up correctly or incorrectly with gender).
Is it your contention that the women are so stupid that they don't notice they are being abused, devalued, held back, stolen from etc etc? And that therefore they can't possibly display any symptoms or behaviour standardly known to follow from being abused?
Incidentally, it's not just that mental abuse (and sexual harassment etc) is likely to lead to dropping out. Being undervalued at work, as women very clearly are (by that factor of 2!), leads to stress which causes things such as heart disease and significantly lowered life expectancy (in pretty much any walk of life). Getting away from the abusers is something of a survival strategy - and one which women might conceivably be more likely to take (I'm not sure if anyone has studied that though).
Re "responsibilities at home": the majority of pregnancy drop-outs are going to be much later on for the sort of people who study science. The pre-PhD drop doesn't match the demographic very well. Being a full-time carer for an infirm parent is more likely to fall on women than men. But that can easily be controlled for.
Posted by: tomforsyth1000
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June 16, 2010 2:09 AM
Here's the puzzling thing. Both my parents were in medicine (retired now), and it's a pretty geeky subject, and the mix is about 50:50 there. My wife is a vet, which is even more taxing on the neurons, and it's been 60:40 towards women for at least the last 20 years - possibly the ratio is higher now. It's absolutely clear the girls can brainbox with the boys just fine.
So why in my field of programming is the mix 90% men? And in my specific sub-field of games programming, it's something absurd like 99+% men. To the extent that (and I wish I was making this up) over half of the female games programmers I know of used to be male. And I haven't actually asked the others, so maybe they're all ex-males. Note that the few (born?) female games coders I do know of are awesome - there's no difference in quality (quite the opposite) but there is absolutely an absurd difference in quantity.
I find this an extraordinary statistic. If all programming manuals were printed on the pages of Penthouse - if you passed acts of government banning the "fairer sex" from games programming - if you surrounded games programming with barbed wire and gender-seeking sentry guns - you'd still expect more women, even on a "don't ask, don't tell" basis. So what the hell is going on in some sections of geekdom? I honestly don't know.
Posted by: SEF
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June 16, 2010 3:40 AM
Computer games have been extremely male marketed in various ways for about as long as they've been around. It's only relatively recently that sporadic efforts have been made to grab the female market (and work out why it's lacking!). So it's not really at all odd that the programmers will be the game players and hence predominantly male. I'd guess the employment side will only even up when and if the consumer side does.
NB Where social(ising) differences exist between girls and boys, some of the gender gap may have to do with what gets labelled as a game at all. Eg if music and art programs aren't classed as games at all alongside shoot-em-ups, even though people do play with them (ie don't just do paid work), then you won't even be counting that part of the market.
Posted by: SEF
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June 16, 2010 5:17 AM
More examples: sudoku, bingo, patience or other card stuff, including tarot and perhaps other fortune-telling stuff.
All used as games (or even conventially regarded as games!) and all with a very high level of female participation (from what I've seen). Yet how much commercial development goes into these compared with shoot-em-ups (or whatever else your own company might be producing)? There could be tremendous scope for different styles of card design (like the cat tarot in the physical world) and game play in the virtual world.
Equalling up exactly who plays what is likely to be harder - and perhaps not even necessary to meet a better equality of employment (and focus!) in the industry. But if the game industry isn't even bothering to cater to "women's" play interests as they already exist or are defined (by society), then there's not much hope of getting the existing pool of women interested in doing the official "game" programming - compared with going into other parts of the programming arena which do already interest them in a play sense.
Posted by: windy
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June 17, 2010 3:51 AM
Gee SEF, I'm glad you were here to explain what I meant by my comments and what women in science experience. I couldn't possibly know anything about those things myself *bats eyelashes*. Asshole.