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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: kech who wrote (102322)	2/26/2005 1:34:39 PM
From: Ilaine	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 793927

Shut down the debate and these improvements may not take place. Why on earth should science be a topic of public debate? This is an argument that I just don't get. You clearly have a political ax to grind here, which is why you keep harping on "debate." But real science isn't subject to debate. The best argument in the world won't change real science one whit. A thing either is, or it ain't. Seven billion people may hold an opinion, but if it's contrary to fact, the majority opinion is irrelevant. Real scientists are quietly going about their real work, which is research. And when they've reached a real scientific consensus, they'll pipe up, and all the public "debate" by non-scientists will be nugatory. In the meantime, you may have noticed (or maybe not, if you're talking instead of reading) real scientists are not coming to Summers' defense. Instead, he's being defended by his fellow economists, conservative "commentators", and other non-scientists who want to squawk about "political correctness" and other shibboleths, and the other usual suspects (Rush, et al.) who want to fight "culture wars" instead of learn science.

To: kech who wrote (102322)	2/27/2005 8:36:06 AM
From: Mary Cluney	Respond to of 793927

With all the science out about gender differences in aptitude for spatial concepts and other cognition differences it is certainly a possible hypothesis that this could have something to do with performance differences. These are the skills needed for geometry and calculus. How much, when, under what circumstances any cognition differences might cause women to drop out of math are all further questions that people should be able to ask. What physiological and innate characteristics and attributes make a person a great mathematician is a really great question. No one should hinder the search for truth - no matter where it ends up. We all agree. Where we disagree is in the use of statistical data (with no correlation between cause and effect) to draw, insinuate, and infer shallow prejudices that people in the sciences (in the field) have painstakingly and conclusively refuted. They have done this over and over again with statistics that show black people, Jewish people, and white people in certain categories are inferior in certain occupations or skill sets and where results show just the opposite. To give you a simple illustration. There is ample evidence to show through statistics that white basketball players are inferior to blacks. But, not all black people are great in basketball. The next logical question is then, what are the characteristics (or the genetics) that make a great basketball player. Height is one measure (the taller the better); speed, agility, and quickness are some other measures ( faster and more agile is better); the ability to jump is still another (the higher the better). Through simple logic, a young Larry Byrd should have been discouraged from devoting his time and passion in the pursuit of basketball greatness. He didn't have the right skin color, millions of people could run faster, jump higher, and are taller. Instead, he became, arguably one of the greatest basketball players the world has ever known. The same set of logic could have been applied to Tiger Woods. Yet he has become the greatest golfer the world has ever known. The same could also be said about Michelle Kwan and Michelle Wie for Asians in athletics. And, this is only in athletics where the rules are simple, the genetic attributes correlated, and things (records) could easily be measured. You and Larry Summers, in this day and age, are still implying "performance differences" based on genetic attributes and characteristics (skin color, gender, length of nose, etc) that have nothing to do with the skill sets in question.