Claire Lehmann and Debra Soh dismantle John Horgan’s indictment of sexism in science

January 13, 2018 • 12:30 pm

The mandatory disclaimer first: I’m not claiming that science is free of sexism. No area in which men labor is, since there are always some sexist men. I would argue, though, that we’re doing our best to free the discipline of sexism (most hiring committees, for example,  have a keen look-out for women candidates, and there are a number of initiatives, scholarships, and the like which are solely directed at women.  I’d also argue that I detect no clear institutionalized sexism in science: that is, I see no rules, guidelines, or institutionalized practices that lead to discrimination against women. But there’s always room for improvement.

But I’d rather listen to a woman than a man about these issues, since women are on the receiving end of any discrimination. Especially when the man who chooses to lecture us about our sins is writer John Horgan, a contrarian who writes a blog for Scientific American. Horgan’s recent column “Darwin was sexist, and so are many modern scientists,” sounded strange to me, for although he cited one study I knew of showing that both men and women discriminate against c.v.’s bearing women’s names, Horgan’s additional argument that science is sexist because Darwin and Galton were, and we still bear that legacy, is an argument that rang false. Virtually all men in that era were sexists judged by modern lights, and so you could indict any area of endeavor as sexist.

Further, Horgan cited Geoffrey Miller, an outlier evolutionary psychologist, as evidence for sexism for writing “Men write more books. Men give more lectures. Men ask more questions after lectures. Men dominate mixed-sex committee discussions,” arguing that Miller claims these traits reflect biological differences. Well, they could reflect biological preferences (differential outcomes don’t by themselves indict sexism unless they occur in the face of equal opportunities), and anyway, one guy’s opinion is not that of the whole field, even though Horgan unfairly indicts the entire field of evolutionary psychology as “subtly denigrat[ing] females’ capacity to reason. That’s simply wrong.

Horgan further dismisses the well known pickiness of women and promiscuousness of men in choosing mates, saying that that could be societal, despite the fact that such differences are seen in virtually all animal species, including our closest relatives (the metric is “variance in reproductive success”).

Finally, Horgan cites the infamous memorandum of fired Google engineer Jame Damore, saying that the memo “cherry-picks studies that supposedly prove male intellectual superiority”.

Horgan’s piece has, however, has been dismantled by two women, Claire Lehmann (editor of Quillette) and Debra W. Soh, a writer with a Ph.D. in neuroscience from York University “with a specialization in sexology”. I’ve never seen a rebuttal to a blog post in Scientific American, but this one—”A different take on sexism in science” (subtitle “The fear that research into sex differences give fuel to those who claim that women are naturally ‘inferior’ to men is misguided”)—appears to severely damage Horgan’s assertions, or at least the data he uses to back them up.

Lehmann and Soh’s counterclaims:

1.) They agree that there is some sexism in science, but it’s much less than in service-sector and low-wage jobs, and, more important, “it is premature to claim that sexual harassment has caused the uneven gender ration in STEM. There is no clear evidence demonstrating a causal link between the two.”

2.) Horgan distorts Miller’s “evo-psych” claims, as Miller claimed that the differences cited above were probably due not to biology but to culture.

3.) Lehmann and Soh note that it’s entirely possible that the differences between men’s and women’s personalities and preferences, some of which are well documented, could explain a sex-ratio disparity at Google, and then add that, contra Horgan, Damore does not claim in his memo that men are intellectually superior to women. I read that memo a while back, but my recollection agrees with Lehmann and Soh.

4.) Horgan himself has cherry picked that single study of c.v.s showing discrimination against women, neglecting a more recent study that says this:

. . . Horgan should have mentioned the 67-page review published in Psychological Science in the Public Interest in 2014 called “Women in Academic Science: A Changing Landscape,” by Stephen Ceci and Wendy Williams. This review compiled data from several hundred analyses of women’s participation in sciences—from the life sciences such as psychology—to the more math-intensive disciplines such as engineering and physics.

They found that the biggest barrier for women in STEM jobs was not sexism but their desire to form families. Overall, Ceci and Williams found that STEM careers were characterised by “gender fairness, rather than gender bias.” And, they stated, women across the sciences were more likely to receive hiring offers than men, their grants and articles were accepted at the same rate, they were cited at the same rate, and they were tenured and promoted at the same rate.

A year later, Ceci and Williams published the results of five national hiring experiments in which they sent hypothetical female and male applicants to STEM faculty members. They found that men and women faculty members from all four fields preferred female applicants 2:1 over identically qualified males.

I haven’t read that study, but you have the link and can judge for yourself, just as you can judge the two sparring articles at hand.

Finally, Lehmann and Soh appear to indict Horgan for white-knighting, and point out, as many have before, that differences between groups, be these differences cultural or genetic, should not mandate differential group treatment or any kind of unequal moral or political treatment:

In an attempt to “protect” women in science from sexist scientists, Horgan commits the sin he accuses others of. He ignores the work of female scientists whose work has challenged popular narratives of sexism in STEM, and he avoids dealing with the female writers and commentators who have publicly supported Damore.

Support for women in science should not be dependent on politics. Stratifying this support for women in favor of those who tout politically expeditious opinions—and castigating those who do not—counters the very idea that women are individuals who have self-determination and are capable of independent thought. There is also something oddly hypocritical about a man educating women on just how oppressed they are.

And finally, we want to stress that the fear that research into sex differences gives fuel to those who claim that women are naturally “inferior” to men is misguided. Difference is not “inferior” unless one thinks that what is male-typical is preferable and what is female-typical is somehow undesirable. We do not share this fear, because we do not view masculine typical traits as the gold standard and female typical traits less than.

Since Horgan’s piece was written just a month ago, and he’s a science journalist, there’s really no excuse for him to cherry-pick literature—unless, that is, he has an agenda that he needs to buttress. Confirmation bias doesn’t look good on a science journalist.

Caturday felid trifects: Grumpy Jesus Cat, cats vs. parrots, cat helps autistic girls

January 13, 2018 • 10:30 am

I now have a comfortable backlog of Caturday felid posts thanks to the kindly readers who send me cat stuff. Today’s trifecta begins with an article from The Dodo showing a cat who, displacing Baby Jesus, has interpolated itself into a nativity scene. The text:

Early last Sunday, on a nippy autumn sidewalk in New York City, photographer Brooke Goldman wasn’t where she wanted to be. Her boyfriend had travel plans that morning, and Goldman made the mistake of offering to walk with him to catch his train. In reality, she wanted to be in bed. But still, she followed through.

“I was pretty out of it,” Goldman told The Dodo. “I was trying to get home as fast as possible to go back to sleep and wasn’t ready for the day at all.”

But in one sleepy stride, suddenly everything changed. As if struck by some saintly vision, Goldman’s eyes landed upon this:

There, a short ways away, a random plump feline sat nestled in the manger of a little nativity scene.

Though he obviously had no qualms about commandeering the spot, or concern about offending its intended occupant, the disgruntled cat did seem to relish in the quiet reverence shown to him by the display’s figurines.

Goldman’s reaction was a little different.

“I was laughing my ass off,” she said.

I would, too, but the moggie doesn’t seem very happy to be playing Jesus. It is appropriate, of course, because cats are gods:

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Parrots have a bad habit of annoying cats; here’s a compilation of these disturbances. It’s an excellent cat (and parrot) video, but some of those parrots are brazen!

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Watch this lovely five-minute report about how, Thula, a Maine Coon Cat has helped a young autistic girl named Iris. They even take baths and go swimming together!

An academic explores the performative social construction of masculinity among South Texas Hispanics by analyzing the size of their barbecues and spiciness of their condiments

January 13, 2018 • 8:47 am

If you looked at Heather Heying’s tw**t in this morning’s Hili dialogue, you’ll see this:

The “salsa accused of constructing masculinity” reference intrigued me, as it looked like one of those obscurantist po-mo pieces that keep academics and journals (predatory or not) busy without contributing anything to society. So I looked the article up, and, indeed, here it is (reference below, free access, pdf here; click on screenshot to see full article):

Molina is an assistant professor of sociology at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, specializing in “Social Demography, Critical Race Theory, Latina/a Issues, Immigration”.

I can summarize the paper in a space shorter than even the paper’s own abstract; here’s my summary:

Mexican-American men in Texas demonstrate their masculinity by barbecuing meat, having bigger grills, and eating spicier pico de gallo.

(Pico de gallo, meaning “beak of the rooster” in Spanish, is a Mexican condiment made of chopped tomatoes, onions, jalapeno peppers and cilantro. It’s used on foods like tacos or fajitas.)

That’s it, and it may well be true, but does it merit a paper? We all know that home barbecuing is one form of cooking largely monopolized by men, though I’m increasingly seeing women do it. But do Hispanic men pride themselves on having bigger grills, or on eating a pico de gallo with more hot peppers? That’s what Hilario Molina, writing in Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, concludes.

But how does he arrive at this conclusion? Does he take a survey or do a poll? No, he does what he calls “autoethnography,” which appears to be a fancy word for “anecdotal observation”. In Molina’s case, he (his students verify his sex and also have some pungent words about his teaching) went to 30 cookouts involving Mexican-Americans in South Texas. From these “field observations,” he simply chooses a number of observations and anecdotes to support his thesis, fleshing them out with tedious and obscure language that simply points to my conclusions above. That’s it—seriously.

I’ll present a few passages to show what this species of sociologist is up to. Note especially the pompous and bad writing meant to give an air of profundity to otherwise trite observations:

Although the physical environment sets the social space, the stage for manly performance, the pico de gallo  and the grill are direct identifiers of masculinity. This is not to say that men do not venture into the kitchen; however, they do so under an umbrella of gendered space immunity. The entry into feminine space is to comply with a gender role which takes precedence over gender– environment boundaries, such as needing the means to make the pico de gallo . As a result, negative social sanctions are non-existent because the trespass into feminised space is a requirement for the ‘ journey’ of macho or male  socialisation, as demonstrated in the passage below that took place at a participant’ s house:

A middle-aged man chops onions, cilantro, tomatoes, and jalapenos; then, placing these ingredients in a glass bowl, he squeezes lemon juice over it. ‘Vieja (Spanish slang for wife) come and try the pico de gallo’, he yells at the wall in front of him. A woman comes from another room. ‘It is too hot! I do not think we will be able to have any’, she protests after tasting it. ‘I will make two; one for us and one for you all’, he stated in a firm tone.

What a sexist pig!

Here’s another bit of “field work”:

Thus, grilling links ‘ man’ to both a present gender identity and one which has a historical and trans-generational recognition of dominance and mastery of the environment whereby ‘ nature’ has become the cognitive embodiment of the social and cultural factors of symbolic conquests. Within this stratum, grilling game (meat) is indicative of manliness and participant attempts to let those around him know his level of manliness, as shown in this passage, an interaction which directly drew my attention in this cookout:

A mature, aged man, surrounded by a myriad of young males, standing near a grill and holding a beer, said, ‘The smell of this mesquite burning reminds me of a time when I was about your age, and I was living in the campo (rural area)’. He then added, ‘Your father and I had to walk for miles to get to school. Today, you all sure have it easy’.

The grill is both a prerequisite for a boy seeking to form a gender identity and a signifier of economic stability and ability as a provider – important qualities of a macho . Thus, a public display unfolds in which a man shows himself enduring, surviving and eventually succeeding against ‘ nature’ – representative of life’ s challenges. By grilling for those within the subculture, he is publically [sic] committing to the group’ s norms and values as his ‘self’ becomes part of the structure.

Well, the statement is nothing more than the common claim that “we had it worse than you when we were kids”, something that’s hardly unique to Mexican-Americans—or to men. Remember the Four Yorkshiremen of Monty Python? There’s nothing in the statement above about constructing a gender identity, demonstrating that the author is simply using anything to reinforce his preordained conclusion.  This is not objective investigation but confirmation bias.

And here Molina explains the significance of his work:

This article contributes to the studies of gender roles and Latino issues by incorporating masculinity theory to present a sociological perspective on working-class Mexican American machos  in the RGV. As such, the purpose of this article is to explain how the behaviour of manliness comes from a traditional and ritualistic association to the natural world. Mexican American masculinity is measured against the gender formation of men’ s and women’ s roles in the RGV. Without the social construction of feminine space (indoors) and masculine space (outdoors), mild salsa for the women and children versus a spicy salsa for the men and the significance of the grill’ s size, the cultural meaning of masculinity (machismo) as representing the apex would not exist.

Within this perception of reality, masculine space serves to define ‘ his’ group position but also serves as a stage for gender role performances. Whereas the pico de gallo  and the barbeque grill are symbolic indicators of masculine discourse and social interaction, they rely on its gender opposite (marianismo) to clearly construct the macho  hierarchy. Therefore, we see how working-class Mexican American males pursue this apex status and also how they transmit these subcultural values of masculinity to the next generation of machitos (little men).

The significance of this project is twofold: (1) it explains gender formation of working-class Mexican Americans living in the RGV area; and (2) this group is, according to demographic scholars, such as Rodriguez and his colleagues (2008 ), the fastest and largest growing ethnic group in the United States. Within the Latinos/as community, Mexican and Mexican Americans account for more than 60% of this ethnic category; as a result, it is essential that studies begin to address structural issues of inequality endemic within this community. In addition, studies must also be conducted on other subcultures where subordinate groups encounter structural and cultural challenges.

This smacks of desperation and a search for tenure. The conclusions may be correct, but they are based on anecdotal observations, not any kind of systematic study. Plus they’re overblown by couching them in po-mo jargon like “gender role performances” and “construct the macho hierarchy.”  Finally, yes, the Hispanic community may be growing rapidly, but seriously, do studies of grill size and pico de gallo help us to either understand or interpret that phenomenon? Inequality of grill performance and the spiciness of pico de gallo is hardly the kind of “inequality” that American liberals need to address!

Now I’m not saying anything here about the quality of this journal, or of sociological work as a whole (yes, there’s good work in the field). What I’m saying is that when serious academics engage in this kind of work, something is wrong with the academic standards of the field. Increasingly, I see trivial and PREORDAINED conclusions tricked out in fancy-schmancy language designed to make them look profound. Further, we see anecdotes often used instead of systematic analysis. I think I could find exactly these conclusions if I went to a bunch of cookouts by white people: men would dominate the cooking and I would probably find—at least occasionally—some guy boasting about how hot he likes his hot sauce. So the conclusions, based as they are on anecdotes, aren’t even unique to Mexican-Americans. Or, if they are, it hasn’t been demonstrated here.

One thing Molina fails to note is the equation of grill size with penis size. Imagine what could be made of this:

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Molina II, H. (2014) The construction of South Texas masculinity: masculine space, the pico de gallo and the barbeque grill. Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power. 21: 233-248, DOI: 10.1080/1070289X.2013.868352

Readers’ wildlife photos

January 13, 2018 • 7:45 am

Today we have a grab-bag of photos by Aussie Tony Eales, whose notes are indented.

Here’s a grab bag of odds and ends to keep the tank topped-up The first is a close-up of a Blowfly—I think from the family Calliphoridae. It’s interesting that there appear to be two distinctive types of compound eyes, the upper rows and the lower rows.

The next is a cute little Cymbacha ocellata Crab Spider (family Thomisidae) building its bell-shaped retreat from a fresh green leaf.

The next is one of my favourite terrestrial orchids, Dipodium variegatum. They have no leaves and are visible only when they put up their flower spikes.

Next is a new spider for me that I saw for the first time only yesterday: Euryopis superba. They are very small (~8mm) and live under eucalyptus bark.

Last, a lacewing larva carrying a pile of parts from its former victims as camouflage. [JAC: This is a new on one me!]

 

Saturday: Hili dialogue

January 13, 2018 • 6:30 am

Good morning on a chilly Saturday, January 13, 2018.  I see on my phone that it’s 8° F (- 13° C) outside, with a predicted high of only 16°F (-9° C), so it’s gonna be a cold one.  Nevertheless I must go out, as there are two cases of vino with my name on them waiting at the wine store, including the fruits of a Bordeaux future for which I’ve been waiting a long time. It’s also National Peach Melba Day, a dish invented by Escoffier in Paris in the early 1890s, named after Australia soprano Nellie Melba, and made from  peaches, raspberry sauce, and vanilla ice cream. I’ve never had it; have you? Here’s what it looks like:

There’s an animated Google Doodle today in honor of Zhou Youguang, born on January 13, 1906 (died 2017), a Chinese economist and polymath who developed a method for writing Chinese characters in Roman script, a method used by both the Chinese government and the United Nations. Despite his development of this system in the 1950s, the Cultural Revolution forced him work in a rice field for two years beginning in 1968.

On this day in 1879, and I’ll quote Wikipedia here,  “In Mozart Gardens Brooklyn Ada Anderson completed a great feat of pedestrianism – 2700 quarter miles in 2700 quarter hours, earning her $8000.” That was a lot of dosh in those times, but look up “pedestrianism”. In that particular event, it took Anderson 28 days to complete the 65-mile walk around a track, and she had no more than nine minutes of sleep at a time. Exactly nine years later, the National Geographic Society was established in Washington, D.C., and on January 13, 1898, Émile Zola published his famous article J’accuse…!, laying bare the the lies of the Dreyfus affair. On this day in 1953, Pravda published an article accusing prominent doctors, who were mostly Jewish, of a conspiracy to poison the Soviet leadership. Many doctors were jailed, but, fortunately, none were killed, and they were freed after Stalin’s death on March 5.  On this day in 1968, Johnny Cash performed his famous live concert at Folsom State Prison in California. It’s one of the highlights of the excellent movie about Cash, “I Walk the Line”, and the live album of the concert became one of the best selling records of all time. On this day in 1982,  Air Florida Flight 90 crashed into the 14th Street Bridge shortly after takeoff from Washington’s National Airport, killing 78 people, including four motorists. Among the dead was someone I knew: Bob Silberglied, a Smithsonian butterfly biologist who I met at Harvard when he was on the staff; he was a terrific guy. Finally, on this day in 1990, Douglas Wilder, the first elected African American governor in the U.S., took office in Virginia.

Those born on January 13 include Salmon P. Chase (1808, he used to appear on America’s largest circulated banknote, the $10,000 bill). Here’s that bill (I’ve never seen one, of course, and it’s no longer legal tender):

That’s not the biggest U. S. banknote ever printed, though, which is this one, used only for government transactions and printed only in 1934-1935:


Others born on January 13 include Horatio Alger, Jr. (1832), Chaim Soutine (1893), Jack London (1905), Paul Feyerabend (1924), geneticist Sydney Brenner (1927 and still with us; Matthew interviewed him in Singapore recently), and Jay McInerney (1955).  Here’s a nice Soutine, and I think it’s a cat. Kudos to the reader who finds out whether that’s true:
Notables who expired on this day include Charles the Fat (888), Jan Breughel the Elder (1625), Stephen Foster (1864), Wyatt Earp (1929), and Lyonel Feininger (1956, one of my favorite painters). Here’s a nice Feininger watercolor:
and a classic Feininger (“The Cathedral”, 1920):
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Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is looking for food. I’m told that at this moment she’s on MY couch, curled up with Cyrus, who serves as a very large hot water bottle (cats are exploitative):
Hili: Do you think they could’ve hidden something here?
Cyrus: I think you are too suspicious.
In Polish:
Hili: Myślisz, że oni tam coś schowali?
Cyrus: Chyba jesteś zbyt podejrzliwa.

From Grania: a polite elephant deposits trash in the proper receptacle:

From Heather Heying, former (and once demonized) biology professor at Evergreen State. Check out the salsa link:

Matthew sent this tweet, showing how deeply New Zealand wants to save its keas (the world’s only alpine parrot):

This is near Milford Sound, where the birds delight in moving traffic cones:

 

The magnificent obsession: man takes over a decade to design and build a Boeing 777 model out of paper

January 12, 2018 • 2:30 pm

Yes, it’s made entirely out of paper: manila folders.

The YouTube notes:

Over the last decade, designer Luca Iaconi-Stewart has been building an incredibly detailed model of a Boeing 777, right down to the tiny seats and moving landing gear, using only paper folders and glue.