why does this stuff get published?

[keryx]

Now and again I wonder if I'm missing something very important by ignoring print and television journalism (and, really, everything but NPR). And then a newspaper will publish something like this. I'll save you a click, if you like: it's a random stream of evolutionary psychology "facts" that purport to celebrate Darwin.

Well, sure. If you want to celebrate Darwin's 19th century attitudes about gender.

My favorite is not actually about gender, but the idea that abusing one's stepchildren is somehow explainable as a biological imperative to adore only one's bio-kids. Cause it has nothing to do with the family functions that result in & from stepfamilies. Nothing at all.

Oh, and for the record? I've never met a man who can mentally reimagine a 3-dimensional object in space as effectively as I. That whole "men are better at spacial relationships" thing grates on me.

Comments

[turbogrrl.livejournal.com]

but it's a woman saying it, so it must be right! Or at least titillating.

I find it amusing that people will ask me why I don't think there are more women in math and sciences, and will promptly cut me off as soon as I open my mouth. ...which pretty much sums it up, anyway.

the glove is thrown

[luguvalium.livejournal.com]

I've never met a man who can mentally reimagine a 3-dimensional object in space as effectively as I.

We should come up with a contest!

Re: the glove is thrown

[keryx.livejournal.com]

It's on. You better bring it.

My fist will not fit in my mouth

[baheru.livejournal.com]

The very form of "Gender A is better than Gender B at Such-and-such" is one that consistently infuriates me. I understand that it's meant to be a vague generalization, but what it's SAYING is that the member of Gender A who is the most inept at the subject in question is quantitatively better at it than the most competent member of Gender B.

Which, unless you're talking about things like, oh, I don't know, possessing certain chromosomes, is most likely incorrect and not particularly useful except to encourage thinking that is, at best, sloppy, and at worst, prejudicial.

I despise imprecise language in general, but especially so when used in defense of "science."

Re: My fist will not fit in my mouth

[puzzlement.livejournal.com]

Yeah. The results it's based on are actually in the form of "the mean/median member of gender A scores higher than the mean/median member of gender B on task metric T" (it's often a normal distribution, with mean and median the same). Even where the result can be consistently produced (and I don't know for which mental tasks this is true, especially cross-culture) you have a huge chunk of gender B steaming into the top half of the A curve and it doesn't state anything about what the high performing members of A and B are like, relatively.

And it's not just that the phrasing comes out sounding like "the worst A is better than the best B", a lot of people then seem to uncritically believe that!

Re: My fist will not fit in my mouth

[keryx.livejournal.com]

a lot of people then seem to uncritically believe that!
Which is the biggest problem with imprecise language, really. It skews perception of facts.

Hm

[(Anonymous)]

Your writing is still as pleasing as ever. I'm sorry it's been so long since I've kept up with your life. I won't make that mistake again!

chaney.diaryland