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"A non-nerd reads it as: I want to kick out all X from tech. / I consider X inferior." I was out on an internet date with Scandinavian woman a few years ago. S

• tarsinge 9y ago
  I can of understand her reaction (I would have had the same) and for me it’s in fact not very dangerous: - to my knowledge it’s impossible to separate biology and culture with the data we have - some discriminations were and are made by wrongfully attributing it to biological traits - since it’s hard or impossible to separate things a lot of people (myself included) adopt « it’s not biology it’s culture » by default because we think if we are wrong it causes less harm and is less dangerous than falsely attributing something to biology, and if it’s right then it helps the society progress. I understand closing the debate is frustrating for the scientifically minded and rationale people, but my opinion is that it’s not a bad heuristic for society as a whole at least until we make progress. But obviously the debate can happen in the right context, but I find it dangerous to introduce it in the actual climate of crtitical thinking we are in
  • korax 9y ago
    This leaves me wondering: What do you consider to be the right context for public debates about these thorny issues? What besides communicating with each other about those issues will move us forward? I don't think they will go away by themselves and I agree that some cannot be resolved, but then we should politely agree to disagree, after having explained our reasoning for each other's viewpoints, no? Disclaimer: I work in this space and we get this reaction quite often, so I am happy to read your thoughts on this.
    • tarsinge 9y ago
      It depends of the issues we are talking of. What I'm saying is that introducing biology at this point in the debate, by looking if the inequality is "natural" because phenotype A or chromosome B gives you some edge or not in science or other discipline, is kind of irrelevant given the weight of culture in our societies. I find it even dangerous because I don't think a lot of people are ready to understand the subtleties of a shift in a normal distribution (if one is present), and it'll just give them a wrong/misused "scientific" evidence for reinforcing their prejudices. Because I can't teach critical thinking in minutes I now resort to "it's always cultural" and try to move the debate forward to the (IMHO) main causes. (not a native english speaker so sorry if I missed your point)
      • insickness 9y ago
        You're saying you want to keep science out of the 'debate.' That's not a debate. That's religion. You refuse to allow scientific evidence into the discussion because you don't trust people with that knowledge. We can't discuss science is what you're saying. We're supposed to keep our heads in the sand and pretend that genetics don't exist to support your agenda. No thank you.
        • tarsinge 9y ago
          I’m not saying I want to keep science out of the debate, I’m saying with our current state of knowledge there is no evidence to help conclude anything and tell things apart between biology and culture in complex high level chain of decisions like choosing a career path. We can’t say “biology=true science!” and try to shoehorn it in the debate no matter what, this, is unscientific. Yes, given that we don’t know, assuming it’s always culture to help society progress (and implicitly saying society needs a change) is a political and philosophical opinion, and on this we can disagree, but don’t invoke religion vs science to create a false dichotomy and paint me on the irrational side.
      • korax 9y ago
        I disagree, we should always, when available, use our best source of knowledge to argue about issues. Always. I see no reason to say, "hmm let's go and use lesser quality evidence." I would even say that, if you don't know the science about an issue, it might be the wisest to refrain from having a strong position on a matter, at all. Sure, many people do not understand statistics, I would dare postulate many many scientists don't properly understand stats ;) But, if we do away with the science domain, people will resort to another domain, which is normally trumped in debates by scientific arguments. And that is, anecdotal evidence. And people will use it just as much and as falsely to defend their believes. (no worries, not a native speaker either :) )
  • eref 9y ago
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    • extra88 9y ago
      > Romance refers to the biologically rooted game It's like you didn't read the comment you're replying to. You do not have good evidence that romance is shaped by evolutionary, rather than cultural, forces. Of course there's a biological motivation for procreation but unless you're going to play semantic games and define "romance" as any activity involved in pursuit of procreation, that motivation doesn't explain specific behaviors.
      • eref 9y ago
        .
        • extra88 9y ago
          > If it exists "It" being a biological basis for romantic behavior? We've survived this long without know how, or if, biology determines our current romantic behavior, I think we'll be okay. We're not going to go extinct because everyone is fucking robots.
          • deleted 9y ago
            [deleted]
          • owebmaster 9y ago
            > We've survived this long without know how, or if, biology determines our current romantic behavior Do we? Because I see no evidence of the opposite. Also, culture (and sociology for the matter) is biologically determined.
            • extra88 9y ago
              Humans have existed a lot longer than science or the contemplation of nature vs. nurture. > no evidence of the opposite There's plenty of evidence that romantic behavior is culturally determined. Just look at how much it has changed over the centuries even though, biologically, humans have hardly changed at all. There's also the wide variance between cultures geographically in which we're all biologically the same.
• matt4077 9y ago
  There are two reasons for that: First of all, almost everything and its opposite can be argued from biology, and evolution. Among the reasons for that is a sort of circular logic, because many ideas of early human life we still hold are based on today’s stereotypes. Secondly, arguing from biology denies the single most important difference of humans and other animals: that we are unique in having the capability to overcome our biology.
  • muninn_ 9y ago
    Which would be fine except we use biology as the basis for all sorts of things all the time. “Men are typically more aggressive”, “Women tend to value family time or Y” “the male-dominated workplace isn’t friendly to women because of X”. I can’t tell you the number of times that biology is used in discussion of generalized differences between the sexes yet if somebody even hints that there may be a difference between men and women and how it may relate to technology it all of a sudden becomes some sort of sexist holy war. Nobody is throwing their hands in the air when it’s suggested that men tend to choose more dangerous lines of work than women (and die on the job at a vastly higher rate) because it’s in their nature, so why are we foaming at the mouth when biology may suggest men tend to be interested in things versus people? If the science suggests something than it is what it is. If it doesn’t then that’s fine too.
• xorcist 9y ago
  > It's as if once we allow these facts into the argument, Right, facts. Most of the biological arguments are very touchy-feely. But .. we can see differences in MRI between gays and straights (or men and women, or some other divide du jour)! That's to be expected. Unless your equipment is broken. But the facts that patterns in the brain has established doesn't tell us anything how, or why, they developed. Scan a professional piano player and compare with a regular person and you'll pick up patterns there as well. Is that some sort of argument that piano talent is innate? If hypothetically some statistical factor could be identified that is more prevalent among black people and piano player, does that mean black people are more suited to be piano players? No, it does not. Yet when considering sex differences, and to some extent race differences, those are the kind of argument that goes for factual. I doubt it's the factual part that bothers people, but rather the logical hoops necessary for these argument to gain practical relevance for decisionmaking. I can somehow relate to the tiredness your friend expressed. In some other areas where I have taken active part for the past decade or two, I still encounter the same arguments over and over again (for example why open source is by necessity non-innovative), and every person genuiney believe they came up with a new and important thought that other people needs to consider. Just a quick skim of the discourse in the relevant area would really go a long way of presenting them in a more informed way. So it might not be the arguments themselves that are tiring but the repetitivesness with the way they are presented.
  • humank 9y ago
    "does that mean black people are more suited to be piano players" Maybe I'm misunderstanding things, but if some statistical factor was identified with predictive power, does that not literally mean that generally they'd be more suited to be piano players? This isn't some argument about philosophically what constitutes a piano player. If this were true, you'd expect on average that this group has a higher proportion of piano players, and you could say heuristically that, yes, they are more suited to be piano players. Caveat: this does not necessarily mean you should base decisions solely off of whether they belong to the group, as it depends on how strong said predictor actually is.
    • owebmaster 9y ago
• aseow 9y ago
  Chances are this didn't have so much to do with open debate as making a faux pas. 1. Scandinavian society is largely based on that biology isn't a good enough justification for inequality. Unless you're being very specific you also end up making an argument against Scandinavia equality. Which is something that many Scandinavians would obviously disagree with. (the argument, not necessarily the arguing). 2. Scandinavians, compared to other people, have few things in modern history to be ashamed of. Unfortunately eugenics is one of those few things. [0] 3. Presenting a casual theory to someone in the field is generally not a good idea. Maybe especially so if it's in a social setting, if your theory states the importance of a competing field and/or if you are part of the historic majority addressing the historic minority. Since them not being taken seriously can be an issue. 4. The research of biological traits doesn't seem to support the large gender difference in technology. The overlap between men and women is large, the correlation between gender traits and e.g. intelligence is weak and differences to other fields seem hard to explain. Even if you accept the idea that women don't like x and technology has a lot of x it's hard to explain why technology must have a lot of x. Other than being dominated for a long time by people who like x. At least while establishing causation, or even correlation, between the factors. [0] http://www.economist.com/node/155244 http://www.economist.com/node/155244
  • insickness 9y ago
    > Presenting a casual theory to someone in the field is generally not a good idea. I don't buy that at all. As long as the argument is based on science, there's no reason you can close your ears to other fields of study that could affect your own. > The research of biological traits doesn't seem to support the large gender difference in technology. Nor does the research support that the large difference in due to social construct. The default answer "It's all due to social construct" is presumptuous. There's an interesting paradox. In countries with more gender equality, like Sweden, women end up in more traditionally female fields, like nursing where as in countries with less equality, like India, women end up in more traditionally male fields, like engineering. Do a search for the Swedish gender equality paradox. The male to female ratio of autism is 4:1. There are other studies that show genetic differences in gender that exist outside of social construct. Male monkeys tend to play with boy toys, while female monkeys play with girl toys. There are obviously genetic differences between men and women as well as genetic preferences. How these affect the ratio in technology is very difficult to ascertain. We can't just say it doesn't seem like enough to account for the difference because we don't know how that difference plays out throughout people's lives.