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I hate it when news outlets and movie production companies focus on individuals and ignore the team effort and dynamic, and it's not because I care about distri

by steego 8y ago

I hate it when news outlets and movie production companies focus on individuals and ignore the team effort and dynamic, and it's not because I care about distributing credit. I want them to tell more stories about teams and communities working together to build things, not more lone genius stories. I get it. I truly do. But consider the context: This picture of a blackhole is going around along with an iconic picture of a woman with a ton of hard-drives that resembles the iconic picture of Margaret Hamilton with a stack of papers. Put yourself in the shoes of someone who knows little to nothing about this project. What questions do you think people have? Headlines have to create irresistible questions that lure people in and this one is using the tried and true "Who's this genius?" formula. Once they've grabbed this casual reader (see headline), they're not going to dive too deep into the project. This isn't serious science journalism, this is a human interest story in the science section. Why did they pick her? Because she lead the team and was a key figure in conceiving and implementing the algorithm. Because she was already the face, spokesperson and active promoter for this project. Look at her TED talk from 2017. I get it. Tons of people deserve credit. More importantly, the story of how this team collaborated should be told. But that's not what this profile piece is about. But let's get serious. You're critiquing the accuracy of a very casual profile piece for average readers. Most of them really don't care what statements are slightly hyperbolic, they just want to understand the gist of the project and her role.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
njepa 8y ago
The ironic thing is that this seems to be a case when someone doing the science gets to represent the project and get credit rather than just institutions and senior researchers.
monksy 8y ago
> Margaret Hamilton with a stack of papers. That was used to say "well women are doing something very important" (If we're truly focused on equality should be yes.. that is normal.. but why is that important to advertise that message) The feeling that I'm getting from all of this is that the result is showcased to the side and they're trying to make her into a celebrity. I would love to hear her praise "her team" (her team is a subset of people in the whole project) Although, I don't think she has enough experience to realize that it's a good thing to do. (That's something you get from working in teams outside academia) If you go to the moon, you don't just praise the one guy who did it. You bring the whole group of astronauts who went and did something. If they're smart they're going to admit that there were a ton of people who helped. EDIT-Update on the comment about the team praise: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19638629 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19638629
- soVeryTired 8y ago
  > I would love to hear her praise "her team" (her team is a subset of people in the whole project) Although, I don't think she has enough experience to realize that it's a good thing to do. She did that in the TED talk. And in the article linked above. And basically everywhere else she's spoken.
  - monksy 8y ago
    Oh.. I had no idea. That's awesome. I made the assumption that she did the academic thing which is "i did this" signed advisor. The assumption was based on the focus of the articles. (editorial bias)
    - themarkn 8y ago
      No need to avoid your own responsibility and bias in making that assumption. It's not accurate to blame it on the media coverage alone. Strikes me as more like confirmation bias around what your expectations are for academics, women, or both.
      - monksy 8y ago
        Excuse me? I admitted that I was incorrect in my impression. I could have deleted the original comment but posted an admission that I was too quick to jump to conclusions. You should be aware of what the media is trying to say, and how it's presented. This comment section is showing how different countries are presenting the same situation. Confirmation bias in academics: It's very common to escalate the work from undergrad->grad->postdoc->professors. (Doing the most work to the least in that order). It's pretty terrible.. but that's how it operates. Does the advisor do much? Do they get their name on the paper, yes. (In many times at the top) Women- Her gender doesn't matter on this. The work she did for her research is awesome, it's clearly her work. (It's similar to super-resolution) This wasn't a single I just applied my algorithm and everything happened. Lots of people were involved in collecting, cleaning, managing, and adapting her improvement to existing CV algorithms to reproduce what a blackhole looks like.

by steego 8y ago

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

njepa 8y ago

The ironic thing is that this seems to be a case when someone doing the science gets to represent the project and get credit rather than just institutions and senior researchers.

monksy 8y ago

> Margaret Hamilton with a stack of papers. That was used to say "well women are doing something very important" (If we're truly focused on equality should be yes.. that is normal.. but why is that important to advertise that message) The feeling that I'm getting from all of this is that the result is showcased to the side and they're trying to make her into a celebrity. I would love to hear her praise "her team" (her team is a subset of people in the whole project) Although, I don't think she has enough experience to realize that it's a good thing to do. (That's something you get from working in teams outside academia) If you go to the moon, you don't just praise the one guy who did it. You bring the whole group of astronauts who went and did something. If they're smart they're going to admit that there were a ton of people who helped. EDIT-Update on the comment about the team praise: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19638629 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19638629

soVeryTired 8y ago
> I would love to hear her praise "her team" (her team is a subset of people in the whole project) Although, I don't think she has enough experience to realize that it's a good thing to do. She did that in the TED talk. And in the article linked above. And basically everywhere else she's spoken.
- monksy 8y ago
  Oh.. I had no idea. That's awesome. I made the assumption that she did the academic thing which is "i did this" signed advisor. The assumption was based on the focus of the articles. (editorial bias)
  - themarkn 8y ago
    No need to avoid your own responsibility and bias in making that assumption. It's not accurate to blame it on the media coverage alone. Strikes me as more like confirmation bias around what your expectations are for academics, women, or both.
    - monksy 8y ago
      Excuse me? I admitted that I was incorrect in my impression. I could have deleted the original comment but posted an admission that I was too quick to jump to conclusions. You should be aware of what the media is trying to say, and how it's presented. This comment section is showing how different countries are presenting the same situation. Confirmation bias in academics: It's very common to escalate the work from undergrad->grad->postdoc->professors. (Doing the most work to the least in that order). It's pretty terrible.. but that's how it operates. Does the advisor do much? Do they get their name on the paper, yes. (In many times at the top) Women- Her gender doesn't matter on this. The work she did for her research is awesome, it's clearly her work. (It's similar to super-resolution) This wasn't a single I just applied my algorithm and everything happened. Lots of people were involved in collecting, cleaning, managing, and adapting her improvement to existing CV algorithms to reproduce what a blackhole looks like.