4 ms·
My understanding of the summary is thus: The variance in aptitude in men is greater than the variance in women, even though the average point for women is high
by true_religion 15y ago
My understanding of the summary is thus:
The variance in aptitude in men is greater than the variance in women, even though the average point for women is higher than that of men.
To put this another way (vastly simplified), there are more male geniuses and more male idiots. However if you were to grab a random woman off the street, she is likely to have greater aptitude than a random man you grab off the street.
So in US highschools where grading is bounded and the same testing is forced on everyone, we see women routinely trouncing their male counter parts in GPA scores.
Then in college, where people have a choice more men go into difficult but unprofitable majors (e.g. Physics), additionally women have a bias against certain subjects (e.g. Computer Science) due to the low-status accorded to it, and thus choose other majors like Law or Medicine.
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Bringing it back to Genetics, that means the 'dum dum gene' (gene which causes aptitude variance) is on the Y chromosome, thus women aren't affected by it at all.
- rmc 15y agoThe variance in aptitude in men is greater than the variance in women Yes there are several diseases that negatively affect intelligence that are much much more common in males (e.g. autism). However genetics (and evolution) is not fair. It's not a trade off, where if one subset of humanity (men) are more likely to have autism doesn't mean that Genetics will give that subset more genius genes "to make up". Evolution is blind, the universe is apathetic. This "genetic disadvange in one area ergo must be genetic advantage in another" idea is only used to explain why people in a privileged position are "entitled" to their privileged position, and a deflection away from the main issue of privilege. If the universe worked that way, then why are the IQ tests for (in the USA) lower on average for african americans? What genetic advantage do they get in return? If Asians are good at maths, what genetic disadvantages do they get to to counter act it? If Jews are better with money, what genetic disadvantages do they get in exchange? If this theory was true, it could have answers for these. If gay people are geneticly more inclined to mental health issues than straight people, what genetic advantages do they get in return?
- rmc 15y agoAlso if was genetics that explains how "men are smarter than women and hence that's why men earn more than women", then you'd have to explain why there has not been a lot of genetic change in the last 100 years, but women are now earning much much more than they were 100 years now. (One of the answers is because of institutional misogyny which artificially kept women earning less than their ability. Since that has reduced in scope, women are earning more. So how do you know it's not institutional misogyny now?)
- true_religion 15y agoI think you're taking this discussion far past the literal meaning of my words. In fact, you're actually taking my words to have the opposite meaning of what they were. Example: > if was genetics that explains how "men are smarter than women and hence that's why men earn more than women What I said: > we see women routinely trouncing their male counter parts Lastly, trying to boil this down into a simplistic "women are smarter than men" or "men are smarter than women" argument is a fallacy in the making. A difference in variance and mean does not mean one population body is 'better' than the other.