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The Shameful Decline of Scientific American

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Re: The Shameful Decline of Scientific American

#201

Post by nucleogenesis »

coldtea wrote: post #194
nucleogenesis wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because gender is a made up thing informed by social norms. Not all societies abide the gender binary. Gender studies are a sociological study because there is no gender without some social structure enforcing it. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_in_Bugis_society Go learn in some depth of “woke” ideology before getting fired up online about it. Learn it from “woke” people and talk with them and take it seriousl…

> Because gender is a made up thing informed by social norms. Not all societies abide the gender binary. If you find fringe examples, and force it enough, yes. Because, thousands of years of global civilization are invalidated because of what this or that tribe does.

“Woke” thinking is a critique on those “thousands of years of global civilization” and the example I posted shows that what this “global civilization” has decided and coerced others into treating as the natural way of things just flat out isn’t.

So to say something like that the gender binary is an oppressive and unjust norm in global society because trans, intersex, non-binary, gender-fluid, etc people exist does at least seem more justified when you find that it’s not the only naturally occurring way for humans to categorize themselves.

Re: The Shameful Decline of Scientific American

#202

Post by mb7733 »

VictorPath wrote: post #190
mb7733 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article called someone a racist, days after they passed away, without presenting any evidence of that fact. (The original article does not cite or refer to any of Wilson's work.) When asked on Twitter to provide some evidence of Wilson's racist views, the author of the article declined to provide any. She said that readers should look it up themselves. That isn't sober critique, it's slander.

> called someone a racist, days after they passed away Wilson was being called racist by many back in 1975. I agree with them. He was a racist who tried to dress his racist political views up in scientific jargon. Like William Shockley. If you don't want people knocking you after your death, don't write books saying whites are genetically superior to oppressed races in the US and that slavery is natural.

Can you provide a reference or at least a quotation or something? Which book are you referring to? This is the same thing the author of the article did -- dragged Wilson through the mud without actually quoting him or referring to any specific work.

I found a reference [0] where Wilson discusses slavery, but he's talking about slavery in ants. The only actual quotation [1] I've found anyone bring up in this discussion shows Wilson had views the exact opposite of what you imply.

[0] https://www.jstor.org/stable/2407145

[1] https://twitter.com/LSMitchell/status/1476447156118638594?s=...

Re: The Shameful Decline of Scientific American

#204

Post by tonguez »

nucleogenesis wrote: post #191
lazyeye wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Woke people only ever want a blank slate to which they can apply their ideology. They wont tolerate nature intruding. Why is there no neuro-psychology component in gender studies for example?

Because gender is a made up thing informed by social norms. Not all societies abide the gender binary. Gender studies are a sociological study because there is no gender without some social structure enforcing it. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_in_Bugis_society Go learn in some depth of “woke” ideology before getting fired up online about it. Learn it from “woke” people and talk with them and take it seriousl…

"Gender studies are a sociological study because there is no gender without some social structure enforcing it."

Everything is a social construct, right... Really heady, intelligent stuff. Extremely interesting. Mindblowing.

"Not all societies abide the gender binary."

There are also a lot of societies where women are considered inferior and don't have any rights.

Re: The Shameful Decline of Scientific American

#205

Post by tonguez »

nucleogenesis wrote: post #201
coldtea wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because gender is a made up thing informed by social norms. Not all societies abide the gender binary. If you find fringe examples, and force it enough, yes. Because, thousands of years of global civilization are invalidated because of what this or that tribe does.

“Woke” thinking is a critique on those “thousands of years of global civilization” and the example I posted shows that what this “global civilization” has decided and coerced others into treating as the natural way of things just flat out isn’t. So to say something like that the gender binary is an oppressive and unjust norm in global society because trans, intersex, non-binary, gender-fluid, etc people exist does at…

No post body was provided.

Re: The Shameful Decline of Scientific American

#206

Post by [deleted] »

bawolff wrote: post #118
dehrmann wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I came here to call out that quote. Apparently this is the author: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monica_McLemore Only half of the story is Scientific American going downhill. The other half is that social activism creeping into science. A professor and researcher, regardless of if they're a social activist, shouldn't disparage statistics like that. It's also troubling that she either 1) understands statistics that po…

I believe social activism should be entertwined with science - we should use science to make the world a more just and fair place, and we should look to human misery as inspiration for things we can study and improve. However, twisting scientific terms by using double meanings of terms that have differing colloquial meanings like the scientific american does, doesn't accomplish that and helps nobody.

[deleted]

Re: The Shameful Decline of Scientific American

#207

Post by Maursault »

da39a3ee wrote: post #183
Maursault wrote: post #33

I am not defending SJW in saying this, merely pointing out a clear and obvious fallacy and a shameful one considering those who submit and post here that use it. Employing the pejorative "woke" is an ad hominem fallacy because it doesn't speak to any argument, and it, in fact, says nothing at all. It ignores all argument for the sake of, I presume, insult. It is fundamentally tribalistic. Insulting or denigrating the…

Ok, and just to be clear, you’re saying SJW (which you used) is ok because it is descriptive? But, like, the etymology of many words is obscure; sometimes we do use words as arbitrary references, whose semantics cannot be inferred from their form, no?

My hypocrisy does not affect the soundness of my argument. I may be a hypocrite, it doesn't mean that I'm wrong. [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque

Re: The Shameful Decline of Scientific American

#208

Post by leephillips »

boppo1 wrote: post #186
Maursault wrote: post #33

I am not defending SJW in saying this, merely pointing out a clear and obvious fallacy and a shameful one considering those who submit and post here that use it. Employing the pejorative "woke" is an ad hominem fallacy because it doesn't speak to any argument, and it, in fact, says nothing at all. It ignores all argument for the sake of, I presume, insult. It is fundamentally tribalistic. Insulting or denigrating the…

You know, I'm extremely frustrated with "wokeness" and its attendant ideologies, but I agree with almost everything you said. I think the problem is that "woke" ideology employs a lot of deliberately slippery language and rhetorical flourishes that make it difficult to argue with. It employs motte and bailey strategies everywhere. I recently lost a friendship with someone who converted to wokeness. I say 'convert' be…

Reminds me of friends who got under the thrall of a[n explicitly] religious cult. You can’t reason them out of it, because their faculties of reason have been short-circuited by the linguistic circularity of the cult. You can’t appeal to what should be their reluctance to cause distress to the people who care about them, because their hearts belong to the cult now. You just need to wait and see if they snap out of it. They often do, and it’s surprising.

Perhaps cult deprogramming techniques can help woke people. I don’t know anything about them, but it’s worth looking in to .

Re: The Shameful Decline of Scientific American

#209

Post by bavell »

jimkleiber wrote: post #162
andreskytt wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Goodness, indeed. But, in the context of memes, this means ideas no longer have to be beneficial to their human hosts in order to proliferate. It used to be that you’d have to be at least moderately well-to-do (thus, capable financially and biologically) for extended periods of time in order for your ideas to appear in print and be spread. That is no longer the case: an idea might be deadly or ruinous within hours an…

I'm a little lost yet curious, what do you mean by "no longer have to be beneficial to their human hosts in order to proliferate"?

I took it to mean that the idea has escaped into the wider world and its fate is no longer tied to its originator's alone.

Re: The Shameful Decline of Scientific American

#210

Post by entropicgravity »

coldtea wrote: post #192

It's not Scientific American. It's every medium. The NYT of 2022 is not the NYT of the past, and WP is not the WP of Watergate. And it goes beyond the ideological issues. In fact, the same declining quality (though not with the same specifics of course) is the case in every industry where they're fighting for increasingly thinner profit margins. It was the same back in the day (as far back as Mark Twain, Hearst/"Kane…

Not to mention National Geographic and the Wall Street Journal. Buzzfeed on the other hand has been getting better, from a low base.
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