Live data from Hacker News

Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

nature.com

81–90 of 144 posts

Re: Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

#81
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ending inequality requires asymmetric behavior. Achieving equality will feel like oppression to those used to having a good deal. Society isn't generally hostile against your son; its hostility is to patriarchy, something Andrew Tate seeks to restore and extend. As a guy, I'm perfectly fine with things like "the future is female" for the same reason I'm fine with things like "gay pride" and "black pride" even though…

> he doesn't have to worry too much if people's trauma leads them to mistake him as being part of something wrong. We're not talking about mature adults capable of reasoning and addressing historical and generational nuance. Children are internalizing the idea that they're bad by virtue of being born a certain way and that's terrible. It's not something they can "not worry too much about". Inflicting pain and trauma…

Sorry, you've lost me. What specific "inflicting pain and trauma on children [...] in the name of progress" do you believe is going on?

Re: Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

#82
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get that, and I have been there before. But how do you fairly judge true merit in an oppressive world? A lot of the typical ways just support or amplify existing biases. That's not to say it's impossible, but an awful lot of people crying "meritocracy" do so in defense of conspicuously unexamined hiring practices.

Which hiring practices are those? The ones that favor women by 2:1? https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1418878112 Anecdotally, an executive recruiter friend I talked to recently here in Europe said that she now has to get approval from corporate headquarters in the US for a straight white male candidate.

If you read that article they believe it is due to women self-selecting out of the field before ever applying for those positions. Or IE. the hiring standards for both groups are not necessarily different, but female candidates are less likely to apply and those that are willing to apply are better qualified:

> Our research suggests that the mechanism resulting in women’s underrepresentation today may lie more on the supply side, in women’s decisions not to apply, than on the demand side, in antifemale bias in hiring. The perception that STEM fields continue to be inhospitable male bastions can become self-reinforcing by discouraging female applicants (26–29), thus contributing to continued underrepresentation, which in turn may obscure underlying attitudinal changes.

> Thus, real-world hiring data showing a preference for women, inherently confounded and open to multiple interpretations because of lack of controls on applicant quality, experience, and lifestyle, are consistent with our experimental findings.

> We hope the discovery of an overall 2:1 preference for hiring women over otherwise identical men will help counter self-handicapping and opting-out by talented women at the point of entry to the STEM professoriate, and suggest that female underrepresentation can be addressed in part by increasing the number of women applying for tenure-track positions.

Edit: Hence why this is complicated. You're clearly suggesting the 2:1 ratio indicates it must be unfair in some way, but the article itself suggests it's not. Fundamentally, you cannot assume that merit-based hiring would result in a 1:1 ratio of male/female, at least not initially.

Re: Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

#83
post #80
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ending inequality requires asymmetric behavior. Achieving equality will feel like oppression to those used to having a good deal. Society isn't generally hostile against your son; its hostility is to patriarchy, something Andrew Tate seeks to restore and extend. As a guy, I'm perfectly fine with things like "the future is female" for the same reason I'm fine with things like "gay pride" and "black pride" even though…

I hope you're young because this level of naivety in an older person would be very concerning. As others have pointed out, the real world does not work based on rationality, and assuming it does will lead to some very bad decisions.

Good thing I never said that the real world is based in rationality. But we should use our rationality both to make sense of the world and to shape the world so it is more reasonable.

Re: Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

#84

National hiring experiments reveal 2:1 faculty preference for women on STEM tenure track - https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1418878112 Even where I work, I'm under a lot of pressure to hire more women engineers to the point we bend rules and relax standards. There is a ton of societal and economic pressure with slogans like "the future is female". I'm a mother and I do not think this is a good thing. I have a so…

So do something about it? Certainly no male can advocate for simple merit based hiring in academia anymore.

Re: Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

#85
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ending inequality requires asymmetric behavior. Achieving equality will feel like oppression to those used to having a good deal. Society isn't generally hostile against your son; its hostility is to patriarchy, something Andrew Tate seeks to restore and extend. As a guy, I'm perfectly fine with things like "the future is female" for the same reason I'm fine with things like "gay pride" and "black pride" even though…

"asymmetric behavior" is just a way to whitewash retribution.

It could be. But there are plenty of other things it could be. Perhaps consider why you leapt to that particular conclusion.

Re: Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

#86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel you are fundamentally in agreement with my point and splitting hairs to satisfy a pedantic desire to make a very specific semantic distinction. It might feel good, but you're not going to win anyone over with this type of nitpicking.

It's not pedantic. It's a damn good point. Most men are shit out of luck just like most women beholden to whims of those with money and power.

It is pedantic because it's nitpicking my choice of words to make a completely separate point. This attracts people with the same concern (like you), but does nothing to bridge the gap to people with an alternate viewpoint (like the OP I responded to).

Put another way, I could have made my point with a different choice of words that would not have drawn the response from mpweiher (and you). The problem is, any choice of words is open to be misinterpreted by someone with an axe to grind.

If you want to be angry and find like-minded angry individuals, be my guest. If you want to build empathy and mutual understanding, then it's worth it to try to engage with people's primary point rather than seizing on an uncharitable interpretation of a particular phrasing or choice of words.

Re: Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

#87
post #83
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope you're young because this level of naivety in an older person would be very concerning. As others have pointed out, the real world does not work based on rationality, and assuming it does will lead to some very bad decisions.

Good thing I never said that the real world is based in rationality. But we should use our rationality both to make sense of the world and to shape the world so it is more reasonable.

> we should use our rationality both to make sense of the world and to shape the world so it is more reasonable.

Recommending that groups take revenge on one another for past behavior and wrapping it in some Orwellian term like "Asymmetric Behavior" is neither rational nor reasonable. It's immoral.

Re: Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

#88

National hiring experiments reveal 2:1 faculty preference for women on STEM tenure track - https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1418878112 Even where I work, I'm under a lot of pressure to hire more women engineers to the point we bend rules and relax standards. There is a ton of societal and economic pressure with slogans like "the future is female". I'm a mother and I do not think this is a good thing. I have a so…

In the US: * The majority of suicides are male * The majority of homeless are male * Men are less likely to go to college * The vast majority of prison inmates are male * The vast majority of workplace deaths are male * The majority of violent crime victims are male * The vast majority of police brutality victims are male Now if we were talking about say India it would be a different story, and this is not to suggest…

I directionally agree with you but there's definitely more nuance when you dig into any individual issue. For example, there are more male suicides because men use more effective methods, and more male prisoners because men are more violent. (I don't say that as a knock on men, either; it's a reflection of the biology-driven distribution of behavioral tendencies that each sex has evolved.)

Re: Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

#89
post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> he doesn't have to worry too much if people's trauma leads them to mistake him as being part of something wrong. We're not talking about mature adults capable of reasoning and addressing historical and generational nuance. Children are internalizing the idea that they're bad by virtue of being born a certain way and that's terrible. It's not something they can "not worry too much about". Inflicting pain and trauma…

Sorry, you've lost me. What specific "inflicting pain and trauma on children [...] in the name of progress" do you believe is going on?

The idea is that letting a generation of young boys think they're personally responsible for a history of oppression and discrimination inflicts pain and trauma.

Re: Females more likely than males to be elected in US scientific societies

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which hiring practices are those? The ones that favor women by 2:1? https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1418878112 Anecdotally, an executive recruiter friend I talked to recently here in Europe said that she now has to get approval from corporate headquarters in the US for a straight white male candidate.

If you read that article they believe it is due to women self-selecting out of the field before ever applying for those positions. Or IE. the hiring standards for both groups are not necessarily different, but female candidates are less likely to apply and those that are willing to apply are better qualified: > Our research suggests that the mechanism resulting in women’s underrepresentation today may lie more on the…

Merit based hiring would never be 1:1, but 2:1 is enormous. I would expect something like 1.2:1 in either direction.
Post reply on HN