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A math professor who objects to diversity statements

theatlantic.com

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Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#181
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Intelligence is indeed substantially heritable. > The heritability of intelligence increases from about 20% in infancy to perhaps 80% in later adulthood. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4270739/

There are intelligent people in all levels of society and all cultures, so this changes nothing.

There also some women that are taller than some men, but men are still taller than women.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#182
post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I am talking about acceptance of the values of equality (3) from liberals, I mean willingness to compromise and understand the benefit of value (3) for society. You're talking about acceptance on paper - yeah, you can have all these fringe ideas, and talk about them all you want, as long as they are not actually implemented. Which is nothing more than value (2). And communist countries.. ah what a stupid trope (…

> yeah, you can have all these fringe ideas, and talk about them all you want, as long as they are not actually implemented. Every developed nation is full of social programs to help the poor and give people things they need to live a good life. It varies a bit from country to country, but even USA has programs to give schooling to every kid and feed the poor so they don't starve and ensure even the poor get healthca…

I am not sure what country you're from, but if it's a Western one, it's unlikely that you have recently (in the past 40 years) fully adopted a more leftist proposal or idea compared to what was accepted 40 years back. So things as social programs largely exist as a consequence of value (3) being understood (and fought for) as important, rather than liberals understanding their importance (in fact, they let lot of it slide in the neoliberal era).

Although to be fair, dominance of ideological liberalism is probably ending, but it yet has to manifest in practical policies. In practical terms, value of (2) is the most important for the middle class, in contrast with value (3) which is the most important for the working (bottom) class, and value (4) which is the most important for the ruling (top) class. So the decline in the middle class (being teared apart by social inequality) in the US is changing the ideological dominance of (2). It's really just another way of reframing my point about liberalism causing its own demise.

That's why, when I am talking about importance of (3) compared to (2), I am not talking about just the bottom of social hierarchy, i.e. giving something to poor people to eat so they don't die (this is actually more based on value (1) than (3)). The value of (3) is also about having a political power (and democracy), and as such the top of the social hierarchy (to which liberalism is oblivious to) needs to be addressed as well. Value of (2) cannot do much about abuse of power by billionaires, for instance. It's simply out of the scope - as far as liberals are concerned, their existence and economic influence is fair and square. And that's why it can lead to fascism. (And we can see in practice, US is not very democratic at the moment, the will of majority of people is ignored in actual policy, but the will of the rich people prevails.)

Addendum (rereading my previous comment): Historically, the hubris that lead to suffering you describe under totalitarian communist regimes was ideological ignorance of value (2) (or (4) for that matter) when implementing (3), as in the circumstances of the communist revolutions, the (3) becomes a cultural hegemon. I think the left mostly learned from that, i.e. you can't have (3) without respecting (2), and also revolutions are tricky (meaning attaining anything without respecting (4) can be bloody). Today however, we are in a different situation, (2) has the cultural hegemony, and so the understanding that (3) is important has been lost to some extent, due to the same ideological hubris (but this hubris of liberals also exists towards conservatives, i.e. value (4), showing that it really comes from its ideological hegemony).

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#183
post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many Americans already don't understand progressive tax as a concept. How can we realistically expect them to understand ranked choice voting?

Proof by example: Alaska already does ranked choice voting https://www.elections.alaska.gov/RCV.php

True, but that doesn't actually establish that voters understand how it works. IIRC, they've only had it for a short time, so there's not much of a track record to establish that voters are casting votes in ways that are consistent with their beliefs and desires.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Please provide evidence of high application rates for underprivileged white males and then abnormally low acceptance rates to support your claim of white men being turned away at the door. Why? The fact that they are under represented is enough evidence, at least according to the left.

Because this is forum that values critical thinking and productive discussion. When you present things out of context, cherry pick data, or make otherwise unrealistic claims, people will push back on you to support your claims.

It is you who make the unrealistic claim that the least represented group can't possibly be discriminated against. Provide strong evidence that they aren't discriminated against in education, then we can talk, until then it is fair to assume that DEI initiatives is pushing out poor white men in favor of other groups because that is what the statistics tells us.

It also tells us why rich people love DEI based on race and gender, it is because it only pushes out poor white men and not rich white men, rich white men are still there.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#186
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I work the DEI training (mandatory, of course) has gone full-on bonkers. I am genuinely struggling to accept it is real and not some sort of massive joke or it was all some crazy fever-dream The thrust of the training is that now treating people "equally" or "fairly" is now racist. If you treat people fairly or equally you are liable for HR punishments. The training then goes on to list various accusations for…

You are not taking crazy pills. This comment perfectly tracks my thoughts upon confronting similar a couple years ago. The toughest part was that I didn’t know the words to name or describe it. I’ll +1 someone else’s recommendation of Tim Urban’s book “What’s Our Problem” - he dove into this rabbit hole and explained what he found, and it’s super approachable. For a deeper dive, Bill Ackman very publicly sharing his…

Christopher Rufo is an actual, openly and loudly, full on grifter. He has literally admitted to inventing the critical race theory concept and conflict. As in, truly made it up out of thin air by combining vague trends with a loosely related legal term and seeding it to the Tuckers of the world. These are not the kinds of people anyone should be listening to about "things happening in the world".

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a white male from a very similar background. The thing that separates us from black and hispanic colleagues is that the white guys that are hiring automatically trust us 10x more than a black or hispanic candidate, regardless of where we came from, where we went to school, or how much money we had growing up. You might see a lot of diversity in PhD programs, but as soon as you step into a high paying professional…

> The thing that separates us from black and hispanic colleagues is that the white guys that are hiring automatically trust us 10x more than a black or hispanic candidate I just don’t think that’s true. I spend a lot of time around elite whites, and I think being a poor white is just about the worst thing in their eyes. God help you if you have a hick accent or something like that. I think they’re much more likely to…

This is supported with data https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/americas-wh... if you scroll to the graphs.

But I think anyone who is elite thinks this way. This includes elite Asians, Blacks, etc. But elite is poorly defined so I am defining it as well-educated and left leaning

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only that, but it presupposes that diversity is a good in and of itself, which I think is quite false when it comes to diversity of physical characteristics (which is all that these initiatives ever care about). Diversity is neutral . It is just as erroneous to think that a group is enhanced by adding people just for their race (or gender, etc) as it is to think that a group is enhanced by excluding people just f…

You aren’t going to get a job like that.

Well you could always turn to a life of crime if you want to keep your dignity. Only half joking.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#189

They’re also goddamn demeaning. My diversity statement would be outside the Overton window of the white ladies who get paid to read diversity statements. Why should I have to perform for them?

What makes you think only white ladies require these? That wouldn't be true of my school where that office is quite diverse. Are you saying that non-white people would never do something like racialize admissions and hiring? because I don't believe that

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#190

Look, if you don't want an echo chamber on this topic, maybe consider the point of diversity statements. I can't put it better than Stephen Jay Gould: "I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops." Consider that a diversity statement is a way to evaluate if the applicant has…

Gould's statement is empty - there is no way to quantify it, so everyone assigns their own value to his statement. You may think its more than X,000,000, I think its 0.

Who is right?

So now it's you and me arguing past each other because there is no way to agree. And millions of other people who have to manage it.

And yes, it does matter what the number is, because that is what is being done to justify X seats into many workplaces and universities. There is always a cost for training + development, and all of it can go to waste at any time.

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