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The Fields Medal should return to its roots

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Re: The Fields Medal should return to its roots

#61

Post by SamReidHughes »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #58
Hasz wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you accept the idea that a penchant for math is randomly distributed among all people, then the odds of 55/56 men winning by chance are very, very, very low.

If you think about it, a 55/56 ratio (.98) is only commensurate with a distribution of mathematical talent by which the vast majority of women can't add 2 and 2 together. Like, it would not even justified by women being "somewhat" less good at maths at the high level than men. Women would have to be really, really bad at maths for that to be a natural result.

No, they just have to be vastly less likely to be top 0.001% at math. In any activity where you can distinguish the top 0.001% talents versus the top 0.01%, you're going to get way fewer women at the top. One of the reasons is, half their cells are using one X chromosome and half are using the other, so they're more likely to get their performance dragged down by deleterious mutations.

Re: The Fields Medal should return to its roots

#62

Post by raincom »

majos wrote: post #10
fantispug wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like Grigori Perelman did?

It appears that Grigori Perelman was a well-known mathematician even before his work on the Poincare conjecture. He proved the wonderfully named "soul conjecture" almost a decade beforehand.

Even though he proved "soul conjecture", no university in the US wanted to give him a tenure job. Instead, they offered him a tenure track position. Once he proved the Poincare, every one wants him on their faculty.

Because of this, Princeton offered Manjul Bhargava (another Fields winner) a tenure job right away without putting on the rigma role of tenure-track.

Re: The Fields Medal should return to its roots

#63

Post by barry-cotter »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #58
Hasz wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you accept the idea that a penchant for math is randomly distributed among all people, then the odds of 55/56 men winning by chance are very, very, very low.

If you think about it, a 55/56 ratio (.98) is only commensurate with a distribution of mathematical talent by which the vast majority of women can't add 2 and 2 together. Like, it would not even justified by women being "somewhat" less good at maths at the high level than men. Women would have to be really, really bad at maths for that to be a natural result.

To see why this is not true think about the average difference in men and women’s height and the relative prevalence of men and women among people 1.6, 1.7, 1.8, 1.9m tall, etc.

Re: The Fields Medal should return to its roots

#64

Post by sueders101 »

eropple wrote: post #40
meri_dian wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps this is more of the case in the UK where class is more of a salient aspect of life than in the US?

Class is profoundly salient in the United States. Unless you've been on the outside it's very difficult to see, because the gradations are more subtle, but they run no less deep.

It's worth noting the distinction between social class and socioeconomic class/status. Socioeconomic status plays a larger role in United States relative to the UK. Social class refers to one's fixed sociocultural background and plays a far larger role in the UK compared to the US.

Re: The Fields Medal should return to its roots

#65

Post by booleandilemma »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #55
snoman wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. Lots to digest here, and I think I detect some strong frustration. My sympathies on that. I have worked at the big 4 (MS) but I'm a consultant now. I do a fair bit of interviewing and what I propose is that you don't actually have a clue what the finances of your interviewers are like, and you don't actually have a clue what the finances of your competitors are like. You would be far better served putting it out…

>> Interviewers don't care about how much money the candidates have because... No, hang on, I get what the OP says and it's a reasonalbe assumption. In large companies with rigid hierarchies, people will often be sort of subtly flash (!) with their money, because it basically marks their position in the hierarchy. You can see this in the clothes people wear, their cars obviously, their phones also obviously, the othe…

Some of my coworkers have this disgusting habit of putting where they’re going for vacation in the shared Outlook PTO calendar.

Re: The Fields Medal should return to its roots

#66

Post by siberianbear »

throwaway0255 wrote: post #8
Fibo144 wrote: post #5

I think the age limit for the Fields medal reinforces this idea that "mathematics is a young mans game." It's one of many reasons why I got discouraged into entering mathematics when I was young because of this and math competitions. When I was younger , I would visit websites such as AOP , and ask questions and then be treated in a condescending way by students who were my age or younger who would then boast about t…

> It took some time to realize that having parents who are academics/engineers helps significantly in guiding you in a career such as mathematics. This is true of every good job. I'm trying to get hired at big 4 tech right now. Every person interviewing me is a rich kid. All of my competition is rich kids. Touring these big tech companies was discouraging. They're all very diverse. Rich white kids. Rich Asian kids. R…

I have no direct knowledge of academic careers like mathematics.

I'm white, but I came from a lower middle-class background in a rural area. My parents were barely supportive of me going to the university. I'm a real-life redneck.

I eventually made millions in Silicon Valley and retired at age 40.

One of the best pieces of advice I received in life was this: don't sell yourself short. Try, strive, and then let other people reject you. But never reject yourself. And if others reject you, stand up and try again. If they hit you harder, then get up quicker and hit back harder.

Perhaps you'll find that you're not really all that you thought. Or perhaps you'll find that with each small success, your odds increase in the next round because you learned something important from your failure in the previous round. If you don't stand up and fight the next round, you'll never know the true answer.

Re: The Fields Medal should return to its roots

#67

Post by majos »

cc81 wrote: post #35
Hasz wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you accept the idea that a penchant for math is randomly distributed among all people, then the odds of 55/56 men winning by chance are very, very, very low.

One argument that some have is that men have a more extreme distribution of IQ and mathematical ability and when it comes to things like the Fields medal it is the few extreme ones that make an impact. I don't know how well done those studies are though. EDIT: I doubt it is that big though.

I used to believe this, but now I think a confounding factor here is that girls are socialized away from extremes in general.

Re: The Fields Medal should return to its roots

#68

Post by addicted »

Hasz wrote: post #16
wheresmyusern wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why is it shocking?

If you accept the idea that a penchant for math is randomly distributed among all people, then the odds of 55/56 men winning by chance are very, very, very low.

The penchant for math is probably randomly distributed between men and women.

But all that is overshadowed by the fact that culturally and societally women are heavily discouraged from entering and succeeding in fields like math. This begins right from childhood, where an abacus may make a good toy for a boy, while the appropriate toy for a girl would be a mini kitchen set.

Fortunately a lot of this is changing, however, the benefits of no longer discouraging 50% of the population from entering science/engineering won't be felt for another couple of generations.

Re: The Fields Medal should return to its roots

#69

Post by [deleted] »

SamReidHughes wrote: post #61
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think about it, a 55/56 ratio (.98) is only commensurate with a distribution of mathematical talent by which the vast majority of women can't add 2 and 2 together. Like, it would not even justified by women being "somewhat" less good at maths at the high level than men. Women would have to be really, really bad at maths for that to be a natural result.

No, they just have to be vastly less likely to be top 0.001% at math. In any activity where you can distinguish the top 0.001% talents versus the top 0.01%, you're going to get way fewer women at the top. One of the reasons is, half their cells are using one X chromosome and half are using the other, so they're more likely to get their performance dragged down by deleterious mutations.

[deleted]

Re: The Fields Medal should return to its roots

#70

Post by snoman »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #55
snoman wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. Lots to digest here, and I think I detect some strong frustration. My sympathies on that. I have worked at the big 4 (MS) but I'm a consultant now. I do a fair bit of interviewing and what I propose is that you don't actually have a clue what the finances of your interviewers are like, and you don't actually have a clue what the finances of your competitors are like. You would be far better served putting it out…

>> Interviewers don't care about how much money the candidates have because... No, hang on, I get what the OP says and it's a reasonalbe assumption. In large companies with rigid hierarchies, people will often be sort of subtly flash (!) with their money, because it basically marks their position in the hierarchy. You can see this in the clothes people wear, their cars obviously, their phones also obviously, the othe…

> No, hang on, I get what the OP says and it's a reasonalbe assumption.

It's definitely an assumption, which is a problem to begin with, and it's not a reasonable one. Interviewers often go through training to avoid pre-judging candidates, and candidates would be wise to do the same.

An interview candidate gets to talk to a couple of recruiters and have at most 2 conversations with 3-6 engineers at most. I would be pretty suspicious if any of those conversations were about the interviewer in any significant way to begin with, let alone about what they drive, where they're going on vacation, or what they make.

So I get what you're saying, and there's certainly people like that anywhere that pays their people exceptionally well, but making assumptions about the character of your future-coworkers before you've actually gotten to know them is a recipe for a bad time.

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