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Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole

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Re: Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole

#61

Post by mirimir »

barry-cotter wrote: post #52
AlexCoventry wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is nothing original or subtle about it, and it was blatantly intended by the Mathematical Intelligencer editor to stir shit up.

All of that can be true and Amie Wilkinson's campaign of harassment would still be vile and disgusting behaviour, unworthy of an adult of any kind. She got the paper withdrawn from two different journals, and got Dr Tabachnikov to withdraw his name from the paper. What do you think of Dr Wilkinson's behaviour? Because that’s what the article is about, a campaign of harassment from a woman in a position of power.

What's relevant here is her unprofessional and harassing behavior. If she were a man, the behavior would be no less vile, nor more so.

Re: Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole

#63

Post by pelario »

jonnybgood wrote: post #62

This is a one-sided story pushing a "Us vs Them" narrative. I can see nothing productive coming out of this.

I'm not sure if this is pushing a "us vs them"; and yes, it obviously is a one-sided story.

So, yes, I would really like to read a reply to this article but any of the other parties mentioned there.

Re: Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole

#64

Post by mirimir »

quotemstr wrote: post #33
brenschluss wrote: post #31

The paper seems to have some egregious and basic errors. Take a look at the paper: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1703.04184.pdf On page 2, it says (in discussing Special Case 1): "If sex A is relatively selective and will mate only with the top most desirable quarter of sex B, then all of the next generation will be offspring of the more variable subpopulation B1" However, if you look at the histogram in Figure 1, it's clear…

You've identified the mechanism by which sexual selection operates. It's clearly a powerful force. This paper is arguing that in addition to sexual selection's first order directional effect, there's an overlaid second order effect on variability, and the argument makes sense. Male reproductive success is already highly variable, because male gametes are cheap. Some males end up being disproportionately successful, e…

> ... since a female mammal cannot have 200 offspring in her lifetime ...

Ah, but now she could. With enough money to pay for enough surrogates (or eventually, machines) and childcare.

So maybe, going forward, there'll be more variability in human female reproductive success. Interesting.

Re: Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole

#65

Post by mirimir »

quotemstr wrote: post #46
brenschluss wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am examining the paper and attempting to understand it based on its arguments. You are critiquing my argument based on what I am saying, not my method. I argue that you are attempting to frame my critique of the paper based on the desired narrative you wish to pursue, rather than any kind of rigorous or inquisitive method. If you agree with this analysis, then you will probably continue to disparage my efforts as s…

Besides, the merit of this paper's argument is irrelevant. It could be totally wrong and the treatment it's receiving would still be abhorrent. Getting into the weeds on population genetics might be interesting, but it doesn't make a difference when it comes to the idea that we should debate results, not censor them.

Yes, that is the point here. If the article had been rejected everywhere, debating its soundness would be relevant. But this paper was accepted, and actually published, so that's irrelevant.

Re: Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole

#66

Post by another-cuppa »

I don't even understand why this is controversial. I've explained this to a number of women before and none of them have felt hurt. On the contrary, in fact, it makes them feel better. Humans always fixate on extremes. Men and women. It's a problem in our society. We always want to see the very best and we're not interested in others who are still way above average. There are thousands of women doing great science, engineering, programming etc., but the very best are almost always men, and it's our fault that we only care about the very best.

Re: Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole

#67

Post by quotemstr »

mirimir wrote: post #64
quotemstr wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You've identified the mechanism by which sexual selection operates. It's clearly a powerful force. This paper is arguing that in addition to sexual selection's first order directional effect, there's an overlaid second order effect on variability, and the argument makes sense. Male reproductive success is already highly variable, because male gametes are cheap. Some males end up being disproportionately successful, e…

> ... since a female mammal cannot have 200 offspring in her lifetime ... Ah, but now she could. With enough money to pay for enough surrogates (or eventually, machines) and childcare. So maybe, going forward, there'll be more variability in human female reproductive success. Interesting.

Yeah. Various kinds of reproductive and genomic technologies invalidate general evolutionary assumptions, but the techniques haven't been around long enough or been common enough to matter so far. But in the future? Who knows?

Re: Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole

#68

Post by semi-extrinsic »

briandear wrote: post #40
quotemstr wrote: post #15

This disgraceful behavior from academia is shredding the credibility of the entire enterprise. How is anyone supposed to trust any unintuitive conclusions with expensive implications --- for example, on climate change --- when the academic community has demonstrated a propensity to shriek at and censor unorthodox ideas instead of contest them on the merits?

This is specificly why I am a climate skeptic. Not a denier, mind you, but a skeptic when it comes to anything purporting to be “settled science.” It’s specifically because there is a strong resistance to anything damaging to the status quo, as supported by grant funding and, to a lesser extent, political agenda. Frankly, it’s hard to trust academia on controversial topics.

What we need to distinguish here is what exactly we're talking about being "settled science".

Is "human CO2 emissions are causing an increased greenhouse effect and ocean acidification" settled science? Yes.

Is "how much will that affect us and the planet at different time scales" settled science? Not completely, no. The climate system is incredibly hard to model.

What scientists are doing in the latter regard is making their best estimates, seeing that these predict very bad things happening, and then saying we should work as hard as possible to reduce emissions.

Which, incidentally, nobody is actually doing.

Re: Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole

#69

Post by quotemstr »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #68
briandear wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is specificly why I am a climate skeptic. Not a denier, mind you, but a skeptic when it comes to anything purporting to be “settled science.” It’s specifically because there is a strong resistance to anything damaging to the status quo, as supported by grant funding and, to a lesser extent, political agenda. Frankly, it’s hard to trust academia on controversial topics.

What we need to distinguish here is what exactly we're talking about being "settled science". Is "human CO2 emissions are causing an increased greenhouse effect and ocean acidification" settled science? Yes. Is "how much will that affect us and the planet at different time scales" settled science? Not completely, no. The climate system is incredibly hard to model. What scientists are doing in the latter regard is mak…

Well, reduce emissions and more seriously consider geoengineering. A lot of otherwise-reasonable climate researchers seem to have an unduly negative view of potential direct interventions in the climate.

Re: Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole

#70

Post by daodedickinson »

zeth___ wrote: post #30
quotemstr wrote: post #15

This disgraceful behavior from academia is shredding the credibility of the entire enterprise. How is anyone supposed to trust any unintuitive conclusions with expensive implications --- for example, on climate change --- when the academic community has demonstrated a propensity to shriek at and censor unorthodox ideas instead of contest them on the merits?

Science has been hijacked from the inside for a long time now. While it's better than trusting straight up corporate releases, there are thumbs on the scales that push studies to get the results those giving the funding want. Social science is particularly bad at this, to the point I doubt any research done since the 1950s isn't ideologically tainted, at that time due to the cold war and the need to discredit anythin…

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