that males are more often outliers - they more often score really horribly and at genius level than females, who tend to bunch their scores more. --------------- Isn't this precisely what Lawrence Summers said -- before loosing his presidency as a result?
That is indeed what he said, and was derided for it by many, who were then in turn derided as PC morons refusing to accept basic fact. Turns out he was wrong after all, and the PC morons were right :) Hey, even a broken clock is right twice a day!
Mmm, not sure how he was "wrong". According to information leaked to the press, Summers listed 3 possible reasons for why there are more men than women in high-end science jobs: lack of a desire to stay longer at the job; "greater male variance" theory; outright sexual discrimination and social conditioning. He was only "wrong" in that he didn't predict that in 3 years a study would come out casting doubt on "greater male variance" theory.
p.s. also -- this is only one study. To be verified and confirmed by other studies. Also, I am curious to see some peer review -- from a first reading my impression is that it was not a blind analysis.
Yes, the second bit he turned out to be wrong about. The rest are indeed perfectly valid facts, this was theory. I wonder if he would have gotten kicked out if he skipped that bit. Probably yes. I still tend to think of knee-jerk PCers as morons. It's just a difference between born different and made different.
From what I've heard from some economics insiders, ousting of Sumners had very little to do with the actual scandal that was used as a pretext. Many in the economics community wanted to see him gone after his support for a particular professor, and this provided a perfect opportunity to make it happen.
I've heard a bunch of gossip/opinions on this. One of them is that he was trying to move Harvard more towards scientific disciplines and away from it's traditionally liberal arts curriculum. This supposedly made him lots of enemies in the liberal arts college and resulted in his ouster.
Actually, that's not what I've heard at all. As I recall the story, there was a professor in essence accused of plagiarism, whom Sumners covered because it was in his interests to do so. This supposedly lost him much respect in the economics academic community. Don't know if that's true or not, but came from a pretty reliable source.
Ok, so let's see where we stand on the number of 'theories'... :) here is my compilation:
Summers was ousted because of (choose your favorite) a) accusations of sexism b) support for a plagiarizing professor c) his decision to move half of Harvard across the river d) his decision to turn Harvard into a *real* university for a change by beefing up sciences/engineering program :). e) all of the above
Faculty of Arts and Sciences is very powerful at Harvard and hated the idea of moving from Cambridge to Allston. They hugely resented Summers's push for the move and the fact that he didn't try to appease them.
You think this is what caused them to oust Summers?? I find it hard to believe. Judging from the article yes there were some "trepidations" on part of the faculty...not exactly a pre-revolutionary mood or anything. In any case this is a speculation. NYT at the time listed another "reason" (more plausible, but still a speculation), as I described here: http://bublik64.livejournal.com/120678.html?thread=698470#t698470
The article is from before the ouster. I don't find it hard to believe at all. Faculty of Arts and Sciences likes to be treated with a lot of respect and be put ahead of all other Harvard schools and Summers simply refused to do be very political with them. That's much more likely to trigger a revolt than some insufficiently PC statements. Pure sciences are AMONG the liberal arts.
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Isn't this precisely what Lawrence Summers said -- before loosing his presidency as a result?
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He was only "wrong" in that he didn't predict that in 3 years a study would come out casting doubt on "greater male variance" theory.
p.s. also -- this is only one study. To be verified and confirmed by other studies. Also, I am curious to see some peer review -- from a first reading my impression is that it was not a blind analysis.
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here is my compilation:
Summers was ousted because of (choose your favorite)
a) accusations of sexism
b) support for a plagiarizing professor
c) his decision to move half of Harvard across the river
d) his decision to turn Harvard into a *real* university for a change by beefing up sciences/engineering program :).
e) all of the above
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Faculty of Arts and Sciences is very powerful at Harvard and hated the idea of moving from Cambridge to Allston. They hugely resented Summers's push for the move and the fact that he didn't try to appease them.
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NYT at the time listed another "reason" (more plausible, but still a speculation), as I described here: http://bublik64.livejournal.com/120678.html?thread=698470#t698470
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