(no subject)
I am grossly disappointed with my Sociology of Gender prof. From the beginning of the class I could tell that I was going to have problems with the class because most of her argumentation was anecdotal. To science, anecdotal evidence is worthless for a number of reasons. tNamely, anecdotal evidence is not an experiment which has conditions and a control. Still, I am quite interested in learning about the topic. However, after today I am deeply disturbed that I will not be receiving the education that I am owed.
In a gender studies class one would expect to hear about biology. Simply put, men and women are biologically different in the sense that men have are genotypically XY whereas women are XX. Further, its common place to make the claim that the differences in genders are the result of these genotypic differences. However, whether you agree or disagree with that claim should depend entirely on weighing scientific evidence. In order to weight the evidence necessitates that you understand the material. This is where my first problem with my professor arises. In her lecture about biology she did not demonstrate basic understanding of mendelian genetics. Firstly, she completely screwed up the concept of recessive and dominant genes (she actually labeled her "genes" with "little r" meaning recessive and "big D" meaning dominant - this is for different alells of the same gene mind you). Secondly, she completely confused the very essential concept that MALES DO NOT ONLY PRODUCE Y CHROMOSOMES. Let that sink in. In her lecture about sex chromosomes, all of her logic revolved around the idea that men only produce Y chromosomes. Not only is it absolutely untrue, it would make no sense at all if it were. All children born would be biologically male!!
Further, she mistreats the actual data about the chromosomes. She claims that the X chromosome contains 2200 genes, and the Y chromosome 24 (The current number is 1021 for the X and 122 for Y). I grant her that biology is not her speciality, however, in an ACADEMIC setting its is IMPERATIVE that one presents data which is ACCURATELY PORTRAYED. That is to say if she doesn't KNOW about biology she has no business teaching it to the class. Moreover, the idea that a scientist who's career is based on studying gender would have such an atrocious misconception of high school level genetics is appalling and unacceptable.
It gets worse.
She then decides its time to talk about psychology. Apparently the entire field of psychology revolves around one machine: the fMRI. At least, this is what she would have you believe. Even still, the fMRI is an extremely useful and important tool for studying the brain, so I'll grant her pardon of this misrepresentation. However, when she's explaining what it is - she completely fucks up again. She actually claims that fMRI machines are used to look at sports injuries like sprains and that its "like a fancy x-ray machine." First, fMRI machines are not used to detect sprains and they are so vastly different from x-ray machines that I'm not even going to bother explaining it here. Second, she claims that fMRI machines detect electric currents in the brain. Wrong wrong wrong. fMRI machines detect changes in magnetic resonance. It works like this, when nerve cells are active they use up oxygen. This increase in oxygen requires that blood flow to that cell increases. Hemoglobin (the fun stuff that carries the oxegen) has one magnetic level when its "loaded" and a different one when its "unloaded." The fMRI machine is then detecting the change in these levels, which indicates where blood is going, which tells you which nerves are firing. That is not the same thing as "detecting the current."
She then goes on to talk about evolution. She makes a number of mistakes here. First she claims that evolution is random. This is the BIGGEST misconception of evolution, and I would expect every single university professor who is even going to mention the word to realize. Evolution (or more specifically natural selection), is the very opposite of random chance. Natural selection works off the idea that certain gene alells are advantageous over others, and that those creatures with those alells will out produce those without them. If natural selection were random, then it wouldn't matter which genes you had because your "chance" to survive has nothing to do with which genes you have, but is entirely arbitrary. The reason this misconception occurs is because gene MUTATIONS are essentially random. That does *not* mean that natural selection is also random. She also had a number of other factual mistakes, such as saying darwin proclaimed "survival of the fittest" (Spencer actually did) and claiming Darwin had knowledge of how genes worked (which he did not. This is perfectly clear if you actually read On the Origin of Species).
After our lecture she proceeds to talk about hormones. Of course this is an interesting topic to me, because hormones go one step beyond the genetics by acting as signals for your body. My problem here is that she "presents" a number of studies which could potentially shed some light on the topic of gender. However, she never cites them. Never. They aren't in the book either. I don't have previous knowledge of the specific studies she is referring to, so I can't do any fact checking the same way I could would the biology or psychology arguments. However, after seeing her dismal display of genetics, psychology and evolution, I'm leery to take anything she says as fact, and fully want to verify all of her evidence myself. Its not that I believe the studies don't exist, however, I'm not sure that she is presenting them correctly or fully. I would not say I am being overly skeptical, but rather protecting myself from this facsimile of science that she's presenting.
For any of you who have had Susan Marshall as a professor, I feel your pain. For those who may have actually had her as a significant part of your UT education, at this point I would recommend you start looking into getting a refund. I have no doubt that she is a very intelligent woman, and I rather enjoy the "entertainment" aspect of the class. However, it is a science class and that is what I would like to be taught. I wonder why she has not had anything published in nearly a decade.
In a gender studies class one would expect to hear about biology. Simply put, men and women are biologically different in the sense that men have are genotypically XY whereas women are XX. Further, its common place to make the claim that the differences in genders are the result of these genotypic differences. However, whether you agree or disagree with that claim should depend entirely on weighing scientific evidence. In order to weight the evidence necessitates that you understand the material. This is where my first problem with my professor arises. In her lecture about biology she did not demonstrate basic understanding of mendelian genetics. Firstly, she completely screwed up the concept of recessive and dominant genes (she actually labeled her "genes" with "little r" meaning recessive and "big D" meaning dominant - this is for different alells of the same gene mind you). Secondly, she completely confused the very essential concept that MALES DO NOT ONLY PRODUCE Y CHROMOSOMES. Let that sink in. In her lecture about sex chromosomes, all of her logic revolved around the idea that men only produce Y chromosomes. Not only is it absolutely untrue, it would make no sense at all if it were. All children born would be biologically male!!
Further, she mistreats the actual data about the chromosomes. She claims that the X chromosome contains 2200 genes, and the Y chromosome 24 (The current number is 1021 for the X and 122 for Y). I grant her that biology is not her speciality, however, in an ACADEMIC setting its is IMPERATIVE that one presents data which is ACCURATELY PORTRAYED. That is to say if she doesn't KNOW about biology she has no business teaching it to the class. Moreover, the idea that a scientist who's career is based on studying gender would have such an atrocious misconception of high school level genetics is appalling and unacceptable.
It gets worse.
She then decides its time to talk about psychology. Apparently the entire field of psychology revolves around one machine: the fMRI. At least, this is what she would have you believe. Even still, the fMRI is an extremely useful and important tool for studying the brain, so I'll grant her pardon of this misrepresentation. However, when she's explaining what it is - she completely fucks up again. She actually claims that fMRI machines are used to look at sports injuries like sprains and that its "like a fancy x-ray machine." First, fMRI machines are not used to detect sprains and they are so vastly different from x-ray machines that I'm not even going to bother explaining it here. Second, she claims that fMRI machines detect electric currents in the brain. Wrong wrong wrong. fMRI machines detect changes in magnetic resonance. It works like this, when nerve cells are active they use up oxygen. This increase in oxygen requires that blood flow to that cell increases. Hemoglobin (the fun stuff that carries the oxegen) has one magnetic level when its "loaded" and a different one when its "unloaded." The fMRI machine is then detecting the change in these levels, which indicates where blood is going, which tells you which nerves are firing. That is not the same thing as "detecting the current."
She then goes on to talk about evolution. She makes a number of mistakes here. First she claims that evolution is random. This is the BIGGEST misconception of evolution, and I would expect every single university professor who is even going to mention the word to realize. Evolution (or more specifically natural selection), is the very opposite of random chance. Natural selection works off the idea that certain gene alells are advantageous over others, and that those creatures with those alells will out produce those without them. If natural selection were random, then it wouldn't matter which genes you had because your "chance" to survive has nothing to do with which genes you have, but is entirely arbitrary. The reason this misconception occurs is because gene MUTATIONS are essentially random. That does *not* mean that natural selection is also random. She also had a number of other factual mistakes, such as saying darwin proclaimed "survival of the fittest" (Spencer actually did) and claiming Darwin had knowledge of how genes worked (which he did not. This is perfectly clear if you actually read On the Origin of Species).
After our lecture she proceeds to talk about hormones. Of course this is an interesting topic to me, because hormones go one step beyond the genetics by acting as signals for your body. My problem here is that she "presents" a number of studies which could potentially shed some light on the topic of gender. However, she never cites them. Never. They aren't in the book either. I don't have previous knowledge of the specific studies she is referring to, so I can't do any fact checking the same way I could would the biology or psychology arguments. However, after seeing her dismal display of genetics, psychology and evolution, I'm leery to take anything she says as fact, and fully want to verify all of her evidence myself. Its not that I believe the studies don't exist, however, I'm not sure that she is presenting them correctly or fully. I would not say I am being overly skeptical, but rather protecting myself from this facsimile of science that she's presenting.
For any of you who have had Susan Marshall as a professor, I feel your pain. For those who may have actually had her as a significant part of your UT education, at this point I would recommend you start looking into getting a refund. I have no doubt that she is a very intelligent woman, and I rather enjoy the "entertainment" aspect of the class. However, it is a science class and that is what I would like to be taught. I wonder why she has not had anything published in nearly a decade.