This is all true, and what's more it's clear as day to anyone with half a brain.Quote:
Originally Posted by Vota
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuro...ex_differences
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This is all true, and what's more it's clear as day to anyone with half a brain.Quote:
Originally Posted by Vota
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuro...ex_differences
Not true. Let's look at a few jobs which can be described as "physical labor" and you can decide whether you think men are more adept at them:
1) Housecleaning.
2) Knitting.
3) Repetitious tasks on an assembly line that don't demand heavy lifting.
4) Waiting tables at a restaurant.
These jobs are often done by women. Other manual labor jobs for which men have few (if any) innate physical advantages, but which are generally performed by men include:
1) Auto mechanic
2) plumber.
3) carpenter
etc., etc. ad infinitum
Jobs that men are probably innately better than women at performing:
1) Mixed martial artist (and many other less idiotic sports).
2) A few other jobs in which strength or size is very important.
By the way, "People like Ecurb" -- a silly and insulting phrase -- do acknowledge the obvious. What I don't acknowledge is that sexist stereotypes are "obviously" the result of innate physical differences. As I said before, they might be, but they might not be. It is often extremely difficult to determine.
I'll grant, Clopin, that since it all appears "clear as day" to you, you also appear to have "half a brain". Is that the left side, or the right side?Quote:
Originally Posted by Clopin
Give me a break, who refers to knitting or waiting tables as 'physical labour'? And is knitting really a 'job' for very many people? I actually never said that women are physically hindered from becoming plumbers or auto mechanics, I agree they are not.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ecurb
Carpentry requires heavy lifting, which men are better suited for. And suggesting that a strength imbalance between men and women is a 'sexist stereotype' is absurd.
I think he was pulling your leg Clopin. I hope he was!
In "Twelve Years a Slave" the champion cotton picker was a woman. Does picking cotton constitute "physical labor"? Of course if by "physical labor" you mean only "labor requiring physical strength" then men have the advantage. How are housecleaning and cotton picking not "physical labor", though?
They are, and you're right, physical tasks which require endurance and not strength do not favour men particularly (though there is a clear cultural bias towards physical prowess in males so I suspect your average male can, in fact, pick more cotton than your average female) so I misspoke. Considering the entire realm of physical labour though, men clearly hold a large advantage in the jobs which do require strength, I'll list a few since you seem to doubt their existence.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ecurb
Pipefitter
Stocker
Construction Worker
Mover
Landscaper
Firefighter
Sheet Metal Worker
Bricklayer
Women also have weaker grip and I'm not a plumber, but maybe if you can't open a jar you'll struggle plumbing as well?
It has already been stated that there is an obvious physical difference between men and women. I think you are labouring the point, (haha), as is Clopin. You just need to compare athletes.Quote:
Originally Posted by Vota
It is stretching a point to suggest jobs with more skill cannot be done by women and nowadays construction work has lots of assistive tech like those conveyor belts for roof tiles, portable lifts etc. (You might want to mention it to your boss and yes I've worked on construction too).
I think the cultural standards we have probably have more influence than you might think. With a labouring job it's not merely down to how much you can lift but whether you can stick with the job. If you consider other countries that don't consider sex to be a barrier to this kind of work then you do find women labouring there in India and other Asian countries. Women were conscripted to dig tank traps and defences in WW2 in Russia. An example in extremis you might say, but they also had front line units made of women. Necessity and a different attitude to what women were expected to is the key. In cases like heavy physical work, it's not about barriers but the expectations of both sexes that this is not their kind of work. You may be a good worker, but in your line of work it's about being able to carry on all day everyday, not about how much you can lift at one time.
This is separate from Clopin's argument that women just do not produce as much excellent literature as men despite his acknowledgement that women intellectually outperform men academically. He also cites more physicists chess players and mathematicians as support for his idea that our reproductive system inherently produces more male geniuses with the counter that this also results in more violence and psychopathic men.
I do not agree with this assessment because it makes a number of assumptions about maths physics and chess and whether any of the qualities needed to become good in this field have any relation to literary excellence.
If we question whether women have equal opportunities in maths chess and physics, we'd have to say yes, but are the expectations that these are the pursuits of men rather than women already there? On the Big Bang Theory comedy - excellent though it is - we get a double message. Science is ok for both sexes, but physics is nerdy and in Sheldon's case for the weird. The women scientists are into biological sciences, which on the one hand shows successful women scientists, but on the other reinforces the idea that physics and engineering is for those nerdy boys. Good though it is, it still contains cultural assumptions, and it is difficult to say whether those cultural assumptions are not influencing the choices made by the sexes regarding career paths in science. In fact the lead physicist on the British satellite that landed on a comet recently was a woman, but we don't usually see women in those roles. Except I've just remembered a black woman astrophysicist who is on the telly. Maybe things are slowly changing.
For these reasons I just don't think you can make bland statements about men being more productive than women. The barriers to women still exist in society and culturally. It is changing though so you'd better keep up.
Another thought - I wonder if you being Canadian is significant in your views. I remember Juniperwolf - a Canadian who used to post - going on about the masculine culture she lived in. Just wondering.
Nobody has made the argument in this thread that there are jobs which women can not perform, even assuming the job is something like ditch digging, women can do it of course just not as well.
Aside from that I have no problem with your post. You don't think evolutionary psychology is as important as cultural or societal pressures and you could be right. I expect to live at least another fifty or so years, so if by then a full 50% of inventions, scientific breakthroughs, mathematics jobs, physics jobs, chess grandmasters, political positions and engineering positions, are made or held by women while 50% of childcare, education, healthcare or social assistance positions are held by men I will certainly admit that my ideas on the subject were dead wrong.
I see it as sort of a chicken and the egg argument, what came first a natural predisposition to certain roles and functions in society which caused a widening gap and inequality over time, or an artificial social hierarchy that culturally pressures people into this or that role and severely underpowers women.
I think it's mostly 1 with a heavy dose of 2, though 2 is becoming less and less prevalent every year and I can't notice any disadvantage women face in entering the hard sciences today. Most of the disadvantage people observe are based on result I.E "women occupy only 10% of jobs in petroleum engineering (no idea if that is true btw) so they must be at a severe disadvantage in entering this field", which, while certainly a possibility is not evidence in itself of any serious lack of opportunity. Like I said, women outperform men in school so do we have to now suggest that this is entirely due to inequality faced by males? I don't think so.
Also I don't think Canada is an overly masculine environment... maybe compared to somewhere like Sweden it is.
Vota made the physical argument strongly, but I think he overstated it beyond the athletic situation.
I think your post is on the whole fair, but whereas there may be more overt advantages for women to take up jobs in petrochemicals - to use your example - the actuality of the situation may be that it is women's mindset that mean they do not take a career route that leads there. Due to current cultural expectations and conditioning, they may make choices which steer them away from such work. That is speculation of course, but I think there's something in it. Who in the Reagan era would have thought that a black president would be possible within 30 years until black presidents began to appear in films like Independance Day. It is very difficult to quantify, but you can see positive movements in things like gay rights and disability laws.
I was just wondering about Canada. Orphan Pip, another Canadian poster, was much more cosmopolitan so I just wondered.
Here in the UK a large local council - Birmingham - was recently ordered to compensate women employees for underpaying for equivalent work done by men. I was surprised at this as the council had a sheen of the progressive. It does show that there's a way to go in employment terms.
Cultural factors that lead to differences in achievement between the sexes can be subtle. Based on my experience, I think it's correct to say that men are more competitive (about sports OR career achievement) than women, on average. But we need not assume that the difference is innate; it could just as easily be based on differences in child-rearing, or differences in how boys and girls are treated.
It's well known, for example, that eldest children are considerably more likely to achieve success (based on a wide variety of measurements) than younger children. Perhaps we can all agree that the difference here is unlikely to be genetic, or even based on the prejudices of society. Logically, it must be psycho-cultural. It's reasonable to think that differences in achievement between the sexes may result from similar psycho-cultural factors. Of course it might also be that such differences can be explained by evolutionary-psychology.
The problem with evolutionary psychology is that it tends to reason in circles. Men are more competitive than women because being more competitive helped them have more children (in the days of polygamy, possibly). However, such generalities tend to be unpersuasive and banal. Even if they are correct (as might well be the case), how do they help us understand and cope with male or female psychology? How do they help us explain cultural differences around the world? In addition, we have no way of knowing if the assumptions ARE correct. Didn't some hyper-competitive men join the priesthood? What about homosexuality -- doesn't that cast doubt on evolutionary psychology? Like many reductionist explanations for complex behaviors, evolutionary psychology lacks both sophisticated predictive capacity and falsifiability. It sounds good, but doesn't really get us anywhere.
Just to clarify my last point, the logical error I often see in Evolutionary Psychology is assuming the antecedent. The error involves the following mistaken logic:
postulate: If A, then B.
Observation -- B exists.
Erroneous conclusion: A must have existed.
Evolutionary thought often falls into this error. Even just considering physical traits (as opposed to more complicated psychological or culturally constituted mores and behaviors), we cannot assume that because a trait exists, it must have promoted descendent-leaving success.
It is true that if a genetic trait increases descendent-leaving success it will tend to spread. That's the fundamental principle of Darwinism. However, assuming that because a trait has spread, it must have increased descendent-leaving success involves the logical error I point out above.
Women actually are not paid less for the same work, the studies which have shown that women make 77 cents on every dollar a man earns only took into consideration total earnings by gender and did not control for relevant variables like field of employment or even hours worked.Quote:
Originally Posted by Paulclem
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christ...b_2073804.html
Ecurb you realise that the exact same reasoning is applied to the following example
"If women are underrepresented in many fields there must be a bias against women inherent in those fields"
"Women are underrepresented in many fields"
"Therefore the reason for this must be that women are being kept out of these fields due to bias"
I don't feel like debating the nature vs nurture thing anymore though, you obviously think nature plays a very small role while I think the evidence suggests it plays a very large role and since neither of us are going to 'prove' the other wrong I'm fine with agreeing to disagree.
I'll just close with saying that I don't even think it comes down to one or the other, nature or nurture, I think both play a role and both are important.
I agree that it's futile to argue nature vs. nurture. There's no way of determining the answer (although my example of eldest children out-performing their siblings proves that it's POSSIBLE that the differences in achievement between men and women are based on nurture alone).
Also, I never argued that (direct) bias is the primary factor for differences in achievement between the sexes. It probably once was -- women didn't go to University, etc. But that's no longer the case, and, as you point out, it would be a logical error to assume the antecedent. However, some sort of "bias", or, at least, differential treatment from the parents MUST be the reason for eldest children's success. What else could it be?
Eldest children have a statistically higher I.Q score, I'm not sure I.Q can be raised through nurture.
There's no genetic reason that eldest children should have a higher I.Q. score than their siblings, so I.Q. clearly CAN be affected by nurture. (I suppose there may be one possible reason, which is that older women are more likely to bear children with birth defects, but I think this alone can't explain the I.Q. differential.) The influence of nurture has also been proven with identical twin studies. Genetically identical twins who have been adopted and raised in different families can have significantly different I.Q.s. In addition, studies show that proper nutrition (as just one example) affects I.Q. -- which is just one example of nurture's impact.Quote:
Originally Posted by Clopin
My guess is that eldest children are more "adult oriented", because their significant relationships in their early life are with their parents. They are therefore more likely to achieve "adult-oriented" goals, including scoring well on I.Q. tests. Younger children are more "peer-oriented", because in addition to their relationships with their parents, they have early relationships with siblings. I'll grant this is just a guess.
I would be interested in reading about the twins actually. And yeh there's evidence to suggest that younger parents bear healthier children but I would assume it more likely comes down to the family unit in European/North American cultures if there are consistent trends among eldest, youngest and middle children.
I find IQ tests dubious considering they are based on certain knowledge the participant might have. I remember reading somewhere how black people in the 60's always scored lower than their white counterparts on IQ tests. It was later shown this was because many black people had never gone to highschool, or something to that effect, so they would not have had the knowledge to take the tests properly. I'm probably not relaying this quite accurately, but that was the gist of it.
There are people that regularly practice these tests to get higher scores. Right off the bat this should tell you something about the nature of these tests.
My anthropology teacher made a pretty good case against the validity of IQ tests once by using aborigines as an example. He said that these people would utterly fail a typical IQ test, but you could place 100+ items in a particular organization in front of them, and then they could repeat that from memory. Now I don't know about you, but the only people that I know that can pull off this kind of feat of memory are people who specialize in card and number memorization.
I'm not saying IQ tests have no validity, but what they test or prioritize doesn't tell the whole picture or give an accurate account of a person's intelligence. I've typically scored extremely high in English tests, and writing essays has always been extremely easy for me, but my math ability is just average. I have very high artistic talent/ability in both painting and music, but chemistry drives me bat**** crazy.
All I'm saying is that IQ tests are a little dubious in what they really say.
I've used the word dubious twice in this post. Double checking to see if it means what I think it means...yes. Inconceivable.
IQ tests aren't based on knowledge though and they seem to be pretty accurate, why Africans score fairly low and East Asians fairly high is a different argument.
IQ tests are based on knowledge. How can you actually test someone's IQ without a reference base of some sort? You can't. Recognizable symbols are still symbols with which we are all familiar with, but you showed an aboriginal certain symbols they might not know what to do with them.
I already mentioned people practicing IQ tests to score higher on them. If IQ tests weren't based on knowledge then it would be impossible to increase your score through practice.
Intelligence tests should use ten or more kinds of test before a generalisation can be made about a score. In practice they tend to focus on three areas : verbal reasoning, numerical aptitude, spatial awareness. I'm sure many of us are already saying but what about ... I find them a crude but perhaps interesting tool to determine a limited number of intellectual abilities. The post above saying the results can improve with practice is correct.
They usually gauge spatial reasoning with a series of logic puzzles, none of which rely on any knowledge base. You can improve through practice though so I agree, they aren't perfect.Quote:
Originally Posted by Vota
That's interesting. I wonder why they emphasize spatial reasoning when basic Math and English skills are much more valued in general?
Well IQ isn't really 'intelligence' as most people would define it. If someone with, say a 110 IQ spent all of his time reading and studying he or she would certainly be more knowledgeable and contribute more to any discussion than someone with a 130 IQ who never learned to read and spent all of his time digging ditches... or something.
Spatial awareness is significant in lots of engineering tasks and tasks which requires the ability to "see" something three-dimensionally before it is made.
I suspect engineers as a group have a higher median IQ than most.Quote:
Originally Posted by Eiseabhal
I assume my spacial awareness is pretty good. I remember having to make the most complex molecular model in the class and getting it right on the first try. The teacher kind of looked at me funny.
I've taken a few IQ tests and usually come out in the low to mid-130's, but I don't put much stock in it. I've had a couple of friends that were in the mid-140's and it felt like our intelligence levels were very even with each other.
I think Clopin's point about knowledge and experience playing a big factor is accurate.
hhhm, I clicked onto this thread thinking the title and the content of the thread would be related....
^ what you said. lol.
To the OP, there are also lots of lists of contemporary literature too. There is a very good top twenty five at quicklit for example. I would include a link, but i'ma newbie and the system won't let me.
I don't know the classics as well as some here, but is the author's body of work a factor in "canonization"?
For example would the fact that E.L. Doctorow has a fairly impressive body of work score points for his best work, where as someone like Claude Brown might get whacked because he only ever produced one great book? I know Harper Lee is the exception and most people consider To Kill A Mockingbird a modern classic. But still...
I also liked what the OP said about 1984 and some others making the grade because of the ideas put forth rather than the actual quality of the writing. I would add to that books that capture the spirit of a specific time, event, or social climate so well that they become synonymous. Dickens did this superbly, Fitzgerald had the roaring 20's, etc. I don't think anyone would call Roots a literary masterpiece, but does it matter?
Good points. I think the one about a body of work is interesting as we haven't really touched on it, though we skirted the issue a bit when discussing Cormac McCarthy.Quote:
Originally Posted by easy75
I suppose it depends. Dickens clearly has a well known body of work, but there are authors like Melville for whom only one is regarded as a classic. Maybe Don Delillo's work will qualify.
By the way, from this thread we started the Nominations for modern classics thread where the intention is to recommend modern works as potential classics. I, personally, am bored by the extensive lists of books that are regularly posted in response to questions. They often don't say very much about what really recommends the books.
I'm much more interested in why posters nominate certain books in terms of ideas, narrative form and other stylistic features. I think it adds a bit more depth to the discussion.
Ahhh, I posted over there but didn't really explain my nominations very well. I will have to edit it later. Plus I forgot a few :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Paulclem
I like this topic, and I think it is relevant. I like to connect modern authors with the ones that came before them, which is probably a silly exercise, but when I read Steinbeck I always think of Dickens. I think the classics deal with things that are universal and timeless. When the books start to lose relevance to the current age, it creates a void that new authors step in to fill. Farewell to Arms may or may not be the classic WWI story, but is it relevant in the same way to the Vietnam generation? The Iraq War generation? Doubtful. So insert Tim O'Brien and maybe someday Phil Klay.
So I guess what I'm saying is, more than anything else, it is how modern books connect on an emotional level to people and events that will determine their future status.