The h Bar

12:00 AM

my brother told me about this professor he had. the guy didn't care about the class at all. he told the students what would be on the test and how to prep for it. When he gave the test, he just left the room. so one guy blatantly cheated. a little while into the test, the prof peeks through the window and looks the guy cheating right in the eye. and then just walks on and never did anything about it.

@0celo7 So are you like studying ST hardcore now or still working up to it? Last time I heard, you were like reading stuff in preparation.

user54412

^^ sounds like half of academia.SE -- those folks don't believe in punishing cheating for some odd reason

Stan Shunpike

really? that's seems like it's counter to the spirit of academia.

0celo7

@KyleKanos I pulled out my crossbow after smithing my bolts and saw "Dwarven Bolt (1337)" in the corner. That must be an omen.

Kyle Kanos

Lol

0celo7

@ChrisWhite Why did you link me that post on my xenon question? I correctly noted it would depend on the isotope.

user54412

12:04 AM

@0celo7 It was mostly the second post I linked. I think there's some good points there (not just Lubos's answer)

Stan Shunpike

@KyleKanos So why are you proctoring an exam?

0celo7

@ChrisWhite Do you know their reasoning?

user54412

the actual definition of "boson" is like the actual definition of "virtual particle" -- everyone is certain there's no ambiguity

Kyle Kanos

@StanShunpike Part of the job :(

user54412

and yet they come to different conclusions

0celo7

12:06 AM

@StanShunpike "Hardcore" might be too string a word. I'm playing Skyrim right now instead of reading ST.

NeuroFuzzy

@0celo7 that was bad and you should feel bad :D

Stan Shunpike

@0celo7 lolol pc, xbox, ps?

@KyleKanos What are you doing now that you have defended your dissertation? What comes after that?

0celo7

X

user54412

@0celo7 No idea. But you often see things like "if the exam can be cheated on, you failed at making a good exam" or "students are going to cheat anyway; you have no right to force them to take the exam without using their phones"

Kyle Kanos

@StanShunpike Enjoying family time :D

And hopefully, after that, a job

Stan Shunpike

12:07 AM

Nice! That's always fun.

user54412

I can only assume the people saying such things got to where they are by being dishonest

Kyle Kanos

Still waiting to hear back from the bank

0celo7

@ChrisWhite That doesn't make sense.

NeuroFuzzy

@ChrisWhite that's... interesting

Stan Shunpike

@KyleKanos the bank?

@0celo7 Have you got a One yet?

0celo7

12:08 AM

@StanShunpike No monies

Kyle Kanos

@StanShunpike I'm working on getting a quantitative analyst position

0celo7

I could have bought a One with all of these damn textbooks

Stan Shunpike

Far Cry 4 is awesome dude.

My brother got the game a few weeks ago and the graphics are on ten

user54412

I personally would have cheaters kicked out of university, without exception, especially at a school where it's at all competitive to get in. It's ridiculous to give students second chances when there are millions of others who would gladly take that slot and whose only crime so far is being unlucky in the lottery that is college admissions.

7

user54412

But I seem to be in the minority there.

Stan Shunpike

12:11 AM

@ChrisWhite I must say I am not a fan either.

0celo7

I got accused of cheating once because Siri went off.

Stan Shunpike

LOL

wtf

Why? What did they accuse u of?

0celo7

You'll never see me with my phone face-up in my pocket ever again.

Looking up the unit circle on my phone for a trig test.

user54412

Happened to me on the Putnam actually (Siri, that is -- no one thought I was cheating)

Stan Shunpike

lolol the unit circle

@KyleKanos So, you won't be doing physics-related work?

0celo7

12:14 AM

I told the teacher that the unit circle is trivial and I would never jeopardize my grade by simply not memorizing it.

I barely got an A for the year because of that bullshit.

Kyle Kanos

@StanShunpike Well I'll be using my training, if that counts

And I still enjoy writing hydrodynamics stuff, so I might keep up that

0celo7

Write a book.

Stan Shunpike

@ChrisWhite what is the putnam?

NeuroFuzzy

@0celo7 things like this are how I learned that my community college had the equivalent of a citizenship grade...

Stan Shunpike

@NeuroFuzzy what do you mean?

user54412

12:17 AM

@StanShunpike The Putnam: "It is widely considered to be the most prestigious university-level mathematics examination in the world"

user54412

Maybe a bit of an exaggeration, I don't know. It's certainly hard.

NeuroFuzzy

@StanShunpike oh, just professors being annoying.

user54412

@StanShunpike 6 hours, 12 questions, 10 points each, and I was very happy to score in the 20s.

user54412

Also, my score dropped each year, which I take as a sign that I am well past my intellectual peak :/

NeuroFuzzy

@ChrisWhite I got an 11 this year, but I swear I wrote proofs that were just fine for two of them. -.-

0celo7

12:20 AM

@StanShunpike I don't know about ST. I'm 100 pages into my two string theory books, but I haven't felt the urge yet to devour the rest of them. Perhaps ST isn't really my thing. Hope not, that's $200 down the drain.

NeuroFuzzy

@ChrisWhite and the 10 was probably for the silly-easy problem. So I'm a bit disappointed. (not SUPER disappointed, obviously, because it's the putnam.)

0celo7

Meanwhile, Hawking & Ellis is calling out to me, trying to distract me from ST.

user54412

@NeuroFuzzy Not bad at all to get points. I took the exam in the same room as multiple Putnam fellows, including my roommate. In retrospect, this may have contributed to me giving up on math.

Stan Shunpike

@0celo7 so is ST not for you? What are your interests? You're doing nuclear engineering in school right this fall? Is that ur focus?

0celo7

@StanShunpike I'm not sure if it's not for me. I'm a little disappointed at my lack of enthusiasm for the subject at this point though. Recall that physics is a hobby, not what I want to do with my life.

user54412

12:29 AM

^ as though building fusion reactors is somehow not physics...

Kyle Kanos

lol: imgur.com/gallery/1ZAKrzW

0celo7

@ChrisWhite I should have been more clear. Applied physics is what I want to do.

NeuroFuzzy

@ChrisWhite Thank you. There were no putnam fellows in the room except the proctor: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Kane_%28mathematician%29

("four-time Putnam Fellow")

@KyleKanos so THAT'S what proctors do...

Kyle Kanos

Yes, imgur is life for the bored

0celo7

12:45 AM

@KyleKanos Take the exam with them!

Kyle Kanos

@0celo7 I've done it in the past, but not today

Kyle Kanos

12:57 AM

Not sure the math on this one.

Icosahedron

does anyone actually drink tea?

Kyle Kanos

The British?

0celo7

@Icosahedron Someone was brewing tea during the AP Psych review after school today.

Icosahedron

1 cup of black tea with 3 sugar cubes.

That is what I regularly take everyday.

Kyle Kanos

2 cups black coffee from Aldi

Icosahedron

1:01 AM

@0celo7 Do you have your review in the teachers lounge?

0celo7

@Icosahedron No, someone brought a plug-in tea kettle.

NeuroFuzzy

ooh... I should make coffee...

Icosahedron

@0celo7 A lot of students don't understand how water boils in kettles.

0celo7

Enlighten us

Kyle Kanos

If I drink coffee (or even have caffeinated soda) after lunch time, I'm awake until 1 or 2 am

Icosahedron

1:05 AM

There was a time when a teacher of mine brought in a kettle to steep tea for the students. He turned it on, and 10 seconds later students had already started steeping their tea.

With cold water that is.

logic: turning on the kettle = water immediately boiled

0celo7

Seems straightforward. What's the catch?

Kyle Kanos

Water requires energy to heat to a boil

So something like "Thermodynamics" is the catch

Icosahedron

and time.

0celo7

Exactly, so why does it boil so fast?

What is the catch?

Icosahedron

It doesn't, that's the catch.

Kyle Kanos

1:10 AM

5 mins ago, by Icosahedron

With cold water that is.

0celo7

You need to define steeping for those of us who don't drink tea.

Kyle Kanos

It didn't boil

Steeping is where you put the tea bag into the water

0celo7

I thought that meant he put in cold water.

I thought you put the bag in the hot water.

This is a poorly worded problem.

Icosahedron

The students did, in fact I did not see anyone react to it at all.

NeuroFuzzy

You should write the editor

Kyle Kanos

1:11 AM

@0celo7 you're supposed to do that, but these kids were putting it into cold water because they thought the kettle worked instantaneously

0celo7

Oh. That's dumb.

Kyle Kanos

Yes, that's what his point was ;)

Icosahedron

It's either due to the fact that most people don't have kettles in their homes, or that they do not know how to drink tea.

Kyle Kanos

This is the worst...I have to pee pretty bad and have 3 kids sitting in the exam

Fortunately they've got 18 minutes before the exam is over

0celo7

Tell them to fuck off

Kyle Kanos

1:13 AM

I can hold it

I'm not like my 3 y/o who lets the floodgates open when she's really gotta pee

0celo7

Are they 3 try hards who try hard or 3 people who look like they're going to switch majors?

Icosahedron

@0celo7 Do you think that you're a try hard, in regular school I mean.

Kyle Kanos

@0celo7 Can't tell (first time I'm seeing any of them)

0celo7

@Icosahedron No, I turn my stuff in 30 minutes early

Icosahedron

Exactly I agree.

0celo7

1:16 AM

100s aren't worth double checking. Hence my overall average is a $\sim95$.

Kyle Kanos

I turn my exams in when I'm done with them, whether it's after 10 minutes or the whole time

Icosahedron

I finish 75 minute physics tests in 15 minutes and just sit there watching my class work through until the final moment.

0celo7

That's ridiculous.

Your tests have to be easy, I couldn't even read the directions in that time.

Icosahedron

yeah...

junior level non ap

0celo7

If my physics teacher does one thing well, it's tests. They're not easy.

Icosahedron

1:17 AM

what is the acceleration of the block?

5x.

It's because you don't do elementary physics.

0celo7

What is the acceleration of the block attached to the spring up the ramp with friction.

Icosahedron

in that case I would just use the lagrangian with dissipation.

0celo7

Don't do that on the AP test.

Icosahedron

why not

0celo7

They rarely give points for answers.

You need work.

Icosahedron

1:19 AM

work?

ap calc on tuesday.... lame.

0celo7

i.e. show how you arrived at the answer, with all steps, using the methods they recognize.

On Physics 2 they will subtract points if you use calculus to arrive at an answer.

Kyle Kanos

^ That's how I took my exams

Icosahedron

i don't show any work.

0celo7

I don't care for your sarcasm.

Icosahedron

even if it's with the lagrangian i would just write 1 equation for the euler-lagrange with the quantities, then the final answer.

Kyle Kanos

1:22 AM

lolwut

-5

Q: FULMINOLOGY HERE NOW

11th September 2004, Burghfield, Reading, Berks, ENGLAND, Driving back from daughters house early morning, sun not up yet,wife said watch out, as i was looking out of side window, nearly put the van into the ditch, stopped the van and asked her to look out of my window, what do you see i said, "i...

quantum-mechanics

0celo7

Look at the point distribution. apcentral.collegeboard.com/apc/public/repository/…

Most points are given for work, and not all answers have points associated.

Icosahedron

that's ultra lame

who solves them like that

0celo7

Me.

Most people in high school, actually.

Icosahedron

try these

@0celo7 you don't count.

it's not like you will automatically alter your strategies the moment you enter university.

0celo7

I don't see your point.

And those problems are hard, but I don't see the relevance.

@Icosahedron Have you started Shankar yet?

Icosahedron

1:53 AM

@0celo7 I am currently trying to sort out some things.

My entire life is really messed up right now.

Stan Shunpike

@0celo7 What music have you been bumping lately?

NeuroFuzzy

2:08 AM

@Icosahedron nothing to do but stay positive

0celo7

@StanShunpike I've played Ludaversal two dozen times, at least.

I was gonna play more Skyrim, but now I feel like it's music shopping time.

Icosahedron

you buy music?

0celo7

Of course.

Icosahedron

@NeuroFuzzy I try.

@0celo7 I wouldn't know about that, I don't listen to music.

0celo7

2:34 AM

@StanShunpike Interesting. A little slow for my tastes.

Stan Shunpike

@0celo7 the beginning sounds like an electronic buzz saw with a personality.

Lol

Did you play the whole Ludaversal album? Is it all dope?

0celo7

2:58 AM

@StanShunpike It's very, very good.

I think Get Lit and Grass is Always Greener are my favorites.

Call Ya Bluff is up there too.

Danu

5:14 AM

@Qmechanic So the argument does work for $n\geq 3$? How does this jive with Schur's lemma not being applicable? Do you have any proof or reference?

@ChrisWhite Do you really think so?

@Icosahedron Many people do back in Amsterdam

NikolajK

8:58 AM

@DavidZ: Hey I saw your updated profile - did you move to China!? That's cool, how is it there. I googled the city, I didn't even know it, and it's as big as Moscow! Also, why do you water down your twitter with all the social justice worrier stuff? Looks interesting otherwise. It's funny how your SE account still says programming is a hobby, but your website says you do a lot of programming and it actually looks like it's your job :)

Qmechanic

9:36 AM

@Danu : As @ACuriousMind and you point out above, the basic version of Schur's lemma works for algebraically closed fields, which $\mathbb{R}$ ain't. It is possible to give an elementary pedestrian proof for $n\geq 3$ via a straightforward relatively short follow-your-nose calculation. (The condition $n\geq 3$ arises because one step in the proof requires 3 mutually different indices.)

For $n=2$ ($n\geq 3$), the commutant $so(n)^{\prime}\subseteq {\rm Mat}_{n\times n}(\mathbb{R})$ of real antisymmetric matrices is a division algebra $\cong \mathbb{C}$ ($ \mathbb{R}$), respectively.

Danu

10:44 AM

@Qmechanic I'm not sure what calculation you are hinting at. Did the stuff I showed when I first brought up the question go in the right direction?

Anonymous

10:56 AM

@Icosahedron This will never happen, because of PO and SE's contrasting goals, and also because of PhysicsOverflow's user rights -- specifically the right to privacy and anonymity, which says that PO data will remain only with PO. Nobody will get access to users' private data.

Mew

hi

can anyone help with my ellipse questions

Danu

> My question might sound idiotic, but I could not help it:

haha

@Dimensio1n0 Hi Dimension

Anonymous

@vzn Thanks vzn - what you say is somewhat true, but you can't blame SE for it if you have an issue with the nature of the community.

Anonymous

@Danu hi?

Mew

Would it be true to say that the shortest distance from focus to ellipse + longest distance from focus to ellipse = 2a

Danu

11:04 AM

@Dimensio1n0 I think you left PSE right around the time you joined, so we never talked. How are you doing?

Anonymous

@Danu Well, I left a bit before you joined - I remember you corrected some silly things (typos I think?) in one of my answers.

Danu

@Dimensio1n0 Could very well be true

So, are you going to be hanging out in chat? Or do you not intend to frequently return (or even participate on PSE again?!)?

Anonymous

@Danu No. I think it would be silly, even disrespectful of me to be here in chat without contributing anything to PSE. I might contribute comments or answers on the main sites that I wouldn't mind seeing deleted. It's just the lack of a clear content protection policy that scares me from contributing useful stuff.

Danu

@Dimensio1n0 Heh, I figure I should be considered disrespectful most of the time ;)

Do you mean content protection in the sense of copyright? Or in the sense of non-deletion?

Anonymous

@Danu No, you contribute to this site.

Anonymous

11:11 AM

@Danu Non-deletion.

Danu

@Dimensio1n0 Sometimes

@Dimensio1n0 What is it, exactly, that you're afraid of? Answers being deleted?

Anonymous

@Danu Well, yes. It annoys me quite a bit when things I consider significant get deleted. Especially auto-deletion - SE has a set of metrics to gauge "deletability" and it works fine most of the time. I presume their eventual goal is complete auto-moderation. The problem is it doesn't work well sometimes, especially on sites like PSE, because the stuff is designed for participation numbers on sites like SO.

Anonymous

I could go chasing around behind auto-deleted posts, and I trust that moderators would respond, but well, not too good a use of time.

Anonymous

(besides, I don't have much time to contribute significant stuff anymore, since I became mod on PO)

Anonymous

@vzn Oh, you're correct regarding disclosing that in my profile. I didn't consider that I didn't mention that -- perhaps the lack of disclosure is what made my comments seem like spam.

Danu

11:26 AM

@Dimensio1n0 Okay, so it's not the moderation, but the automatic scripts that you're wary of at this point.

Anonymous

@Danu Both.

Danu

@Dimensio1n0 What is it about the moderation that makes you uncomfortable?

Anonymous

@Danu As I said, it's annoying when things get deleted. Especially comments.

Anonymous

The point is that there's no clear content protection policy, which makes me suspcious if something's deleted.

Danu

@Dimensio1n0 Suspicious of what?

@Dimensio1n0 Okay, I get that deleted comments can be annoying.

David Z

11:49 AM

@NikolajK (1) yeah, I got a job in China that started last year. It's pretty good... they have great food :-) It's difficult to get around if you don't speak Chinese (but I'm working on that) or have people to translate for you.

(2) it's not up to you to decide what counts as watering down my Twitter account and what doesn't ;-) Assuming you mean things about gender disparity in science, I post them because it is a problem, and one that shows up in surprising ways that most people don't realize. I think certain aspects of psychology that relate to gender discrimination are quite interesting, and the large-scale data analysis that (some) people are doing to diagnose it is also interesting.

(3) Officially my job is in physics, but in practice I wind up doing a lot of programming, at least for my current project. I guess it's natural that I take the talents I've acquired in my hobbies and apply them toward my work, when it makes sense to do so.

David Z

12:02 PM

physics.stackexchange.com/review/suggested-edits/81380

...

ACuriousMind

@DavidZ Immediate review ban, I'd say :P

How on earth does one approve that?

David Z

My thoughts exactly :-P

Mew

gender disparity is fine tho

why do we need 50% women?

it's like needing 50% blondes

I wonder if there is an eye color disparity in science

that would be terrible

ACuriousMind

@Mew Gender disparity would be fine if it weren't demonstrably due to conscious and subconscious biases.

Mew

has it been proven that it is due to bias tho

In the high paying field of medicine, 55% of students are female, yet in mathematics, 10% were female

Females are choosing to not go into maths and physics and hard sciences because they don't enjoy these subjects as much as subjects that deal with people directly

But I guess females are just choosing wrong hey? They don't know what they really want right?

ACuriousMind

12:12 PM

@Mew Well, the wealth of (good and bad) studien makes it somewhat difficult to find out what is reliable and what is not, but, for example, this study, though not specifically about science fields, shows that meritocratic decision making is inherently biased against women

And since the hard sciences are very much meritocratically organized, this lets one suspect that this organizational bias is also persent in the hard sciences.

Mew

are you implying women have less merit then men

ACuriousMind

@Mew No. Look at the study, it shows that when told to evaluate equally qualified men and women by their merit, people tend to award the men more rewards than the women, which is not based upon their merit.

Paradoxically, in this study, the bias goes away when the evaluation criteria are not explicitly meritocratic anymore (hence the title)

Mew

Yes, but this isn't really related to why women don't choose to study maths and physics

in high school, examinations determine how well you do in mathematics and physics, not teacher opinion

and even those girls who do well in physics and maths tend to choose careers that work with people (like medicine, pharmacy) rather than those that deal with hard sciences

it is about instinct rather than society

the instincts of many individuals gives rise to the societal picture

ACuriousMind

You do not know instinct. You are inferring the instinct from the choice people make in the context of society, and it is undeniably the case that the hard sciences were long seen as "unfeminine" disciplines.

To say it is "instinct" doesn't explain anything at all. And I don't think the goal has to be that there's a 50-50 gender distribution in every field. But one has to ask whether the disparities in the fields are not due to societal biases that deter one gender from choosing a particular carrer.

Mew

So women don't choose physics and maths because they want somethign considered 'feminine"?

humans are more complicated than that

Women have different desires then men

Studies have shown that women use more words per day than men on average, because they enjoy social interaction more

ACuriousMind

12:21 PM

@Mew If a child is told (ex- or implicitly) from a very early age that a certain behaviour or interest is not considered appropriate, many of them will cease to pursue it. It's the "girls' toys" vs. "boys' toys" on a far grander scale.

Mew

Yet studies show that boys go for boys toys instinctively

ACuriousMind

Lol, some just flagged a math exercise posted in some other chat room :D

Mew

even before they have been exposed to advertisements

Society does make it seem like maths and physics are masculine

but this is because billions of individuals has lead to shaping society that way

rather than a superior society existing first controlling individuals

ACuriousMind

@Mew As I said before, many studies in these matters are...of questionable value. I've not been able to find sufficient evidence either way, but at least some people still discourage their chilren from playing with the toys of the "opposite gender", regardless of the preference of the child

Mew

Yes, but it makes sense

Suppose that boys really did naturally prefer boy's toys

then of course if a boy preferred a girl's toy, parents would naturally be a little startled

and may at first encourage their son to be "normal" and play with boy's toy's

and this would appear as though society is biased

even though it is also true that most boys prefer boys toys in this hypothetical scenario.

ACuriousMind

12:27 PM

@Mew You have a very...idealistic view of how society works. We are not in John Rawls' ideal society that was designed by everyone with regards to how they would want it to be if they were the least powerful. Society is shaped by those in power (not only actual force, but also control of information, etc.), and they generally shape it not with regards to the less powerful

To say that society is the way it is because people choose it to be that way is a fallacy

Mew

No i'm saying it could be the way it is because people choose it

In the West, there are no "ones in power"

everyone is accountable

My relative is head of hospital, multimillionaire, but is he in power? No because he is accountable to doctors and shareholders

Are politicians in power? No because they are accountable to voters

Are CEO's in power? no they are accountable to shareholders

ACuriousMind

@Mew Yes, of course, that is a possible explanation. Yet, again, the existence of biases in many decisions imply that many societal dynamics are not, in fact, shaped by rational and informed choices.

Mew

I've known many girls in school who were great at maths

and they swear left right and centre that they chooose a different career because they enjoy it more

not because of societal pressure

and the maths courses in Australia are piece of cake to get into at uni

ACuriousMind

@Mew Do you really not see the difference in power there? That everyone is formally accountable does not mean that there are no power differences. The head of the hospital is more powerful than a simple worker because the former's decisions affect the well-beings of many people directly and powerfully, while the latter's do not, for example.

Mew

yes

but 90% of those in power don't abuse it

They try and use thier power for greatest good

The greatest gender gap is in construction

and yet in medicine there are more female graduates than men

how perculiar

ACuriousMind

12:37 PM

@Mew Well, good for them! You see, the insidious thing about all these biases and imbalances in societal dynamics means that people may not actually be unhappy with their choices. And I am not saying they, personally, should have chosen otherwise. But this still means that society is wasting potential when 50% of the humans do largely not consider a certain career, and so it is desirable to have a world where these disparities and biases are eliminated from our decisions

Mew

If they don't pick the career because they aren't as good at it or they don't enjoy it, then who cares?

ACuriousMind

@Mew You don't have to be evil to create a system that is biased against certain types of people (e.g. none of the HR people in the study about meritocracy were, and no one creating the guidelines was, and yet, the system was demonstrably biased).

Mew

correct

normal people view mathematics as masculine and they are nto eveil

they are just realistic that naturally men are more mathematically minded then women

t does appear that on many, many different human attributes-height, weight, propensity for criminality, overall IQ, mathematical ability, scientific ability-there is relatively clear evidence that whatever the difference in means-which can be debated-there is a difference in the standard deviation, and variability of a male and a female population. And that is true with respect to attributes that are and are not plausibly, culturally determined"

ACuriousMind

@Mew ...which you are inferring again from the human being you look at after they have gone through socialization. We do not have access to the "natural" state of humans.

Mew

^Because maths and physics tend to pick those who are on the high end of the bell curve, the larger standard deviation in ability amongst men tends to increase the number of successful mathematicians

David Z

12:42 PM

This reminds me of something cool: an interactive blog post displaying how segregation emerges from tiny biases

Mew

so even if the mean ability of men and women in maths is equal, the fact that there are more great male mathematicians leads to more men in maths

because average just doesn't cut it in this field

ACuriousMind

@DavidZ That's a good one. Forgot about it, it's an awesome demonstration of "You don't need intent to create biased systems".

Mew

good demonstration

so what's the solution, force some yellows to be unhappy?

ACuriousMind

@Mew Decrease the individual bias is the solution. For humans, this means something like actively trying to prevent the next generation from inheriting the biases that their societies might have, and trying to decrease the effect of the individual biases on the society at large.

Mew

So that means decreasing women's desire to be with other women

because at the moment women might not choose maths because there are no other women in maths. This is how the yellow objects thought

this led to women sticking together (yellow triangles segregating)

so we solve the problem by teaching women that it is ok to be the only girl in the maths class

a formidible task

ACuriousMind

12:59 PM

@Mew Yes and conversely that it is okay for guys to take up careers which are women-dominated.

Mew

yeah very tricky

impossible i would say

David Z

Actually I wonder if it would be more effective to decrease men's desire to be among other men

Mew

the desire to be around peers is too strong. It is like teaching people to ignore being hungry

ACuriousMind

And yes, this is neither easy, nor is it even guaranteed that it will actually change the gender balances (because, as you said, it might be that these are actually natural distributions).

David Z

Though it's not so important because that's only a temporary solution. Once the gender balance becomes less extreme, it will be less of an influence.

Mew

1:00 PM

David, I think men have a strong desire to be around lots of women ;)

David, would you be in support of a gender balance even if it meant less competent women took the places of more competent men?

ACuriousMind

But that it isn't easy doesn't mean it is not the thing we should do. No change of any society was ever easy (and we are fortunately at a point where we do not need to resort to violence and revolution to get change).

David Z

@Mew The same argument would indicate that women have a strong desire to be around lots of men. So why were you suggesting that that desire should be increased? ;-)

@Mew nope

Mew

Well then before we push for change, we should first continue to determine whether change is necessary or not

no point putting in so much effort only to find out that the standard deviation in men's mathematical ability meant that most people able to do great maths are indeed men

David Z

I am sufficiently convinced that this change is necessary.

Mew

So you don't believe the evidence that the SD of men's IQ is greater than that of women?

And thus the number of men with IQ over say 120 is significantly greater than the number of women

Men outnumber women on the low end of the spectrum too, and women outnumber men in the middle of the specturm, thus the mean is equal among genders

David Z

1:05 PM

That's not what I'm talking about

Mew

But if the number of men with IQ over 120 exceeds that for women, then naturally you would expect a gender imbalance in the hard sciences

even without the involvement of societial bias

ACuriousMind

While IQ is the most reliable performance predictor there is, you are seriously overestimating its significance, I think.

@Mew Why not? Is a bias-free society not a goal in and of itself worthy striving for?

Mew

No it isn't

I think productivity is better than bias free.

I'd rather live in a society that has the technology to save lives and cure disease, than a society where veryone dies young but at least men and women are 50% in research

ACuriousMind

Well, if the disparities are due to inherent differences in ability, they won't go away when removing the bias, so why would productivity be negatively impacted by removing bias?

JamalS

"Actually I wonder if it would be more effective to decrease men's desire to be among other men" (DavidZ) - why is this the case? Is it even the case?

Mew

1:11 PM

wrong

ACuriousMind

The whole point of "bias" is that it is not rationally justified

Mew

various adjustments can be made to suppress able men in order to achieve equalty

in the past, banks were given extra money to hire female employees, and suitable male candidates were not hired because of these quotas

I have also heard of suggestions to change the science cirriculum to reduce abstractness, in order to encourage female participation

this can decrease the effectiveness of science in order to cater for equality

ACuriousMind

@Mew All I have talked about is removing societal biases. I have never expressed support for the various ways in which people did try to "achieve equality", and I have explicitly said that the goal is not a 50-50 gender distribution as such.

I am aware of propasal of the type "Make science pink so that girls will like it", and I believe they are as misguided as you think they are.

David Z

@JamalS I don't know, but I think it'd be worth testing. The idea is that if men actively want to have some gender diversity in their coworkers/classmates/friends/etc., then they will be more likely to encourage women to join these groups rather than discourage them. And because the groups are already male-dominated, it seems plausible that the greater effect comes from adjusting mens' attitudes.

ACuriousMind

Because all they are doing is using the societal bias to superfically remove the appearance of inequality, they are not actually removing the bias.

Mew

1:15 PM

yes

I think we generally agree then

I am mainly against using the statistic of more men in science as evidence itself for gender bias and indicative of a need for change

If specific biases/discrimination is identified it should of course be squashed, but just the fact that more men are in science doesn't mean we need to make changes

good discussion

gtg laterz all

ACuriousMind

bye

David Z

@Mew agreed. But the fact that there are more men in science (to whatever extent this is the case - more so in physics than biology, for instance) is a strong motivation to investigate whether specific biases are keeping women out of these fields. The investigation has been and is being done, and biases have been and are being found, and that's a problem.

NikolajK

@DavidZ: How is China different from where you were before - I heard the people are much more cautious of authority

there was this whole scandal about Yang and his student (from Yang-Mills theory), where the student was too scared to complain about something negative Yang did to his career.

David Z

Actually, in my experience it's kind of the opposite. In the US a lot of people are afraid of the police (often with good reason), but in China they just kind of blend in.

Ah, I see we're talking about different kinds of authority :-P

NikolajK

Ah, yeah I meant in academia :)

I had to look up the City you live in... and it's huge. I realize I don't know my geography.

David Z

1:25 PM

China does have a long tradition of very deferential teacher-student relationships. The teacher is worthy of ultimate respect, and the student is expected to be obedient. That's changing these days, though. Especially in high-level academia, there are a lot of western-educated professors, so looking at the teacher and student as partners is a lot more common.

NikolajK

I heard some actually like it if there are western students who "teach" to be more creative in the sense of not being yes-men

David Z

I would believe that

Chinese people who are reasonably educated are certainly aware of how the country's students have an international reputation for being uncreative

so I think they're trying to move away from the pure memorization model of education

It's a slow change though. Like, the Chinese class I'm taking puts a lot of emphasis on memorizing specific dialogues, even though it's not like we are going to use those dialogues in real life.

Jiminion

Does anyone know how Chinese calculus works? I've heard they teach it in a different way and it can be quite interesting to see how they solve problems. (Maybe they rote memorize many common steps?)

NikolajK

@Jiminion: I at one point spent 30 minues figuring out a multiplication like 324*12 performed in an American school book

(I'm from Europe)

Jiminion

The IQ of men is at LEAST one SD lower than women in family situation comedies....

NikolajK

1:34 PM

it's funny that even for that there are algorithms I couldn't decifer

Jiminion

@NikolajK What did they do that was odd? (My mom had a very strange way of dividing that she was taught when she was young.)

NikolajK

it wasn't "odd" per se, it was the basic american multiplication way, I guess

@DavidZ: You can of course respond to every opinion about your content with "it's not up to you to decide"...yes, it's obviously not for me to decide. The gender stuff was unexpected between the other physics results reports, and clearly, from how I said it, I'm not a fan. My female 30yo coworker here at the German Aerospace agency wants kids and after getting her PhD she’ll have to look for a good job and then right wawa flake the employers by getting on paid baby time for a year.

Hiring men over women comes with biology, life's harsh, whatcha gonna do - it’s not a good cause to make it harder for men to get into the same jobs (or post-doc position, to name a relevant example) by quota. Hell, here in Germany they have hiring positions which are dropped and put out again if no women applies (i.e. 9 men apply, but none get a chance because „equal opportunity!“).

Fact is also that if you want to date the hot girls, they make you pay at the restaurant and that will not change in my dating life. It’s self-destructive to purposely spend your time creating a world that draws all benefits from you.

David Z

You could think of it as "opinion noted and dismissed"

@Jiminion I don't know about it, but I can't imagine that it's all that different

Perhaps they do put a little more emphasis on memorization, but it seems to work out mostly the same in the end

Jiminion

@DavidZ Apparently there are circumstances where it is performed very uniquely compared with Western calculus. But I've yet to find a concrete example of this. (Ramanujan's math was unique because he learned from Carr's book, which was purely expository (w/o proofs))

NikolajK

@DavidZ: They put so much emphasis on memorization, they even have the Chinese Reminder Theorem :)

David Z

1:44 PM

haha, yeah... number theory is really just magic as far as I'm concerned :-P

@NikolajK I suppose in a way, that's why I post on gender issues: there are a lot of people who aren't aware of these subtle biases, and increasing awareness is the first step toward eliminating them. So it had better be unexpected, otherwise it's pointless.

ACuriousMind

@KyleKanos: Did you flag the "answer" in the meta post as not an answer?

Kyle Kanos

Link?

Oh, for pmd?

ACuriousMind

Yeah, I feel it'd be a conflict of interest if I did that^^

Kyle Kanos

I didn't flag it

Though now I'm thinking I should

ACuriousMind

Well, you said "This doesn't seem to answer your queries", so I figured...

NikolajK

1:57 PM

@DavidZ: One gender being in the role of having to get babies before 35 and the other being able to do that till 55 is "biologically unfair", if that makes sense. Given the uneven starting conditions, the way people are pushing it is not the situation they dream of, where everybody is happy. I don't think the world is turning for the better as we even out the path more and more. E.g. you will see more single parent families as you weaken the gender roles further and further in this way.

Men will always carry the provide role on top of that, you can't water down the differences to reach "fairness".

Anyway, I get that nobody ever changes their minds on this topic, so let's drop it.

@DavidZ: Regarding the Chinese Reminder, I recently played a Gödelian move on ACuriousMind. Wanna play?

user223679

Can someone help me in a question that I have.

NikolajK

@Mew: If you start with IQ, you will eventually only offend people - that's not a sensible argument if you want to do some good.

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