Responding to the question “What do you believe that most people on this site don’t?”:
I believe that people who try and sound all “edgy” and “serious” by intoning what they believe to be “blunt truths” about race/gender differences are incredibly annoying for the most part. I just want to roll my eyes when I see that kind of thing, and not because I’m a “slave to political correctness”, but because I see so many poorly defined terms being bandied about and a lot of really bad science besides.
(And I am not going to get into a big explanation right here, right now, of why I think what I think in this regard—I’m confident enough in this area here to take whatever status hit my largely-unqualified statement above brings. If I write an explanation at some point it will be on my own terms and I frankly don’t care who does or doesn’t think I’m smart in the meantime.)
Racial differences and gender differences are very different topics. Especially if we are interested in discussing whether, or the extent to which, they are rooted in biology.
I agree (and I see sex/gender as far more valid of a biological concept than “race”, for the record), but I’ve noticed a correlation between people who would describe themselves in terms like “race realist” and people who think there’s good evidence for women being “less suited” to math and science than men, cognitively speaking. (And again, getting deeply into this right now is not something I’m going to do, it would be wandering off-topic for one thing.)
Responding to the question “What do you believe that most people on this site don’t?”:
I believe that people who try and sound all “edgy” and “serious” by intoning what they believe to be “blunt truths” about race/gender differences are incredibly annoying for the most part. I just want to roll my eyes when I see that kind of thing, and not because I’m a “slave to political correctness”, but because I see so many poorly defined terms being bandied about and a lot of really bad science besides.
(And I am not going to get into a big explanation right here, right now, of why I think what I think in this regard—I’m confident enough in this area here to take whatever status hit my largely-unqualified statement above brings. If I write an explanation at some point it will be on my own terms and I frankly don’t care who does or doesn’t think I’m smart in the meantime.)
Racial differences and gender differences are very different topics. Especially if we are interested in discussing whether, or the extent to which, they are rooted in biology.
I agree (and I see sex/gender as far more valid of a biological concept than “race”, for the record), but I’ve noticed a correlation between people who would describe themselves in terms like “race realist” and people who think there’s good evidence for women being “less suited” to math and science than men, cognitively speaking. (And again, getting deeply into this right now is not something I’m going to do, it would be wandering off-topic for one thing.)