As I see it, one major purpose of institutions is to to not interfere too much with genius, to get the best people working on specific problems and challenges, and to try and give talented others on down (the rest of us, per IQ tests and abilities) opportunities to succeed.
Once you start demanding equality of outcome, you’ve gone too far, in my estimation.
There seems a lot of going too far in many parts of our institutions lately, demanding utopian ideals be their guides and that nature/human nature/reality submit to these utopian, post-Enlightenment ideals guiding these institutions.
“The purpose of bureaucracy is to devise a standard operating procedure which can cope effectively with most problems. A bureaucracy is efficient if the matters which it handles routinely are, in fact, the most frequent and if its procedures are relevant to their solution. If those criteria are met, the energies of the top leadership are freed to deal creatively with the unexpected occurrence or with the need for innovation. Bureaucracy becomes an obstacle when what it defines as routine does not address the most significant range of issues or when its prescribed mode of action proves irrelevant to the problem.”
and:
“Moreover, the reputation, indeed the political survival, of most leaders depends on their ability to realize their goals, however these may have been arrived at. Whether these goals are desireable is relatively less crucial.”
In the world of politics and the political economy, there is endless competition over limited resources and their allocation, hence the bloodsport and all the fighting.
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Here’s another take, the entirety of which can be found here.
“[Thomas] Sowell’s argument is a relatively simple one: “innate” mental abilities do not develop spontaneously but must undergo development, which is differentially fostered by different cultures, even when the abilities are general and abstract and do not consist of items of cultural knowledge. “
“…Sowell’s approach splits the difference between “nature” and “nurture“…“
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With Larry Summers being pushed out by members of the Democratic party for his nomination as chairman of the Federal Reserve, it reminds of when he was pushed out of the role of President at Harvard. For the many reasons that may be involved, I suspect the notion of a faint, scarlet ‘S’ for ‘sexist’ marked on his chest is one. You don’t need much logic or reason to make that charge.
I keep putting this post up, because, one hopes we’ll arrive at a little sanity in pursuit of truth.
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He may have been fired for many reasons, but Summers off-the-cuff Remarks at NBER Conference on Diversifying the Science & Engineering Workforce had a lot to do with it:
1. The first is what I call the high-powered job hypothesis-Summers notes that high positions demand high commitment. Science could be analogous to other professions like law. He appeals to a longitudinal study that suggests that fewer women may agree to, or be willing to, devote such time and energy to their jobs over their careers as do men. Changing the nature of these professions to higher female ratios may change some of the fundamental ways we arrange our society:
“…is our society right to expect that level of effort from people who hold the most prominent jobs?”
Perhaps…though the subtext might be: are some members of our society right to expect that the guiding ideas of diversity and equality won’t come with a host of other problems…?
What about biology?
***Charles Murray takes it a few steps further, asserting that our social sciences are leading us to become more like Europe (less dynamic and less idealistic in our pursuit of Aristotelian happiness) He also argues that there is a sea-change going on in the social science that will come to support his thinking. This last part could be a few steps too far…but it’d be nice.
2. The second is what I would call different availability of aptitude at the high end-The bell curve argument that there are more genius and idiot men. When you get to MIT, 3 and more standard deviations above the mean…means a lot.
3. The third is what I would call different socialization and patterns of discrimination in a search-If discrimination is such an important factor in there being a lack of women scientists, then economic theory holds that there are going to be:
“…very substantial opportunities for a limited number of people who were not prepared to discriminate to assemble remarkable departments of high quality people at relatively limited cost simply by the act of their not discriminating.”
So if the theory holds…where are the science departments scooping up all women scientists at low cost…who’ve been rejected elsewhere due to discrimination?
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I believe there is quite arguably discrimination against women in the sciences, and they have a harder road to reach success. But there is also substance here…and clearly politics was a factor in Summers’ firing as well; the women’s groups who viewed his ideas as an attack on their belief appealed to public sentiment in the worst kind of way.
Will social science ever be enough to address such an issue…or is it possibly changing to adapt to the demands people require of it?
On This Site: Charles Murray Lecture At AEI: The Happiness Of People
Addition: I always get an email or two that suggests I’ve joined the ranks of those who don’t fully understand the problem and seek to oppress women. I don’t think I’ve done such a thing, and if women are going broaden and deepen feminism, they may well have to answer to arguments like these.
It’s not like there aren’t women in the sciences either, Vera Rubin, Lisa Randall and Lise Meitner come to mind, but this debate is clearly not just about science. It’s also about feminism, the social sciences, money, politics, public opinion etc…
