Last month, I discussed what was being said about what
Lawrence Summers may have said at a conference discussing the issue of the underrepresentation of women in the sciences. Well, now we have what
Summers DID say, and from where I sit, the speculation was kind:
Among his comments to a conference of economists last month, according to the transcript, Dr. Summers, a former secretary of the United States Treasury, compared the relatively low number of women in the sciences to the numbers of Catholics in investment banking, whites in the National Basketball Association and Jews in farming. He theorized that a "much higher fraction of married men" than married women were willing to work 80-hour weeks to attain "high powered" jobs. He said racial and sex discrimination needed to be "absolutely, vigorously" combated, yet he argued that bias could not entirely explain the lack of diversity in the sciences.
At that point, the Harvard leader suggested he believed that the innate aptitude of women was a factor behind their low numbers in the sciences and engineering.
"My best guess, to provoke you, of what's behind all of this is that the largest phenomenon - by far - is the general clash between people's legitimate family desires and employers' current desire for high power and high intensity; that in the special case of science and engineering, there are issues of intrinsic aptitude, and particularly of the variability of aptitude; and that those considerations are reinforced by what are in fact lesser factors involving socialization and continuing discrimination," Dr. Summers said, according to the transcript. "I would like nothing better than to be proved wrong, because I would like nothing better than for these problems to be addressable simply by everybody understanding what they are, and working very hard to address them," he added. . .
He also urged research on "the quality of marginal hires" to the faculty when efforts to diversify are under way. How many of these hires, he asked, have "turned out to be much better than the institutional norm who wouldn't have been found without a greater search?" Or are "plausible compromises" that are not unreasonable additions to the faculty? And "how many of them are what the right-wing critics of all of this suppose represent clear abandonments of quality standards"?
So let's see now - the President of Harvard University says that he BELIEVES that women are innately inferior in the sciences BUT he would love to be proven wrong. Hmmm, Harvard has a problem attracting women for its science disciplines and the President of Harvard states that women are innately inferior in the sciences. Yes, that's just what you like to see right? Personally, I don't see how he continues as President of Harvard after this.
More on the flip
Why was this issue political rather than scientific, despite the protestation of a large contingent of scientists here at dailykos? Here's part of the answer:
After releasing the 7,000-word transcript, Dr. Summers said in a letter to the faculty that he should
"have spoken differently on matters so complex" and that he had "substantially understated the impact of socialization and discrimination." The issue of gender difference is far more complex than comes through in my comments," he wrote. . . .
[MY NOTE - Complex? Excuse me, you were talking out of your ass Summers. You were called on it in the conference and afterwards. Get up and say you were talking Bullshit.]
In recent weeks, the Summers controversy has led to a wider debate among academics about not only sex differences but also the state of campus political correctness - with Dr. Summers's supporters insisting that a left-wing cabal on the faculty was seeking to bring down his presidency over his remarks.
Many right wing pundits ripped the female scientists who were outraged by Summers' remarks. Regretfully, many kossacks piled on. I think their responses to the trancript fair vindication:
Several female scientists who were at the National Bureau of Economic Research forum and who expressed outrage at Dr. Summers's remarks there said they felt vindicated. Critics had accused them of misinterpreting him and overreacting out of political correctness. "I'm glad his words are finally out there," said Shirley Malcom, who grew up in segregated Alabama and is now the director of education for the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington. "Because so many of us have been accused of implying that he said things he did not, and now people can actually judge for themselves."
The transcript makes clear that either due to his utter lack of sensibility, the charitable interpretation, or, because he is a sexist whose prejudices have clouded his judgment, my belief, Summers is unfit for the position of President of Harvard.
Right now, Harvard is standing by him. Let's see how long that lasts. Hopefully, not long.