That's a logical rationale, and might even be accurate, but in this case I want hard evidence.
Joel Send a noteboard - 13/01/2011 09:03:32 PM
We really can not prove why any creature evolved the way it did since we can't demonstrate evolution in the lab. I have seen speculation but like most things in this field it is nothing more then that and there is not reason why an expert’s speculation would be better then mine or maybe even yours.
There is no real difference in simple math and girls do as well if not better then boys at arithmetic and multiplication. They also do well in some complex math things like geometry proofs. It is the higher levels of math where the real differences show up and the higher you go the bigger those differences become.
The best theory I have seen is the only real difference comes in with spatial thinking. We know that men and women even seem to navigate differently with women using land marks and men more often relying on maps in their heads. In a hunter gather society where weak little humans were hunting things like mammoth and wooly rhinoceros there would have been enormous evolutionary pressure to be good at since being bad got you killed and your kids starve.
If you assume males were the primary hunters (and only screwball left sociology professors try to argue otherwise) then the ability to handle spatial issues would help the males much more then it help the females. The females were more likely to travel shorter distance and since they were aiming for stationary targets they would have been more likely to return by the same path. Land mark navigation.
Males on the other would have traveled much further to find animals then follow them looking for opportunities to pick off weaker straggles from a large herd. Once they started hunting they would have used multiple men driving the animal to a desired location to kill it. That requires spatial skills to both plan and execute, be in the wrong place and your trampled, let it get away and your status as a hunter drops. Once you attack spatial skills come into play with angles of attack and such.
Like I said that is all just a theory and unprovable since we don’t even know how they hunted but it does give a viable explanation.
There is no real difference in simple math and girls do as well if not better then boys at arithmetic and multiplication. They also do well in some complex math things like geometry proofs. It is the higher levels of math where the real differences show up and the higher you go the bigger those differences become.
The best theory I have seen is the only real difference comes in with spatial thinking. We know that men and women even seem to navigate differently with women using land marks and men more often relying on maps in their heads. In a hunter gather society where weak little humans were hunting things like mammoth and wooly rhinoceros there would have been enormous evolutionary pressure to be good at since being bad got you killed and your kids starve.
If you assume males were the primary hunters (and only screwball left sociology professors try to argue otherwise) then the ability to handle spatial issues would help the males much more then it help the females. The females were more likely to travel shorter distance and since they were aiming for stationary targets they would have been more likely to return by the same path. Land mark navigation.
Males on the other would have traveled much further to find animals then follow them looking for opportunities to pick off weaker straggles from a large herd. Once they started hunting they would have used multiple men driving the animal to a desired location to kill it. That requires spatial skills to both plan and execute, be in the wrong place and your trampled, let it get away and your status as a hunter drops. Once you attack spatial skills come into play with angles of attack and such.
Like I said that is all just a theory and unprovable since we don’t even know how they hunted but it does give a viable explanation.
That may seem odd coming from me, but it's precisely because I know determination and experience will enable most people to produce a plausible rationale for even the most absurd proposition. A friend of mine from HS used to talk about a fellow Plan II student at UT whose senior thesis was an Aristotelian DISproof of gravity; logically airtight, and completely ridiculous--and even the author knew it. We might not have observed speciation in the lab, but we have observed specialization, and that approach seems like it offers the possibility of evaluating whether there's a sexually based difference beween mathematical ability. Or it might not, but it seems worth exploring. Forming a theory is only part of the equation; testing that theory is just as vital.
Honorbound and honored to be Bonded to Mahtaliel Sedai
Last First in wotmania Chat
Slightly better than chocolate.
Love still can't be coerced.
Please Don't Eat the Newbies!
LoL. Be well, RAFOlk.
Last First in wotmania Chat
Slightly better than chocolate.
Love still can't be coerced.
Please Don't Eat the Newbies!
LoL. Be well, RAFOlk.
Looks like the feminist movement wasn't as successful as it appears
11/01/2011 06:21:01 PM
- 2092 Views
I think you're extrapolating a bit too much
11/01/2011 06:45:38 PM
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The aricle does mention that women feel pressured to work when they did not want to
11/01/2011 06:48:47 PM
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I don't trust the figures.
11/01/2011 06:50:24 PM
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One assumes the latter, to the extent that "same job with same experience" can be defined. *NM*
12/01/2011 07:10:13 PM
- 601 Views
While I don't 100% agree with the article, some feminists annoy me no end.
11/01/2011 06:47:03 PM
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My wife told me just this weekend I need to stop pressuring her to have a career
11/01/2011 06:52:11 PM
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Re: My wife told me just this weekend I need to stop pressuring her to have a career
11/01/2011 09:35:43 PM
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Re: My wife told me just this weekend I need to stop pressuring her to have a career
12/01/2011 01:36:14 AM
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It's not just that choice though.
11/01/2011 07:12:48 PM
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It feels more hypocritical coming from feminists than "traditionalists". *NM*
11/01/2011 07:17:24 PM
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For you maybe.
11/01/2011 07:27:52 PM
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I agree. I would also like to add, if I may...
12/01/2011 01:27:59 AM
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all 25 of them?
12/01/2011 05:14:56 AM
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Pffft, look it up a bit. You might find info on the national propaganda radio (NPR) site.
12/01/2011 12:47:33 PM
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It's a difficult dynamic even under the best of circumstances, when both partners have chosen it.
12/01/2011 02:25:20 PM
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I have to admit that this bothers me.
11/01/2011 07:33:09 PM
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I guess you think the same of me then.
11/01/2011 09:48:31 PM
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Another one?
12/01/2011 06:01:43 AM
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Re: Another one?
12/01/2011 12:33:58 PM
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~never mind~ *NM* *NM*
12/01/2011 04:42:47 PM
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I'm going to answer you anyway.
12/01/2011 04:54:18 PM
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not to mention
12/01/2011 05:11:42 PM
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you don't want kids?
12/01/2011 05:46:25 PM
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bleck
12/01/2011 11:14:25 PM
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You don't have to be a doctor to contribute to the world
12/01/2011 05:27:26 PM
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Poor Aeryn
12/01/2011 05:29:47 PM
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I replied before she edited
12/01/2011 05:41:53 PM
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The primary issue...
12/01/2011 05:52:42 PM
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Agreed; ironically, that first line applies to this thread and mine with the parenting article.
13/01/2011 10:00:28 PM
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It has been a long, long time since I have seen a woman getting looked down on for staying at home.
12/01/2011 01:48:42 AM
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My commentary on the whys and wherefores of this stuff would be way too politically incorrect
11/01/2011 07:56:24 PM
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I think all of that makes sense
11/01/2011 08:36:39 PM
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I'm not sure why either sex should surpass the other in math.
12/01/2011 02:34:09 AM
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men have more physical strength period
12/01/2011 05:30:14 AM
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There's a lot more to running (especially marathons) then leg strength.
12/01/2011 05:41:11 AM
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how much time the experts spend being wrong doesn't make them less wrong
12/01/2011 03:16:10 PM
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How much more time they've spent studying it before drawing conclusions makes a big difference.
12/01/2011 05:42:26 PM
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your right it is just a coincidence that their results always matches their politics
12/01/2011 05:56:03 PM
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There's definitely such a thing as a self fulfilling prophecy.
12/01/2011 07:00:23 PM
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so you would trust them if they only admitted conseratives?
12/01/2011 09:51:00 PM
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Admitted? No, but they'll take anyone with the grades.
13/01/2011 09:47:42 PM
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Every study I have seen shows most schools have few to no non-leberal proffesors
13/01/2011 10:07:08 PM
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Every study I've ever seen shows that math and science fields have few to no women.
13/01/2011 10:42:46 PM
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not when we know men are better at math thewpmen are
13/01/2011 11:10:18 PM
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Sigh... we know no such thing, and even if we did, it would be those biased liberals telling us.
13/01/2011 11:30:33 PM
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When you talk about reasons men "should" be better at math
12/01/2011 03:47:53 PM
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Both, really; the latter is a consequence of the former.
12/01/2011 05:21:28 PM
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I'm trying to understand your position
12/01/2011 05:28:43 PM
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Now you've got it.
12/01/2011 06:40:50 PM
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we know the brain of women works differently then the brains of men
12/01/2011 05:40:15 PM
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What evidence I'm aware of seems inconclusive.
12/01/2011 06:46:50 PM
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There are theories but of course they are unprovable
12/01/2011 10:50:08 PM
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That's a logical rationale, and might even be accurate, but in this case I want hard evidence.
13/01/2011 09:03:32 PM
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I think if you look you find you believe all sorts of things that can't be proven
13/01/2011 10:03:54 PM
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here is some evdience to argue that it is not society but biology
13/01/2011 08:43:43 PM
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I think you did like I always do and forgot to give us a way to click your link.
13/01/2011 09:56:52 PM
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oops
13/01/2011 10:07:55 PM
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Seems like that's an argument for both views, in a way.
13/01/2011 11:14:11 PM
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You can use anything to prove what you want if you are willing to spin it hard enough
14/01/2011 02:57:29 PM
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I would also like to say this:
11/01/2011 09:33:23 PM
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Of course
12/01/2011 01:47:14 AM
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"Night" is also almost invariably feminine, in my experience.
12/01/2011 07:58:12 PM
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Re: "Night" is also almost invariably feminine, in my experience.
12/01/2011 08:15:59 PM
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I'm glad YOU think it's fun...
13/01/2011 10:05:07 PM
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I seem to remember reading about genders in Norwegian once, but I forget now...
13/01/2011 10:11:24 PM
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Re: I would also like to say this:
12/01/2011 09:15:28 AM
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Re: I would also like to say this:
12/01/2011 12:27:14 PM
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No
12/01/2011 12:28:48 PM
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Re: No
12/01/2011 12:35:56 PM
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Re: No
12/01/2011 12:37:33 PM
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Re: No
12/01/2011 12:43:36 PM
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Re: No
12/01/2011 12:47:56 PM
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Since this has become too complicated
12/01/2011 12:54:54 PM
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The two are used as different psychological concepts.
12/01/2011 02:24:58 PM
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Have you left a memo at the Feminist Movement's Office?
12/01/2011 12:46:45 AM
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what the point? Like good liberals they only believe science that agrees with them *NM*
12/01/2011 05:31:09 AM
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Actually, the feminist movement was completely successful.
12/01/2011 01:42:44 AM
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I was playing a bit but I agree that the feminist in the past accomplished a lot
12/01/2011 05:34:04 AM
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NOW is just a left-leaning PAC.
12/01/2011 03:16:52 PM
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I would argue the women's movement and the feminist movement are not the same thing
12/01/2011 03:53:19 PM
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Mmm. I don't think you understand the feminist movement. You have been reading to many things
12/01/2011 01:56:20 AM
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I was refering to groups like NOW
12/01/2011 05:40:46 AM
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Gosh, look what you started.
12/01/2011 03:00:23 PM
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somebody need to start something it is pretty dead around here *NM*
12/01/2011 03:16:54 PM
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I agree that it would be awesome to hang with my kid every day and not have to work.
12/01/2011 11:33:25 PM
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that part would be great
12/01/2011 11:40:49 PM
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I could do it every day.
13/01/2011 12:52:56 AM
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So here's the question. Why don't men have a "choice" to opt-out?
15/01/2011 06:13:28 AM
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This sounds awful to me.
13/01/2011 04:27:08 AM
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I should have twigged on to that sooner. I would have if I had read more posts before answering.
13/01/2011 02:50:20 AM
- 1071 Views