Matt Taylor's shirt

[Vorian]

1) He was in a PR role (and should have been conscious of this), but is a full-fledged contributing member of the team. No particular argument there, and I'm not sure where you saw it. (It's possible I'm overlooking or forgetting something here.)

This post in particular stands out. It doesn't appear to be a common argument but it's there.

[Cycle]

1) I've seen people repeatedly try to dismiss Matt Taylor as a "PR guy". That strikes me as exceptionally disrespectful.

Are people dismissing him as a "PR guy" or criticizing him for not understanding that he was acting as a "PR guy" in addition to being a scientist with a PhD?

Being a scientist with a PhD doesn't mean everything you do is right, nor does it mean you are good at everything.  The mistake Taylor made here is that he didn't understand what the role of being a "PR guy" required of him.  That is, he needed to think about the image he was projecting to the world.  Both on behalf of his other team members (i.e., not just himself), as well as the image that others see (i.e., he is supposed to be someone that the next generation looks up to).

[Beorning]

"Rape culture" as used in the feminist mainstream absolutely, categorically does not include "all men are rapists" or "all penis-havers are rapists" or "all penis-havers are men" or "looking at a woman is rape". Are there extremists who hold these views? Yes - a tiny minority at the extreme edge of the bell curve that other feminists are fighting against. Painting this crap as the viewpoint of all feminists - against what every single person around you is saying - is frankly deceptive bullshit.

Hm. Pardon me for bringing up the things I've said earlier in the general feminism thread, but... the Swedish "rape tax" proposal? It was created specifically because of the "all men are rapists" mentality. And it made it to the Swedish parliament. So... "a tiny minority at the extreme edge of the bell curve"? Not really, not.

And for all the claims you're making about most feminists fighting this sort of stuff, I haven't heard a single feminist voice back here criticizing that proposal. I also haven't heard any feminists criticizing Magdalena Środa for her outrageous misoandrist views. And, on a human-to-human, Internet forum level, I've observed what happens when, say, one feminist poster spews bile on our current president's wife for her having made a choice of being a housewife. What happens is that other feminists shrug and don't say a word against it. Because it's easier to endlessly rant about the evils of men, Church, etc.

Yes, I do realize that I'm not deeply into feminist publications, discussion etc. But really, my personal experience just doesn't convince me in the truth of the claim that the misoandrist, hateful feminism is a fringe edge of the movement that's actively being fought against.

[Cassandra LeMay]

Well. Those of us arguing that it was a problem? The position I've been seeing, and the one I espouse, is "This shirt will probably not discourage women from entering STEM in and of itself, but it is certainly symptomatic of the much larger cultural issue STEM has with women - and that does. This is why it was a problem and why it was appropriate to call him out on it." I, for one, would be very glad to see the discussion transition away from the shirt and toward the general problem it is representative of.

So you are saying that you would be happy to have a calmer discussion? That's all well and good, but given that that discussion doesn't really happen, aren't you implying that that is everyone else's fault? I am sure there is a more scientific name for this rhetorical device, but I would call it "finger pointing by implication". That doesn't help all that much to further the debate culture you might want to see here.

But then you get people like Nachtmahr or Euron Greyjoy, who drag it back to "HOW DARE YOU QUESTION WHAT HE WORE IT'S JUST A SHIRT", so we get stuck at the stage of saying "It's not just about this one action, it's about the much broader context of that action."

Summing up other people's opinion IN ALL CAPS?

That is exactly the thing that stands in the way of a calm and rational discussion.

3) and 4) Okay, let's look at broadly international stats on women in astronomy. Statistically indistinguishable from men, says you. Bullshit, says the IAU. Or perhaps you'd rather drill down to the level of the Rosetta team itself: Notice anything about the male:female ratio there?

No, the IAU does not call it "bullshit". It provides a dataset that seems to support your point.

To judge how far it does support your point that the STEM field is biased against women would require a close analysis of several other factors. One is the male-to-female ratio in a population. It may make only a small difference, but if a country has significantly more men than women we should take that into account when examining the data.

The second, and in my opinion more important, point is general access to higher learning for women. If higher learning is generally barred to women, any data that shows women are underrepresented there in STEM does not point to a problem in the STEM area, but to a rather bigger problem. If almost no woman in a given country ever gets an opportunity to enter university that will automatically translate to a seriously low number of women from that country in STEM work. But that does not mean a bias against women in STEM exists in those countries. It points to a far bigger problem. The data sets are just not comparable if only applied to STEM.

[Slywyn]

This post in particular stands out. It doesn't appear to be a common argument but it's there.

He was -acting- as a PR guy.

Don't forget I pointed out in the same post that he was part of a team and we should be proud of his accomplishments.

Let's not put words in my mouth please.

[Vorian]

He was -acting- as a PR guy.

Don't forget I pointed out in the same post that he was part of a team and we should be proud of his accomplishments.

Let's not put words in my mouth please.

Err, no, the rest of your post was a good point but in your own words:

He was basically their PR guy and we're acting like he's the next Einstein.

Completely disregarding any other contribution he may have made. If that's not what you meant, fine, and thank you for clarifying. But let's not pretend it came out of nowhere.

[Beorning]

Also, Slywyn, you said this:

And you know what? Landing a probe on a comet was not even all that difficult. And they still managed to screw it up.

With all due respect and without any hostility: come on...

[Kythia]

Also, Slywyn, you said this:

With all due respect and without any hostility: come on...

Eh, I dunno.  I landed three probes on comets this morning.  Did one of them one handed because I was brushing my teeth

[Slywyn]

Err, no, the rest of your post was a good point but in your own words:

Completely disregarding any other contribution he may have made. If that's not what you meant, fine, and thank you for clarifying. But let's not pretend it came out of nowhere.

Yes, let's not look at the context of the rest of the post.

I clearly only ever said he was a PR guy, I never said he was part of a team, I never said we should be proud of his accomplishments.

Also, Slywyn, you said this:

With all due respect and without any hostility: come on...

You know what landing on a comet takes? Math, understanding of physics, a lot of money, and time.

It's not 'hard', it's not something we don't know how to do. It's just something we've never done before.

[Kythia]

Ironically, the actual landing may be off topic for this thread, but assuming its not:

How big a deal actually is this?  Is this a moment that will change everything like the Wright brothers or something, a parlour trick like Slywyn has it or something in between?  I don't fully get the ramifications of it all - what's changed?

[Vorian]

Yes, let's not look at the context of the rest of the post.

I did, and what I got out of it was you rightly reminding us there was a team involved and unfairly painting him as just a PR guy, directly from what you actually said. Well, that and an irrelevant attack on the competency of the team that doesn't track with anything I've heard elsewhere. I'm not putting worlds in your mouth, I'm taking the most immediately apparent (to me, granted) meaning to your words in the context you wrote them. Again, if that was not your intent I appreciate the clarification, but your continued pattern of personal attacks isn't doing anything to convince me this was a legitimate misunderstanding. In any case, that was posted mainly for Ephiral's benefit to point out the sort of thing I thought consortium was talking about, and that I felt was needlessly hostile toward the scientists involved. Now I'm out of this part of the discussion, and probably the whole thing. For the record though my personal viewpoint on this is most closely in line with this:

I found this interesting...

It is a pornographers view on the issue.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/11/a-pornographer-and-atheist-explains-why-the-science-guys-shirt-crash-landed/

I just have a little different idea about what is acceptable collateral damage than most of the opinions I've seen expressed here.

[Slywyn]

Ironically, the actual landing may be off topic for this thread, but assuming its not:

How big a deal actually is this?  Is this a moment that will change everything like the Wright brothers or something, a parlour trick like Slywyn has it or something in between?  I don't fully get the ramifications of it all - what's changed?

Basically we get to learn more about comets and what they're made of.

From what I understand it can be important or not depending on what we actually learn.

It could confirm what we already think we know, or it could tell us something we never could have guessed.

[Ephiral]

So you are saying that you would be happy to have a calmer discussion? That's all well and good, but given that that discussion doesn't really happen, aren't you implying that that is everyone else's fault? I am sure there is a more scientific name for this rhetorical device, but I would call it "finger pointing by implication". That doesn't help all that much to further the debate culture you might want to see here.

Okay, let's remove the implication: By and large, it is not the people who objected to the shirt who are keeping the discussion focused on the shirt. I'd very much like to discuss the broader context it took place in, and have in fact tried repeatedly to introduce it into the discussion.

Summing up other people's opinion IN ALL CAPS?

That is exactly the thing that stands in the way of a calm and rational discussion.

The truth hurts doesn't it? Your whole movement revolves around being a victim to both "microagressions" and "macroagressions". Face it other then the right to vote and making it illegal for a husband to rape his wife, feminism hasn't accomplished anything of significance. A movement that should of died a long time ago, but it's kept alive because victim hood is so alluring. I mean why work or try to do something, when you're being oppressed?

But yes, me using caps was the problem, I'm sure. So very sorry.

No, the IAU does not call it "bullshit". It provides a dataset that seems to support your point.

To judge how far it does support your point that the STEM field is biased against women would require a close analysis of several other factors. One is the male-to-female ratio in a population. It may make only a small difference, but if a country has significantly more men than women we should take that into account when examining the data.

The second, and in my opinion more important, point is general access to higher learning for women. If higher learning is generally barred to women, any data that shows women are underrepresented there in STEM does not point to a problem in the STEM area, but to a rather bigger problem. If almost no woman in a given country ever gets an opportunity to enter university that will automatically translate to a seriously low number of women from that country in STEM work. But that does not mean a bias against women in STEM exists in those countries. It points to a far bigger problem. The data sets are just not comparable if only applied to STEM.

The complaint I was addressing was that the previous citations were too broad, and we should really be looking at astronomy on its own. The assertion I was challenging ws that women and men are statistically indistinguishable. So I cited figures on men and women in astronomy, with the requested international perspective. In short: Exactly the data that consortium said was lacking, and which he claimed would refute the problem with women in astronomy. It not only did not support his point, it proved it blatantly and laughably false. Why are you now shifting the goalposts?

[Vorian]

The complaint I was addressing was that the previous citations were too broad, and we should really be looking at astronomy on its own. The assertion I was challenging ws that women and men are statistically indistinguishable. So I cited figures on men and women in astronomy, with the requested international perspective. In short: Exactly the data that consortium said was lacking, and which he claimed would refute the problem with women in astronomy. It not only did not support his point, it proved it blatantly and laughably false. Why are you now shifting the goalposts?

Ok, one last thing since this seems to have been missed (bolding mine):

4) Likewise most of those demographics tend to bundle the various STEM disciplines into one and treat them as a whole rather than as individual disciplines that likely have their own cultures and approaches. To give a simple example over the last 10 years the retention and progression rate for women in astronomy (so from graduate student to assistant professor and from post doc to assistant professor) is statistically indistinguishable from that of men. As such it would appear that any discussion of micro-aggressions with regards to astronomy would have to focus entirely on what happens to people before they actually get involved in the field.

consortium made the claim that men and women stayed in and progressed within the field at rates proportionate to the numbers entering the field to begin with, and that that implied whatever was keeping women out of the field was prior to entering it rather than within the field itself.

[Cycle]

consortium made the claim that men and women stayed in and progressed within the field at rates proportionate to the numbers entering the field to begin with, and that that implied whatever was keeping women out of the field was prior to entering it rather than within the field itself.

What report shows this?

[Ephiral]

consortium made the claim that men and women stayed in and progressed within the field at rates proportionate to the numbers entering the field to begin with, and that that implied whatever was keeping women out of the field was prior to entering it rather than within the field itself.

Valid point, and the (extremely limited, non-European) data the IAU's women in astronomy group provides does support similar rates of retention and advancement. This is a far cry from saying that the problem is not within the field, though - hiring, for instance, is certainly something within the field that wouldn't show up in that data. I withdraw that point in my rebuttal to consortium, though I'd suggest that the still-ridiculously-low numbers of women are still indicative of a problem.

[Silk]

Valid point, and the (extremely limited, non-European) data the IAU's women in astronomy group provides does support similar rates of retention and advancement. This is a far cry from saying that the problem is not within the field, though - hiring, for instance, is certainly something within the field that wouldn't show up in that data. I withdraw that point in my rebuttal to consortium, though I'd suggest that the still-ridiculously-low numbers of women are still indicative of a problem.

Well one thing to keep in mind in that matter is just sheer population as a whole, there is a finite amount of men and women in the world, and while there is fields that are dramatically heavy in female population (see nursing and social sciences) those numbers will be detracted from somewhere and vice versa. a 85% female population in nurses will have to be detracted from somewhere else. as there is at best 51% female 49% male. Not saying that's the cause, but it is something to consider.

[Caehlim]

How big a deal actually is this?  Is this a moment that will change everything like the Wright brothers or something, a parlour trick like Slywyn has it or something in between?  I don't fully get the ramifications of it all - what's changed?

I'm studying Astronomy at the moment and from the perspective that's given me, I'd say it's a lot bigger than it looks.

One thing that is quite surprising about Astronomy is we know very little about it. It seems odd given that we can whizz about the solar system in our little spacecraft and still not really know much in this field of science. Many of the significant discoveries about the planets and stars were made by people who are still alive today.

Understanding the formation of our solar system is still a contentious subject. People furiously debate the origin of the moon for example, and although the Theae theory that another object impacted the Earth is relatively well accepted these days, it really is just an educated guess.

The problem is that the formation of the solar system happened around 5 billion years ago and we're here now just looking for evidence of it. Most of it is buried far beneath the surface of planets, unreachable since the furthest we've ever drilled into the Earth is 12km. Seismic probes, electromagnetic sensors and a lot of very intuitive and clever mathematics and physics can let us figure out some of the evidence but it's still tough.

A comet though formed at the same time as the solar system, and in its structure we will see evidence of how our solar system came to exist. It's also much smaller than a planet so we can easily reach its core. Plus this comet has been until recently hanging out in the Kuiper belt, far from the sun and so basically snap-frozen preserving that evidence. If the formation of the solar system was a homicide investigation, a comet would be a bullet fragment that was lodged in a wall and safe from when it rained on the scene.

Unfortunately this mission was a little bit of a mixed-bag of success and failure. We only just got started, but the position that Philae has landed on is blocked from sunlight so its solar panels have been unable to recharge the battery. We've still got more information about comets than we ever have before, but not everything we wanted.

[Ephiral]

Well one thing to keep in mind in that matter is just sheer population as a whole, there is a finite amount of men and women in the world, and while there is fields that are dramatically heavy in female population (see nursing and social sciences) those numbers will be detracted from somewhere and vice versa. a 85% female population in nurses will have to be detracted from somewhere else. as there is at best 51% female 49% male. Not saying that's the cause, but it is something to consider.

Which would be a valid argument if we didn't have research and documentation showing women being undervalued and driven out.

[Steampunkette]

It still wouldn't be a valid argument. Reverse the Gender involved and add in "Car Mechanics" as the alternative.

Unless it's Silk's intention to specifically say that women aren't interested in STEM Fields (which I doubt is her intention) the argument merely deflects based on sexist stereotypes of "Men's Work" and "Women's Work"

[Sethala]

This is venturing into a lot of stuff I don't know much about (and don't really have the brainspan or time to really understand), but I did want to toss in my two cents...

First off, yes, after reading some of these reports about how people treat different genders in science fields, I agree there's an issue.  Someone talked briefly about a study here with identical resumes given with only the name changed (sadly, skimming through the thread a second time, I couldn't find it to give proper credit) and the female name was far less recommended than the male name.  A few other people mentioned how women are generally passed over for awards.  These are all issues that we should work on fixing.

The microaggression sexism bit, though?  I don't think that's a very large issue, or at least not as large as some people are making it out to be.  I could be entirely wrong on this, of course, and like I said it's not something I've really spent much time looking into.  Regardless, I don't think the fact that he wears a shirt like this is any kind of significant barrier to entry, nor do I think it's a sign that there's a much larger problem, at least not by itself.

I also don't think that a smaller representation of women in these fields compared to men is an issue.  As Consortium pointed out, the rate of advancement within the field is pretty comparable between men and women, so whatever's causing less women to get in, it has more to do with something that happens before they enter the field.  Personally, I think a large portion of that can be put on genetics and brain chemistry, though I admit that gender roles in society also plays a large factor.

As for Cycle's idea of firing him... no.  Flat out, no.  If he were hired as a PR guy, where that was his main job?  Yeah, I could see causing a mess like this would get you fired.  "PR guy" is not Matt Taylor's job, however, just a brief role he took on for an interview.  Should he have worn something more professional?  Yeah, definitely.  Should the fact that he didn't put his science career in jeopardy?  No, and anyone that thinks otherwise needs to take a long look at their priorities.

[Sho]

As Consortium pointed out, the rate of advancement within the field is pretty comparable between men and women, so whatever's causing less women to get in, it has more to do with something that happens before they enter the field.  Personally, I think a large portion of that can be put on genetics and brain chemistry, though I admit that gender roles in society also plays a large factor.

I...I'd love some clarification on this. Are you saying that women are genetically less capable of entering STEM fields?

I'm asking for clarification because I'm almost 100% certain you're not saying that, since thinking that is true would be exactly what everyone is arguing is the problem.

[Valthazar]

I...I'd love some clarification on this. Are you saying that women are genetically less capable of entering STEM fields?

I'm asking for clarification because I'm almost 100% certain you're not saying that, since thinking that is true would be exactly what everyone is arguing is the problem.

I posted this table in the MRA thread, and I agree, this is only one component of the much broader nature vs. nurture issue.  Research suggests that there are some (statistically significant) differences in physiology and brain chemistry between genetic males and females.  I agree wholeheartedly that this data should not be misinterpreted to suggest that women are any more or less capable than man in STEM fields.  In fact, many researchers dismiss these conclusions entirely. 

On a personal level, I feel that social factors are the much greater reason for the lack of women in STEM fields - but I do realize that biological differences may potentially be a tiny factor (albeit one that is still being explored).

Table

[Silk]

Which would be a valid argument if we didn't have research and documentation showing women being undervalued and driven out.

To dismiss a 1% factor because there is a 10% factor isn't the best recourse though. As I said, i'm not stating it as a cause, merely just something to consider. Especially since were talking about microagressions and how every small thing becomes a big thing.

[gaggedLouise]

Ironically, the actual landing may be off topic for this thread, but assuming its not:

How big a deal actually is this?  Is this a moment that will change everything like the Wright brothers or something, a parlour trick like Slywyn has it or something in between?  I don't fully get the ramifications of it all - what's changed?

It makes a couple of "first-time ever" in scientific terms. First landing on and transmission from the core of a comet, first dig into the ground of such an object - and it's at a distance equal to the span between Earth and Jupiter when the two are in straight line on the same side of the sun. The experiment will have to be repeated with a few more comets of course to provide more data, but I figure the results are notable and they have a bearing on some real key questions about the early days of the solar system and, like, the origin of the oceans and the background of life on Earth. Some scientists think part of the water in the primeval ocean may have been provided by icy comets dropping down in spates onto the Earth, and taking any kind of molecules with them down, molecules that may have included some building-blocks for life - and Philae seems to have found organic molecules on the comet: not life of course, but the kind of stuff they were looking for.

Also, despite contact with the lander being broken off after just days, it managed to carry out much the larger part of the scientitific program it was sent there for, and the vital parts of it (with the help of ingenuity from its base camp on Earth).

As a feat of engineering and "rocket science" it was absolutely amazing, as big as the early probes photographing Mars and the outer planets or the first flight across the Arctic Ocean in the 1920s. Sneaking up on a tiny speck of space rock in fast motion and managing to put down a small, vulnerable lander like that, and to stay in contact after landing - that was really cool, and very difficult.