Tuesday, January 18, 2005

Harvard and gender issues, when everybody is (likely) wrong It was interesting (and a bit amusing) to see the controversy over the remarks made by Harvard's President Lawrence Summers that one reason why women do not excel in science as much as men do may be that there are innate differences between the sexes. This actually happens to be my field of professional research (genotype-environment interactions), so I feel somewhat qualified in commenting on it. The reason this is amusing is that both sides are very likely wrong. Summers cannot substantiate his claims, because the necessary experimental research on genotype-environment interactions in humans simply cannot be done (we can't breed people at will and then grow them under controlled environments). Moreover, even if there are genetic differences between genders in some cognitive abilities, this doesn't mean they cannot be overcome by changes in the (social) environment: e.g., phenylketonuria, a genetic disease that causes severe mental retardation because of the inability to metabolize a common aminoacid, can be entirely prevented, simply by avoiding to intake sodas and other drinks and foods that contain phenylalanine. On the other hand, the outrage by some people present at the speech, as well as in the press, is equally misguided: of course there are plenty of genetic differences between men and women (in case you haven't noticed, just look a bit closer at some of our obvious anatomic features :-) and surely some of them carry over into cognitive traits (which, after all, depend on the brain, itself a complex result of genotype-environment interactions that occur during development). What is disturbing, of course, is that the leader of such a highly respected academic institution would go public with such simplistic statements that would cause an undergraduate in an introductory biology course to fail an exam... Then again, Summers is an economist, what does he know about biology? 10:20:52 AM    comment []

well, I was kidding, but... The other day I jokingly suggested that President Bush should start a faith-based anti-missile initiative (actually, the idea was originally Richard Dawkins'). Well, apparently the Russians had already done something similar, by building a whole department devoted to fight "psychic influences" on their beloved leaders (Boris Yeltsin, for example). While the current no-nonsense Russian President, Vladimir Putin, has apparently abolished the department, the Pravda reports that many Russian "experts" in psychic matters are worried because they heard that the Americans have developed "weapons of mass manipulation" (I kid you not!) that could be used against the former Soviet block. (The US has in fact had such weapons for a long time, they are called TV commercials, some of the best ones are tested during an annual event called "the Superbowl".) This would be funny if it weren't for the fact that some of the world's "leaders" are wasting so much time and money on utter nonsense. Some leadership indeed. 8:44:02 AM    comment []