I was too busy doing a 200-piece jigsaw puzzle with a 3-year-old to join the March for Science (plus I would be afraid that someone would rat me out as a mere engineer or, far worse, flight instructor). Can readers fill me in? What happened? Who marched? What did their posters say? Were there speakers? Who were they and what did they say? Amidst the complaints about the flow of tax dollars being reduced (an “attack on science” if Americans decide to spend more of their money on other things), was there a discussion of “Why Most Published Research Findings Are False”?
The web site says “Inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility are central to the mission and principles of the March for Science. Scientists and people who care about science are an intersectional group, embodying a diverse range of races, sexual orientations, gender identities, abilities, religions, ages, socioeconomic and immigration statuses.”
If there are actual scientists marching, can this be true? We can agree that science is one of the least diverse fields in terms of employment, right? And the people who make hiring decisions in science are scientists? So if women and certain minority groups have been excluded from science then it has to be scientists themselves who have done the excluding? Therefore we have the phenomenon of a group of demonstrated sexists and racists marching, at least in part, to denounce sexism and racism.
> (plus I would be afraid that someone would rat me out as a mere engineer or, far worse, flight instructor).
No fears!
http://www.factcheck.org/2016/04/palin-as-much-a-scientist-as-bill-nye/?platform=hootsuite
To sum up, Nye has a degree and experience working in engineering, which is the application of science. He has also spent much of his career working with and for the scientific community. Thus, his credentials make him more of a scientist than Palin.
And what is a flight instructor other than a Professor of Applied Aeronautical and Aerodynamics, both scientific pursuits.
“Inclusion, diversity, equity, accessibility, sexual orientations, gender identities, abilities, religions, socioeconomic, immigration status” are all political terms, not scientific terms.
Are you sure it wasn’t the “March For Political Science”?
This is fun reading: “7 Enviro Predictions From Earth Day 1970 That Were Just Dead Wrong”
http://dailycaller.com/2016/04/22/7-enviro-predictions-from-earth-day-1970-that-were-just-dead-wrong/
And everyone should follow Retraction Watch.
http://retractionwatch.com/
>We can agree that science is one of the
>least diverse fields in terms of employment,
>right? And the people who make hiring
>decisions in science are scientists?
>So if women and certain minority
>groups have been excluded from science
>then it has to be scientists
>themselves who have done
>the excluding?
This is a non-sequitur; it is quite possible for women and certain minority groups to be “excluded” from science even if scientists themselves are not biased in their hiring decisions.
Can’t figure out what Trump policies they were protesting, since he hasn’t done anything & everything he tried was overturned by the lawyers.
@jack crossfire: Although I can’t speak with authority for these particular protesters, I suspect that the Republican refusal to impose a carbon tax, which President Trump seems to agree with, is one important policy they were protesting.
Philip,
You are being slightly disingenuous, no?
You neglected to mention that you also have a PhD in CS, as well as a BS in math.
John: CS is not science! And a Bachelor’s degree is the new High School diploma.
Neal: Please explain “it is quite possible for women and certain minority groups to be “excluded” from science even if scientists themselves are not biased in their hiring decisions.” How did the exclusion of new workers in a field happen except due to the actions of existing workers (including managers, of course)?
@philg: Hiring managers select from a pool of qualified applicants. Becoming a qualified scientist requires a long process of preparation. Factors not under the control of scientists which filter out women and certain minority groups during this process of preparation could impact the composition of the scientific workforce even if hiring managers are not biased in their decision making. K-12 educational resources are allocated by politicians not scientists. Most individuals respond to societal pressure and expectations. Thus, pressure and expectations from society in general (as opposed to scientists) could work to remove women or certain minority groups from the scientist preparation pipeline. Parents and the people they socialize with also play a role both by directly helping children prepare (by for example, spending a Saturday working on a 300 piece puzzle with them) and by helping children see and understand the opportunities which may be open to them as adults. Therefore, children whose ancestors were systematically excluded from the opportunity to become scientists may themselves be less likely to end up in the scientist hiring pool.
I can’t say with authority which of these factors best explain the existing composition of the scientific workforce, but if I were to guess, I would say all of the above (including biased hiring decisions by existing scientists).
It should have been called the “March for Government Money.”
March for Science? March for Women? March for ?
And don’t get me started on “Inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility are central to the mission and principles …”
Society is getting delusional when they have such a lofty goal. They are scientist after all and you would think they should know better that you cannot make everyone happy but yet those marchers want to be happy at the expenses of others. But who will make those “others” happy?
Real scientific disciplines have names: Chemistry, Physics, Biology, etc. Fake-o sciences have to put “science” in the name: Political Science, Social Science, Computer Science. My alma mater worked around the problem by renaming the department the “School of Computing”.
From Twitter:
Neal: “Hiring managers”? The only hiring managers at scientific employers are PhD scientists, correct? If you want to get into grad school, it is a scientist (or committee of scientists) who decides whether or not to admit you. If you apply for a postdoc, it is a scientist who gives you the job or not. If you apply to become a professor, it is scientists who vote thumbs up or down. If you want to work in a commercial science job, e.g., at a drug company, it is scientists who say “yes” or “no”.
You want to blame K-12 for educating only white and Asian males? There are more than enough women and non-white science undergrads to fill every job for a PhD scientist. If these undergrads either choose not to attend graduate school, or are rejected from grad school, or drop out of grad school, or drop out of science after grad school, or can’t get hired as scientists, how could anyone be blamed other than existing scientists?
Is it your theory that people in the English or Business Administration departments are somehow responsible for women and non-white/non-Asian males dropping out of the science education and career path?
>There are more than enough women and non-white science undergrads to fill every job for a PhD scientist.
Even if true, this ignores their proportional representation in hiring pool which would need to be considered when deciding if hiring decisions were biased.
I don’t really have a comprehensive “theory” for the origin of the current gender or racial composition of scientists. I don’t really doubt that biased hiring decisions play a role, but I suspect that other factors (like those I mentioned and probably others I didn’t) also contribute. However, the purpose of my comment was really to point out that there are other POSSIBLE explanations some of which deserve serious consideration as contributing factors. Asserting that under representation of women or certain minorities among scientists is prima facie evidence that scientists themselves are biased is fallacious even if it is in fact true that existing scientists are biased against women and minorities.
Neal: Why does proportional representation matter? Suppose that Scientist Joe is the supervisor of a group of all white/Asian males. Joe says he is committed to diversity (but not committed enough to identify as female). Even if there is only 1 “sought-after minority” or “person who identifies as a woman” among 500 applicants, what stops him from bringing in that person?
I don’t know if anything “stops” him, but if Joe chooses to hire one of the other applicants that by itself is not evidence that he is biased against the “sought-after minority” or “person who identifies as a women”. Conversely, an applicant pool which looked like that would be a pretty strong indication of some kind of bias (at least in the more generic sense) in the pipeline which produced it.
“Science!” is now the closest thing to the national religion. Actual religion in public is taboo. So people who really want to believe in something believe in “Science!”. “Scienctists!” are the high priests.
There’s apparently a huge bias against women in masonry(0.1% females), drywall installation(0.3%), diesel engine repair(0.5%). That’s where the low hanging fruit of anti-female bias is !
Perhaps, similar factors operate in science ?
Apparently, scientists are much less biased against women than drywall installers: there are 48% women in all science occupations.
https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2017/nsf17310/static/data/tab9-5.pdf
On the other hand, it seem there’s a bias against males in the biology/medical area where the above percentage is reversed (47% of males). The anti-male bias becomes worse in anthropology (33% males) and becomes especially bad in psychology (27.2% males). Time for male psychology scientists march !