Lawrence Sommers caused outrage among academics in the US, when he said that genetic differences harm the chances of success of female scientists. Professors from the prestigious university issued a statement of condemnation
Aggregation of information from various sources
The president of Harvard University, Lawrence Somers, caused a lot of outrage among academics in the US when he claimed that genetic differences cause women to be less successful than men in science and mathematics. At an economic conference held last week, Somers said that already in high school, boys reach higher achievements than girls in science and math classes, due to genetic differences.
In an interview with the "Boston Globe", he said that his words are based on studies that examined the genetic effects on behavior. As an example of the differences between the sexes, he gave his daughter, who as a child was given two toy trucks, and chose to call them after dolls.
Somers, who served as US Treasury Secretary in Bill Clinton's administration and was the World Bank's chief economist, said he was citing the guesswork of others, and did not intend to express his personal opinion.
A group of professors from the university published a notice of condemnation, saying that these things could harm the university's plan to recruit senior female scientists. Somers, who is the head of the oldest and most prestigious university in the US, admitted that he was probably mistaken in understanding the impact of his words, and apologized if he harmed the university's chances of recruiting female scientists. He said that the reasons for the minority of women in the senior ranks of science should be investigated, adding that he never said, and that he does not believe, that women do not have the ability to succeed at the highest levels in research in mathematics and science.
After the publication of the above news in Haaretz, Prof. Mina Teicher, the chairperson of the National Council for the Advancement of Women in Science and Technology, asked to respond, a copy of her response was sent by the university's spokesperson's office to the website of the science
in honor of
Mr. David Landau
Editor of Haaretz newspaper
Reference to publication
Greetings,
I would be very grateful if you could publish my words below, as part of a news item or a short article, as a response to the news item "President of Harvard: Innate differences may cause men to excel in science and mathematics", which was published last week in the news pages of the Haaretz newspaper.
I was amazed to read the statements of Prof. Lawrence Summers, president of Harvard University and a world-renowned economist, regarding the talent of women in mathematics and science, as quoted in the newspaper "Haaretz"
(20.1.2005)
Prof. Summers, who recently visited Israel, impressed the academic elite in the country with his lectures on managing an outstanding research institution with large budgets. However, it turns out that Prof. Summers also finds it appropriate to express himself on subjects outside his field of expertise - mathematics and genetics, saying that women do not succeed in mathematics and science for genetic reasons.
Needless to say, there is no scientific proof that confirms his words.
The National Council for the Advancement of Women in Science and Technology, which I chair, examines the issue of the advancement of women (especially in the higher ranks) and brought proposals to the heads of universities in Israel to change the advancement path so that it would also suit women.
I appeal to all women who are considering choosing a scientific career to ignore Prof. Samrat's words and to choose a scientific-technological career that will guarantee them integration into the country's top job. The human capital inherent in women applying for scientific-technological employment is priceless.
The IDF also recognizes this potential and built a plan, in cooperation with the education system and the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, to increase the participation of female soldiers in the technological array.
Two days ago I participated in a brainstorming session of the chairpersons of the councils for the advancement of science from all European countries in order to formulate proposals for admission procedures, criteria for excellence and promotion paths that would be free from the effects of gender.
The European Union is aware of the problem of women not participating in this system. According to them, increasing the number of women in science and technology is a pan-European strategic goal. As an active mathematician in Israel and around the world, I am aware of the low representation of women in this area (and other similar areas). I make every effort to serve as a model in order to attract more women and girls in this field and to my delight I have had great success. (Also on a personal level - I have six PhD students and they are all soldiers).
Best regards,
Prof. Mina Teicher, Chairman of the National Council for the Advancement of Women in Science and Technology
Innate differences or confirmation of prejudices?
By Natalie Angier and Kenneth Chang
The president of Harvard University caused an uproar when he said that women's underachievement in science and mathematics may be due to innate differences between the sexes. But the question remains: is there any truth in his words?
The recent statement by the president of Harvard University, Lawrence Summers, that the poor achievements of women in science and mathematics may be due to innate differences between the sexes, joins a heated debate that has been going on for decades. Although Summers drew the ire of many and was eventually forced to apologize, the question remains: Is there any truth to his words? Does science have evidence of innate differences between the sexes, which may explain the small number of women involved in science in general, and in senior positions in particular?
Researchers from various fields, who have examined the differences between the sexes, claim that there are many differences between men and women - in the scores they achieve in quantitative reasoning tests, in their relationship to mathematics and science, in the structure of the brain and in the way their bodies absorb drugs, including those that affect the brain. However, despite the desire to find unequivocal answers to complex questions, the researchers warn that differences in structure do not necessarily indicate differences in function.
"We're not going to get anywhere if we deny the neurological and hormonal differences between men and women, because they clearly exist," said Virginia Wallian, a professor of psychology at Hunter College. "Our problem as scientists is to assess the importance of these differences in day-to-day functioning."
Brain researchers, for example, have proven that a woman's brain is on average about 10% smaller than a man's brain, even after taking into account her physical dimensions. However, throughout history, such anatomical diagnoses have been used to confirm prejudices against women. In the last century, for example, the French scientist Gustave Le Bon claimed that the woman's small brain - close in size to that of a gorilla, according to him - explains her "instability, inconsistency and inability to think and reason logically".
Apart from the matter of size, there is evidence that the female brain is richer in gray matter - the neurons that are responsible according to the accepted assumption for the act of thinking - while the male brain is more loaded with white matter - the tissue that connects the neurons. And to complicate the matter even more, brain imaging done at the University of Irvine in California, shows that men and women of equal IQ used different amounts of gray and white matter when asked to answer the same questions.
Many researchers were surprised by the similar cognitive ability of boys and girls. Elizabeth Spelka, a professor of physiology at Harvard, who studied the abilities of children between the ages of five months and seven years, said that "as adults we see many differences between boys and girls and treat them accordingly, but when you measure their abilities, it turns out that they are very similar."
The differences begin to appear in adolescence, especially in mathematics. These differences have been diagnosed all over the world: in a test conducted in 2003 among 250 15-year-old students from 41 countries, boys scored slightly better in math in about half of the countries; In the other countries no differences were recorded. The Japanese girls, for example, achieved results almost identical to those of the Japanese boys - results that were better than the American boys. The girls in Iceland left the boys far behind. However, it is interesting to note that in Iceland, as well as in other countries, the girls expressed a more negative attitude towards mathematics than the boys.
These results led many researchers to the conclusion that none of the species has a monopoly on basic mathematical abilities, and that it is culture, more than chromosomes, that explains differences in achievement in exams. Harvard University President Summers and others believe that the test results, as well as other phenomena more common among boys such as learning problems, attention problems and autism, indicate that the male brain is more sensitive and prone to extremes of genius or incompetence. According to him, in the American SAT tests, in which the maximum score is 800, the number of men who received a score above 700 is double the number of women; But men are also more likely to get all the questions wrong.
Summers also said that women may not gravitate towards the sciences because they feel abstracted and alienated. For example he brought his daughter, who received toy trucks and treated them like dolls and called them "Daddy-Truck" and "Baby-Truck". Others replied that many men give names to their cars.
Dr. Spelka, who tried to explain the difference in the number of male and female scientists, said that "women who work in science are discriminated against at every stage of their professional lives." This is proven by an experiment conducted recently at Princeton University, where students were asked to give grades to two candidates for a job as engineers. One was more educated, the other more experienced. In 75% of the cases, the one with much more education is chosen. However, when the candidates were a man and a woman, and the holder of the education had a woman's name, she was preferred in only 48% of the cases.
Knowledgeable of science and society
For news on the subject at the BBC
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