> In the end, the resolution of such controversy often depends upon one's standard of proof, a standard dictated in turn by political beliefs. I impose the highest standards of proof, for example, on claims about biological inequality, my high standards stemming directly from my philosophical and political beliefs in equality. On the other hand, given the same claims, a scientist happier with present-day social arrangements would no doubt be satisfied with weaker proof. How much and how strong the proof one demands before accepting a conclusion is a matter of judgment, a judgment that is embedded in the fabric of one's individual belief system.
-Steven Goldberg, _Why Men Rule: A Theory of Male Dominance_ (the previous edition of which was titled _The Inevitability of Patriarchy_ (!!)), Introduction:
+S. Goldberg, _Why Men Rule: A Theory of Male Dominance_ (the previous edition of which was titled _The Inevitability of Patriarchy_ (!!)), Introduction:
> [T]he relevant point here is that the consequences of an acceptance of an empirical explanation have nothing to do with the correctness of that explanation. This is so obvious that for thousands of years the attempt to refute an explanation by citing the (putative) bad effects of an acceptance of that explanation has been recognized as fallacious. Even if acceptance of the belief that the world is round somehow threatened our species' survival, that would not make the earth flat. Truth is independent of consequences.
>
> I'm simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes and that these differences may explain why we don't see equal representation of women in tech and leadership. _Many of these differences are small and there's significant overlap between men and women, so you can’t say anything about an individual given these population level distributions._
-The distressing thing about this whole affair (and others like it—I am old enough to remember the Larry Summers imbroglio back in 'aught-five) is the extent to which the vast majority of the outrage over Damore's document fails to engage with _what he actually said_. Damore is _very explicit_ about how he's making an argument about distributions. (I liked [Diana Fleischman's take](https://twitter.com/sentientist/status/894959693822558209).) Whether you agree or disagree with his arguments and whether you approve or disapprove of his being fired, one would hope for people to be damned for the content of what they _actually said_, rather than a perceived tribal aura of sexism or anti-sexism. (One wonders exactly what hypothesized value of Cohen's _d_ separates good people's hypotheses from _bad_ people's hypotheses.)
+The distressing thing about this whole affair (and others like it—I am old enough to remember the L. Summers imbroglio back in 'aught-five) is the extent to which the vast majority of the outrage over Damore's document fails to engage with _what he actually said_. Damore is _very explicit_ about how he's making an argument about distributions. (I liked [Diana Fleischman's take](https://twitter.com/sentientist/status/894959693822558209).) Whether you agree or disagree with his arguments and whether you approve or disapprove of his being fired, one would hope for people to be damned for the content of what they _actually said_, rather than a perceived tribal aura of sexism or anti-sexism. (One wonders exactly what hypothesized value of Cohen's _d_ separates good people's hypotheses from _bad_ people's hypotheses.)
It would be one thing if it were just the middlebrow, the Twitter mobs and <em>Gizmodo</em>s of the world getting this wrong. But _Nature_! (Lest I too risk failing at reading comprehension, it's possible the intent of the reference to "the controversy over" is just to tie the anti-discrimination stance of the editorial to current events, without meaning to put words in Damore's mouth. But I'm not optimistic.)
Friend of the blog—I mean, I _hope_ we're [still friends](/2017/Jan/the-counter/) even though I'm kind of [trying to overthrow them](/tag/ozy/) as _de facto_ Gender Czar of the [_Less Wrong_](http://lesswrong.com/) diaspora—Ozymandias of [_Thing of Things_](https://thingofthings.wordpress.com/) has been [running an intellectual Turing test](https://thingofthings.wordpress.com/2017/02/15/transgender-intellectual-turing-test/) challenging adherents of the gender-identity and two-type theories of transgenderedness to try to impersonate each other for the good of our collective epistemology!
-(An aside on credit-assignment and the history of ideas: Ozy says _Blanchard–Bailey_ where I've usually been trying to say _two-type_ in order to avoid the [tricky problem of optimal eponymy](/2017/Mar/nothing-new-under-the-sun/), but if you are going to be eponymous about it, I can understand just saying "Blanchard" but feel like it's unfair to include Bailey but _not_ Anne Lawrence. My understanding of the history—and I think Michael Bailey reads this blog and I trust him to send me an angry email if I got this wrong—is that [Bailey's research](http://faculty.wcas.northwestern.edu/JMichael-Bailey/research.html) had mostly been about sexual orientation and from-childhood gender nonconformity, not the two-type taxonomy as such. Bailey's popular-level book _The Man Who Would Be Queen_ drew controversy for _explaining_ the two-type taxonomy for a nonspecialist audience (in the last part of a book that was mostly about the androphilic/feminine-from-early-childhood people, not my people), but the critics who disparage _Queen_ as "unscientific" are missing the point: popular-level books that _present_ a scientific theory _aren't supposed_ to capitulate all the evidence for the theory—for that, you need to follow the citations and read the primary literature for yourself. In analogy, it should not be construed as a disparagement of Richard Dawkins to note that it would be weird if people talked about the "Darwin–Dawkins theory of evolution"!)
+(An aside on credit-assignment and the history of ideas: Ozy says _Blanchard–Bailey_ where I've usually been trying to say _two-type_ in order to avoid the [tricky problem of optimal eponymy](/2017/Mar/nothing-new-under-the-sun/), but if you are going to be eponymous about it, I can understand just saying "Blanchard" but feel like it's unfair to include Bailey but _not_ Anne Lawrence. My understanding of the history—and I think Michael Bailey reads this blog and I trust him to send me an angry email if I got this wrong—is that [Bailey's research](http://faculty.wcas.northwestern.edu/JMichael-Bailey/research.html) had mostly been about sexual orientation and from-childhood gender nonconformity, not the two-type taxonomy as such. Bailey's popular-level book _The Man Who Would Be Queen_ drew controversy for _explaining_ the two-type taxonomy for a nonspecialist audience (in the last part of a book that was mostly about the androphilic/feminine-from-early-childhood people, not my people), but the critics who disparage _Queen_ as "unscientific" are missing the point: popular-level books that _present_ a scientific theory _aren't supposed_ to capitulate all the evidence for the theory—for that, you need to follow the citations and read the primary literature for yourself. In analogy, it should not be construed as a disparagement of R. Dawkins to note that it would be weird if people talked about the "Darwin–Dawkins theory of evolution"!)
In the intellectual Turing test, contestants answer a set of questions both as themselves, and while trying to pass as someone who believes the other thing, while the audience tries to discriminate the honest entries from the fakes. Below are my probability assignments for this contest (I think it's important to assign probabilities rather than binary guesses, so that you can assess your rationality with a Bayesian [strictly proper scoring rule](http://yudkowsky.net/rational/technical/) rather than a crude "number correct"), along with an optional brief comment—
projects / Ultimately_Untrue_Thought.git / commitdiff