posted
Those can be warning signs, but if you took that to a judge in any state, they would turn you away. There's just not enough evidence. The defendants could argue that there were women on the committee, that one of the people they hired was a woman, and they could show that they already employ women at their establishment.
Maybe those committee members really were being sexist, maybe they weren't. Either way, you'd have a very hard time proving it without any other evidence other than "Well it just seems like they were being sexist".
Now, like you said, if you went around and asked all the women in that area if they had experienced any sexual discrimination while working there, and they said that they had and each instance was clear, then you could probably file some kind of class action lawsuit. But with only this one example to go with, there's just not enough evidence. That is what I am basing my opinion on. I don't work in this field and I don't work in that company, so I have only this one example to form an opinion on, and as it stands here, there's not enough evidence to say that they were being sexist.
You just can't make a case of it simply because they hired more men than women, or vise versa. You also can't force an employer to hire an equal amount of women, because then it would still be sexist, only of a different sort. Employers turn people away all the time because of the vibe they got from them. What argument could you make that said this wasn't the case here? Maybe it just happened to be that in this case, these five individuals really were the people the committee liked the most. Without them saying otherwise, you can't prove it.
Now, if one of the female employees had a resume that shined brighter than any other person's there, and they were enthusiastic and clearly wanted the job, and they were still turned away, then yes, I could see there being sexism. But from what has been stated here, we don't know if that happened.
Regardless, I doubt this will be as much of a concern in ten years' time. According to a recent survey I read the other day, women currently outnumber men in Master's and Doctorate degrees, and that number is supposed to get even higher. That means you'll likely start seeing more female applicants. It is therefore inevitable that more women will be hired in that industry. If it comes to the point that you have twenty applicants for five positions, and fifteen are women, but only one gets hired, still, then I think you can safely say there's some sexism going on.
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I think you're missing my point: I don't mean (and didn't say, nor did anyone, I think) that based on what scholarette said, there was enough to actually take it to civil court. I said that what she said was enough to start asking the question in a serious way. And it is. Again, much depends on how invalid or valid the reasons for dismissing the women were, and if those reasons didn't bar the men.
I've got to admit, though, that the sort of thing it would take to get you to start looking for sexism, really overwhelming number gender disparity, is a bit depressing. Apparently it really does take massive undeniable sexism before it will stop being default denied-unless you meant that it would take those sorts of numbers to make the numbers of themselves be enough? I'm not clear.
I'm still not sure where on Earth we started talking about a court case here, though. In any event, when a woman talks about sexism in a science related field, my first inclination is to think, "Yeah, totally possible, I remember girls 'being bad' at math, and I remember how many more girls were in liberal arts courses vs hard sciences courses." It's not to say, "Hey, we shouldn't talk about that without some very serious proof. Part of it comes back to this thinking, implied or spoken at some places in this thread, that unless one has a directly, unarguably racist or sexist thought or motive, we can't claim a given action of theirs was racist or sexist. I dispute that assumption that's believed, or seems to be believed, by many.
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quote:Regardless, I doubt this will be as much of a concern in ten years' time. According to a recent survey I read the other day, women currently outnumber men in Master's and Doctorate degrees, and that number is supposed to get even higher.
Do you have a source for this data? Similar numbers that I've been able to find refer only to US Citizens. If you include non-US citizens at US Universities, males still out number females by a significant margin and, in my experience, nearly all non-US citizens who receive Ph.D's stay in the US after graduation.
But regardless of the citizenship question, the numbers look very different for math, the physical sciences and engineering. In 2009, women earned 27% of math and computer science degrees, 33% of the the Ph.Ds in physical and earth sciences and 22% of the PhDs in engineering. The further you move up the latter, from B.S., to PhD, to full Professor and the trend can not be explained entirely by time lag.
[ May 13, 2012, 11:26 AM: Message edited by: The Rabbit ]
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Jeff, I strongly recommend you Google "blind orchestra auditions."
Because the phenomenon that's being discussed here is extremely well-known and well-studied, and there is absolutely evidence that supports scholarette's implication.
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Yeah. It's one of those things that's actually quite simple to study, and has been. And as for the audition study, man, that's with musicians and music, not fields which are commonly thought of as not being 'appropriate' for women such as engineering. Playing in an orchestra is about as liberal arts as something gets, and yet still if not addressed sexism is pretty strong.
It's things like this that are what make it likely for me to get so exasperated with white male perspectives on racism or sexism in this country. One of the most common problems now is, as with the orchestra study, unconscious often unspoken mental stereotypes that are so basic and unquestioned for so many of us that they're simply never examined at all. But when you point that out, many times the response will be something along the lines of 'well you can't prove that' or 'hey, he's not a racist' as though it were something someone could just reflect on for a moment or two and be sure of. That kind of self analysis is hard, and anyone who claims to have done so in such a matter-of-fact way ought not to be credited as much as they credit themselves, which isn't the same as thinking they're lying.
And, just to offer up something from the other side, it also is irksome when it is simply assumed that a man will make a mediocre father or partner on an emotional level, that he is by default insensitive of boorish or absurd.
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quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: Anyway, if scholarette's encounter was not just isolated but an example of how things go there, it absolutely is enough to start talking about sexism. There's this very odd attitude in this country, for one with so much racial and gender turmoil in its very recent past, that unless there's a cross burning or some starched white sheets involved, the burden of credibility in public opinion is still almost always on the side of the establishment. It's not one that's really earned, so far as I can tell, but it's supported by these implied or outright stated notions that unless someone is an openly virulent racist or sexist, we shouldn't even talk about them with them.
So, one quick thought on this front, Rakeesh. I agree with you that somebody saying we shouldn't talk about sexism in this type of situation is wrong. I didn't quite feel Jeff was saying that (and your exchanges after this quote sort of bear that impression out)...
But when it comes to, say, acting on situations like this (not specifically in civil courts per se, but any sort of action, whether in a court or within a company or whatever) I think that there is a bit of an assumption of innocence on the part of any individual accused of racism or sexism.
I don't think that's a bad thing. I think that an assumption of innocence is an important part of any liberal society. I suspect you'd agree, except maybe when it comes to certain hot button issues where you subconsciously assume guilt instead.
Or maybe you only agree insofar as the actual justice system, but are okay assuming guilt when discussing social justice? I don't agree with that, but it makes a certain amount of sense I suppose. You don't run the risk of falsely imprisoning an individual, at any rate.
The problem I have with it is that discussions like this inform actions people take, so I think it's hard to assume guilt in theory but assume innocence in practice.
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As an aside, I don't really have much difficulty believing Scholarette's interpretation of events. They were scientists, right? Overall, I think that the intellectual/nerd subculture is one of the more insidiously sexist subcultures in America today. Much worse for it due to just how oblivious they are, and how shocked they'd be to hear someone say that.
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Things like a presumption of innocence just don't generalize from the courtroom to the rational weighing of evidence that applies to ordinary belief. In ordinary life, "preponderance of evidence" ought to be the standard, although this standard is also somewhat distorted the way it gets used in the courtroom.
Here's an example a friend of mine has been thinking about:
quote:The court case is the classic example of what is known as “the problem of naked statistical evidence” in legal scholarship. Here is the court case in broad outline (I will present the hypothetical version that is usually presented in legal scholarship, the “Blue Bus Case,” which abstracts from the non-critical details of the actual case).12 As Schauer presents it:
“Suppose it is late at night…and an individual’s car is hit by a bus. This individual cannot identify the bus, but she can establish that it is a blue bus, and she can prove as well that 80 percent of the blue buses in the city are operated by the Blue Bus Company, that 20 percent are operated by the Red Bus Company, and that there are no buses in the vicinity except those operated by one of these two companies. Moreover, each of the other elements of the case – negligence, causation, and, especially, the fact and the extent of the injury – is either stipulated or established to a virtual certainty.”(81-82)
In civil cases, the standard of proof is that the plaintiff must prove her case “by a preponderance of the evidence.” This is usually taken to mean “by a balance of the probabilities” (Schauer notes that that is the phrase used in English law), which we might think means probability(p) > 0.5, where p describes the proposition the plaintiff is trying to establish. However, in the actual case, and “as the overwhelming majority of courts would conclude,” according to Schauer, the plaintiff cannot win the lawsuit, because the evidence that the plaintiff was hit by a Blue Bus is ‘merely statistical’.
But of course in such a case an individual should conclude that it was a Blue Bus.
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This generalizes to the racism and sexism examples, by the way, if we have independent reason to think these kinds of bias are common.
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quote:So, one quick thought on this front, Rakeesh. I agree with you that somebody saying we shouldn't talk about sexism in this type of situation is wrong. I didn't quite feel Jeff was saying that (and your exchanges after this quote sort of bear that impression out)...
Heh, would this be anything like how we were suddenly talking about taking the matter to the courts and how there wasn't enough evidence for that? I'm not clear if Jeff actually was saying we shouldn't talk about it, but his response was strange. We were discussing it and suddenly were informed that (obviously) this wasn't preponderence-of-evidence level of evidence here.
quote:But when it comes to, say, acting on situations like this (not specifically in civil courts per se, but any sort of action, whether in a court or within a company or whatever) I think that there is a bit of an assumption of innocence on the part of any individual accused of racism or sexism.
How far does this assumption of innocence (which I'm fine with, by the way) extend? You and Jeff have (somewhat) clarified that it doesn't extend to an assumption of innocence below outright overt sexism or racism, but again: assume scholarette's observations were accurate. She watched men obtain 80% of the positions available, and also watched many of the women applicants be rejected for reasons she considered pretty puffy and vague. Assume for just a second that she wasn't simply leaping to find sexism where maybe it doesn't exist, and that the female applicants in this case actually were rejected for reasons that were simply odd and poorly worded.
That in and of itself isn't, I agree, enough to claim sexism. But what it is enough for is to say, "Hmmm, alright. Let's look at the interview process for the men, and see how that went-especially let's see if they said or did anything similarly to the rejected women, and if the responses were the same."
quote:I don't think that's a bad thing. I think that an assumption of innocence is an important part of any liberal society. I suspect you'd agree, except maybe when it comes to certain hot button issues where you subconsciously assume guilt instead.
*snort* I think you're missaplying the term 'assume innocent until proven guilty'. In practice, that's not unless I'm very much mistaken supposed to mean, "I just know the accused is innocent." No, rather we mean it the sense of 'just because someone makes an accusation doesn't make it true; look to see if there's evidence for it'. I mean this in terms of how you're using the term here.
quote:Or maybe you only agree insofar as the actual justice system, but are okay assuming guilt when discussing social justice? I don't agree with that, but it makes a certain amount of sense I suppose. You don't run the risk of falsely imprisoning an individual, at any rate.
The problem I have with it is that discussions like this inform actions people take, so I think it's hard to assume guilt in theory but assume innocence in practice.
You're welcome to point to a paragraph or sentence where I assumed the would-be employers in scholarette's story were guilty here, Dan. Seriously. No. What I'm doing is suggesting that for something like this, it's probably not the best course to simply believe someone isn't a racist or a sexist because they wouldn't claim any racist or sexist beliefs. That really does seem to be the standard being used by some people in this thread.
But the thing is, no decent person in our society is going to do anything but get defensive if it's suggested they behaved in a racist or sexist way. It's considered an insult in polite society (took long enough). Now which is more likely, Dan? That there are in fact no decent people who hold or behave in racist/sexist ideas or practices? Or that the fact that it's considered a major social flaw to be held a racist or sexist, that people are careful not to hold on to the classict racist/sexist beliefs?
Here is the action scholarette's anecdote would inform me to do, were I in a position of authority to do so: what I said above. Take a glance at the hiring procedure that went on that session, and see what I see. Remember this one for later, should further troubling trends arise-if so, take a closer look still.
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I'm not saying what you assume I'm saying. I understand why you keep making the mistake: When you ask questions, you pretty much always seem to already be certain of what someone's answer is going to be. I'm not doing that. I may have a guess that someone will answer one way or the other, but if I was certain, I wouldn't ask.
When I ask a question like "Or maybe you only agree insofar as the actual justice system, but are okay assuming guilt when discussing social justice?" I am not asserting that this is what you think. I'm communicating to you that what you've said so far seems ambiguous to me, and I'm guessing that this might be a possible explanation.
If it's not, the correct answer is "No," not "Point to where I said I think this." You didn't explicitly say it, or I wouldn't have needed to ask the question.
As far as your statements about what might be appropriate actions to take, I agree pretty much completely. Those make sense to me.
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quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: I think you're missing my point: I don't mean (and didn't say, nor did anyone, I think) that based on what scholarette said, there was enough to actually take it to civil court.
Yeah, I know. I brought that up because if anyone really wanted to get something done, legally speaking, it would ultimately become a court case. Change only happens in business when it is forced or if it will ultimately make more money. In this case, nothing is going to get done unless that particular business is threatened, and the main way to do that is through the courts. That's why I brought it up.
Again, don't mistake my analysis of this particular situation as me not believing there was sexism involved. I certainly believe that every human being on the planet is in some way favorable towards and against other races and sexes, however slight, because that's how the human mind works. It's part of our nature to segregate and separate the Other, no matter how similar they actually are. If it looks different, it must be different, at least until something that is even more different comes along, and then we can be friends (but only until the other different thing is dead).
However, as I said before, unless there is adequate proof, such as a written or oral admission or some other hard evidence, there's not really anything anyone can do about it. And that's what I think everyone here can agree on...that sexism definitely exists, just as racism does, but if you ever want that to change, there needs to be proof. That's all I was saying.
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quote:Originally posted by Jeff C.: I certainly believe that every human being on the planet is in some way favorable towards and against other races and sexes, however slight, because that's how the human mind works. It's part of our nature to segregate and separate the Other, no matter how similar they actually are. If it looks different, it must be different, at least until something that is even more different comes along, and then we can be friends (but only until the other different thing is dead).
However, as I said before, unless there is adequate proof, such as a written or oral admission or some other hard evidence, there's not really anything anyone can do about it. And that's what I think everyone here can agree on...that sexism definitely exists, just as racism does, but if you ever want that to change, there needs to be proof. That's all I was saying.
No, I don't really agree. Sorry.
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quote:Originally posted by Jeff C.: I certainly believe that every human being on the planet is in some way favorable towards and against other races and sexes, however slight, because that's how the human mind works. It's part of our nature to segregate and separate the Other, no matter how similar they actually are. If it looks different, it must be different, at least until something that is even more different comes along, and then we can be friends (but only until the other different thing is dead).
However, as I said before, unless there is adequate proof, such as a written or oral admission or some other hard evidence, there's not really anything anyone can do about it. And that's what I think everyone here can agree on...that sexism definitely exists, just as racism does, but if you ever want that to change, there needs to be proof. That's all I was saying.
No, I don't really agree. Sorry.
Why not, Dan? You don't agree that you need proof to change it, or you don't agree that it exists?
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I don't agree that every person is innately wired towards irrational prejudice.
I also don't agree that the only way to change racist attitudes is with proof.
If you just mean, the only way to reliably nail a particular somebody under the law, then sure.
But the way to engender real sea-changes in the attitudes of most people isn't just to keep nailing people who are racist to the wall. You need to put better ideas out there. And you don't actually have to "prove" to someone that they are currently racist in order for them to adopt a new framework for their worldview that is not racist.
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Dan, regarding the proof thing, I was saying businesses, not people. Sorry if that wasn't clearer.
The part about every person being naturally wired to fear the unknown, that's my opinion. However, it has some grounding in science as well. Human beings are naturally built to be afraid of outsiders, just like any mammal. We are born that way. It is, then, necessary for us to change ourselves, over time, to be less afraid and bigoted towards the Other. Apes do the same thing.
In fact, Mark Twain wrote an essay called "What Is Man?" (click for the full text) that delved into this from a philosophical perspective, wherein he discussed how people are born a certain way and, like an ore, need their impurities refined out of them (which he equated to learning and being better educated). These impurities, he explained, represented racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry.
We can't help how we are born, but we can help who we become. We all have racism hard-wired into our brains, and some of that will never go away, but you can get rid of most of it.
Anyway, that's just my opinion. Nobody has to agree if they don't want to.
[ May 13, 2012, 07:32 PM: Message edited by: Jeff C. ]
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quote: I certainly believe that every human being on the planet is in some way favorable towards and against other races and sexes, however slight, because that's how the human mind works.
Actually, studies of implicit bias indicate that women (like men) tend to be biased against other women.
I doubt it's hard-wired, though. But any opinion about that--mine, Dan's or yours--is mainly guesswork given the present lack of evidence.
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I don't think we have racism hardwired into our brains. I think we might have a certain amount of paranoia hardwired from a time when you didn't know if a rustling in the brush was a saber-toothed lion or a skunk.
But racism and sexism are taught and learned, not innate.
I've read dozens of racism conversion experiences where people who used to be violently racist broke down and changed almost instantly when confronted with the humanity of their crimes. None of it was inborn.
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I say we must crush institutionalized any-ism* with an iron boot, but should not worry about individual belief structures. That is to say, yay for promoting positive attitudes, teaching tolerance and equality, but we should accept that there will always be some people who are A-holes and are going to try and bully, abuse or otherwise crap on someone else. In saying the above, I'm not saying "just accept it" I'm saying, deal with the situation like any other A-hole and not lump it into "racism" or "sexism" or "whicheverisum".
I get really tired of people being all uptight about a joke or how "we whites are so privileged" etc. People are people. Good, bad and everything in between, and either a joke is insightful or not, funny or not, and while Kutcher's take on Indians was certainly insensitive, getting all up in arms about it just makes the world a more brittle and sharp edged place.
*My definition of "institutionalized any-ism" is as follows: A group or organization who makes it their purpose to oppress or deny equality to any group based on race, age, gender, sexual orientation, etc. For instance, when state governments had segregation laws.
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My personal opinion is that white guys don't get to have an opinion on this topic that anyone takes seriously for another hundred years.
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: My personal opinion is that white guys don't get to have an opinion on this topic that anyone takes seriously for another hundred years.
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: My personal opinion is that white guys don't get to have an opinion on this topic that anyone takes seriously for another hundred years.
Excluding people by race...great plan.
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Humans have been around for, what, >100000 years last time I checked. We've been 'civilized' in an industrial age for, hmmm, at most six or seven generations, and that's being pretty generous I think.
Do y'all imagine that most, much less all, of those instincts learned and bred into us BY us over hundreds, thousands of generations have been successfully extinguished? No? I admit it is an absurd notion that they have, so for the sake of argument let's assume they haven't.
Given that, how many instincts that we teach ourselves (because really, those are the worrying ones) that were rational and useful 60K years ago are still rational and useful in a 21st century post-industrial society? Lots, or even just a few?
Then yeah, we're at least partially hardwired to have some irrational instincts. The notion that we're inherently rational with good instincts...man. Just weird.
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The not-so-flippant side of that is this: you can sit down and go through a test which will measure inherent biases in judgment that are just an inexorable and clingy infliction of our culture.
Do the Weapons IAT. It is the most hilariously telling. At least it tells me I'm not THAT much of a racist.
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quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: Then yeah, we're at least partially hardwired to have some irrational instincts. The notion that we're inherently rational with good instincts...man. Just weird.
Seems weird to me that you imagine the options are either A) We're innately hardwired (a.k.a. genetically predisposed) towards irrational prejudice/racism... or B) We're innately (genetically) rational with "good instincts."
That's a ludicrously false dichotomy. The fact that I reject A doesn't mean I believe B.
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Sam, I did two of them. The basic light/dark skin and (at your suggestion) the weapons test. According to the weapons test, I moderately associate white faces with weapons. I'm not really clear if that means I'm racist against white people or against black people. I mean, I like weapons. I also like wallets, phones, and water bottles though, so...
Anyway, according to the skin tone good/bad test, I have a moderate preference for Dark Skinned faces over Light Skinned faces.
Although I took what I think was this test once... I don't know, 6 months ago? And it came back the opposite, with a preference for light skinned faces.
In any event, I'm extremely skeptical that a test like that is actually reliably measuring anything meaningful, but I suspect you could have guessed that I'd say that. What explanations for behavior does a simple test like that provide?
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Dan, I didn't say we're genetically predisposed towards irrational judgments. I said some of the things we're predisposed towards are irrational. Which means that yes, there is a false dichotomy, in this case of your making.
quote:In any event, I'm extremely skeptical that a test like that is actually reliably measuring anything meaningful, but I suspect you could have guessed that I'd say that. What explanations for behavior does a simple test like that provide?
For the purposes of this discussion, what does your last question matter? Or is this another idea to be rejected because it means bad things for the human condition if it's true?
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quote:In any event, I'm extremely skeptical that a test like that is actually reliably measuring anything meaningful, but I suspect you could have guessed that I'd say that. What explanations for behavior does a simple test like that provide?
For the purposes of this discussion, what does your last question matter? Or is this another idea to be rejected because it means bad things for the human condition if it's true?
Huh? No.
So, the test seems to work this way:
Step 1: Gather data (i.e. someone takes the test) Step 2: Explain the data (How?) Step 3: Reach conclusions about someone's preferences/motive/etc.. (i.e. I think whitey's packing heat and prefer dark faces, or something)
When I say "What explanations for behavior does a simple test like that provide?" what I'm essentially asking is: how does Step 2 work? "Behavior" in this case refers to Step 1, someone taking the test.
But the creators of the test seem to think they have solid explanatory power, right? They can, looking at a small slice of someone's behavior, explain that behavior into consistently true conclusions about their preferences.
That claim seems almost as bold (and unlikely) as someone reading my personality in my horoscope, or using an online quiz to accurately figure out if I'm a Slytherin or a Hufflepuff.
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I just explained that that wasn't what I was saying at all. Literally, just a couple posts above yours. Rakeesh (and apparently you) failed to comprehend what I was saying. He has an excuse, though: his statement was based on misreading me. That happens. Effective communication is hard.
But I've clarified it now. So... what's your excuse?
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In a more general sense, I can't decide if I should bother trying to defend myself against a blanket allegation like this.
I had some more stuff written up trying to do just that, but I don't think it's worth it. You go ahead and think what you want.
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It might be. But you don't get to have an opinion on it.
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quote:Although I took what I think was this test once... I don't know, 6 months ago? And it came back the opposite, with a preference for light skinned faces.
As a side note: awareness of what is being tested will skew the test results if you are uncomfortable with previous results (or results you consider likely). Seriously.
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Yes. Not about that comment, about a trend in your position about any of these things, be it psych or sociological inquiry or people's economic habits and baser natures. The common thread, I think I have come to see now after reading that, is a number of appeals to consequences of a belief. Something which I would have to figure into deciding how to approach any such discussion in the future.
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Step 1: Gather data (i.e. someone takes the test) Step 2: Explain the data (How?) Step 3: Reach conclusions about someone's preferences/motive/etc.. (i.e. I think whitey's packing heat and prefer dark faces, or something)
When I say "What explanations for behavior does a simple test like that provide?" what I'm essentially asking is: how does Step 2 work? "Behavior" in this case refers to Step 1, someone taking the test.
But the creators of the test seem to think they have solid explanatory power, right? They can, looking at a small slice of someone's behavior, explain that behavior into consistently true conclusions about their preferences.
Apparently, you did not even look at the website before drawing this conclusion about the test and it's creators. They are very up front about what the tests measures and how they should be used. I strongly suggest you look at this background they give on understand the purpose of the tests and [url = https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/demo/background/ethics.html]this[/url] commentary they offer on ethical considerations.
Among other things, the tests creators warn
quote:Can (or should) people use this test to make decisions about others? Can one, for example, use this test to measure somebody else’s automatic racial preference, and use it to decide that they should or should not serve on a jury? We assert that the IAT should not be used in any such way. Especially at this early stage of the IAT’s development, it is much preferable to use it mainly to develop awareness of one’s own and others’ automatic preferences and stereotypes. Using the IAT as the basis for making significant decisions about self or others could lead to undesired and unjustified consequences.
quote:Although I took what I think was this test once... I don't know, 6 months ago? And it came back the opposite, with a preference for light skinned faces.
As a side note: awareness of what is being tested will skew the test results if you are uncomfortable with previous results (or results you consider likely). Seriously.
Heh. Oh, well, that's good then, otherwise my results may not fit your assumptions!
Seriously, though: The first time I saw the test, I went through it slowly once to try and understand what the point of it was. It said it couldn't draw any conclusions from my answers because I'd taken the test too slowly. Then I went through faster.
So, by what you're saying, every time I took it after that first inconclusive attempt, my results were tainted? Rabbit's right, I didn't spend much time reading their site. Do they assert this, or is this your assertion, Tom?
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Rabbit: Right. So the disclaimer confirms that the test is about as reliable (and should be given about as much credence) as an online Hogwarts sorting hat. Gotcha. Well, at least they're upfront about it!
Posts: 3580 | Registered: Aug 2005
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Yes. Not about that comment, about a trend in your position about any of these things, be it psych or sociological inquiry or people's economic habits and baser natures. The common thread, I think I have come to see now after reading that, is a number of appeals to consequences of a belief. Something which I would have to figure into deciding how to approach any such discussion in the future.
'Kay. Well, you're still wrong.
It's true that people have thought that's what I was saying in the past. I remember several examples of that. But they were mistaken.
Now, I have argued that the consequences of, say, a policy, would be or are horrible, and therefore the policy was bad. And it's true this argument happens to involve "consequences."
But "appeal to consequences" indicates that I'm determining whether or not something is true based on it's consequences, as opposed to whether or not it might be good. This seems like a pretty basic misunderstanding, either of the fallacy or of me. I'm guessing the latter.
Anyway, the point is, you're wrong.
Posts: 3580 | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Rabbit: Right. So the disclaimer confirms that the test is about as reliable (and should be given about as much credence) as an online Hogwarts sorting hat. Gotcha. Well, at least they're upfront about it!
The disclaimer states that the test should not be a model for making significant decisions, rather than to demonstrate things about one's own hidden irrational biases. I suppose it's very much so in your tendencies to want to conclude the test as useless as an online hogwarts sorting hat test, so.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:But "appeal to consequences" indicates that I'm determining whether or not something is true based on it's consequences, as opposed to whether or not it might be good. This seems like a pretty basic misunderstanding, either of the fallacy or of me. I'm guessing the latter.
Define what you think the fallacy is, then.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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Here's an example of someone using an appeal to consequences: "Racism isn't prevalent today because if it was that would mean we haven't really improved much. I believe we have improved a lot, so it must not be prevalent."
There's a real-life example where Destineer thought I was doing this, I think in the Trayvon thread, but I can't find it right now. Basically, I said something sounded horrible, and his response was along the lines of "yeah, sometimes things are horrible!"
Which, if you stripped my comment of context and assumed I was calling it horrible as an argument, would sound like an appeal to consequences. So, as I said, people have certainly assumed I was doing that.
For contrast, here's an argument that uses consequences without using the fallacy: "I don't think racism is very prevalent today. If we implement policies that assume it is prevalent I think those policies will have horrible consequences for society. So we shouldn't implement them."
In this case the person may be wrong that racism isn't prevalent, and they may be wrong that said policies will have horrible consequences. But those are both logically defensible arguments, and not an appeal to consequences.
Posts: 3580 | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Rabbit: Right. So the disclaimer confirms that the test is about as reliable (and should be given about as much credence) as an online Hogwarts sorting hat. Gotcha. Well, at least they're upfront about it!
The disclaimer states that the test should not be a model for making significant decisions, rather than to demonstrate things about one's own hidden irrational biases. I suppose it's very much so in your tendencies to want to conclude the test as useless as an online hogwarts sorting hat test, so.
Heh, so, I was certainly being a smartass, and I should probably apologize for that.
If I'd taken her comment more seriously I would have said: Rabbit's statements about what the site's suggests we should do with their "results" in no way answers the question I was asking.
I wasn't asking "How do we explain what the significance of these results might be?"
I was asking "How do the test creators go from receiving their data to reaching their conclusion? (a.k.a. results)"
We're conditioned to assign a lot of authority to "tests" or more specifically "test results."
They sound so objective! And, in fairness, real tests are. Math tests, STD tests, and the like. We put in data, the test tells us our results! If our result is wrong, it's because we put in the wrong data.
But that's because, in the cases of math tests and STD tests, we tend to trust the method of interpretation used on the data we put in.
Some methods of interpretation would be bad, right? If my math test was graded by throwing darts at it, that would be a bad way of determining the results of my inputs.
In the case of this test, I don't understand what their method of interpretation is. Moreover, unlike an STD or math test, I also can't even imagine any method that would seem very concrete.
That makes me skeptical.
Posts: 3580 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
That's a far more encouraging and thoughtful response. Anyway, the test is useful in that if you actually do it, it offers a way to provide insight into one's own implicit associations. Nearly nobody can create an equivalent timed response with the same degree of accuracy, and IAT is a way of testing for something which a person is usually unable to self-report because they are part of unrecognized mental bias. If you have any more questions about what the IAT does do (versus what it is not claiming) you can check the FAQ.
Related particularly to the issue of sticky mental/racial attachments:
quote:It is obvious that children are not born with preferences for one group or another. But early in development, infants appear to develop preferences for what is familiar such as their mother's voice, female faces (if their primary caregiver is female), and members of their race/ethnic group. It would appear that children are born with a mechanism to develop preferences rapidly, even though the specific things they come to prefer are a function of their environment. Frances Aboud showed that children explicitly express negative attitudes toward outgroups. We showed that 6 yr old, 10 yr old and adult Whites show the same level of automatic preference for their ingroup. What changes over time is the lowering of explicitly expressed preferences, with 6 yr olds reporting the strongest ingroup preference, 10 yr olds more moderate preference, and adults reporting the least of all. See Baron & Banaji, 2006; Dunham, Baron, & Banaji, in press.
quote:So, by what you're saying, every time I took it after that first inconclusive attempt, my results were tainted?
Yes. Because you're taking it knowing what you have to do to obtain results.
So you can only take their tests once and expect to get anything valuable? Is that once for each test, or once overall?
This is interesting to me, because I think what you're saying here makes sense from a common-sense approach. If you wanted to test my math skills right now, and gave me a test, each time I took the test I might be able to do a little better, just from knowing what I did before and what my results were. So I get why you say that.
On the other hand, how do you reconcile that understanding of their test with what they say here (from the FAQ)...
quote: What does it mean if I get a test result that I don't believe describes me or, if I take the same test twice, I get different results each time. Answer: You may be giving the test more credit than it deserves! These tests are not perfectly accurate by any definition of accuracy. Normally, outcomes will change at least slightly from one taking to another. You may discover this if you repeat any of the tests. We encourage repeating any test for which the outcome surprises you. If the outcome repeats, the result is definitely more trustworthy than is the first result alone. If the outcome varies, it is best to average the different results. However, if the outcome varies widely from one taking to another (something that is unusual) we suggest that you just regard the set of results as 'inconclusive'. Besides normal variation in the reliability of assessment, the IAT is also known to be malleable based on differences in the social setting and recent experience. These factors will influence the consistency of measurement across occasions.
Looks like they not only expect the test to be reliable across multiple uses, but if anything they expect it to be more reliable.
In my case it seems they would say that I should take it a few more times to see if I trend toward one result or the other.
Also, they seem to be suggesting that maybe a recent experience of mine could have changed my implicit attitudes. Of course the only logical conclusion is that I was racist before this discussion, but then you guys cured me. Thanks, Hatrack!
Posts: 3580 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
*facepalm* Dan, do you want me to explain to you how this sort of test works, or are you just being bloody-minded? I really can't tell.
Are you familiar, for example, with the Keirsey Temperament test? I can start with that and go from there, if you'd like.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
Knowing intellectually that all human beings have a tenancy to prefer the subgroup they belong to is useful to help put aide any feelings of discomfort one might feel when dealing with someone not in said group.
Beyond that, I can't say as this test or knowlege of this human tendency is useful, and it certainly isn't proof of some inherent racism.
I would say that people preferring the "known" to the "unknown" is kinda in the "duh" category.
Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005
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I think Danf has made his point clearly and well...this particular test I'd designed to be taken more then once, not like you claimed previously at all
Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005
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