• Gender Gap Persists in Academia - Abysmal in Philosophy, Economics, and Math
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[QUOTE=xxncxx;41578528]you can still study things yourself without actually going to college.[/QUOTE] That's what I said? Or better yet, what Voltlight said?
[QUOTE=NoDachi;41577885]"So Mr Voltlight why do you think you're appropriate for this position?" "Well I spent a weekend reading wikipedia and shit" "Do you have any actually credible qualifications, peer reviews and references?" "Well ... no" "get the fuck out m8"[/QUOTE] Yeah, what the others said in response to you is correct. I'm saying those qualifications are fucking worthless. I work with employers, and I know for a fact they laugh at having stupid qualifications like that. It's more like: "So, Mr or Mrs -----, you studied feminism?" "Yeah!" "And that how do you feel that aids you in these field of medicine/IT/Anything?" "I'm very open minded~" "Come back when you have common sense" They won't even consider you when you have qualifications that are completely random like that. I could almost quote, but one of them pretty much said "If they actually spent time studying something like that, then I don't think they really have a clue". Personally, I believe the best way to get a job is to get relevant qualifications, and build upon personal skills in your own time. Myself, I went for IT and art qualifications, taught myself how to use a variety of programs and an understanding of anything related, and that's it. Use all the skills I have learned every day now.
I seem to be in a little bubble where nobody I've ever met, school or otherwise, has been outwardly sexist. The very worst I've heard was my philosophy professor spending a minute talking about how women lubricate when seeing flowers, concluding by asking "How many women in this room have lubricated when seeing flowers?" However, he also asked the men in the class "How many of you have big porno dongs", which makes me think he just doesn't give a shit about social norms.
[QUOTE=NoDachi;41577885]"So Mr Voltlight why do you think you're appropriate for this position?" "Well I spent a weekend reading wikipedia and shit" "Do you have any actually credible qualifications, peer reviews and references?" "Well ... no" "get the fuck out m8"[/QUOTE] The beginning is always hard, but if you can do something on your own or have somebody who knows your worth vouch for you, once you get few years of work done in the field and a portfolio of the work, the studying matters less. But yeah, you still definitely have it harder than after going through recognized education.
[QUOTE=voltlight;41577522]Who the fuck studies feminism and pregnancy. That's so damn try-hard. Maybe the gender gap is purely due to stupidity?[/QUOTE] Kind of depressing how society has almost collectively deemed several study-subjects as "useless."
[QUOTE=milkandcooki;41580172]Kind of depressing how society has almost collectively deemed several study-subjects as "useless."[/QUOTE] some people are just anti-intellectual idiots
"The gender gap is purely caused by people who don't want to study the things I think are important." Welp, problem solved. As for Langan, here's a direct quote from him about his views, [quote]I believe in the theory of evolution, but I believe as well in the allegorical truth of creation theory. In other words, I believe that evolution, including the principle of natural selection, is one of the tools used by God to create mankind. Mankind is then a participant in the creation of the universe itself, so that we have a closed loop. I believe that there is a level on which science and religious metaphor are mutually compatible.[14][/quote] I don't think there's anything wrong with him questioning a scientific theory or supporting intelligent design. If he can put the theory forward, he has every right to do so - even if he's wrong. As long as he's trying to explain his belief rationally, and it can be debunked through further scientific/mathematical examination, I don't see a problem - ? Plus, even if he's dead-wrong about intelligent design, some of the most brilliant minds today are absolute idiots outside of their fields. Richard Dawkins, for instance, believes that fantasy literature is inherently harmful to rational thinking. He believes fantasy literature and fairy tales reinforce anti-scientific beliefs. That's pretty off-base, seeing how fantasy literature and fairy tales traditionally have a lot more to do [i]with[/i] rational thinking (Grimm's Fairy Tales were literally all warnings for children) than without.
[QUOTE=milkandcooki;41580172]Kind of depressing how society has almost collectively deemed several study-subjects as "useless."[/QUOTE] I deal with this every day as a philosophy student, but for a moment, reach inside of yourself and realistically ask, "What would I do with a degree in Feminist Studies."
[QUOTE=Crazy Ivan;41580641]I deal with this every day as a philosophy student, but for a moment, reach inside of yourself and realistically ask, "What would I do with a degree in Feminist Studies."[/QUOTE] Well, according to [url]http://www.humanities.uci.edu/womensstudies/undergraduate/ws_degree.php[/url] : [quote]A study of Women’s Studies graduates was done by Barbara F. Luebke and Mary Ellen Reilly, called Women’s Studies Graduates: The First Generation, found that WS graduates hold a wide variety of specific positions, including: University professor Elementary or high school teacher Physician Legislator Journalist Lawyer Artist Musician Actor Health clinic coordinator Small-business owner Clinical social worker Medical administrator Nurse, Nurse-midwife Legislative aide, lobbyist Public relations manager Advocate for domestic violence survivors Librarian Television writer Psychotherapist Energy conservation manager Film-casting director HIV educator Union organizer Novelist Chiropractor[/quote] From my experience, WS and GS courses always pair well with another Major. Two English teachers at my high school, for instance, were English majors with Women's Studies/Gender Studies minors alongside their teaching certificates. Sometimes Gender Studies also opens you to special internships. One of my friend's roommates, for instance, is a Poli Sci major and Gender Studies minor. So, she earned an internship through our joint political-gender studies initiative that allowed her to work for Barbara Buono's gubernatorial campaign.
i'm an ongoing associate of applied technology. the field i'm pursuing shouldn't be seen as boys-only club/male-binary thing, but sadly, this seems to be the case most of the time. i've seen very few people that are not the majority in those classes
[QUOTE=Reimu;41580459]"The gender gap is purely caused by people who don't want to study the things I think are important." Welp, problem solved. As for Langan, here's a direct quote from him about his views, I don't think there's anything wrong with him questioning a scientific theory or supporting intelligent design. If he can put the theory forward, he has every right to do so - even if he's wrong. As long as he's trying to explain his belief rationally, and it can be debunked through further scientific/mathematical examination, I don't see a problem - ? Plus, even if he's dead-wrong about intelligent design, some of the most brilliant minds today are absolute idiots outside of their fields. Richard Dawkins, for instance, believes that fantasy literature is inherently harmful to rational thinking. He believes fantasy literature and fairy tales reinforce anti-scientific beliefs. That's pretty off-base, seeing how fantasy literature and fairy tales traditionally have a lot more to do [i]with[/i] rational thinking (Grimm's Fairy Tales were literally all warnings for children) than without.[/QUOTE] I took the liberty to read up on Langan and his ideas this afternoon. I'm sorry to say most of it seems like complete nonsense. He uses terms willy-nilly without defining anything and throws as many of them out there as he can in each sentence. If you're trying to publish a scientific article, or even a philosophical argument, generally you need to establish exactly what it is you're trying to say as clearly as you can. Its not uncommon for seemingly basic ideas to be defined in papers if they are a major topic of discussion within that paper. Langan's work seems to lack definitions for basic terms and beyond, and doesn't cite any works that might provide clearly defined definitions in reference to any of the terms he's using. As far as questioning scientific theories goes, there's no harm there. I've questioned all sorts of ideas during my studies, and I've even found that some of the "basic principles" I had been taught were actually wrong. I'll never forget the day one of my organic profs casually mentioned that oxygen and sulfur don't make double bonds. That one was a real brain bender initially. Its a whole separate issue when you don't express your new models very clearly and instead of clarifying what it is you mean to say go around and belittle those that express confusion or doubt in your model as Langan seems to have done. And, to make matters worse, it really, really doesn't make things good for you when you join an organization such as the International Society for Complexity, Information, and Design when their expressed mission goals are as follows: [QUOTE]to reverse the stifling materialist world view and replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions and to affirm the reality of God.[/QUOTE] I could go on and on about the members of ISCID and their publications as well as their links to The Discovery Institute and what have you, but that's not the important part. The important part is that most of the legislation being tossed around dealing with science education and children is being written and pushed by the Intelligent Design movement, and is causing problems. Just today I read a news article detailing how during a public hearing in Tennessee about adopting The Next Generation Science Standards developed in collaboration with 25 other states was going to lead to the ideologies that led to the holocaust and other genocides because it emphasized evidence based reasoning and the teaching of evolution. In my state there have been three bills in the past two years proposed that would provide the option of teaching "alternate theories" in public schools, and they've been gaining support each year. Anyway, I'd wager that even though academia may have a host of problems we're better off with it than without it. I'm all for citizen science and more open processes involving peer review and publication, but not every work should be published, and Langan's is a pretty good example of this. There are loads of intelligent people out there that probably can't find jobs they could do or are interested in because they lack the proper credentials, but there are probably just as many if not more people out there that want those jobs and are by no means qualified. I personally, would rather live in a world where engineers, doctors, lawyers, and my co-workers have proven that they have the qualifications for the positions they hold. I've seen lots of terrible lab practices during my studies. The most memorable was an incident where this girl spilled a large quantity of 10M HCl all over herself and the fume hood without gloves on. Her method of clean up involved using her bare hands to wipe off the acid on the lip of the fume hood and basically onto the floor as well. She then attempted to walk away without telling anyone anything and went right to recording data instead of cleaning the acid off her clothes or skin. Thankfully, no one else was harmed by her negligence and she was promptly removed from the class. I'm not too fond of chemical burns, and as such, I'd rather not have someone like that working in the same lab as me. It would be interesting to see similar studies done on other academic databases. I'm hoping my field is more balanced. There have been some minor issues with some of the older faculty members here at Purdue, but I'd like to think we're doing better than 40%
[QUOTE=Emperorconor;41577551]What the hell is this? Is this feminism riddled with dialetics or nihilism?[/QUOTE] It's free feminism you get with your hotel stay
The Ecology one astounds me because throughout my undergrad and my postgrad, my year has been female dominated, and my lecturers are a pretty even 50-50 split.
My whole family sucks at math.
[QUOTE=person11;41577647]It is not competition: it is harassment.[/QUOTE] they mean the same thing dumbass
[QUOTE=Eltro102;41582783]they mean the same thing dumbass[/QUOTE] No they don't. Also "dumbass" is p. unnecessary, especially considering you're not in a heated argument with him or anything.
The bottom line is that there are not enough women interested in these fields.
[QUOTE=Disotrtion;41583942]The bottom line is that there are not enough women interested in these fields.[/QUOTE] That (because of how society creates gender roles), and because of harassment.
[QUOTE=NoDachi;41580177]some people are just anti-intellectual idiots[/QUOTE] [QUOTE=milkandcooki;41580172]Kind of depressing how society has almost collectively deemed several study-subjects as "useless."[/QUOTE] I really don't think you guys have thought this through. Like. At all. How do sheep even use computers?
[QUOTE=voltlight;41588546]I really don't think you guys have thought this through. Like. At all. How do sheep even use computers?[/QUOTE] good one
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