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[转贴]女人最好不要做科学家(大家来练习英文阅读啦)
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2006-07-13 14:07:00
[WEPAN] Male Scientist Writes of Life as Female Scientist
> Male Scientist Writes of Life as Female Scientist Biologist Who
> Underwent Sex Change Describes Biases Against Women By Shankar
> Vedantam Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, July 13, 2006; Page
> A10
>
> Neurobiologist Ben Barres has a unique perspective on former Harvard
> president Lawrence Summers's assertion that innate differences between
> the sexes might explain why many fewer women than men reach the
> highest echelons of science.
>
> That's because Barres used to be a woman himself.
>
> In a highly unusual critique published yesterday, the Stanford
> University biologist -- who used to be Barbara -- said his experience
> as both a man and a woman had given him an intensely personal insight
> into the biases that make it harder for women to succeed in science.
>
> After he underwent a sex change nine years ago at the age of 42,
> Barres recalled, another scientist who was unaware of it was heard to
> say, "Ben Barres gave a great seminar today, but then his work is much
> better than his sister's."
>
> And as a female undergraduate at MIT, Barres once solved a difficult
> math problem that stumped many male classmates, only to be told by a professor:
> "Your boyfriend must have solved it for you."
>
> "By far," Barres wrote, "the main difference I have noticed is that
> people who don't know I am transgendered treat me with much more
> respect" than when he was a woman. "I can even complete a whole
> sentence without being interrupted by a man."
>
> Barres said the switch had given him access to conversations that
> would have excluded him previously: "I had a conversation with a male
> surgeon and he told me he had never met a woman surgeon who was as
> good as a man."
>
> Barres's salvo, bolstered with scientific studies, marks a dramatic
> twist in a controversy that began with Summers's suggestion last year
> that "intrinsic aptitude" may explain why there are relatively few
> tenured female scientists at Harvard. After a lengthy feud with the
> Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Summers resigned earlier this year.
>
> The episode triggered a fierce fight between those who say talk of
> intrinsic differences reflects sexism that has held women back and
> those who argue that political correctness is keeping scientists from
> frankly discussing the issue.
>
> While there are men and women on both sides of the argument, the
> debate has exposed fissures along gender lines, which is what makes
> Barres so unusual.
> Barres said he has realized from personal experience that many men are
> unconscious of the privileges that come with being male, which leaves
> them unable to countenance talk of glass ceilings and discrimination.
>
> Barres's commentary was published yesterday in the journal Nature. The
> scientist has also recently taken his argument to the highest reaches
> of American science, crusading to make access to prestigious awards
> more equitable.
>
> In an interview, Nancy Andreasen, a well-known psychiatrist at the
> University of Iowa, agreed with Barres. She said it took her a long
> time to convince her husband that he got more respect when he
> approached an airline ticket counter than she did. When she stopped
> sending out research articles under her full name and used the
> initials N.C. Andreasen instead, she said, the acceptance rate of her
> publications soared.
>
> Andreasen, one of the comparatively few women who have won the
> National Medal of Science, said she is still regularly reminded she is female.
> "Often, I will be standing in a group of men, and another person will
> come up and say hello to all the men and just will not see me, because
> in a professional setting, men are not programmed to see women," she said.
> "Finally, one of the men will say, 'I guess you haven't met Nancy
> Andreasen,' and then the person will turn bright red and say, 'Oh
> Nancy, nice to see you!' "
>
> Summers did not respond to a request for an interview. But two
> scientists Barres lambasted along with Summers said the Stanford
> neurobiologist had misrepresented their views and unfairly tarred
> those who disagree with crude assertions of racism and sexism. Harvard
> cognitive scientist Steven Pinker and Peter Lawrence, a biologist at
> Britain's Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, said
> convincing data show there are differences between men and women in a
> host of mental abilities.
>
> While bias could be a factor in why there were fewer women at the
> pinnacles of science, both argued that this was not a primary factor.
>
> Pinker, who said he is a feminist, said experiments have shown, on
> average, that women are better than men at mathematical calculation
> and verbal fluency, and that men are better at spatial visualization
> and mathematical reasoning. It is hardly surprising, he said, that in
> his own field of language development, the number of women outstrips
> men, while in mechanical engineering, there are far more men.
>
> "Is it essential to women's progress that women be indistinguishable
> from men?" he asked. "It confuses the issue of fairness with sameness.
> Let's say the data shows sex differences. Does it become okay to
> discriminate against women? The moral issue of treating individuals
> fairly should be kept separate from the empirical issues."
>
> Lawrence said it is a "utopian" idea that "one fine day, there will be
> an equal number of men and women in all jobs, including those in
> scientific research."
>
> He said a range of cognitive differences could partly account for
> stark disparities, such as at his own institute, which has 56 male and
> six female scientists. But even as he played down the role of sexism,
> Lawrence said the "rat race" in science is skewed in favor of pushy,
> aggressive people -- most of whom, he said, happen to be men.
>
> "We should try and look for the qualities we actually need," he said.
> "I believe if we did, that we would choose more women and more gentle
> men. It is gentle people of all sorts who are discriminated against in
> our struggle to survive."
>
> Barres and Elizabeth Spelke, a Harvard psychologist who has publicly
> debated Pinker on the issue, say they have little trouble with the
> idea that there are differences between the sexes, although some
> differences, especially among children, involve biases among adults in
> interpreting the same behavior in boys and girls.
>
> And both argue it is difficult to tease apart nature from nurture.
> "Does anyone doubt if you study harder you will do better on a test?"
> Barres asked. "The mere existence of an IQ difference does not say it is innate.
> .
> . . Why do Asian girls do better on math tests than American boys? No
> one thinks they are innately better."
>
> In her debate with Pinker last year, Spelke said arguments about
> innate differences as explanations for disparities become absurd if
> applied to previous eras. "You won't see a Chinese face or an Indian
> face in 19th-century science," she said. "It would have been tempting
> to apply this same pattern of statistical reasoning and say, there
> must be something about European genes that give rise to greater
> mathematical talent than Asian genes."
>
> "I think we want to step back and ask, why is it that almost all Nobel
> Prize winners are men today?" she concluded. "The answer to that
> question may be the same reason why all the great scientists in
> Florence were Christian."
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