January 2015
Last week, while perusing Scientific American‘s blog section I stumbled
upon a post entitled, “Richard Feynman, sexism and changing perceptions of a
scientific icon,” written by Ashutosh Jogalekar. Already a Feynman fan, I had an
inkling of the article’s thrust even before reading it: Richard Feynman was, on
occasion, a total jerk to women.
That much is clear to anyone who has read Feynman’s book, Surely, You’re
Joking, Mr. Feynman!In it, the Nobel Prize-winning physicist candidly
reveals a great many personal anecdotes and beliefs. Some aren’t exactly
politically correct. For example, in regard to women, he describes his very
questionable approach to picking up girls at parties or bars. With a hat-tip to
Field of Dreams, it is best described
as “If you disrespect them, they will come.” Don’t buy them anything, don’t be
polite to them, and don’t do what they want… until they’ve agreed to sleep
with you, that is.
When I read that section, I was taken aback. Feynman’s actions were archaic,
rude, and unacceptable, unbefitting of one of my scientific heroes.
Ashutosh Jogalekar, who penned the article at Scientific American,
described having a similar reaction to Feynman’s “casual sexism,” which also
manifested in more than just social arenas. But, he noted, though some of his
actions are “disturbing and even offensive” when viewed from the
socially-evolved lens of today, “they were probably no different than the
attitudes of a male-dominated American society in the giddy postwar years.”
Thus, Jogalekar reasoned, we should not condemn Feynman wholly as a sexist.
That seems to make sense. While anecdotes from Feynman’s own book show that he
was a jerk to women in certain settings, there’s no
evidence that Feynman ever discriminated against women in science. In
actuality, it was quite the opposite. As Julia Lipman
wrote in 1999:
“Feynman took the side of a female
Caltech professor who brought a sexual
discrimination complaint against the school. He encouraged his younger sister’s
career as a physicist even though their parents didn’t believe that women should
pursue scientific careers.”
And so, Jogalekar concluded, “We can condemn parts of his behavior while
praising his science. And we should.”
The article earned some controversy on Twitter, but generally prompted diverse,
reflective discussion. Not a big deal.
Ashutosh Jogalekar’s Feynman article appeared last Friday. The next day, it was
taken down, and Jogalekar was abruptly excused from Scientific American‘s
blog network. (The article has since been reposted
“in the interest of openness and transparency.“)
Scientific American editor Curtis Brainard offered an explanation for the dismissal earlier this
week. He said that some of Jogalekar’s posts lacked clarity, which made them
insensitive to “valid concerns that many readers have about past and existing
biases and prejudices in our society.”
In addition to the Feynman piece, Brainard referenced two earlier articles that
stoked the ire of a few readers, expressed almost entirely through social media.
“The first was a guest post
in April about Larry Summers’ statement regarding women in science. The second
was a post in May, which favorably reviewed a
controversial book by Nicholas Wade, A Troublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race
and Human History.” (Robert VerBruggen also gave this book a
moderately positive review for
RealClearScience.)
The first post attempted to navigate the muddy waters of gender discrimination
in science, and why, in certain fields, there are more men than women and vice
versa. The guest author, Chris Martin, respectfully contended, “The research
clearly shows that such discrimination exists—among other things, women seem to
be paid less for equal work… but the latest research suggests that
discrimination has a weaker impact than people might think, and that innate sex
differences explain quite a lot.”
What exactly is “insensitive” about that?
In his review
of Nicholas Wade’s controversial
book, Jogalekar wrote:
“Overall I found this book extremely well-researched, thoughtfully written and
objectively argued. Wade draws on several sources, including the peer reviewed
literature and work by other thinkers and scientists. The many researchers whose
work Wade cites makes the writing authoritative; on the other hand, where
speculation is warranted or noted he usually explicitly points it out as such.
Some of these speculations such as the effects of genetics on the behavior of
entire societies are quite far flung but I don’t see any reason why, based on
what we do know about the spread of genes among groups, they should be dismissed
out of hand. At the very least they serve as reasonable hypotheses to be
pondered, thrashed out and tested. Science is about ideas, not answers.”
While I disagree with Jogalekar’s favorable view of the book, there was nothing
in his review that struck me as distasteful. His article was well within the
mainstream of scientific thought.
In the wake of his removal from Scientific American‘s blog network,
Jogalekar has remained polite and pensive, expressing nothing but respect for
Brainard and the magazine. He did, however, ask some open questions.
For example:
“How much should a brand care about opinions (particularly negative ones) on
social media, especially in an age when waves of such criticism can swell and
ebb rapidly and often provide a transient, biased view of content?”
The simple fact is that science is occasionally uncomfortable and sometimes runs
counter to what we believe. But that doesn’t mean we should shy away from it.
Yet, that is what Scientific American has chosen to do; they have
dismissed a blogger for tackling controversial topics and ruffling a few overly
sensitive feathers.
“A scientific topic cannot be declared off limits or whitewashed because its
findings can be socially or politically controversial,” Jogalekar sagely wrote
in one of his pieces.
Apparently, Scientific American disagrees. And in their politically
correct world where feelings come before facts, that means you lose your job.
RealClearScience, July 17, 2014.
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