From: levine@symcom.math.uiuc.edu (Lenore Levine)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written
Subject: Re: Brain size (was Re: the "cause" of homosexuality)
Date: 23 Jul 92 15:53:50 GMT
Article-I.D.: news.BruMts.JwE
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana

burt@aupair.cs.athabascau.ca (Burt Voorhees) writes:

>>In article <doom.711461436@elaine36.Stanford.EDU> doom@leland.Stanford.EDU (Jo
>seph Brenner) writes:
>>>ojvind@renoir.cns.caltech.edu (Ojvind Bernander) writes:
>>>
>>>>There _are_ many anatomical differences between races and between sexes,
>>>>if you take an average.  For example,  men are bigger than women.
>>>
>>>Are you sure about this one?  In _the Jewell-Hinged Jaw_,
>>>Samuel R. Delany claims that this is essentially a myth.
>>>The harder you work at avoiding selection biases, the closer
>>>the average height of men and women get.  You have the
>>>impression that women are shorter for various reasons...
>>>couples tend to pair up with men taller than women, so you
>>>always *see* them this way...

>>Mr. Delaney is wrong.  Statistical analyses and tables of physical
>>anthropologic measures are not made by watching couples pass in front of
>>one's table at a restaurant.  One cannot deny physical reality simply
>>because it is politically incorrect.


>>Bill Oliver

> >As long as we're being politically incorrect but statistically
>accurate, let's consider gender differences in math ability.  Seems
>to hold up statistically.  If we make the not too crazy assumption
>that there are gender differences in cognitive skills in general which
>are biologically based then what shows up as differences in math
>skills can be attributed to a bias in mathematics introduced by the
>fact of history that math was developed almost entirely by men (for
>various socio-cultural reasons) and hence should be expected to
>rely more on those cognitive skills at which men statistically tend
>to excel.  That raises an interesting question: are there forms of
>mathematics which have never been developed because they rely more
>on cognitive skills at which women tend to excel?
>  Of course there are other areas where this same kind of thinking
>might well apply.

>Burt Voorhees

There may very well be some statistical differences between the
sexes, but I don't think you've chosen a very strong example...

In some non-Anglo-Saxon cultures the proportion of women mathematicians
is much higher...

And, if you read soc.feminism, you will discover there are cultures
where mathematics is considered a *female* activity...

Now, this is no proof of anything, but in my family there are clearly
some people who have inherited mathematical talent and some who have
not. And the ones who have are: myself, my mother, and my brilliant
sister (who unfortunately is not doing very much with her life :-( ).
Ones who are not so mathematical: my late father, my brother, my 
other sister. (Corresponds exactly to the left vs. right handed
division, for what that's worth.)

In my grandmother's family, there were three sisters. Two obviously
had mathematical talent, one obviously didn't... 

I suspect that Eastern European Jews (like my family) tend to be more 
cognizant of women as mathematical than Anglos. I know when I was
twelve I was given a slide rule -- a rite of passage and symbol of hopes 
for my future...

What statistical differences between the sexes stand out most strongly
to me? 

I guess the most strong are those having to do with sexual preference,
which I suspect has a genetic component. There's the obvious one, people
*tend* to be more attracted to the opposite sex than the same. 

And, also, men *tend* to be less monogamous in their sexuality and
more willing to make love to people they don't know. 

But these seem to be very rough differences to me. More like the
difference in height between men and women than the differences in
height between St. Bernards and Chihuahuas...

Lenore Levine
levine@symcom.math.uiuc.edu