From: utzoo!decvax!harpo!seismo!rlgvax!guy
Newsgroups: net.women
Title: Re: compliment
Article-I.D.: rlgvax.1094
Posted: Thu Feb 24 16:54:43 1983
Received: Fri Feb 25 06:26:56 1983

References: cires.1994

"The difference between oriental and occidental 'reality'?"  Are you implying
that Orientals and Occidentals have different hemispherical lateralization
in their brains?  Somehow I doubt that...

Furthermore, there *may* be a difference on the average between the
lateralization of women and men, *but* is this difference significant?
I.e., (assuming some simple one-dimensional measure of lateralization)
there will be some curve of incidence of value "n" of this measure vs.
"n".  This curve, if it is a Gaussian, will have some standard deviation;
if the difference between women and men is .1 SD, who *cares* whether
there is such a difference?  Categorizing men as "good at logic, machines,
etc." and women as good at "sensitivity" may be accurate, but 1) if it is true,
it is probably due to socialization; and 2) it sounds too much like the
condescending statements made about women over the ages ("You shouldn't think
too hard, you know, it'll wear out your brain and make you unfit for
childbearing" with the implicit statement that childbearing is a woman's role
in life) for me to trust it.  Lots of statements about groups of people having
"roles" that they are best suited for come suspiciously often from those
groups whose "roles" turn out to be elite roles.  Similar remarks have been
made about the Irish in the U.S., about blacks, about working-class people,
etc., etc.; at this point, I tend to think "shoot first and ask questions
later" when I hear such remarks.

					Guy Harris
					RLG Corporation
					...!decvax!mcnc!rlgvax!guy