UPDATE2: Glaciers, Gender, and Science - Now with more bickering!

[Fallow]

Howdy fellow escapees!

Have you ever thought - "Gee, that glacier would look so pretty if it was only a bit more feminine. I wonder if it has been oppressed or marginalised recently."

Well, you finally have your answer! Thanks to Mark Carey (UO) all your questions will be answered [http://reason.com/blog/2016/03/07/this-university-of-oregon-study-on-femin]. This is one of the results from a grant of $412,930 for studies like this. Thank you taxpayers.

Spoiler: An excerpt

Merging feminist postcolonial science studies and feminist political ecology, the feminist glaciology framework generates robust analysis of gender, power, and epistemologies in dynamic social-ecological systems, thereby leading to more just and equitable science and human-ice interactions.
​

And just for you sophists out there, here is your daily fill of buzzwords:

Spoiler: Buzzzzzzzz

Feminist and postcolonial theories enrich and complement each other by showing how gender and colonialism are co-constituted, as well as how both women and indigenous peoples have been marginalized historically (Schnabel, 2014). Feminist glaciology builds from feminist postcolonial science studies, analyzing not only gender dynamics and situated knowledges, but also alternative knowledges and folk glaciologies that are generally marginalized through colonialism, imperialism, inequality, unequal power relations, patriarchy, and the domination of Western science (Harding, 2009).
​

Remember, if you don't have anything to say, use obtuse words and complex phrases!

And what is the response so far?
There's a writeup on Powerline [http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2016/03/academic-gibberish-watch-we-have-another-winner.php] saying "This is why we get Trump". This is corroborated by a different piece that reaches the same conclusion [http://reason.com/blog/2016/02/23/how-political-correctness-caused-college]. I don't know if that's correct but the parallel to the Paris agreement on climate change is unsettling.

If you want the whole study, it's available on Sagepub [http://phg.sagepub.com/content/early/2016/01/08/0309132515623368.long#sec-2] in preprint.

So, what do you all think about this? Is it high time we stopped misgendering glaciers? Have they been marginalised for too long? Are we so biased towards ice that it needs to be properly studied by a crack team of mixed genders and minorities? Or is this a case of misappropriated funds wasted on perhaps less-than-stellar "science"? Enquiring young minds wants to know!

EDIT: Noted that the money was not only for the study, but a grant for studies in the area.

UPDATE:
It looks like Jerry Coyne (Chicago U), a professor in Ecology and Evolution has added his thoughts on the matter [https://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2016/03/13/postmodern-glacier-professor-defends-his-study-says-it-was-misunderstood-it-wasnt/]; here are two excerpts:

Spoiler: obtuse wording and complex phrases

It?s horribly written, in the kind of obscurantist, ideology-packed prose that we?re used to from postmodernism. And it says the same thing over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. These people need to learn how to write.

Spoiler: anti-science, objectively bad research-damaging approaches

It?s actually anti-science, for it repeatedly points out the problems with so-called objective Western science, namely its refusal to incorporate the voices of marginalized people, but, more important, to accept ?other ways of knowing? about glaciers. It turns out that these ?other ways of knowing? are simply subjective and emotional views incorporated in human narratives, art, and literature. These are not ?ways of knowing? that will advance the field. Science is repeatedly denigrated, and, in fact, I?m surprised that this stuff was funded by the National Science Foundation. Has it become the National Science and Other Ways of Knowing Foundation?

And a strong conclusion:

In the end, the paper, infused with anecdotes, confirmation bias, and calls for "other ways of knowing," reminds me a lot of theology. It's a maddening and useless piece of work, and it angers me that the money we taxpayers spent on it wasn't diverted to something that actually adds to our knowledge.

​

I'd say read the whole thing, it's a hoot and a half and you will have a few good laughs too.

UPDATE AGAIN:

Here is another thought on the article, this time on the supposedly "most viewed webpage about climate" site. The title is "Climate Craziness of the Week: 'feminist glaciology' in the climate change context"

 

[Cowabungaa]

At first I thought this was sorta bad satire. I was going to make a point against it in favour of the academic fields I actually move around in.

But then I saw it's...real? I...what? Their abstract plain puzzles me. Alternative representations of glaciers?! I mean, sure there's very interesting research to be done about science/the scientific community, knowledge production, the sexes and gender norms/roles. But this I can't wrap my head around.

The paper isn't about glaciers as such by the looks of it though, so your OP is a little misleading. It seems to be about how we come about knowledge about glaciers. But why on Earth a feminist perspective matters for that I can't remotely imagine. And that's coming from someone who wholly realizes the role gender perspective plays in the sciences.

The same goes for the post-colonial perspective. There's a lot of useful stuff to be said about that in relation to the scientific community. But...glaciers?!

I actually want to read the paper now, I'm so baffled. This is a really weird kind of excess.

 

[RikuoAmero]

At first I thought this was sorta bad satire. I was going to make a point against it in favour of the academic fields I actually move around in.

But then I saw it's...real? I...what? Their abstract plain puzzles me. Alternative representations of glaciers?! I mean, sure there's very interesting research to be done about science/the scientific community, the sexes and gender norms/roles. But this I can't wrap my head around.

The paper isn't about glaciers as such by the looks of it though, so your OP is a little misleading. It seems to be about how we come about knowledge about glaciers. But why on Earth a feminist perspective matters for that I can't remotely imagine.

The same goes for the post-colonial perspective. There's a lot of useful stuff to be said about that in relation to the scientific community. But...glaciers?!

I actually want to read the paper now, I'm so baffled. This is a really weird kind of excess.

Another reason why I find feminists distasteful. They insist on looking at EVERYTHING through a feminist lens. I'm an atheist, yet I don't insist that we look at glaciers through an atheist lens. Just that we look at them and study them. A research paper on glaciers out to contain nothing about social politics - what does one have to do with the other?

 

[Cowabungaa]

Another reason why I find feminists distasteful. They insist on looking at EVERYTHING through a feminist lens. I'm an atheist, yet I don't insist that we look at glaciers through an atheist lens. Just that we look at them and study them. A research paper on glaciers out to contain nothing about social politics - what does one have to do with the other?

Don't generalize feminism as such because there are certain excesses in the field. We're not all Anita Sarkeesian.

As for what those two have to do with each other, I'm not yet done reading the paper (partially coming around to it) but to put it in a broader perspective there's definitely strong links between scientific knowledge and social politics. Why? Because science is also political. Science is also part of our social environment. There's a lot of useful things to be said about the production of scientific knowledge and gender roles in society. Because yeah, the latter is dominated by a masculine perspective. And yeah that has consequences for what kind of hypotheses are tested and what kind of perspectives are considered. If anything that's old hat by now, we've realized that for some time now.

As for your athiest example, the thing is; you do look at it through an atheistic lens. You just don't realize you do because that's firmly within the paradigm of how we do science. Imagine for instance if the mainstream view on glaciology is "God has deemed that glaciers must melt. So it's we have nothing to do with it." If that were the case you'd be well-aware of your atheistic perspective. But because that's the default way of doing science it's more difficult to spot. We as a species have a lot of trouble of recognizing the paradigm we're in. That includes scientific paradigms.

Anyway, here was a relatively enlightning bit from that paper, for instance:

Women often do possess different knowledge about glaciers due to many issues, such as: spending more time than men attending to livestock near Andean glaciers (Dunbar and Medina Marcos, 2012); managing agriculture, terracing, and irrigation that includes the distribution of glacier runoff in highland Peruvian communities (Bolin, 2009); being responsible for mobility, storage, and shelter amidst changes to snowfall and other cryospheric changes on the Tibetan Plateau (Yeh et al., 2014)

The idea of that paper is that those perspectives and knowledge are not considered when doing glacial research which then, in the end, has impact on how we deal with glaciers in terms of conservation and management. And while that is indeed quite niche, it's not unimportant. Glaciers play an important role in the lives of a significant chunk of the planet's populace.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Spoiler: snip

Another reason why I find feminists distasteful. They insist on looking at EVERYTHING through a feminist lens. I'm an atheist, yet I don't insist that we look at glaciers through an atheist lens. Just that we look at them and study them. A research paper on glaciers out to contain nothing about social politics - what does one have to do with the other?

Don't generalize feminism as such because there are certain excesses in the field. We're not all Anita Sarkeesian.

As for what those two have to do with each other, I'm not yet done reading the paper (partially coming around to it) but to put it in a broader perspective there's definitely strong links between scientific knowledge and social politics. Why? Because science is also political. Science is also part of our social environment. There's a lot of useful things to be said about the production of scientific knowledge and gender roles in society. Because yeah, the latter is dominated by a masculine perspective. And yeah that has consequences for what kind of hypotheses are tested and what kind of perspectives are considered. If anything that's old hat by now, we've realized that for some time now.

As for your athiest example, the thing is; you do look at it through an atheistic lens. You just don't realize you do because that's firmly within the paradigm of how we do science. Imagine for instance if the mainstream view on glaciology is "God has deemed that glaciers must melt. So it's we have nothing to do with it." If that were the case you'd be well-aware of your atheistic perspective. But because that's the default way of doing science it's more difficult to spot. We as a species have a lot of trouble of recognizing the paradigm we're in. That includes scientific paradigms.

Anyway, here was a relatively enlightning bit from that paper, for instance:

Women often do possess different knowledge about glaciers due to many issues, such as: spending more time than men attending to livestock near Andean glaciers (Dunbar and Medina Marcos, 2012); managing agriculture, terracing, and irrigation that includes the distribution of glacier runoff in highland Peruvian communities (Bolin, 2009); being responsible for mobility, storage, and shelter amidst changes to snowfall and other cryospheric changes on the Tibetan Plateau (Yeh et al., 2014)

The idea of that paper is that those perspectives and knowledge are not considered when doing glacial research which then, in the end, has impact on how we deal with glaciers in terms of conservation and management. And while that is indeed quite niche, it's not unimportant. Glaciers play an important role in the lives of a significant chunk of the planet's populace.

Oi! You knock that off right now, we are supposed to be misrepresenting this sort of thing, or else the feminists will take over. The idea that a marginalised group might be being marginalised in the way thing are being viewed has no place in science.

 

[Fallow]

And what is the response so far?
There's a writeup on Powerline [http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2016/03/academic-gibberish-watch-we-have-another-winner.php] saying "This is why we get Trump". This is corroborated by a different piece that reaches the same conclusion [http://reason.com/blog/2016/02/23/how-political-correctness-caused-college]. I don't know if that's correct but the parallel to the Paris agreement on climate change is unsettling.

I'm not sure I understand how it parallels the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. If you wouldn't mind, could you elaborate on that? Do you mean the opinion is unanimous or something else?

It's from the Powerline report where certain similarities are shown between the paper and the Paris Climate agreement. It's a very short read and shows that some of the same sophistry is in the agreement.

...
Why? Because science is also political.

...

I think you mean 'biased' here, since there is a level of personal politics that make into the scientific outcome that should not be there. All science should be objective and neutral regarding the subject matter, but humans alas tend to prefer certain outcomes (look at the correlation between analysis of market models and personal political preferences of the scientist; they correlate really well).

As for your athiest example, the thing is; you do look at it through an atheistic lens. You just don't realize you do because that's firmly within the paradigm of how we do science. Imagine for instance if the mainstream view on glaciology is "God has deemed that glaciers must melt. So it's we have nothing to do with it." If that were the case you'd be well-aware of your atheistic perspective. But because that's the default way of doing science it's more difficult to spot. We as a species have a lot of trouble of recognizing the paradigm we're in. That includes scientific paradigms.

I don't think that's accurate. The scientific model is agnostic, not atheist. Science is prepared to accept a god, any god, that can be proven real. You seem to conflate atheism and the scientific model based on the fact that they are both objectivist and require proof. This does not make them one and the same though.

Anyway, here was a relatively enlightning bit from that paper, for instance:

Women often do possess different knowledge about glaciers due to many issues, such as: spending more time than men attending to livestock near Andean glaciers (Dunbar and Medina Marcos, 2012); managing agriculture, terracing, and irrigation that includes the distribution of glacier runoff in highland Peruvian communities (Bolin, 2009); being responsible for mobility, storage, and shelter amidst changes to snowfall and other cryospheric changes on the Tibetan Plateau (Yeh et al., 2014)

Unfortunately none of these people have anything worthwhile to contribute to glacier "knowledge". Attending livestock near a glacier does not make anyone a glacier expert, nor even knowledgeable. Handling irrigation does not make one a glacier expert, nor even knowledgeable. Being responsible for stuff amdist changes to snowfall does not make one an expert on glaciers, nor even knowledgeable. Perhaps there are other factors that make these people experts, but from the listed examples, none would provide anything to a glacier study in a climate-related field.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Since you're already reading the paper, if it gives some examples about how glacial conservation and management research might be impacted by these perspectives, do you think you could summarize them like how you did with this part right here?

I would be interested to know. My initial thought is she just means that by examining the female workers the importance of glaciers might become more important than previously estimated to the lives of the surrounding people. But it could be something different entirely.

I'll try to see what I can scrounge up once I've finished it, but considering how the paper opens with "not meant to be comprehensive, but rather starting points to indicate lines of future investigation" I doubt it'll give a lot of in-depth examples regarding its impact.

However, when I look at the bit I already quoted from the paper it's not hard to imagine the kind of impact it could have. Looking at the Peruvian example, for instance, it could mean that pasture growth is not given a large enough consideration when looking at the effects of glacial melting. This is of course speculation from my part, but it doesn't seem an unreasonable possibility.

Further, I found this part quite enlightening regarding policy:

Including these divergent local voices and perspectives diversifies (and localizes) the information produced in national climate assessments and underscores the disconnect between local women?s knowledge and Western scientific conclusions expressed in the IPCC and elsewhere. Williams and Golovnev believe this is vital to illustrate, given the ways in which policy is too often based solely on Western science.

That seems to be a fair enough point and an important point at that. For instance, when I watched the concluding meeting of the COP21 the Urugyuan representative was clear to point out that "loss and damages" was not properly addressed. Something which the Global South tried to fight for as hard as they could but ultimately failed to make any meaningful gains in. And considering how "loss and damages" is not a problem the West/Global North is bothered by you can see how a strong bias for Western research in determining policy (though that was far the only reason why COP21 failed to address "loss and damages") can be very problematic in getting climate legislation that's fair for the Global South.

Also, a funny side note; it's interesting that you say "she" in probably referring to the writer of the paper. When instead it seems to mostly be a group of guys with, I think, one lady. Goes to show, eh?

snip

Regarding your agnostic point, I mostly meant that the concept of a god does not come into play when doing science. In that way it's a-theistic. There's no theism, a divine being plays no role in the creation of scientific knowledge. It's not a usable variable within scientific research. Hence why I said what I said. That's what I was referring to, not something regarding the provability of a god. My ultimate point was not regarding atheism anyway, it was about how we have a hard time recognizing the paradigm we're in.

As for your point regarding bias, no I really did mean "political". Because science plays an important role in politics and politics play an important point in science. Politics determines, partially, where money goes regarding scientific research, scientific knowledge is used in political decision making, you name it. That's what I was referring to. It's like what computer science professor Phillip Rogaway said regarding computer sciences in his interview with The Atlantic: [http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/12/the-moral-failure-of-computer-science/420012/]

"When three-quarters of the faculty in a department are funded by the Department of Defense, well, that's not apolitical."

Naturally it's not literally like that with glacial research, but considering that glacial research is a part of climate research and when you consider the kind of role climate science plays in political discourse it's not hard to see that social politics and science are linked.

Lastly, regarding your point about glacier knowledge, you seem to be missing the point of the paper. The point of the paper is not doing glacial science. It's a paper about glacial science. It contributes to knowledge about the field of glacial science. They're not pretending to be experts on glaciers because glaciers aren't the subject of the paper at all. Glacial science is the topic of the paper.

And yeah I get it. That's a really niche thing. That makes it look a little silly. But that doesn't mean it's unimportant. Because through that niche subject they're making an important point regarding the state of the scientific community.

 

[Fallow]

Regarding your agnostic point, I mostly meant that the concept of a god does not come into play when doing science. In that way it's a-theistic. There's no theism, a divine being plays no role in the creation of scientific knowledge. It's not a usable variable within scientific research. Hence why I said what I said. That's what I was referring to, not something regarding the provability of a god. My ultimate point was not regarding atheism anyway, it was about how we have a hard time recognizing the paradigm we're in.

Aha. Atheistic means someone that actively believes there is no god. Agnostic means unsure, 'waiting for the data', or willing to switch when new results come to light. That's why we saw things differently.

As for your point regarding bias, no I really did mean "political". Because science plays an important role in politics. Politics determines, partially, where money goes regarding scientific research, scientific knowledge is used in political decision making, you name it. That's what I was referring to. It's like what computer science professor Phillip Rogaway said regarding computer sciences in his interview with The Atlantic: [http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/12/the-moral-failure-of-computer-science/420012/]

"When three-quarters of the faculty in a department are funded by the Department of Defense, well, that's not apolitical."

Naturally it's not literally like that with glacial research, but considering that glacial research is a part of climate research and when you consider the kind of role climate science plays in political discourse it's not hard to see that social politics and science are linked.

That makes sense, I misunderstood your original argument.

Lastly, regarding your point about glacier knowledge, you seem to be missing the point of the paper. The point of the paper is not doing glacial science. It's a paper about glacial science. It contributes to knowledge about the field of glacial science. They're not pretending to be experts on glaciers because glaciers aren't the subject of the paper at all. Glacial science is the topic of the paper.

Here I think you are missing the important factor though. Yes, they are talking about glacial science. And that is why it's such a bad idea to listen to the people they list as possible sources for glacial knowledge. They want to taint other, real studies with the opinions of these non-experts. Understand that in real science interviewing a hobo as an expert on the homeless would be an obscene faux pas, and the same goes for all the listed people in climate contexts. Treating a drug addict as an expert on drugs is inconceivable, and provides no objective knowledge in any sense. Trying to "give a voice to the marginalised in glacier science" is not a good move for a real study, especially not since climate science is important.

And yeah I get it. That's a really niche thing. That makes it look a little silly. But that doesn't mean it's unimportant. Because through that niche subject they're making an important point regarding the state of the scientific community.

Was it $412,930 worth of 'important'?

 

[RikuoAmero]

Merging feminist postcolonial science studies

I'd like to know what the hell this even means? We're WELL past the age of the colonies. The USA ceased to be a collection of British colonies in the late 1700s. Technically, it's accurate...but why bother calling it postcolonial science?

 

[RikuoAmero]

Fallow said

Aha. Atheistic means someone that actively believes there is no god.

Not in my book. I as an atheist merely lack belief in the god claims of others. I believe there are no gods (note that I do not make a claim of knowledge here) when I'm wearing my rationalist skeptic hat.

 

[Fallow]

Fallow said

Aha. Atheistic means someone that actively believes there is no god.

Not in my book. I as an atheist merely lack belief in the god claims of others. I believe there are no gods (note that I do not make a claim of knowledge here) when I'm wearing my rationalist skeptic hat.

That, as you say in the end yourself, would make you a skeptic., which is not necessarily the same as an atheist.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Here I think you are missing the important factor though. Yes, they are talking about glacial science. And that is why it's such a bad idea to listen to the people they list as possible sources for glacial knowledge. They want to taint other, real studies with the opinions of these non-experts. Understand that in real science interviewing a hobo as an expert on the homeless would be an obscene faux pas, and the same goes for all the listed people in climate contexts. Treating a drug addict as an expert on drugs is inconceivable, and provides no objective knowledge in any sense. Trying to "give a voice to the marginalised in glacier science" is not a good move for a real study, especially not since climate science is important.

Why would that be their goal? From what do you determine that?

Because when I read the paper I read no such thing. What I read is the writers pointing out a gap in climate studies. They're not discounting existing studies as such, they're saying they're incomplete. Why? Because certain perspectives are overlooked. And that has an impact on the knowledge created by that scientific field. And considering the importance of that field that's a pretty important thing to say.

So I don't understand why you would say that that's a bad thing to point out. Glacial science has a blind spot. This paper attempts to point out that blind spot. That's all there is to it.

Isn't it obvious why that's important? How is it not a good move to point out that there are marginalized perspectives in a certain field of science? Isn't it important to get a complete picture as possible for any scientific field, no matter how niche? And that's all they really seem to want to say, for as far as I've read the paper. It's important to examine science itself. I don't see how your hobo analogy comes into play. It seems to suggest that science cannot be an expert on science itself. But meta-studies that are about the science itself are incredibly common and incredibly important.

As for the money? I can't comment on the exact number as I don't know what factors are at play that make that number, well, that number. But considering that out of a nearly 4 trillion dollar US budget, of which science makes up a mere 1% of about 30 billion yeah that paper is totally worth some money.

Science itself needs to be examined. Especially when it's climate science because it's so important. I'm baffled that you seem to suggest that that's not a good idea.

 

[EternallyBored]

Merging feminist postcolonial science studies

I'd like to know what the hell this even means? We're WELL past the age of the colonies. The USA ceased to be a collection of British colonies in the late 1700s. Technically, it's accurate...but why bother calling it postcolonial science?

Using the split of the USA from Britain is kind of off, the USA was one of the earlier colonies to successfully declare independence, but colonialism and its effects lasted a lot longer than the 1700's. Postcolonialism is generally considered to have started around the 1950's, as that's when most colonies had either gained independence or been absorbed into another country. Remember, the Vietnam war started as the French fighting to protect one of their colonies. Most African colonies also weren't totally let go of until the 20th century, and Hong Kong wasn't given back to China until 1997.

The general idea is to look at the fallout of all of this, primarily things like the long lasting effects of the dissolution of various colonies, the factionalism in the Middle East and Africa due to arbitrarily creating countries out of oppositional ethnic groups, the withdrawal of resources and technical personnel that a now third world country is incapable of replacing, and the racial tensions caused by citizens of a colonizing country becoming citizens and the ruling class of a colonized country for centuries.

What that has to do with glacier science, well, I'll let the people here who have the time to actually read the paper argue that out.

 

[DoPo]

Aha. Atheistic means someone that actively believes there is no god.

No, it doesn't. It means lack of belief in gods. This is a small but important distinction. "Active belief" implies...well, action. Atheists need to do stuff in order to not believe. In reality most simply don't do anything special. A sizeable amount just never really bothered. In that case, "active belief" is just plain wrong - it's akin to me claiming that you're actively trying to not observe follow the traditions of, say, my grandfather's home village. How much time and energy do you spend on not doing that? I imagine it's none. In fact, I am fairly sure you have no clue whether you are or are not following the traditions and hence cannot even claim with certainty if you're doing it or not. It's because you cannot be bothered. You're not "actively" avoiding it. In the same way that atheism isn't about "actively" being godless.

 

[Silvanus]

Well, you finally have your answer! Thanks to Mark Carey (UO) all your questions will be answered [http://reason.com/blog/2016/03/07/this-university-of-oregon-study-on-femin].

This links to a blog with the byline, "Free Minds and Free Markets", which sets off various alarm bells for me. I don't really trust them to give a balanced appraisal.

Can we get a link to the piece itself?

EDIT: Link was included, my bad.