Hacker News Reader

> "Women scientists are harder to work with because if you criticize, they cry"

Let me fix the quote for you:

> "Let me tell you about my trouble with girls. Three things happen when they are in the lab: you fall in love with them, they fall in love with you, and when you criticise them they cry."

He was making an obvious joke about his love interest, not "women scientists".

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Hunt#The_toast

> In India, where I grew up, a person from a "lower" caste(not backed by financial standing, only birth status) is given a lower standard to clear to say becoming a doctor. Which only leads to bullshit doctors.

I'd like to see a credible source to this statement.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4858461/

>India is the only country where medical seats are officially sold, therefore, acknowledging the importance of money power over merit (6). In private medical colleges significant numbers of seats are paid seats at undergraduate and post graduate levels, which are beyond the payment capacity of a common person.

I'm in a plane, and cant supply sources at the moment, sorry.

Personal anecdotal evidence from 2003. I finished school, and applied for studying engineering. There is a "cutoff" for colleges and programs. Because I was not born in a "backward caste", I needed to get 92.4% to get into the program I aspired to. Whereas, someone who was born in a "lower caste" and has a paper that says so, will only need something to the tune of 65-68(don't remember the exact number) to get into the same program. As far as I know things have not changed for the better in decades.

For what it's worth, the person with that piece of paper might be a millionaire, and their parents more educated than mine, and it doesn't matter, they get ahead of me with lower score.

> There is a "cutoff" for colleges and programs. Because I was not born in a "backward caste", I needed to get 92.4% to get into the program I aspired to. Whereas, someone who was born in a "lower caste" and has a paper that says so, will only need something to the tune of 65-68(don't remember the exact number) to get into the same program.

Your initial claim was about "affirmative actions leading to bullshit doctors". Your current comment talks about "affirmative action implementation".

>For what it's worth, the person with that piece of paper might be a millionaire, and their parents more educated than mine, and it doesn't matter, they get ahead of me with lower score.

So what is a better solution in your opinion in a country where you say the corruption is very high? Poor people can't afford tutoring with the "right" professor, buying books from the same "right" professor or buying the exams questions for the same professors, or later buying the exams and paying for poor people to write theyr projects and thesis. I this corrupt environment I assume a rich medical student will obviously have the bigger grades and grab the "money making jobs"

> Poor people can't afford [...] buying books from the same "right" professor

For books, there is (luckily) Library Genesis.

That is not enough because the professor will ask you to buy his books, also you can tutor with that professor and he will give you the questions for the exams(my experience is from Romania 15 years ago where corruptions was/is big enough) Edit: To be fair and paint a correct image not all professors are corrupt, there professors that are fair and there are ones that are also very good as teaching not only good at their domains, unfortunately the corrupt ones are the ones with higher positions probably are the ones better are politics.

That's my experience in Romania too and being a foreigner that made the stats look good, gave me an edge over my colleagues.

I hope you also found some of the good professors that are great at teaching and inspiring, at my time there were still such professors.

Here you go: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reservation_in_India

I'd like to clarify that I was asking a source for "Reservation leading to bullshit doctors". Not the fact there is "Reservation in India".

Google gives me:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_action#India

caste based reservations are a real thing. Every government institute or any institute which takes govt funding has to allocate seats to OBC,SC,ST,NT tribes and castes.

https://www.google.com/search?q=obc+sc+st+education+reservat...

Ah! The classic "optimize for only and only productivity and nothing else" argument.

The purpose of living in society has many goals. One of them is to work in such a way to improve what and how we improve so we can have more wealth. But there are plenty of other goals. Such as not destroy the environment. And most importantly, to make people in society happier.

A coal power plant is not allowed to use low grade highly polluting coal because even if its cheaper to do so, the outcomes for society are worse with it than forcing the power plant owners to spend more money on more expensive coal. Its a reasonable restriction on what inanimate resources can be used by a corporation.

A university should be made to have better parity between genders. It might lower the scientific productivity of the university - evidence needed. But not doing so has the negative societal outcome of making a lot of people very very unhappy. Affirmative action is a reasonable restriction on what human resources can be used by a corporation.

But here you are not talking about coal. The alternative is not a more polluting fuel, is another person that is also very unhappy his opportunity was taken away because he had the wrong gender. We all agree that situation sucks, so we don't make a net possitive by making more people misserable AND being less productive.

If you have a historical system of imbalance (e.g.: caste system), and today we decide we're going to get rid of it, do you think it's just going to fix itself and everybody is suddenly equal? Even though all the people in power are from the upper caste, and the lower castes are uneducated, and poor?

It's not "blantantly idiotic"! I often think the way affirmative action is implemented is flawed, but at least it takes into account the momentum of the problem and tries to do something about it. It takes a long-term view of how equality might be achieved by propelling those up who wouldn't make it otherwise, to disrupt the infinite loop. In the short term those who are used to privilege find it a little harder (boo-hoo, you've tasted a little a tiny slice of what the other side has had... for centuries). It's for the long-term achievement of what you ostensibly support.

I agree with all your points up to the anecdote about India. Personally I have a big problem with the Indian caste system already, so yes, I am biased here. Without further details, especially the overall picture, in the last paragraph I get the impression that you are loathing someone of perceived lower standing to get things easier than you and maybe having more already. Not sure how I should understand that, either you are against castes and for treat people based on merit (not preferring the already rich) or you want to be treated based on some perceived social superiority. I cannot judge.

Not sure what I wrote that made you think I perceived myself or anyone to be superior or inferior. I hate the caste system unconditionally. I believe everyone should be treated fairly and only on merit at least when it comes to education, science, and healthcare.

That said, I agree that there may be a social imbalance and there exists groups of minorities identified by whatever(financial standing, family background, etc) that have fewer opportunities that are reachable. Example, Someone living at poverty line aspiring to be a doctor. My ask is that the policies should help them with financial incentives and tutoring to compete at the same merit level as everyone and then help them become a good doctor as opposed to saying they only barely need to study to become a doctor.

Honestly, I had about 6 different answers to your original post :)

So, we agree then on everything. As someone else pointed out, Affirmative Action is a difficult thing to implement, regardless it is the only realistic way to get things started. Sad that the cast system is actually making life difficult for everyone. For higher castes based on money they don't have due to ill implemented affirmative action and still for lower castes due to birth.

And yes, the policies you ask for are an ideal. Unfortunately, it seems, they are against human nature sometimes. Still worth figjting for, so.

>I get the impression that you are loathing someone of perceived lower standing to get things easier than you and maybe having more already

I largely agree with OP's comment and I think you're conflating disliking the system with disliking those who benefit from it; they're not mutually inclusive.

The irony is his rant like other recent controversial cases proves the bias they are arguing against. He has 'come out' but given his deep seated beliefs what are the chances a female receives fair and equal opportunity from 'professionals' like him?

If you believe in 'meritocracy' and rational behavior you can't suddenly 'choose' to ignore the real risk to women and their careers from men who hold such views. Even with a small proportion of such men and there is no way to tell the numbers, there is a huge risk women will be discouraged right at the start and face a possibly hostile environment.

Research and life is difficult enough and women will drop off or be discouraged. And this will then further feed sexists more data points to justify their positions making a neat cycle of discrimination and 'scientific data'. The large number of men who continue to defend these regressive and unscientific positions proves beyond doubt the huge risk women in professions continue to face with them in it.

> The irony is his rant like other recent controversial cases proves the bias they are arguing against. He has 'come out' but given his deep seated beliefs what are the chances a female receives fair and equal opportunity from 'professionals' like him?

I'm sorry, I do not understand the irony you saw in what I said. I'd appreciate if you take a couple minutes and explain what you think my bias is. I'm honestly hoping that you'd give me something to introspect and change my opinion if necessary. I'm genuinely not understanding what I 'came out' with... I did not take any side, I only argue to be fair and judge only based on merit.

I'm not 'choosing' to ignore any real issues. I'm only saying the way to deal with it is not artificially affecting fairness either side.

I don't have the power to hire people for any jobs or give out opportunities of any kind at the moment, but if I ever get there in the future, I believe that I will treat candidates purely on merit and not care if it was woman/man/which color/age/whatever. If they are better than others, and have the will & attitude to take job, they win. I'd like to be chosen for something myself the same fair way.