This author spins a disturbing tale of academic gatekeeping. Thoughts?

quillette.com/2018/09/07/acade

(Link originally posted Mastodon by @rnitsch.)

@peterdrake @rnitsch The entire work sounds like biased pseudo-scientific nonsense.

@realmattseymour
I'm not strong in probability calculations, so can't say I completely understood it... what doesn't make sense to you?
@peterdrake @rnitsch

@arteteco @peterdrake @rnitsch To be fair, this paper itself is maths. I'm a mathematical idiot, however the concept behind the paper of Greater Male Variability Hypothesis is, as far as I am aware a contended idea that is far from proven. A maths exercise is all well and good, but if it serves to strengthen a disputed idea, I can see why it would end up being shelved.

@realmattseymour
I have troubles seeing your point then. If you read it but don't understand it (as I do), why does it sound pseudoscientific to you?

If it were trash it wouldn't have been published in the first place. Personally I am very surprised to know of a paper accepted, published and then vanished. It's... weird, to say the least.

@peterdrake @rnitsch

@arteteco @peterdrake @rnitsch it isn’t trash. It’s maths. Maths is maths so from that perspective the paper is fine. That it can be seen as legitimising a contended and potentially deeply problematic hypothesis is why there’s a problem. Politics comes into this of course. Some will argue that idea should be discussed and not suppressed. Other will say that it’s unhelpful to add fuel to a particular fire whilst claiming not to. I can see both sides of this.

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