Posts by MK

1) Message boards : Cafe LHC : Alessandro Strumia (Message 36953) Posted 4 Oct 2018 by MK Post: I am really disappointed by responses: Bronco: Either you are a (bad) troll .. or your dichotomous view blinds you. I am no Trump's man and I actually despise him. He's a racist and sexist egoistic self-centered sociopath. Nevertheless, he's the president elect and appeal to many non-racist and non-sexists decent people because he can talk about issue that the "progressists" claimed taboo, but that affects poeple's life. Your Clintonian attitude of calling "deplorable" anybody not sharing your views might have cost you the presidency. You say I lie while I did not (except that Strumia was not CERN's employee, but affiliated. sorry for that, but it's a minor point). But by calling lies something that is true, you open the door to all "alternative true" - of which Trump uses without any moderation. Relation to truth has been changed first by media and "progressits" first and I blame them for that. For example, the fact that preferences of men and woman are not only cultural, but biological too became a crime. The "gender theory paradox" is taboo. No social scientist would dare work on this - unless (s)he's politicized. How can you pretend to be on the side of truth after that? Then it's easy for Trump to use that political-science springboard and make all sorts of 'alternative' claims about anything he finds convenient (global warming). CERN's response of condemned and revoke Strumia was the wrong attitude. CERN should have proved him wrong (or not because many of his claims are correct). Moderators: You change the title without consulting me. I think we could agree on something better that would reflect the content of the text. At least, I didn't get deleted which I thought could have happened, so thanks for that. The press release says that you welcome all gender, race and religion which is fine, but we know that already. This is not what I asked, and I asked an extremely clear question: Are they quotas by gender/race/nationality at CERN for scientific or managerial positions? Can you answer that? The information is known by HR and managers. Either you reveal the truth, or you hide it from public scrutiny. Withholding that information is unethical to me. People deserve to know. You are financed by tax payers, and volunteers (like me). And applicants should know when they apply at CERN what their chances are, and how their gender and race will impact positively or negatively their chances. Am I wrong? If you do discriminate, let me tell you that I am convinced it's harmful to most: (1) scientific progress (2) for majority group member who fail and can never be sure why (3) for minority group, whether they make it ('because of the quotas..) or not (even with help of quotas...) The only one who would win are actually the "majority" who still get in (despite of quotas...).. but that's short term. They will be frustrated when comes promotion time.. Happy to keep talking. But it seems CERN's idea is to wait and do nothing. Soon that controversy will be over and you ll just keep doing whatever is decided against the will of the majority. But don't pretend to be surprised to see how politics are being reshaped and the new dimensions are establishment Vs anti-establishment, and what dramatic consequences will occur after the later eventually wins - unless the establishment agree to have a no-taboo no-name-saying public debate.
2) Message boards : Cafe LHC : Alessandro Strumia (Message 36941) Posted 2 Oct 2018 by MK Post: Fellow Boincers and fundamental physics aficionados, Alessandro Strumia was fired from CERN yesterday as he made a presentation about gender and STEM. Basically, he argues that there is a pro-woman bias in STEM and more specifically Theory. He makes assumption, develops a methodology to prove his point. he uses a large database for empirical validation and he validates them. It's not been peer-reviewed, his code is not there and we can't yet trust it. The context is that there is some personal disappointment: he lost a position to a woman who has 1/10th of his citations and put her name there. There is also one sentence that is not politically correct (which is the only one the media reported, as you can expect). I was appalled when I read the presentation. I expected hate and misogynistic messages and found a well argued presentation with one sentence over the top. It's not reason to terminate somebody's career! This is a dramatic consequence for emitting an opinion. Plus it happened in a workshop where people are asked specifically to talk about gender in STEM. Should a woman have done the same speech in reverse, would she be fired? Is it true that only one opinion is acceptable at CERN? Has science become blind for the dogma of gender equality of preference and equality. Can only one group be vocal about unfair practices? Isn't this kind of practice fueling resentment and the so called populism that is plaguing our democracies? CERN should think of the idea of the presentation and not the form. The appropriate response is not to fire Strumia. CERN should rather clear its name from these allegations of unfair employment practices: Can a spokesperson a CERN confirm whether CERN's employment practices are (A) based on equality of opportunity, i.e. based on a as-blind-as-possible recruitment process or (B) based on equality of outcomes? i.e. a sexist/racist filter is applied to candidates? i.e. that some superior candidates in terms of scientific abilities or creativity are deprived of the possibility to exert their profession and aspiration, to give this opportunity to inferior candidates because these are from an "under-represented group" in terms of gender, race, height, eye color, religion? i.e. creating an atmosphere of suspicion concerning all the members of the under-represented group, as whether they entered because of their skills or because of quotas? Here is a link to Strumia's presentation: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1c_NyUhOZ8erdqU2AGZJZtNfFeA91Kefj/view I tried to create a team to support freedom of speech in science, but that feature is disable. You apparently have to get a boinc-wide account by writing an email of David Anderson. I am still waiting for the response... Anybody more skilled willing to try?

LHC@home