It seems to me there are two types of explanations for IMVH—genetic-up and behavioral-down.
A fellow “math dork”, I’m inclined toward the behavioral-down explanation on the basis of theory. In light of female selection. The fundamental male problem is to stand out. To stand out, be exceptional, literally.
Use your resources and cultivate your talents to venture out beyond the convex hull of other men.
Why not compete more directly? You could, but you would likely lose, playing someone else’s game. Your niche is a new point on the boundary of the growing star.
Why the *genetic* increased variability, then? Survival bias? As many points as the star may permit, there are still more interior men. Poor chaps who set out in one direction or another and were not to finish the journey. Some are chosen anyway, fewer than on the boundary. You were propelled, in part, to your success by some uncommon sauce, some slight advantage in the race to your corner of the map.
You're betraying a too-elevated view of female preference.
Human male status as viewed by women isn't 1-dimensional, but it isn't high dimensional either. Some combination of (prospective) wealth, height, confidence.
In the rest of the animal kingdom, it's 1 dimensional, and is basically physical dominance.
There just aren't that many points on the star. If what you're suggesting were true, we'd only see higher variability in physical dominance traits in non-human animals, which we don't.
But you left out one very important dimension—Status. The world is bumpy with a million hierarchies one may climb. Why?
How many sports are there to conquer with physical prowess?
How many more mountains are there to climb with a brain?
What can you make of creativity, of rigor, of fine motor coordination, or perfect pitch, or charisma, or a way with words?
A single trait admits a near limitless number of possible pursuits. For instance, a “writer” is not sufficiently descriptive to define a hierarchy—how many genres of nearly non-intersecting audiences.. each a mountain bestowing its own status at the peak.
On Summers- he was also in trouble for screwing up investments badly, connections with some unsavory Russian characters, etc. His remarks on M/F differences were peculiar because they focused on different abilities and different willingness to be obsessed with a career. Based on doctors, lawyers, etc. the career differences can't be an enormous factor in the different fractions in CS, physics, etc.. Different abilities also don't show up much in objective measures. He oddly skipped different interests, the factor that stands out most in objective measures and in anecdotes.
That's an interesting history. My high school recollection of this was that he was definitely fired because of those remarks; I hadn't heard the other stuff.
I have a friend who has met him personally, and said he wasn't surprised he was fired, but just because he's an arrogant jerk.
My wife really liked Summers although one of our sons reported at least two times Summers had lied to him and I noticed another time at a reunion. Ellen just liked that somebody was willing to recognize sex differences. We never go to Harvard Club things but made an exception when Summers was coming to one in Chicago. She'd noticed that males had significantly more Summa's and no-honors than females, fitting the wider-spread for males picture. I went through some crude models and saw that, allowing for selective admissions, that wouldn't plausibly come from a prior spread in some pre-existing academic traits. Instead it would be consistent with a difference in motivations to be sure to do ok vs, to excel or screw it.
Ellen dressed in a way that she had no trouble getting Summers' undivided attention and told him of the stats. He said that the difference could come from bleed-through of the broader initial distribution for males. He seemed pretty proud about making that point. I said I'd run through a rough quantitative estimate and it couldn't come close. He walked away without another word.
Great piece. Let me quickly get out over my skis.
It seems to me there are two types of explanations for IMVH—genetic-up and behavioral-down.
A fellow “math dork”, I’m inclined toward the behavioral-down explanation on the basis of theory. In light of female selection. The fundamental male problem is to stand out. To stand out, be exceptional, literally.
Use your resources and cultivate your talents to venture out beyond the convex hull of other men.
Why not compete more directly? You could, but you would likely lose, playing someone else’s game. Your niche is a new point on the boundary of the growing star.
Why the *genetic* increased variability, then? Survival bias? As many points as the star may permit, there are still more interior men. Poor chaps who set out in one direction or another and were not to finish the journey. Some are chosen anyway, fewer than on the boundary. You were propelled, in part, to your success by some uncommon sauce, some slight advantage in the race to your corner of the map.
A just so story? Perhaps. Perhaps more?
You're betraying a too-elevated view of female preference.
Human male status as viewed by women isn't 1-dimensional, but it isn't high dimensional either. Some combination of (prospective) wealth, height, confidence.
In the rest of the animal kingdom, it's 1 dimensional, and is basically physical dominance.
There just aren't that many points on the star. If what you're suggesting were true, we'd only see higher variability in physical dominance traits in non-human animals, which we don't.
Possibly.
But you left out one very important dimension—Status. The world is bumpy with a million hierarchies one may climb. Why?
How many sports are there to conquer with physical prowess?
How many more mountains are there to climb with a brain?
What can you make of creativity, of rigor, of fine motor coordination, or perfect pitch, or charisma, or a way with words?
A single trait admits a near limitless number of possible pursuits. For instance, a “writer” is not sufficiently descriptive to define a hierarchy—how many genres of nearly non-intersecting audiences.. each a mountain bestowing its own status at the peak.
Nice article!
On Summers- he was also in trouble for screwing up investments badly, connections with some unsavory Russian characters, etc. His remarks on M/F differences were peculiar because they focused on different abilities and different willingness to be obsessed with a career. Based on doctors, lawyers, etc. the career differences can't be an enormous factor in the different fractions in CS, physics, etc.. Different abilities also don't show up much in objective measures. He oddly skipped different interests, the factor that stands out most in objective measures and in anecdotes.
That's an interesting history. My high school recollection of this was that he was definitely fired because of those remarks; I hadn't heard the other stuff.
I have a friend who has met him personally, and said he wasn't surprised he was fired, but just because he's an arrogant jerk.
My wife really liked Summers although one of our sons reported at least two times Summers had lied to him and I noticed another time at a reunion. Ellen just liked that somebody was willing to recognize sex differences. We never go to Harvard Club things but made an exception when Summers was coming to one in Chicago. She'd noticed that males had significantly more Summa's and no-honors than females, fitting the wider-spread for males picture. I went through some crude models and saw that, allowing for selective admissions, that wouldn't plausibly come from a prior spread in some pre-existing academic traits. Instead it would be consistent with a difference in motivations to be sure to do ok vs, to excel or screw it.
Ellen dressed in a way that she had no trouble getting Summers' undivided attention and told him of the stats. He said that the difference could come from bleed-through of the broader initial distribution for males. He seemed pretty proud about making that point. I said I'd run through a rough quantitative estimate and it couldn't come close. He walked away without another word.
Opportunistic lying, sex pest-adjacency, abruptly terminating conversations. It takes a politician to get to the top of Harvard.