Blogs

Specifying the Self: Zadie Smith’s Concept in Ernst Mayr’s Writing

Gaby Kogut

Biology/English 223: Evolution/Stories/Diversity

2/15/07

In her essay, “Fail Better,” Zadie Smith describes what she sees as the qualities of and purposes for the novel. She theorizes the novel as an author’s attempt to describe his unique “self” and believes that since the author can never fully do that, the masterworks in the literary cannon are excellent failures, instead of successful novels. I would like to apply her ideas to Ernst Mayr’s novel on science, What Evolution Is, and examine how well her ideas hold up. I have two arguments against her conception of self, one that applies to how the self comes through a novel’s content and the other relates to the self in a novel’s style. My reading of Mayr’s content and style prove my arguments against Smith.

       Ernst Mayr seems very disdainful of creationists and their opposition of evolution in his book What Evolution Is. He makes it very apparent to the reader that he believes their claims have no proof to back them up and in his list of books that would prove that they are wrong we have such unbiased sounding titles as Niles Eldredge’s The Triumph of Evolution and the Failure of Creationism as well as Philip Kitcher’s Abusing Science: The Case Against Creationism. Why are these titles so harsh? It is because on the other side of the divide the creationists are just as stubborn. Philip Kitcher says that creationists are abusing science but Paul Abramson the editor of creationism.org says that evolutionists are abusing science. The animosity these groups hold for each other is astounding and due to the opposite nature of their beliefs I wondered if it were possible for the two groups to co-exist. I believe that the answer to my question is a provisional yes. I do not believe that these groups need to publish entire books that are poorly veiled attacks on the opposing side. I believe that evolutionists and creationists could co-exist if they were willing to listen to each others points and agree to disagree on certain others.

Just a test!

In January 2005, the then president of Harvard College, Larry Summers, publicly questioned the intrinsic ability of women in the physical sciences in front of an audience of intellectuals. This incident became infamous and endlessly discussed. In January 2005, I was beginning my first semester back at Bryn Mawr College as a physics major after a one year leave of absence. At the time, I remember Summers' comments exploding across campus. The president of our college distributed a statement denouncing Summers' words. I remember thinking how lucky I was to go to an institution where my abilities would not be underestimated due to my gender. Although I remember reading several op-eds and discussing his remarks with friends, I never read the transcript of his talk or encountered a supporter of his views. The conversations I recall were very one-sided.

When pioneering feminists fought for women’s rights, they knew that they had a long battle ahead of them. Today, when most of us would like to think that women are equal, we still can’t quite put our finger on just why women are still underrepresented in the hard sciences. Women actually make up the majority in the so-called soft science fields like anthropology, and they have a large representation in many other high-powered and male dominated fields, but they are lagging behind in others.

The question as to why women are so sorely outnumbered in various scientific fields has been raging for years now, and almost every expert to ever glance at the issue has some pet theory that is sure to raise someone’s hackles.

 A Reaction to the “High-Powered Job Hypothesis” All my life I have thought of myself as a kind of scientist – from my childhood curiosity about the world to my matriculation at a “School of Science and Mathematics” to my physics degree from Bryn Mawr College, I have identified myself as being interested in and, to some degree, talented in the natural sciences and math.  I have not, however, ever identified myself as the high-powered kind of scientist pulling down six figures working and perhaps teaching at a major research institution.  I would infinitely rather do a job that al

Reconsidering The Boys Club

By E. Newbury

You've got it wrong. It isn't socialization that we should blame for gender roles, it's just pure logic and biology. Oh, and it’s these factors, combined with shoddy job market, that cause the lack of women in scientific fields not discrimination. It’s because our brains are different that women are bad at science and math.

R.Malfi
2/2/06

Thanks Larry, but No Thanks

Some say that gender equality is no longer an issue in the workplace. I've heard it myself, from the mouths of friends. Feeling, myself, that this statement is incorrect, I struggle to understand the source of this sentiment. Perhaps this belief is partly derived from the fact that an increasing number of women seek higher education. Perhaps it comes from seeing women like Hilary Rodham Clinton, Nancy Pelosi and Condoleezza Rice in leadership positions. There is no doubt that women have come a long way, that they've overcome many obstacles to enter positions formerly closed to the female sex. What remains to be seen, however, is a State of the Union Address where the room is 30 to 50 percent women. In this article, I wish to focus specifically on women in the sciences, but it is important to keep in mind that the ongoing dialogue presented here should be taken beyond this field into discussions about other professional areas and the workplace as a whole.

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• Courses for Spring 2007:
  • Biology 202: Neurobiology and Behavior
  • Emergence 362
  • The Story of Evolution and the Evolution of Stories
  • Gender and Science: Re-envisioning & Revising the Relation