Beelzebub666 & Olga_Rus_80 , you'ld make a beautiful couple, great minds think a like, fools seldom differ, I dig the bitching & barking, keep up the good work, for when I'm tired at chess & need time to relax, I read your comments & suddently I'm fresh again to PLAY CHESS!
Men, Women, and Chess.
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Thx!
Olga_Rus_80 wrote:
Ok so I understood right.
So you say not to have better conclusion.
It's not true that provides zero informations, it says that in a situation where social bias could possibly not yet have deployed some effect, the position seem equal.
If you see that green balls reaches the ground when you let them free and you see that you have a set of red balls that seem exactly the same, do you think to have zero informations about the possible behaviour of the red ones? Please tell me what is not working in this analogy according to your opinion. I have to warn you anyway that this man
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_of_Ockham
could be disappointed.
About the "soft" and "hard" science, I warned you before about the importance of using the right instrument according to the object studied.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/mate-check--women-play-worse-against-men-451542.html
(sorry I don't reach the link to the original paper that has been already posted in this forum)
Actually it is true that it provides no information. If two sets of people can add 2 + 2 that does not tell you anything about their abilities with higher mathematics. Amateur and expert players are actually utilising different areas of the brain in differing degrees by the way:
http://www.tc.umn.edu/~athe0007/BNEsig/papers/NeuroscientificBasisOfChess.pdf
And on what are you basing your speculation that 'social bias' kicks in only for higher age groups? This study which you chose found disparities in all age groups and clearly stated so, did you even read it?
As for your analogy, the rate of fall of either set of balls tells you what the force of gravity is, an external force not related to the properties of the balls. If you introduce some difference to the surface of one set of balls affecting the friction forces, then they will fall at slightly different rates and you would be unable to determine the surface properties of one by dropping the other. So your analogy fails in either case, without friction it is independant of any property of the balls while chess performance is dependant on the properties of the player, and with friction you have different results from each set, neither informing you about the other. The anology is clearly a very poor one.
Quite what you think Ockham's Razor has to do with it will probably remain a mystery.
Your newspaper article suggesting the cause is that women are scared to play men contradicts the conclusion of the study you posted and are now trying to defend with balls that it's actually because more men enter at lower levels. Did you have a preferred hypothesis? I'd go with Maas et al if I were you, his pilot study does at least warrant further research.
I have no problem accepting social factors along with neurological factors by the way, it's your assumption that neurological differences cannot have an affect that is laughable.
That cat looks really nice Olga. I'm a dog person myself, but I'd get a cat too if my wife didn't hate them. It's the shedding I think.
I substitute teach and bring out the chessboard sometimes for the highschool students to play. The number of takers are overwhelmingly males. Strangely enough from my experience, when I sub at the elementary level, the girls are just as interested in chess as the boys.
lock this... these two people need to send PM's to each other... instead of spamming the forums with their obvious dislike and lack of respect of each other... MIght as well start yet another new slate and hope this doesnt happen yet again ^^
Many women excel in chess- Polgar sisters, cramling, etc. i think the reasons there are not many women in the highest level of chess are because there is a separate competition in men and women, few women were invited to play in prestigious tournaments like linares and corus, and women sometimes have more things to do besides chess.
the only reason this is true is because there are less women playing it.
Let's start from 7). That was your original thesis: neurological differences (that there are, I haven't addressed that) affects specific performance in chess. Maybe in something else, too; to support this thesis you many post ago provided this link (to a newspaper):
dated 2005. Now, let's give a look at Mr. Howard, whose study is cited in the article.
"ARE GENDER DIFFERENCES IN HIGH ACHIEVEMENT DISAPPEARING? A TEST IN ONE INTELLECTUAL DOMAIN","ROBERT W. HOWARD",Journal of Biosocial Science,Volume 37,Issue 03,01May2005,pp 371-380,DOI 10.1017/S0021932004006868,23Jul2004
Males traditionally predominate at upper achievement levels. One general view holds that this is due only to various social factors such as the ‘glass ceiling’ and lack of female role models. Another view holds that it occurs partly because of innate ability differences, with more males being at upper ability levels. In the last few decades, women have become more achievement focused and competitive and have gained many more opportunities to achieve. The present study examined one intellectual domain, international chess, to quantify its gender differences in achievement and to see if these have been diminishing with the societal changes. Chess is a good test domain because it is a meritocracy, it has objective performance measures, and longitudinal data of a whole population are available. Performance ratings overall and in the top 10, 50 and 100 players of each sex show large gender differences and little convergence over the past three decades, although a few females have become high achievers. The distribution of performance ratings on the January 2004 list shows a higher male mean and evidence for more male variation, just as with traits such as height. Career patterns of players first on the list between 1985 and 1989 show that top males and females entered the list at about the same age but females tend to play fewer games and have shorter careers. In this domain at least, the male predominance is large and has remained roughly constant despite societal changes.
In the abstract there aren't explanations about visuospatial intelligence, nor of how it can differ from man to woman, nor how could it have an influence on chess perfomance. Anyway, in the article (that is useless to link here, unless you have a subscription), it make the hypotesis of visuospatial difference, but that was just a speculation that needed further studies.
Then there is a specific reply on this claim:
"HOW INTELLECTUAL IS CHESS? – A REPLY TO HOWARD","MERIM BILALIC","PETER McLEOD",Journal of Biosocial Science,Volume 38,Issue 03,01May2006,pp 419-421,DOI 10.1017/S0021932005001185,13Apr2006
Howard’s (2005) claim that male dominance in chess is ‘consistent with the evolutionary psychology view that males predominate at high achievement levels at least partly because of ability differences’ (p. 378) is based on the premise that top level chess skill depends on a high level of IQ and visuospatial abilities. This premise is not supported by empirical evidence. In 1927 Djakow et al. first showed that world-class chess players do not have exceptional intellectual abilities. This finding has subsequently been confirmed many times. Different participation rates, or differences in the amount of practice, motivation and interest for chess in male and female chess players, may provide a better explanation for gender differences in chess performance.
So, they say: the premises of that obiter dictum does not have evidence.
Then, there is the re-reply of Howard:
"IQ, VISUOSPATIAL ABILITY AND THE GENDER DIVIDE: A REPLY TO BILALIC AND McLEOD","ROBERT W. HOWARD",Journal of Biosocial Science,Volume 38,Issue 03,01May2006,pp 423-426,DOI 10.1017/S0021932005001197,13Apr2006
Bilalic and McLeod’s arguments fall short on several grounds. There are excellent logical reasons to expect strong ability/chess expertise links and specific research evidence to date is sparse, with mixed findings. Data are presented from Georgia, which has a high female participation rate in chess, which suggest that differing gender motivation levels and participation rates impact relatively little on chess performance differences at the extreme.
So, it says that there are "logical reasons": reasons that will fall anyway under the Ockham's Razor.
The final re-re-reply is the latest, so we have to guess that this is the state-of-art of the discussion
"PARTICIPATION RATES AND THE DIFFERENCE IN PERFORMANCE OF WOMEN AND MEN IN CHESS","MERIM BILALI?","PETER MCLEOD",Journal of Biosocial Science,Volume 39,Issue 05,01Sep2007,pp 789-793,DOI 10.1017/S0021932007001861,26Jul2007
Howard’s (2005) claim that male dominance in chess is ‘consistent with the evolutionary psychology view that males predominate at high achievement levels at least partly because of ability differences’ (p. 378) is based on the premise that top level chess skill depends on a high level of IQ and visuospatial abilities. This premise is not supported by empirical evidence. In 1927 Djakow et al. first showed that world-class chess players do not have exceptional intellectual abilities. This finding has subsequently been confirmed many times. Different participation rates, or differences in the amount of practice, motivation and interest for chess in male and female chess players, may provide a better explanation for gender differences in chess performance.
The superiority of men over women in chess has been cited as evidence that there are fundamental differences in male and female intelligence (Howard, 2005a, 2006; Irwing & Lynn, 2005). An alternative interpretation of the difference is that it is due to differential male and female participation rates in chess (Charness & Gerchak, 1996; Bilalic & McLeod, 2006; Chabris & Glickman, in press). This has been dismissed by Howard (2006) on the grounds that changes in the difference in skill level between top male and female players in recent years are not correlated with changing relative participation rates. Here it is shown that Howard’s analysis is misleading. The data are consistent with differential participation rates as the explanation of the gap between the performance of women and men in chess.
A report about visuospatial ability in chess could be found here too:
So, what is "laughable", according to your point 7)?
It's very tiresome, the way you insist on writing the point you argue against as well as your own. First to me, now to Dr Howard, who stated in the article "probably only a threshold level of visuospatial ability is needed, beyond which general intelligence is more important." From this you conclude that he is claiming to have proved a difference based on differing visuospatial ability and set about attacking that. Yes, that is pretty laughable.
Point 7 is pretty clear, i started with 'the evidence leans towards', and have contradicted many times your claim that this is 'It is proven that'. You are the one claiming a definite unshakeable conclusion. The fact that there are differences in how our brains operate does not preclude there also being social factors affecting performance. Women may well get better at chess if social dynamics change further, despite the changes to this point having had little affect, but they aren't going to develop male brains.
Let's come to point 1) and 2). The study you offer at point 2) was conducted on a bunch of right-handed males and, of course shows that a novice uses different calculation than an expert. It doesn't provide any evidence about differences between males and females, neither it can be used to demonstrate or argue that one way of using brain could be better than other (I'm assuming in hypotesis here that effectively visuo-spatial ability is important and is differently evolved in women, hypotesis not demonstrated, neither is demostrated that it could lead to better or worse result).
The point 1), well, my dear, if the premises are the same, onus probandi incumbit ei qui dicit: you have to give evidence that, at same premises, there are different consequences.
The study in point 2 demonstrates the point that higher level players and lower level players are using different areas of the brain in different degrees. Which was the point I made. I did not suggest it said anything about males and females, you are yet again arguing against yourself. The point that experts and beginners are utilising different regions is pertinent to your assumption that conclusions drawn about beginners can be extended to experts and follows from point 1, which you did not even attempt to address, that equal ability at a basic activity does not equate to equal ability at an advanced activity.
Are you suggesting that you can draw conclusions about potential ability in higher mathematics from the ability to do basic arithmetic? It's a simple question which is of course why you dodged it altogether. If you can bring yourself to give an honest answer, the point is made.
For point 3: yes, and it's in consonance with my thesis.
Your 'thesis' on this question was that 'social bias' does not affect younger age groups, hence equal performance for beginners. The study you use to attempt to show equal performance for beginners specifically states the disparity is not dependant on age groups. That's direct contradiction, not consonance. Try again.
About point 4): you concentrate your fire on the very wrong part of the analogy, this demonstrates to me that our brains works differently.
I know that gravity is always the same and results of game changes at each game, but the point was: if you have a law (empirical one) that leads towards a certain result, what you should expect is always the same. The "different friction of the red balls" have not been demonstrated in any way. Entia non sunt multiplicanda sine necessitate. You don't have to create two different rules of friction of the two different sets of balls, just because they have different colours. Each ball could have a different friction from another, but you can't add a +1 handicap friction to one set without explaining why.
So, your objection about this is really superficial.
If the red balls have a different property that is relevant to the test (falling), that is demonstrated by comparison. If they do not then you are testing only an external force independant of the balls telling you nothing about them. The objection is fundamental rather than superficial, namely that your attempt at an analogy is deeply flawed. Chess is not independant of any property of the players, it is entirely dependant on the players ability.
You began with your assumption that neurology is irrelevant to the brain's ability and constructed a pathetic anology in which you look at an irrelevant property, colour, and ignore the relevant factor, friction. Unless you are actually going to pretend that chess ability bears no relation to the ability of the player, your analogy is specious. In order to bring it even marginally close to being relevant you would need to assert (assume) that despite different surface properties the friction is the same. The 'different surfaces' are demonstrated, since you already concede different neurology.
Let's come to points 6). It doesn't contraditc anything. It's much more likely to contradict that there are neurobiological fixed limit in a certain ability as it seems you'd like.
One states the difference is due to differing numbers of participants, the other states the difference is due to women being scared to play men. Two different hypotheses to explain the same observation. You see no contradiction there, but you do see a contradiction with a third hypothesis to explain the same observation. You don't seem able to reason consistently.
Point 5). I said above: entia non sunt moltiplicanda sine necessitate. You are the kind of guy that in a horseback riding club, hearing a cloppete clop behind you, says: "it's a zebra!"
You have no evidence that is a zebra, but you keep saying that. You don't have any study about how female brain moves differently in a chess game (the study you cited was conducted on males) neither you have a proof of how could it affect qualitatively the game, but there is a bunch of evidence of the role of the social-bias, not only in the "newspaper" I cited (and that you notice at poin 6) that is only a newpaper, but I can assure you that there is the related paper somewhere, in this forum too), but
(same study, again)
Are you now going to pretend that there is no evidence that male and female brains operate differently in processing tasks?
http://www.cerebromente.org.br/n11/mente/eisntein/cerebro-homens.html
You again repeat the lie that I suggested the study demonstrating differences between beginners and experts was intended to demonstrate the differences between males and females. I have already addressed that.
If you want to refer to a paper that you claim is 'somewhere on the forum', produce it.
Surely you must be aware that you've just reposted the same study yet again at the end there? Do you want me to type out the same criticism of it yet again or are you capable of scrolling up to one of the multiple occasions where I have already responded to this?
Olimar wrote:
lock this... these two people need to send PM's to each other... instead of spamming the forums with their obvious dislike and lack of respect of each other... MIght as well start yet another new slate and hope this doesnt happen yet again ^^
You're just being silly Olimar. I for one am really enjoying the banter, and if you don't enjoy it feel free to not come here to view it. Nobody is taping your eyelids open A Clockwork Orange style.
Again ?
Olga_Rus_80 wrote:
@ paul211: ok!
@belzy: now I'm quite busy, you still seem to me roqué on your position without a real dealing with the matter in object. You can change the example with one of your own that you like, it doesn't matter for our purpouse that the scientific law we want to study come from outside or from the element itself. The "colour" itself is something that has not to deal with "friction", while "brain usage" has something to deal with "brain usage". That's ok. What you missed (probably because you are adversating my thesis tout court, maybe because to admit a questionable cause seems to you to transform a "hard" science in "soft", while the doubt should be the lumen of every researcher), what you missed is that you are missing the specific nexum between this variance and specific performance. You haven't provided any evidence about it. While I tried to show a very little part of available evidence about a different explanation of the phenomenon.
btw, about the paper that has been cited, you can found the citation in the newspaper.
I don't want to annoy or to spam the forum with a cul de sac discussion, and I'm quite busy, so I'll continue only one element eventually, and only if there could be progress. I heard sometimes that arguing on the internet is the most unuseful think, I like to think that it depends from the attitude. So, in order to continue, you should stop with insults as I do, secondly, clarify your thesis. If you change "there is scientific evidence of" with " evidence leans towards", it still doesn't change the core. Evidence of differences there are, no evidence there is of specific nexum, a lot of evidence there is about "social bias"* + equality in playing strength (you omitted all the latter reference I reported) in all conditions + equality in initial condition. So, "evidence leans towards" something really different.
*which is, repling to your reply at point 6), both less partecipants and social role.
So, as fast response, please let's make this something useful and let's deal one point per reply.
A neat way of dodging out of the dead ends you talked yourself into on a few of those points.
Your gravity analogy fails for the clear reasons already given. In the simplest possible terms, brain usage potentially affects chess while colour does not potentially affect gravity. All the analogy shows is your assumption that there is no possible doubt. You correctly assert that science begins with doubt, but fail to realise you are the one pretending there is none.
All I omitted was, as I already stated, the study I've responded to half a dozen times. My objection is simple, that equality in lower playing strength does not equate to potential to reach the heights.
Evidence leaning towards is clearly different from it is proven that. Male and female brains handle different tasks differently, and exhibit different aptitudes in certain tasks, as per link I just posted. You have no basis for concluding this cannot form any part of the disparity in chess. Please don't again accuse me of having concluded there can be no social factors, since I have clearly and repeatedly stated it is likely to be both. What is unlikely is for it to be exclusively due to social factors. Therein lies my 'thesis'.
""All I omitted was, as I already stated, the study I've responded to half a dozen times. My objection is simple, that equality in lower playing strength does not equate to potential to reach the heights."
No, you omitted also a study that wished to demonstrate equality is not only in lower playing strength, but at every level."
You refer to the link labelled as being 'linked back to'? Guess what, it's the same study again. How many more times do I have to point out that I've looked at and addressed this study? You keep googling up different links that just lead straight back to it.
""Male and female brains handle different tasks differently, and exhibit different aptitudes in certain tasks, as per link I just posted. You have no basis for concluding this cannot form any part of the disparity in chess."
And you have no basis for concluding that this difference has impact on chess. As stated in the abstracts I reported, there is no empirical evidence. It's a theory not yet demonstrated."
You are trying my patience. I state I have a basis for leaning towards the conclusion there is an impact, which you continue to interpret and argue against as 'I have definite proof this is so'. And it is an empirical basis, albeit it not a conclusive one.
"Please don't again accuse me of having concluded there can be no social factors, since I have clearly and repeatedly stated it is likely to be both.
That's a strawman or I might be not clear. The social factor is the only factor where "evidence leans towards""
I have argued for multiple pages that it isn't. You just baldly stating that is so of course doesn't address a single argument I have made, so there is nothing to address here.
"What is unlikely is for it to be exclusively due to social factors."
You fail to argue under this last aspect."
Again a bald statement with nothing to address. See my last dozen posts for the response.
I'm not going to have an argument about whether we had an argument, this is getting ridiculous. Go and look up what the word empirical means, and address my points, not the ones you want to write for me. Women in the kitchen indeed. You posted two links to the same study, go and check for yourself.
Olimar wrote:
lock this... these two people need to send PM's to each other... instead of spamming the forums with their obvious dislike and lack of respect of each other... MIght as well start yet another new slate and hope this doesnt happen yet again ^^
Why such a negative response, they are harming no one & to tell you the truth I like this soap opera, I switch on every day just to watch this & PLAY CHESS, keep up the good work!
Olga_Rus_80 wrote:
You not only haven't checked my links, but neither your citation
D’Ettole, C., Maass, A., & Cadinu,
Women are surprisingly underrepresented in the chess world, representing less that 5% of registered tournament players worldwide and only 1% of the world's grand masters. In this paper it is argued that gender stereotypes are mainly responsible for the underperformance of women in chess. Forty-two male-female pairs, matched for ability, played two chess games via Internet. When players were unaware of the sex of opponent (control condition), females played approximately as well as males. When the gender stereotype was activated (experimental condition), women showed a drastic performance drop, but only when they were aware that they were playing against a male opponent. When they (falsely) believed to be playing against a woman, they performed as well as their male opponents. In addition, our findings suggest that women show lower chess-specific self-esteem and a weaker promotion focus, which are predictive of poorer chess performance. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Anyway in this foggy dodging you show I realize it's impossible to have a pacific confrontation, so I quit.
You say you know what empirical science is, but I have tons of literature about empirical and statistical science demonstration (that I had to study for criminal and civil proceedings) that differs a lot from your idea of scientific evidence. For the sake of all, only PM. (But I have serious doubt you could ever have any doubt in your views)
edit: wait, you have written
"address my points, not the ones you want to write for me."
ahahah ok good-bye mr. dodger
Already 'checked out', a few posts back. I've referred to Maas et al more than you have. You are being dishonest yet again.
You seem to have a compulsion to accuse me of whatever fallacy you are using, first strawmen, now dodging, when you yourself dodged the points you could not answer with 'i don't have much time, so let's just pick one i want to continue with'.
We can exchange PMs on the topic if you like, since I suspect you would be more receptive to reason without an audience.
thegab03 wrote:
Olimar wrote:
lock this... these two people need to send PM's to each other... instead of spamming the forums with their obvious dislike and lack of respect of each other... MIght as well start yet another new slate and hope this doesnt happen yet again ^^
Why such a negative response, they are harming no one & to tell you the truth I like this soap opera, I switch on every day just to watch this & PLAY CHESS, keep up the good work!
I know, this is really entertaining.
goldendog wrote:
Men must have poor memories--it seems this same thread comes up every two weeks and we all jump in anew
LOL I think I've read this thread about 25 + times since I joined in Aug 2007. I always start reading it and think 'hey i've read this thread, someone must have revived it' and then I look at the dates and realize no, its just another thread that has the same arguments and posts in it.
In the future though the newly formed Chess Mistresses can send an alert out to their members and flood any future threads that arise with pre-planned counter arguments.
Oh so you're back.
Trying to discuss it like two gentlemen (well a gentlewoman and a gentl..ok forget it), you say: "The fallacy was the assumption that equal performance at the beginner level means equal potential to reach the same highest level".
Is it right? I ask just not to hear strawmen ahead. If it is, why do you think to have better conclusion?
Equal performance at the beginner level means equal performance at the beginner level. It provides zero information about the maximum potential of each set. Is that really beyond your comprehension?
Incidentally, if you're going to continue pretending I was using your technique of attacking strawmen, perhaps you'd like to post specific examples as I just did.