If you were to Google whether diversity is a strength or a benefit, you would find countless articles indicating that diversity improves efficiency or output or is otherwise beneficial. But a recent paper published in the journal Theory & Society debunks that claim. The paper is entitled "The diversity hypothesis: A rapid scoping review of diversity and scientific output and impact in the natural and social sciences," and the author conclude: "Based on over 100 scientific articles, we find that only between 15% and 28% of results reported in the literature are consistent with the hypothesis, with the balance of the results not being consistent with it. Based on this, the scientific evidence implies that the Diversity Hypothesis should be rejected." That is, studies that had considered diversity based on sex, nationality, race, age, LGBT, institution, and geography, overwhelmingly were inconsistent with the diversity hypothesis--that diversity is our greatest strength. The only type of diversity where it did not hold true--but even here showed mixed results--was diversity of disciplines.
When the billionaire oligarchs and their collaborators say "Diversity is 'our' greatest strength," whom do they mean by 'our'? It certainly isn't the people at large who benefit from the Balkanization of society. Rather 'our' should be read in the narrow sense of the word, to mean the billionaires and their pals. They're the ones benefiting from diversity!
ReplyDeleteIs the continent of Africa known for it's architecture? Music? Art? Scientific discoveries? Does Latin America lay claim to anything special? Or is history accurate, and the last 6-700 years of Europeans are the reason we live like we do?
ReplyDeleteEuropean civilization invented the modern world and virtually everything in it. Europe to include the U.S. and the Anglophone world as well as other societies which originated there. This is the great politically-incorrect truth which must not be spoken in today's world. Yet it remains fact and facts are stubborn things.
ReplyDeleteAnd keep in mind how many of those incorrect and misleading papers come from the "paper-mill" cartels, which cooperate to publish as many fake papers as possible (and reference each other's fake papers as much as possible) in order to suck up money meant for genuine research. (One of the more recent studies highlighting this was "The entities enabling scientific fraud at scale are large, resilient, and growing rapidly," published by Northwestern University in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.)
ReplyDeleteNot to mention papers which fail to include important details, such as "In vivo base editing of Chd3 rescues behavioural abnormalities in mice," published in Nature as an open access article, which failed to mention that the handful of monkey trials resulted in 100% fatality, as well as their one human trial (a toddler) which resulted in the patient's death. China Uncensored covered the case in July, and I see that Nature placed an editorial note (the same day) saying they would investigate.
And I honestly can't begin to count the number of third-world papers and patents (that I have personally run across) which involved foreigners stealing research from their naive (possibly traitorous) colleagues at universities such as the University of Utah (which regularly loses scientific research involving energy, electronics, and chemistry to Chinese institutions; due to their visiting scholars and foreign-exchange grad students moving to prototype faster than federal or individual institutions' regulations would allow).
Unity is our greatest strength.
ReplyDelete