> I think there should be a rule that people who know nothing about
> genetics (presumably including this guy) should not say anything about
> the subject. Don't ask me who would enforce it, though.
>
> Jon Johanning // jjohanning at igc.org
I think Summers probably knows what he's talking about. As Justin pointed out, the concept of "innate" differences is a bit sloppy (Justin would say hopelessly, but I don't go that far because you can often coherently rephrase talk of "innate" differences). Of course it's possible that genetic variation between men and women is responsible for the differences in achievement between the sexes at the highest levels of the maths and sciences in the same sense that genetic variation between the sexes is responsible for the fact that most extremely tall people are men. Are such differences inevitable? Of course not. A Shaquille O'Neal who suffered from severe malnutrition throughout his entire childhood almost certainly doesn't approach 7 feet--just as an Einstein deprived of human contact for the first 10 years of his life probably never thinks up something like the theory of relativity.
Nonetheless, one could (and perhaps should) take the position that although there may be some genetic differences between the sexes that generally rebound to the benefit of one sex over the other, we should act as though there aren't since humans in the past have been so eager to attribute inequalities in outcomes to dubious alleged differences in "natural" endowments (what we now call "genes").
-- Luke