21st Century Heresy

As Harvard welcomes its new president, It's A Magical World would just like to take some time to ensure her predecessor is not forgotten. When Larry Summers made his now infamous comments in January 2005, yours truly was not around to comment on it. So, we'll go ahead and do it now.

For those of you living under a rock, at a conference held by the National Bureau of Economic Research, Summers said there is a greater variance in intelligence among men than among women, and that the difference could be intrinsic. He then stated that he "would like nothing better than to be proved wrong." Predictably, the left-leaning ivory tower academic community hit the roof. For Summers to suggest something so heretical to the progressive conception of the world to which they sought to subscribe was appalling. There was no possible way it could be true, because the academics decided there was no possible way it could be true. It was not worth investigating at all because the very idea was so obviously wrong.

Despite the fact that Summers literally pleaded for people to investigate and refute his claims, he had to repeatedly apologize for saying what he said and had to perform penance by hiring more female faculty. But his comments set the wheels in motion for what would ultimately lead to his resignation. Harvard even had to absolve itself of Summers' sin by hiring a female president.

I don't have nearly enough information to either agree or disagree with Summers. I do know, from my personal experience, that there are inherent differences between men and women, so his suggestion doesn't seem all that unreasonable. It's at least worth looking into. And if there indeed is some critical difference in the way boys and girls learn, I'd rather know about it so we can structure our educational system accordingly, rather than sweeping it under the rug and insisting there's no possible way it could be the truth.

Keep mind that when Galileo proposed that the earth revolves around the sun and not vice-versa, his theories were so heretical that he was sentenced to house arrest and was forced to recant, under threat of excommunication from the Catholic Church. Well, guess what history proved to us?