1. Your preferred rephrasing of the first box says the essentially the same thing I said -- so why was my phrasing dishonest? You're quibbling.

2. Re: the second box: Again, I addressed this directly and acknwowledged your point that Summers was probably not intending his remarks to apply to all circumstances. My response was that that fact in itself reveals something about his underlying assumptions. You may disagree with my conclusion, but I fail to see intellectual dishonesty.

3. You have changed the terms of my statement. I said that the left does not object to inquiring into genetics as a factor. Your response is that many on the left, including Yglesias and Meyers, "want to simply conclude that any and all differences in the number of women in sciece positions at universities is due solely to bias". I haven't read Meyers, but Yglegias summarizes his own view as follows:

" * Genetic, gender-linked differences in some forms of mathematical ability? My non-expert's understanding is that, yes, they're there, along with genetic, gender-linked differences in some other intelligence metrics.

" * No sexism in academia or the sciences? Not bloody likely." http://yglesias.typepad.com/matthew/2005/01/genetics_is_onl.html

Do Yglesias and I believe that sexism is a factor? Yes. Are we claiming that genetic differences don't exist or shouldn't be studied? No.

The point of my historical examples was not to prove that discrimination exists today, but to prove that Summers reasoning was flawed: We cannot, contrary to his statement, assume that markets will cure discrimination.

I think you are being dishonest again. I think if you had written, "We cannot, contrary to his statement, assume that markets will always and/or quickly cure discrimination," then you'd be on firmer ground.

I do not think it is unfair or intellectually dishonest to test his hypothesis against other historical periods because his stated reasoning was one of general application. Of course, he would not really have asserted that black ballplayers were not discriminated against in the 1930s (and, I presume, would not have asserted that women were not discriminated against at Harvard in the 1950s). But that was precisely my point. Summers stated reasoning is not sufficient and, therefore, what underlies the stated reasoning is an assumption that discrimination is not a significant problem in this market.

Again, I think you are being dishonest. You are taking his comments from a discussion and cooking them up to be some sort of Grand General Theory. I have no reason to believe that was his goal, and as such, I'm going to conclude you are being deliberately dishonest.

If youve read my other posts on this subject, youll see that quite a few people on the right have tried to translate Summers as merely asking for a genuine inquiry into all possible factors. I dont object to that (nor have I seen many on the Left object to that). However, what Summers actually said went beyond that to prejudging the conclusion of what inquiry would find.

Again, I just don't believe you. First of, the inquiry is in progress and from what I've read some of the results is that there really are things like morphological differences in the brain between genders, races, etc. You seem to want to assert tht these differences mean nothing with no evidence save historical data. That is just crap. Second there are those on the Left who want to simply conclude that any and all differences in the number of women in sciece positions at universities is due solely to bias. See for example PZ Meyers and Matthew Yglesias.

So in the end, I just don't fine you open to honest inquiry here.

The point of my historical examples was not to prove that discrimination exists today, but to prove that Summers’ reasoning was flawed: We cannot, contrary to his statement, assume that markets will cure discrimination.

I do not think it is unfair or intellectually dishonest to test his hypothesis against other historical periods because his stated reasoning was one of general application. Of course, he would not really have asserted that black ballplayers were not discriminated against in the 1930s (and, I presume, would not have asserted that women were not discriminated against at Harvard in the 1950s). But that was precisely my point. Summers’ stated reasoning is not sufficient and, therefore, what underlies the stated reasoning is an assumption that discrimination is not a significant problem in this market.

If you’ve read my other posts on this subject, you’ll see that quite a few people on the right have tried to “translate” Summers as merely asking for a genuine inquiry into all possible factors. I don’t object to that (nor have I seen “many on the Left” object to that). However, what Summers actually said went beyond that to prejudging the conclusion of what inquiry would find.