If you're a white cis male scientist and you think objectivity, rationality and universality are in danger because you see people fighting against being oppressed and misrepresented in research and policy, let it be clear you really just defending yourself, and worse, denying it. https://twitter.com/Abebab/status/1280855963109556231

I want to say more on this, on the danger of coming across as a pedantic asshole, but so be it. This is close to my heart. So here comes a rant of sorts. My apologies if I miss the mark or flooded your timeline. I am fully open to other perspectives, this is just mine.

thread

I think many (white male etc) scientists are truly dedicated to their work and genuinely want to 'find out things'. Quarks, dinausaurs, decision making, brain matter: You want to know the exact nature of reality.

Good. /2

Now I want to walk you through your own experience. First thing that may happen is you meet other people online doing a type of research that you have never seen before. Let's say on twitter you encounter "a critical-feminist analysis of social injustice in US suburbs"/3

So you look at their methods section and you go wtf and you think hey it is my duty to defend science! You go and tell them that their research is all wrong, it's not objective, it's not rational, it's normative, political, it's just BAD SCIENCE.

Well done! /4

For the moment, you neglect that this research is not your field, you were not educated in it, you don't know what it is about. You're a very smart guy. But that does not mean you can make sense of everything just like that. You lack a personal history to grasp certain things. /4

Now, you are annoyed that these people are doing such 'vague stuff' and what do you know, when you tell them so, you get told to back off! Well of course you do not, right? It's FREE SPEECH right? What is science if you are no longer allowed to ask questions? Right? /5

Then it gets even worse. Bc you happen to be not into quarks or dino's but in AI, the hard science of the human mind, building this brutal machine learning algorithm. Great team, Prof is a really cool guy, you all work like crazy but these guys are the best, beers on Friday./6

And then one of these vague feminist black marxist weirdo's tells *you* that YOUR research is problematic. Talking about human values etc. WTF - they were doing this crazy shit, you weren't allowed to tell them straight, and now YOU are being criticized? COME ON! /7

But it may just be so, that the entire history of science, the philosophy behind it, the methods, the tradition, the ways to do things, the logic, the framing, the concepts, the mindset, and all the resulting methods, especially in a human-related area like AI, are *loaded*./8

And the further point is: you cannot see this. It must be really terribly frustrating, and going against all your intuitions of what science is about (intuitions!): There is something you, all by yourself, cannot understand, precisely because you are who you are! /9

You will only see it, once you first accept the fact that there are people, who grew up in our society, yet all their lives they kept running up against situations in which they experienced, quite clearly, in a literal in-your-face sense: wait, this here, this is not about me./10

This education, is not about me. This handbook, it does not describe me. This therapy, it does not fit me. This toy, is not for me. This café, is not for me. This playground, is not for me. This schoolbook does not talk about me. This TV news bulletin: not for me./11

I mean it is not as if the people in question cannot read the book or go to that bar or play in that playground. They can watch the news. But they experience quite clearly that they are not acknowledged given how and from which context these things are designed. /12

What can I compare this with? Well perhaps this: what if you were told everyday to wear pink trousers instead of jeans, and I am assuming for the moment you are the regular white western male cis guy who is brought up as a jeans-wearing boy.

Something like that. Every day

/13

The entire world, especially everything we take for granted, all 'normal and everyday', are for some not a warm bath, but an intermittent cold shower. Because of your gender, your race, your ability, your sexuality.

(And if you're white cis western male: you don't feel it!)/13

HAH You say. But I wasn't talking about the everyday world. I am in the UNIVERSITY which is a safe space, where rational intelligent actors have conversation on the basis of argument alone. All these things you mention play no role here, or should not play any role.

/14

But this university you speak of is a fantasy. It does not exist, and holding on to it in discussions with people fighting their oppression, demanding their inclusion, is disrespectful to their cause. Draw a picture of your rational heaven if you wish and hang it up a wall. /15

But the reality we live in is a loaded reality. And for you this means always already a welcome place, whereas for other people, it is hostile. Anything we do to approach rationality, universality and objectivity, our methods, is *part* of that loaded reality, not outside it./16

Keep the ideal fantasy of science as a pin-up on your wall.
But don't use it in arguments against what marginalized people try to achieve.

Ps. Even the Greeks didn't have a rational free debate.
Greek women and slaves did not go freely discussing things on the forum.

/end