re: Sexist MRI Machines

Anyone who has ever worked for a female supervisor knows this.

Can I logically ask why logic and rational thought would be needed while being shown disturbing images in a controlled environment that didn’t actually pose any threat to either sex? If the goal is to induce an emotional response, why would there be any need to rationalize emotion Instead of just feeling it?

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scientists being attacked and labeled as "neuro-sexists" by liberals and findings suppressed by major news media...

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HEY! Don't confuse them with the facts.

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google

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Here's your problem.

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Honestly speaking, not sure how hard you could have tried, but that possible hint of mock, “incisive OP”, may be a tell that incisiveness is not going to be a part of your rhetoric.

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Honestly speaking, it wasn’t a hint. But it was also fairly tongue-in-cheek, so don’t take it personally—or as a metric by which to gauge my incisiveness.

I searched under a number of different permutations of “MRI”, “brain activity in men and women under duress”, “decision-making processes in men and women”, “amygdala activity and decision making”, etc. In spite of having been a research assistant all through grad school and earning a master’s in a field with a heavy emphasis on neuroanatomy, I didn’t turn up any recent research stating that women demonstrated zero logical response to disturbing images, nor how such a response could impact their fitness for some nebulous political role. So yes, I would love to see your links. I’m pretty sure a few other, possibly non-female posters have asked as well.

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Re-translating "certain political positions of power" to general leadership skills is a bit lacking logic in my book.

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Well, I am a woman. You’d have to expect that my amygdala is just lit up like a Christmas tree right now, and my brain’s having to divert power from all those logical thinking areas just to keep up.

But in all seriousness, I’m really not sure what you’re saying about “certain political positions of power” if this isn’t somehow tied to a woman’s ability to lead in a crisis. I might give your argument more credence if you said women might not be well-suited to, say, front-line combat leadership because of this and other biological differences, but for some reason you’ve failed to offer any degree of specificity regarding which positions you believe would be impacted. You can’t really blame me for drawing a general inference from what was a pretty vague conclusion to begin with.

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I do like that Googling and failing to find something resulted in a robustly convoluted and misconstrued interpretation of pretty much everything I posted. (where in the hell did I say anything about “diminished or absent activity in the amygdala”???)

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You didn’t, nor did I say otherwise. I just presented that information as a counterpoint to the idea that logical reasoning is the determining factor in whether or not one can respond appropriately to disturbing images. (Although, yes, I did have to make a bit of a logical leap there since you never spelled out the actual negative effects of discordant neural responses on ability to function in power roles.)

I’ll admit to yanking your chain a bit, but you seem genuinely upset about being misunderstood when, quite frankly, you put yourself in this position. You posted a coy reference to “certain political positions of power”, with an uncited reference to “recent research” containing few supporting details and a relationship to your conclusion that was seemingly tangential at best. There was so much information missing that I’m not sure how you got from Point A to Point B even if the studies do exist. I mean, how long did those levels of activity persist, and were enough measurements taken to even answer that question? Did anyone actually evaluate what, if any, impact these patterns had on cognitive function or processes?

I’m all for legitimate scientific discussion. It’s a fascinating topic to me, and I actually despise lack of objectivity in this area. But if you don’t cite your sources and lay out your arguments in a clear, syllogistic form that supports your conclusion, I’m not sure how you can reasonably expect any responses other than the ones you got.

Is there a link to this?