Image: BRIAN REA
In Brief
Under Pressure
- For most of history women in the Western world were denied opportunities to seek higher education and develop their talents.
- The dearth of women at the top of their fields is now often the result of compromises made for the sake of family, rather than differences in ability.
- Women who seek eminence face difficult choices regarding when to invest in their careers versus their personal lives. More cultural and institutional support for women could dispel the lingering gender disparities.
Try this simple thought experiment. Name 10 female geniuses from any period in history. Odds are you ran out of names pretty quickly. The message is clear: something is rotten in the state of genius.
Besting most of one's species is an accident of circumstance. The sequences of DNA nucleotides, arranged just so to impart intelligence, curiosity and passion, are part of that fluke event. More serendipitous still are the conditions needed for a person to devote decades to an idea or calling, deaf and blind to the distractions bound up in being human.
This article was originally published with the title Where are all the Female Geniuses?.
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Add CommentAnother article being a feminist propaganda. Dear authors please read the biography of Marie-Curie. She grown during times when all the women unlike today were NOT invited in the universities, were NOT encouraged to become scientists, DID NOT receive additional support due to their sex. What make her different is that she was finding solutions and not excuses. She focused on mathematics, then chemistry and physics and NOT on gender studies and proving the whole world that the women are better than men. There are hundrends articles like this based on the same schema: list a few places were women are better or more represented than men and take one field in which they are not and blame it on culture, men etc. I wonder if it still qualifies as objective science (since most of authors are females...). When I was studying there already existed programs for women only (while there was none just for men), there were additional financing posibilities for female scientists with kids (male single parent can take care on his own no?) and still more men made it to stay in the universtity. How much more sex-based discrimination and promotion do you need? Are you really interested in science and development or just in sex propaganda at all cost? When readind such articles I feel discriminated. It seems for science it matters more what I have in my pants than what I have in my brain.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou forgot a word. RECOGNIZED genius.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUntil very recently, unless you had men around you who accepted your genius superiority (yeah right like that happened a lot) showing up the men in power in your life (all men had power over women) was about as good a survival skill as a slave showing up the master or a low ranking employee outsmarting a proud arrogant boss. Just dumb. Even now, being a smart woman has perils men never experience. At work, at home, dating, in public life. To overlook this is more dumbness in itself.
There have always been women geniuses. In the past they handed their ideas over to their husbands to claim as their own if they wanted their ideas not to die with them. And I'm sure many a black eye followed that gift.
It will be interesting to see what happens in the next few decades.
Women have never been able to use muscle to get ahead in life and the idea that their sexuality was an advantage is absurdly naive. Men TOOK women who were attractive. There weren't any laws to stop them. Being attractive was a liability until rape and harassment laws started protecting women only about 30 years ago. Up to the late 60's most women went to the altar pregnant. Do you know why? Because all a guy had to do if he wanted to OWN a woman, was persuade her to go on a few dates, get her alone, get her a bit tipsy, sex her up a bit, promise to withdraw and then dump his load deep inside her and PRESTO - she's pregnant and walking down the aisle with him - no education, no career, no money to use to escape and social pressure to be "respectable". This is a best case scenario. Being date raped was the norm. Marrying you rapist was also the norm. Abortion was illegal and dangerous and inaccessible and birth control was in the hands of men who didn't care to use it. Getting a woman pregnant was easy and carried few consequences. Usually the rapist got a pat on the back and a quickie wedding. Everyone went along with it pretty much.
Seriously, does anyone think any woman now or in the past has insisted on unprotected sex with a man she wasn't sure she wanted to marry and raise kids with? When you are dating you don't know the person. They put their best foot forward for a while and if they run out of patience they got pregnant to force the issue. Recent studies show more than half of women today have experienced men pressuring them to get pregnant. Do people not realize how this tied women down to domestic drudgery instead of becoming a genius inventor. Pffft.
Both excellent views, I should have worn my fencing helmet, but I have seen the silent pain, through the years, of women waiting for men to catch up and wait...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thiswhat do you mean by genius? A business savy person? A scientific marvel? A charismatic politician? A great athlete? A prolific inventor? or just 2 standard deviations above the normal IQ. Ok, now name 10 geniuses. male or female.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNow check out the membership demographics of Mensa. Fairly evenly split, and the vast majority you've never heard of even though we are distributed throughout all fields of work, pornstars, scientists, politicians, factory workers, garbage men, and even members of the 47 percent. Genius has nothing to do with notoriety.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis article is a great example of why SciAm should never have allowed comments. A reasonable point of view being comment trolled by pedantic jackasses.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@pdrazek
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMarie Curie was only able to put to use her exceptional talent because her father-in-law offered to look after her and Pierre's daughter, which was unusual for the time. Otherwise she would have been "making excuses", as you put it, and raising her child by herself.
Also, it is incorrect to suggest that physics is male-biased in the same way that other subjects are female-biased. Here in the UK, for instance, the proportion of girls taking physics for their 16-18 studies is just 15%; that's far lower than the proportion of boys studying languages or other typically girl-predominate subjects. Those statistics (mostly) won't be due to childcare of course, but there certainly are other factors: lack of encouragement during upbringing and social pressures, for instance.
Presumably, girls and women will continue to benefit from "sex propaganda" until their opportunities equal men's. And vice-versa.
As an employer I don't think anyone has the luxury of discriminating against anybody regardless of race creed colour and whatever sex you want to be, nowadays you have to hire the best you can afford. But if some people wish to take issue as to why they are not hired they can always take the easy option of they have been discriminated against.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAlthough Libby Tarian has issues way beyond this
Where are all the female geniuses??
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWell, I can tell you where at least one is located. I am presently living with one and am happy to call her wife. She may be unrecognized by academia, may not receive awards and accolades, but she is a genius, in many aspects of life.
Why do so many people put such stock in ego distorting recognition?! GK
Libby T: I'm not sure where you got the idea that "pretty much" most of the weddings prior to 30 years ago were due to date rape, but I would love to see some of your sources. Preferably peer-reviewed and free of obvious bias. I doubt we'll see any, though. As a man who had a very hard time conceiving with his wife, I don't think it's all that "easy" to take a lady out, get her tipsy, and BAM! impregnate her in one shot. I'm also a bit confused as to why you think that female genius attributed to husbands leads to black eyes. While I'm sure it is a possibility, just assuming that this is the norm is silly. Not all men are brutish neanderthals who behave themselves only because it's the law.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd GK, I couldn't agree more. What's the use of being a genius if all you care about is recognition?
Although reading through the first two comments is uncomfortable, they are both appropriate to the *brief* article. We can understand the world better if we try to understand other people's observations and interpretations. Doesn't mean we must embrace them, but we emerge with more rounded interpretations and understandings of our own. Pursuing science is no more comfortable or pure than the pursuits in other parts of our lives. I like these two comments because they are not in contradiction to each other, but different angles on the same cube.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe women geniuses can be found in publications by their male department heads. Or the equivalent in industry. One only has to read past the first author or patent holder to find the genius behind the work. Note, they are not generally easy to find. Look for such titles as lab tech, or research assistant.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1) Hypatia - the last great mathematician of ancient Alexandria
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this2) Marie Curie - first person to win the Nobel prize twice in physics and chemistry
3) Hedy Lamarr - invented spread spectrum communications, the basis of cell phones. A famous Hollywood actress in 1940s "the most beautiful woman"
4) Marilyn vos Savant - has the highest IQ of all time according to Guinness World Record
5) Lisa Randall - Harvard physics professor and science writer, one of the "most influential scientists in the world"
There they are. They are not just genuises, they are also beautiful.
I suppose I read the title improperly. To me, it (should have?) read, "Why have so few women been RECOGNIZED as geniuses?" Our history is replete with women who have made extraordinary contributions to many of the artistic and intellectual undertakings that most of us point to when asked what is the best of humanity. Arguably the genius list could include Mary Shelley, Albert Einstein's wife (who apocryphally was supposed to have helped with the math. but may have done more...see the unintentional sexism in the fact that I can't bring her name to mind...), Barbara McClintock, and many more that we (should) know well. I do not doubt that there were many more female geniuses in Europe and North America as well as in even more paternalistic cultures, that we do not know about. Given the amount of male domination and pure sexism I have seen within my own family, never mind the "culture" as a whole, I do not doubt that there were far more female geniuses that were never allowed to achieve success commesurate with their potential. Now, folks, we live in a time of extraordinary challenges, some of which could be absolutely devastating for the human enterprise in the relatively near future. Should we continue to waste our energy by arguing about what the perceived deficiencies of the article are? Or should we energetically pursue change that would ensure that the best minds and talents interested in the future and in solutions to the challenges posed by the future are encouraged and supported in their endeavours, whether male or female, no matter what race or religion or gender?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs an autistic radish, I believe a woman's genius is entirely missed because her is affective genius. Women use both sides of their brains and *think with heart*. Men think about how to invent and control, not how to respect (others and the earth) and relate. John Gottman(at the UW) has been studying this ability of females to read the unconscious body language and intonation)and men only *get it* when it's considerably slowed down and documented on film. Women socially program all the little tots, male or female, from the womb into the young years. Seems if you don't value what women do well, the society suffers, becomes violent,declines.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am informed of many smart women, but many more who are dumb. They are dumb because they were raised to be that way, conditionaed to value personal appearance over personal integrity, materialism over intelligence, security over independence, etc. Who or what causes that to happen? Women control 75% of household disposable income. Many love to shop. They are all so "worth it".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSome of that is due to Madison Avenue and Wall Street; some, to women, many who openly covet that special status.
Little wonder with so much pandering and social conditioning that more women do not achieve more of their cognitive potential.
Throughout human history, the overwhelming majority of major religious and political leaders, discoverers, explorers, inventors, scientists, philosophers, writers, composers, industrialists, financiers, and labor leaders have all been predominantly male Homo sapiens. This is merely an observation, not a value statement about genius or creativity. Female Homo sapiens seem more focused on biologic creativity (reproduction), as in other hominids.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGenius involves driven selfish obsession using whatever is at hand to the exclusion of all other interests. Having children can break the focus needed to get there.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow many geniuses were there prior to modern times? History has been written by men so we know little of female genius from before modern times AKA the printing press.
Ask instead how many have appeared in recent time and up to today? There seem to be enough female artists, scientists. astronauts, .... today to change the debate.