网范文：“Should there be more women in science and engineering ” 很多人认为,应该有更多的女士在科学和工程领域。女性参与有很多好处,目前女性话语权缺失不公平。然而这些理由不明确，英语毕业论文，也不够彻底。这篇社会范文讲述的是拥有更多女性参与科学探讨。不过,女性比男性更少学习科学和工程专业。通常认为女性会受益于科学学科毕业,由于更高的薪水。拥有更多女性工程师也将是对经济有益的,因为增加的工程师和多样性的设计会产生积极的作用。
另一个观点是,名额不足代表女性是不公平的。问题是如何招收更多的女性在科学学科。一些提供任何理由或很模糊的,公平是一个答案,但肯定不是唯一的。然而,这些词语并不意味着存在的参数。下面的范文研讨了这一问题。
Abstract
Many people hold this truth to be self-evident, that there should be more female students in science and engineering. Typical arguments include possible benefits to women, possible benefits to the economy, and the unfairness of the current female under-representation. However, these justifications are never explicitly and thoroughly presented. Clearly stating and scrutinizing them, we show that they in fact have logical flaws. When made consistent, these arguments do not unconditionally justify enrolling more women in scientific disciplines. In particular, what women want must be taken into account. Outreach programs towards K–12 girls must therefore purport to allow them to choose a field freely, rather than try to draw as many of them to scientific disciplines as possible. This change of mindset must be accompanied by a close examination of the purpose and effects of these programs.
INTRODUCTION
RAISING A HORSE FROM THE DEAD Far fewer women than men study science and engineering. It is often argued that women would benefit from graduating in a scientific discipline, due to higher salaries and the possibility to help others. Having more female engineers would also be beneficial to the economy because of the increasing need for engineers and of the positive impact of diversity on designs. Another argument is that this under-representation of women is unfair. The question is then how to enroll more women in scientific disciplines. In most articles on the subject, justifications for a greater female enrollment are relegated to the introduction (i.e. the only part of the article that needs not be in any way original). Some provide no justification at all or very vague ones, such as “for a variety of practical and moral reasons” (Felder et al., 1995).
The closest authors get to presenting arguments is naming them: they mention the name of an argument —rather than the argument itself—, say that it has been widely used (probably implying that it must therefore be valid), and move on. They for instance say “a lot of people argue for diversity in terms of fairness [ . . . ] but that’s not my argument” (Wulf, 1998), “fairness is one answer, but certainly not the only one” (Gosink, 2017), or “aside from the obvious issues of access, fairness and equity” (Sullivan et al., 2017) without ever actually making these arguments explicit. Yet, such words do not imply the existence (let alone the validity) of arguments any more than dragons exist because the word ‘dragon’ does.
In fact, everyone is so convinced that asking why there should be more female students in science and engineering would be beating a dead horse that nobody checked whether the horse was dead. They would reply that their arguments need not be made explicit because they are obvious. Also ‘obvious’ is the revolution of the sun around the earth. Philosopher Alfred North Whitehead said that “it requires a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious.” Such a mind should not be very unusual amongst scientists and engineers. They should be able and willing to “undertake the analysis of the obvious.” In the present context, this requires a precise study of these justifications, even (or especially) when they seem obvious. The least this will take is to state arguments explicitly and clearly rather than glibly allude to them. Logic and accuracy are still invaluable and should still be used outside of science.
Motivating science and engineering
As technology plays an ever-increasing role in society and economy, the number of engineering graduates must increase. And since females and minorities are under-represented they offer great potential sources of engineers (Baum, 1990; Brainard & Carlin, 1998; Chen et al., 1996; Cuny & Aspray, 2017; Grose, 2017; Lane, 1999; Moskal, 2017; Rockland et al., 2017; Sullivan et al., 2017; Wulf, 1998; Zywno et al., 1999). Furthermore, more women in science and engineering would be good because of the greater variety of designs which more diverse teams could invent (Cuny & Aspray, 2017; Gosink, 2017; Lane, 1999; Moskal, 2017; Wulf, 1998). These arguments seem altruistic since women can contribute to the economy: “More compelling arguments have been raised that recognize the direct benefits that female participation is likely to have upon these fields.” (Moskal, 2017). But compelling for whom? These arguments may efficiently motivate science and engineering to attract women, but this is not sufficient. In essence, these arguments treat women as mere pawns to be transferred from one department to another based on some external reason (e.g. the economy). Can one force somebody to do something for the sake of others?
According to Immanuel Kant (1785), this is wrong because one should never treat people merely as means, but always as ends. To utilitarians, good means maximizing the happiness of the greatest number (Bentham, 1789; Mill, 1871); if women do not want to become engineers, having more of them in the field will decrease their happiness while increasing that of others only marginally. (One can notice that forbidding that students choose their field freely and getting the best students to fields which are deemed a priority by the State is typically a practice of dictatorships, not democracies.) These economic arguments achieve the great fit of getting to agree (against them) ethical views which seldom do so: be it from a Kantian or a utilitarian viewpoint, these arguments must be rejected if women do not want to study science and engineering, i.e. they are not valid justifications on their own. That science and engineering should want to attract women does not imply that there has to be more women in science and engineering: what women want is crucial.
Some disagree and argue that one needs more female engineers independently of what women want. Whether this is correct or not, one must at the very least be consistent and apply the same rule 3 to all possible contributions to the economy. If child labor and child pornography can benefit the economy, should they be legalized? There are several ways out of this problem. One may ignore the issue altogether; this is ever popular yet not quite satisfying. One may stand by the premise of efficacy maximization and accept its logical consequences; this is self-consistent but will never get wide approval. One may claim that there exist particular cases; but a rule with too many exceptions is not a rule at all. One may provide a refined argument which does not endorse child labor and child pornography; but this path is at best narrow and it may not even exist. Finally, one may look for an argument of a completely different nature, which would not have the dreadful consequences of efficacy; this we will attempt in Sec. III.
CONCLUSION
Many in science and engineering hold this truth to be self-evident, that there should be more women in the field. We considered several commonly proposed justifications: higher salaries, the possibility to help others, the increasing need for engineers, and the impact of diversity on new designs. When made explicit and seriously scrutinized, they in fact show that there should be a mutual attraction between women and scientific fields. This attraction is not universal so that there should be more women in science and engineering only inasmuch as women actually want to graduate in these fields. Many claim that women are under-represented in science and engineering and that, out of fairness, their enrollment should be increased. Yet, under-representation is statistical in nature, it is neither right nor wrong. We therefore redefined it to make it an ethical concept.
Although an improvement, this still had a shortcoming: its asymmetry. We finally settled on a criterion which did not mention under-representation and simply states that all women should be allowed to graduate in a field congruent with their abilities and desires. This conclusion is similar to that obtained from mutual attraction. As currently conceived, outreach means trying to sell our product (science and engineering) to as many potential female customers as possible. It does not aim at empowering women to choose freely any more than any other sales pitch does. Since drawing always more women to science and engineering violates their right to choose a career freely, a change of mindset —a ‘paradigm shift’— from increasing enrollment to increasing freedom is necessary. Since present outreach is incompatible with its justifications, programs have to be modified to be really justified (or better arguments must be proposed to justify the programs in their current form). Of course, this is easier said than done: trying to allow women to choose a field freely would be a moral dream but also a practical nightmare. Nevertheless, one cannot go on undisturbed on a path which appears to be the wrong one.()
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