Reflection: Pythagoras’ Trousers: God, Physics, and the Gender Wars, by Margaret Wertheim
Wertheim, M. (1995). Pythagoras’ trousers: God, physics, and the gender wars. London, UK: W.W. Norton & Company
Pythagoras’ Trousers: God, Physics, and the Gender Wars, by Margaret Wertheim,
outlines the history of women in physics, showing how its origins in
and long relationship with religion in the Western World have
intentionally and unintentionally kept women out of this field more
than any other scientific field. Wertheim shows how Pythagoras
introduced a mythical relationship with numbers to the West and
connected numbers to a Greek dualistic worldview where masculinity,
goodness, and transcendence were juxtaposed with femininity, evil,
and tangibility. Wertheim then follows this dualistic view through
European history, showing how it has driven the study of physics as a
transcendental religious pursuit both incidentally and deliberately
closed to female participation. Highlighting the contributions of the
lucky few women whose male relatives provided them access to
scientific knowledge, Wertheim shows the struggles these women faced,
their access being precluded not just by social and educational
constraints, but also by religious barricades. In describing the
eventual split between physics and the church, Wertheim shows how the
religiosity that remained in the field of physics in fact made it
even more difficult for women to enter this field, despite gains in
other sciences. In her last chapter, Wertheim demonstrates that
physics still lags far behind the other sciences in female
representation, admonishing the field to change not just surface
practices, but also deep-set beliefs in order to allow women, at
last, into the field. She argues that this diversity and change of
mindset will also reorient the field of physics to solving real-world
problems rather than theorizing about the mathematical meaning of the
universe.
This book is certainly too long to be used for most classes. However, I think it
does lend itself well to taking excepts. In particular, I think
students would be able to understand Wertheim’s argument with just
the first and last chapters, and two to three anecdotes from the rest
of the book. Though the book was written almost 25 years ago, many of
the points are unfortunately still quite applicable. The last chapter
in particular raises many questions about the purpose of science, the
role it plays in society, and it’s relationship with religion which I
think would make excellent class discussion or writing topics.
However, one major problem with this book is that it is very
Western-centric. I understand why it is, as much of modern physics
culture is shaped by European history. Nevertheless, want to pair
this book with another text investigating the development of physics
or the sciences in non-European cultures. If I could not find such a
text, I would still consider using this text and assigning students
to research the culture and history of physics outside of Europe.
While most of this book explores the history of physics, the last chapter
delves into questions about the current culture of physics, and
changes that could be made to this culture to improve both women’s
participation in physics and the field in general. As this chapter is
more speculative, it provides excellent topics for discussion. For
one, Wertheim claims that shifting the culture of physics away from a
transcendent pursuit of mystical truths to a culture of
problem-solving would benefit society in general, as well as opening
the doors to those who do not identify with a mystical love of
abstract math. Though Wertheim builds a powerful argument that the
low numbers of women in physics are due to its long history of being
connecting to religion, it would be worthwhile for students to
investigate these claims and other possible influences. As mentioned
before, it is also important to investigate other cultural contexts,
and the lack of other perspectives in Wertheim’s book provides an
opportunity for students to investigate these contexts themselves. If
the whole book were being used in a class, more discussion options
also present themselves. One theme that regularly presents itself in
the stories of women who did manage to practice science was that the
men in their lives used their privileged positions of maleness and,
in most cases, wealth to provided these women with their
opportunities (though this help was often not without strings
attached, as the men frequently took credit for the women’s work, or
drew the line when these women had gone too far even for these men’s
comfort). This theme lends itself to the discussion of how to be a
good ally and use one’s privilege for good. Finally, it is
interesting that the author has a thinly disguised, strongly negative
view of Galileo, and I think the way she discusses him could be
interesting for students both as an unusual perspective, and also as
an example of showing one’s opinion in writing without explicitly
stating it.
Obviously, this text addresses gender inequality, but it does so by examining
the complex interaction between gender stereotypes, gender
socialization, and the hidden curriculum. Throughout history, women
were prevented from accessing certain opportunities to learn, which
fed into the stereotype that women were incapable of learning, which
in turn closed more doors to women. In instances where women did
manage to make a scientific name for themselves, they often had to
make a choice between their [frequently unpaid] scientific career or
marriage, with much social pressure toward the latter. More recently,
it has been shown that males noticeably outperform females in math by
age 17, though the sexes perform equally at age nine. Wertheim
suggests this discrepancy is due not to innate ability, but to gender
socialization: girls are implicitly taught that it is unfeminine to
be good at math and science. Arguing that much of our gender roles
today come from the ancient Greek dualistic view of male/female,
good/evil, transcendence/tangibility, Wertheim shows how girls are
taught to focus on the physical order of themselves and things around
them, while boys are free to explore their ideas. In her final
chapter, Wertheim suggests that the ways women have been socialized
into their gender roles may at least prove helpful in changing the
culture of physics, to improve the field and allow for more equitable
access.
Thanks for sharing about this book, Melanie! I found your last point about how women are socialized to be unsuccessful at math and science to be particularly jarring. Was this point surprising to you? Did this socialization have anything to do with you changing majors from astrophysics to linguistics? Have you ever been judged for being a woman in science?
I also wonder more about the connection between physics and religion. Can you help me understand the relationship? Does this relationship still exist today, say in a high school physics course?
I didn’t find it at all surprising that women are socialized to be unsuccessful at math. I absolutely felt that pressure through high school and even now. Fortunately for me, I’m fairly immune to peer pressure, and my family was pretty supportive (though I did get a lot of gendered Legos, and that still pisses me off to this day), so it didn’t impact me too much. But I definitely DID learn that it’s socially easier to downplay my intelligence, especially about math/science, which I still do. I was also fortunate in that my high school had a bizarrely upside-down social hierarchy because it was an arts magnet (drama people at the top of the pecking order, nerds in the upper-middle, football players and cheerleaders way at the bottom!), so I was not judged for being good at math or science like I might have been at other high schools. While I don’t think the negative math/science socialization was one of the main contributors to my switching majors, I think it may have exacerbated some of the other issues. For example, one the main main factors in my switching was that I bought into the idea that math/science ability is either something you have or something you don’t have, rather than something you can learn. So when I hit college and suddenly wasn’t getting the As that I was used to getting, I assumed I had just misjudged my ability. And when I looked at the curve and didn’t see myself or the 2 other women I knew in my 150-person lecture (there were more than 3 of us women in the lecture, but not a whole lot more, and all the profs and TAs were male), and assumed that men were in the A and B range (because the class was mostly men, so statistically some of them must have been in that range, though in fact most of them had to have been in the same C range as I was), that just seemed to confirm that I had misinterpreted my ability. So really it was more a lack of growth mindset, imposter syndrome, and a lack of female role models that caused me to switch, but all of these things are very intertwined, with negative socialization ultimately part of the cause of the lack of role models.
Even though I was never really judged for being into math and science, I did–and still do–get pushed into “female” activities (crafting while having touchy-feely conversations, discussing relationships and children in a wholesome place like a coffee shop) when I’d really rather be discussing “masculine” things (the meaning of life, theology, science) over beer; sometimes I fight back when this happens, and sometimes I just resign myself because it’s too much effort.
The connection with religion really surprised me at first, because on the surface it’s the complete opposite now: the culture of physics today is that physics is the only religion we need, and religion is for silly, foolish people. But as Wertheim explained it, the connection made perfect sense and I can absolutely confirm it from my own inside perspective of physics culture. For most of the history of physics (or what later became physics) until the Enlightenment, it was a purely religious pursuit, and it was mostly just priests and monks who could study physics. (Part of this was because the only universities, at first, were religious institutions specifically for training priests, which obviously meant no women whatsoever, and also meant everyone who was educated what by definition a priest.) The idea was, they wanted to prove the universe followed various (mostly Greek) ideals of perfection in order to prove that there must be a divine presence behind it all. After the Enlightenment, physics split from religion, but still retained its religiosity–physicists still talk about a Grand Unifying Theory that would unite all the forces and, basically, sum up the universe in a single equation. When physicists talk about this as yet hypothetical equation they talk about “reading the mind of God”. So even though the culture of physics is very anti-religious today, it’s also, at the same time, very religious.
I’m glad to see you have read something that is right up your alley Melanie!
Well, the influence of religion on early scholarly work is something we are all familiar with through grammar translation method, right? GTM existed because that was what scholarly work was all about, reading and translating. I think you’ll also like this post of mine, Melanie, https://teachforsocialjustice.middcreate.net/race-resource/why-the-alt-right-loves-ancient-rome/
Also, I will share it soon but this is published only today: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/boys-and-girls-have-an-equal-aptitude-for-math-so-why-are-there-are-so-few-women-in-higher-paying-stem-jobs-2019-11-12
Nooooooo, I was going to post that article about girls having the same aptitude as boys!! (but from NPR: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/11/08/777187543/math-looks-the-same-in-the-brains-of-boys-and-girls-study-finds)
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