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Over 1,600 scientists have signed a statement condemning Alessandro Strumia, an Italian physicist and professor of physics at the University of Pisa, who gave a talk in which he claimed that he "proved" women were less capable physicists than men, the BBC reported.
Strumia spoke at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, during a workshop specifically aimed to help women in physics. CERN has since suspended Strumia’s participation at the lab, and the University of Pisa is considering a disciplinary review of his actions.
“In this talk,” the statement read, “he argued that the primary explanation for the discrepancies between men and women in theoretical physics is that women are inherently less capable.”
The statement continues to counter the arguments that Strumia made in his talk and highlight some of the scientific errors that he made.
“The science case presented by Strumia was fundamentally unsound. It is clear to all of us that Strumia is not an expert on these topics and is misusing his physics credentials to put himself forward as one,” the statement read. “Furthermore, those among us who are familiar with the relevant literature know that Strumia’s conclusions are in stark disagreement with those of experts. He frequently made the basic error of conflating correlation with causation, and while Strumia claimed to be proving that there is no discrimination against women, his arguments were rooted in a circumscribed, biased reading of the data available, to the point of promoting a perspective that is biased against women.”
In response, Strumia told the BBC that most of the signatories were from “politically correct” countries, which he cites as part of the problem. He also argued that the physics community was 100 times larger than the group that signed the statement.
