Isn't that the precise question that science is trying to answer, but which is being disputed by people who do not like the answers?
> Humans are highly social creatures and children show signs of learning socially very early so it requires a great deal of care to distinguish between a correlation and the underlying cause
Sure. And you'd also have to distinguish things like hormones... would those be categorized as "nature" or "nurture"? If you categorize them as "nurture" then it would give more credence to the blank-slate hypothesis, since there are definite, measurable changes to physique and behavior from having a higher blood testosterone level, for example.
> The problem is that the latter part is really hard to actually deliver: historically that meant that girls were actively discouraged or prevented from being interested in things which are identified as male
This is sort of a "they can't handle the truth" argument, or perhaps a "guilty until proven innocent" argument, which I don't like. But it is an argument. I guess... It's also an appeal to tradition fallacy- it's quite possible that times have changed and that, more generally, everyone is supported in whatever interests them, way more than it was in "those times", regardless of any emerging scientific info about correlations to gender.
> but even without overt prevention social pressure is a real problem
So is the Petrie multiplier: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petrie_multiplier
We should then teach young people not to care about conformity, then. I didn't... My Pascal class in high school (this dates me... this was the late 80's) had 1 woman and myself, and she was awesome. (She's a doctor now.)
> Maybe at some point they give up after being asked again why they're doing something associated with the other gender, which is tiring even if it's not intended to be mean
As a guy I often meet other guys, and the usual guy thing is to talk about sports, which I have pretty much zero interest in. When I was younger, they would give me shit about it (oh jesus, having flashbacks to bad trading of baseball cards, etc.), but as an adult, guys sense when that's not your thing and move onto other topics. I don't think we'll ever completely escape the "jerky kid" element to social pressure, perhaps because part of what it means to be human seems to be to learn how not to be an asshole. :)
> and the only thing which seems to work is actively correcting against them so that every kid has as wide a range of opportunities open to them
Well that's the catch- what is the best way to "actively correct against them"? Some might say "enforcement" (quotas, etc.) but I don't think that's fair, my way would be "teach people not to care one bit what others think about their interests because they are YOUR interests."
Science does investigate all sorts of questions and there isn’t exactly a movement to shutdown neuroscience and psychology research. What there is a reaction to are people claiming to know the answer to these big field-defining questions, which conveniently says that their politics are the only right position, and otherwise claiming the mantle of science while acting contrary to how actual science is supposed to work. Sometimes that includes criticism of scientific figures but that’s when they aren’t doing good science: nobody would question that James Watson is a real scientist but the criticism he gets today isn’t for asking unpopular questions but for falling so short of the standard. Had he wanted to do real research into intelligence and genetics he’d have had no shortage of resources and collaborators but he wouldn’t have the big dramatic claims, just more slow progress chipping away at one of the hardest problems in the world.
If science is still trying to find the answers, then the people who claim to know what the science proves merely have an agenda.
And it's the agenda that people don't like, the attempt to write all differences between gender, particularly in terms of social and business roles, off as genetics.
Where does that raw interest come from? Humans are highly social creatures and children show signs of learning socially very early so it requires a great deal of care to distinguish between a correlation and the underlying cause. If something is social behaviour, that means that we can also question whether it's worth continuing.
> What if it turned out that the "urge to take things apart and learn how they worked", at some very low level, was more of a male thing? Why would that be so bad? That doesn't mean that equivalently-interested women need be held back in any way/shape/form (because, duh, they shouldn't!)
The problem is that the latter part is really hard to actually deliver: historically that meant that girls were actively discouraged or prevented from being interested in things which are identified as male but even without overt prevention social pressure is a real problem — maybe nobody tells someone directly “you can't do this” but if the image of programming is “you'd be the only girl” or the widespread “only nerdy boys like this” trope that's going to have an impact, and one which will probably start well before anyone is, say, picking a major in college. It doesn't even need to be conscious — maybe nobody actually thinks negatively but they just assumed that, say, a bright high school student would be more interested in biology than math or CS and never really even suggested the latter. Maybe at some point they give up after being asked again why they're doing something associated with the other gender, which is tiring even if it's not intended to be mean.
Those social factors are all around us and the only thing which seems to work is actively correcting against them so that every kid has as wide a range of opportunities open to them.