Writing on Nautilus, Monica Zoppè of the Institute of Clinical Physiology in Pisa, Italy, proposes a “female road of science”.
Funding agencies distribute money on the basis of competition — an attitude, writes Zoppè, typical of males. Women, she adds, “are more inclined to collaboration… and if forced to compete do so reluctantly”. The best way to grant women their share of funding (50%), she says, would be to have one channel for men, “in which male scientists set the rules and judge applications; and one for women, managed by and dedicated to female scientists”.
In the online discussion, in which we invite you to participate (at the URL above or in a comment to this post), Bill Hooker writes: “I would be sorry to be trapped by my Y chromosome in the other, competitive, track — but I would not oppose the new system in the slightest. Since my hypothesis is that greater emphasis on cooperation over competition would vastly improve the infrastructure of science, such a system as Dr Zoppè proposes can only benefit me as a test of that hypothesis.”

Nature 448, xiii; 2 August 2007