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Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

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Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#361

Post by 99mistakes »

GVIrish wrote: post #266
dx034 wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He was fired because he basically said women are underrepresented in IT because they are biologically unsuited for it. I don't understand why people keep repeating that statement. He said that biological differences explain the different ratios of men and women, NOT that women are not suited for tech jobs. He explicitely did not say (nor mean) that a woman can't be a good software engineer. Just that on average, mo…

> I don't understand why people keep repeating that statement. He said that biological differences explain the different ratios of men and women, NOT that women are not suited for tech jobs. He explicitely did not say (nor mean) that a woman can't be a good software engineer. Just that on average, more men than women will show the features needed for software engineers. The problem is that his whole argument is based…

You're such an idiot that it's astounding. Neuroticism is the technical term in psychology. Women score higher in the neuroticism trait, end of story. Study up or shut up.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#362

Post by js8 »

timgrahamtech wrote: post #310
js8 wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Anyone who publishes an incoherent 10 page manifesto insulting their coworkers and trashing their company's policies can reasonably expect to get fired. It doesn't matter if any of the bosses agree or disagree with the opinions expressed; it's just an unprofessional thing to do." I agree completely. Just like these guys: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charter_77 Very unprofessional!

Ale mluvim cesky a to znam dobre. You're actually going to compare Google's hiring policies to the oppression of a eastern bloc state? Do prdel.

Yes, because it is the same argument.

The GP didn't talk about about hiring policies, he talked about institutional criticism. The subject of the criticism is irrelevant.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#363

Post by alexknvl »

timgrahamtech wrote: post #295
Aeolun wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Publishing something on an internal board that's aimed at discussing diversity is hardly 'publishing the rant for all the world to see'. I just don't get how people who're obviously upset about this memo and must therefore have spent some time reading up about it (right? Right?!) still get this basic fact wrong. This guy expressed his opinions, and a witch hunting mob, because that's what it was, descended on him fro…

Let's not pretend he didn't know what he was doing. There are textbook examples about people who blast off a rant to the entire company and then are somehow surprised when it becomes public ( http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/1... ).

It wasn't even meant for the entire company. He gave it to a small community of people within Google who later distributed it across the company AFAIU from his interview with Jordan Peterson (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEDuVF7kiPU).

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#364

Post by Chris2048 »

kogepathic wrote: post #233
toyg wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Twitter seems to be a poor vehicle for nuanced debate at the best of time Understatement of the century. How on earth can you expect to have "nuanced debate" with only 140 characters?

> How on earth can you expect to have "nuanced debate" with only 140 characters? Oh come now, it seems to work fine for Trump! /s

Sad!

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#365

Post by xapata »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #297
GVIrish wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't understand why people keep repeating that statement. He said that biological differences explain the different ratios of men and women, NOT that women are not suited for tech jobs. He explicitely did not say (nor mean) that a woman can't be a good software engineer. Just that on average, more men than women will show the features needed for software engineers. The problem is that his whole argument is based…

> He even stated 'Neuroticism' as a trait women are predisposed to, which could've been pulled right out of an argument for why women shouldn't be allowed to vote. Did you read this article? Or references linked by the original memo? Even this article clearly points out that "neuroticism" thing is pretty much established, accepted, and uncontroversial science.

No, I don't think it is. Not even the definition of neuroticism is uncontroversial.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#366

Post by TeMPOraL »

Lukasa wrote: post #315
averagewall wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If a coworker of mine started publicly saying that I'm not genetically qualified for the work I do Why are you changing the meaning of what he wrote? He didn't say that at all. He was very clear that he was talking about the group not any individuals. If you choose to misunderstand what someone said, when they did a good job of explaining it clearly, then I think you shouldn't spread that misunderstanding around in…

> He was very clear that he was talking about the group not any individuals. Since when does that excuse anything? If he'd written "Jews are, in general, hateful monsters. Not the Jews who work here, they're great, but most of the rest" does that statement become acceptable? More importantly , Mr Damore does not know all the women at Google personally. He cannot. So when he says "In general, women are less suited to/…

> he cannot possibly implicitly mean "but clearly that does not apply to every woman currently employed at Google, who were all hired because they are the best in the world at their jobs"

He clearly can, were it not for affirmative actions - if you assume perfect recruitment based on merit, you can expect everyone accepted to be suitable for the role. But in this case you'll also find, as the memo author explained quite sensibly, that the gender ratio might not be 1:1 due to distribution of interest in the population, which affects the distribution of the candidate pool.

I mean, come on, this is a pretty obvious point - and I'm starting to believe that it takes intent to misread it like you did.

> Damore asserts that Google practices discriminatory hiring practices.

Yes, that's the definition of affirmative action. It's literally discriminating in order to counter perceived discrimination in the opposite direction.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#367

Post by rtx »

GVIrish wrote: post #223
steveeq1 wrote: post #26

> That leaked internal memo from James Damore at Google? The one that says one shouldn’t expect employees in all professions to reflect the demographics of the whole population? I don't see how this is an unreasonable argument to make. There is a dearth of male kindergarten teachers, for instance. This doesn't mean the school is being "sexist". It might just mean that certain genders tend to be attracted to certain t…

> I don't see how this is an unreasonable argument to make. There is a dearth of male kindergarten teachers, for instance. This doesn't mean the school is being "sexist". It might just mean that certain genders tend to be attracted to certain types of professions. If that's all the manifesto said, this wouldn't be a story. I am a minority in tech and I certainly didn't see a lot of people like me in my Computer Scien…

Was he making a statement or trying to find an answer?

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#368

Post by mpweiher »

kromem wrote: post #345

An interesting anecdote regarding gender bias and tech. In the very early stage of my company, we wanted to outsource some UX work. After an exhausting review of applicants on one of the freelance sites out there, we finally settled on a Pakistani woman who had the best balance of portfolio vs cost. At the initial Skype call, there was no video. And it turned out to be a guy speaking in a very high voice. We didn't r…

That experiment was done in STEM academia recently, and showed a 2:1 hiring advantage for women.

http://www.pnas.org/content/112/17/5360.abstract

It should also be noted that the earlier study, which showed a smaller effect and only if the resumes were calibrated to be (a) mediocre and (b) precisely calibrated to be the same, was done in Psychology. Which is, of course, a field dominated by women and maybe not the typical "STEM" that we think about when we talk about the underrepresentation of women in tech.

Those two findings in turn gel with a recent French study that showed bias in grading in favor of the underrepresented gender in a particular field (though the bias was stronger in favor of women than in favor of men).

http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/46681/...

And of course there was the recent trial (not an experiment AFAICT) in Australia to reduce gender bias:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-06-30/bilnd-recruitment-tria...

"The trial found assigning a male name to a candidate made them 3.2 per cent less likely to get a job interview. Adding a woman's name to a CV made the candidate 2.9 per cent more likely to get a foot in the door."

UPDATE: I was looking for one more thing, and finally found it. Despite the fact that the study showing bias against women is much weaker, it has been cited several times more often than the study showing bias for women (table near the bottom). https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/rabble-rouser/201707/wh...

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#369

Post by PeterisP »

Lukasa wrote: post #352
bluecalm wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I say: black people are more suited to be NBA players. This is obvious looking at black players % in the league in comparison to the total population as well as the fact that black people are poorer on average and get less opportunities (or even chances for proper nutrition, let alone training). Should white NBA players be offended by that statement? The answer is obvious: they shouldn't as that only means they were…

> Should white NBA players be offended by that statement? The answer is obvious: they shouldn't as that only means they were the ones on the tail of the genetic distribution and made it anyway or maybe even they overcome disadvantages to get there. I don't know: I'm not an NBA player and have no idea what the experience of becoming one is like. But there is a difference in kind here. He didn't say "Men are better sui…

Have you read the memo? By saying "stop saying that women are worse at coding" you are putting words in his mouth, as the memo states a very, very different thing i.e. that women are less likely to choose coding for various reasons, including biological ones. There's a world of difference between these two arguments.

And there is solid evidence for that difference, and it should be brought up, and asking to stop the discussion is, frankly, ridiculous - we can all see that there is an important open problem with different viewpoints and thus it should be discussed, and expressing all kinds of possible viewpoints should be facilitated.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#370

Post by TeMPOraL »

int_19h wrote: post #248
timgrahamtech wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then the goal is making him understand that he got fired for how he expressed those opinions. He didn't just talk to HR or his manager, he published a rant for all the world to see making it the CEO's problem. Anyone who publishes an incoherent 10 page manifesto insulting their coworkers and trashing their company's policies can reasonably expect to get fired. It doesn't matter if any of the bosses agree or disagree…

In one of the previous discussions, it was said that it was published in an internal social network, in a group that was specifically dedicated to diversity hiring at Google. Is that incorrect?

Moreover, as it was uncovered in previous discussions, it was a response to Google soliticing opinion of employees about their diversity programs.
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