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Sundar Pichai Should Resign as Google’s C.E.O

nytimes.com

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Re: Sundar Pichai Should Resign as Google’s C.E.O

#281

Post by mwytock »

ebola1717 wrote: post #274
mwytock wrote: post #135

A lot of people on "our side" did a bad job of simply refuting the argument presented. Its straightforward to do in one sentence: "While there may be scientific evidence of differences between men and women, using these differences to conclude that women are biologically less inclined to engineering is a gross leap in reasoning that is not at all supported by the facts." Then you can go on and explain why for histori…

I think people have done a very good job of saying that. They just get drowned out by outrage from the right, and overly clipped soundbites from both sides. My twitter feed has tons of very thoughtful pieces responding to the memo. They just never breach the front page of Hacker News.

Maybe. I don't think Sundar Pichai or Danielle Brown did though, they just said "this is not OK" and "code of conduct". Perhaps they felt they didn't need to engage with this kind of argument, but that mentality is exactly what has a lot of people upset.

Re: Sundar Pichai Should Resign as Google’s C.E.O

#282

Post by peoplewindow »

malandrew wrote: post #270
peoplewindow wrote: post #77

I am minded to agree. And that's a shame, because Pichai has done good things for Chrome and Android when he was leading those. The article doesn't really touch on Pichai's biggest mistakes here. Mistake one: Damore's memo alleged discrimination, both against men and conservatives. Gender and political affiliation are both protected classes in California and they just fired him for whistleblowing. He has now filed a…

Do you have a reference for the shareholder's question? I had not heard that before and would like to read more.

I was repeating a claim I saw on HN earlier and went looking for references. It turns out the person who asked the question wrote a whole article about it:

http://www.investors.com/politics/commentary/i-confronted-go...

At the meeting, I asked Alphabet Chairman Eric Schmidt about the company's actual commitment to diversity and inclusion in light of the company's public policy positions, not to mention the views of top management, that all skew to the extreme political left. I noted conservatives may not feel welcome in such an environment, let alone feel free to express their beliefs. Schmidt and other company executives dismissed my entire question by claiming everyone at the company — and in the tech industry as a whole — was in agreement with them.

After that confrontation, a strange thing happened. I started receiving messages from Google employees thanking me for challenging Alphabet's leadership. Without realizing it, I was apparently speaking for a closeted segment of Google employees with conservative beliefs.

One email read, "I'm working with a few other Googlers to fix the company's political discrimination problem. Really appreciate you shining a light on the matter."

Another said she was working closely with a group of conservatives at Google, and noted, "(t)hey're all very appreciative that you were standing up for their interests at the shareholder's (sic) meeting. The shareholder resolution your organization filed also made a lot of people happy."

Re: Sundar Pichai Should Resign as Google’s C.E.O

#283

Post by frgtpsswrdlame »

where_do_i_live wrote: post #229
frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And he basically confirmed it by doing his first interview with Stefan Molyneux.

The memo appears to be based on actual real science that seems to be the consensus. However, the author appears to be completely tone deaf and extremely socially awkward - he has very poor communication skills. And lacking the understanding that there is a current culture war going on - to allow himself to be taken as a champion of some of those groups seems to show he is oblivious to the greater social/political dis…

>The memo appears to be based on actual real science that seems to be the consensus.

No. See this wired article, his view is not consensus. I do agree that it was pretty poorly made though!

Professor Gina Rippon, Emeritus Professor of Cognitive Neuroimaging at Aston University in Birmingham, said it was surprising how much of the research Damore misinterpreted or got wrong. She added that sex differences backed-up by proper research scrutiny were so tiny they couldn't explain the kind of gender imbalance at Google.

"They're assuming a divide that doesn't really exist," Rippon said. "Either its biological or its social and if its biological you can't change it so Google shouldn't be wasting its time with all these high minded equal opportunity initiatives.

"But the key thing is it can be changed – we know that if women have poor spatial skills, which has been demonstrated in the past, then its easy enough to change that by appropriate training – very often its associated with video game experience for example. He seems to be saying there are fixed differences and we're wasting our time trying to gain equality," Rippon said.

http://www.wired.co.uk/article/google-fires-engineer-over-an...

Re: Sundar Pichai Should Resign as Google’s C.E.O

#284

Post by where_do_i_live »

taysic wrote: post #233
where_do_i_live wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You overgeneralize and mischaracterize the memo with your claims, which leads me to suspect you never read it. >Do you realize how subjective this is and how impossible it is to prove that today there are no other influences at play than biology He never claims there are no other influences at play - From the memo; note the works "in part" and "may explain" - Note, I’m not saying that all men differ from all women in…

One of his main points in the memo is at the top:"Differences in distributions of traits between men and women may in part explain why we don’t have 50% representation of women in tech and leadership. " What am I missing? This is the topic he explores the most in his memo and I don't see anything analyzing social effects. While his paper is nuanced, he basically only focuses on the biological argument and seeks to ch…

I'm not sure what your counter argument is exactly.

He argued to change their diversity goals and implementation, with an intention to do a better job of getting a _more_ not less diverse company, including more woman and minorities. He did not argue to end all diversity goals outright, again that appears to be a mischaracterization.

Re: Sundar Pichai Should Resign as Google’s C.E.O

#285

Post by imh »

KirinDave wrote: post #184
endorphone wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are women working at Google who do not need to be reminded of the genetic and biologic differences they have from their cishet male counterparts. I'm a white male. I know that the average Asian has a higher IQ than the average white man. This means positively nothing when comparing me with a given Asian, however. That is the root of this discussion that so many so profoundly miss. The average Google male is not…

> He was not saying that women who work at Google are at a biological disadvantage, in any way, and that is a perverse misreading. Quite frankly: many people do. Some of them are at Google. James chose to run headlong into this discussion without any practical knowledge of the discourse. His point was poorly delivered precisely because it leaves open such radical room for misrepresenting it. Discussions of social iss…

>No one owes James a charitable reading.

A charitable reading isn't something that's owed. It's something that almost universally helps discourse. Communication is hard.

We're always willing to give Us a charitable reading, and it's a damned shame people are so unwilling to afford that to Them, regardless which side of anything you're on.

Re: Sundar Pichai Should Resign as Google’s C.E.O

#287

Post by citrusx »

mc32 wrote: post #204
agentultra wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> By firing him they made him a hero to enormous groups, To a small, vocal group. > By doing it in an anti-science, anti-evidence way There were good reasons for doing it that had nothing to do with science or evidence. There are women working at Google who do not need to be reminded of the genetic and biologic differences they have from their cishet male counterparts. If Damon had issues with the policies at Google…

One could say the people wanting the ex a employee fired were also a small vocal group. I really doubt more than 10% of Googlers felt personally threatened affronted by someone having a different view on advancing women in tech.

So, only about 7800 people is all?

Re: Sundar Pichai Should Resign as Google’s C.E.O

#288

Post by humanrebar »

frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #98
humanrebar wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> His firing makes sense: the CEO and HR are both acting to protect the company. No. His firing confirmed part of Demore's thesis; that Google has monoculture issues and sits in some sort of bubble. > This is the reality of business. Is it? If that's true, we need to be much more aggressive about corporate consolidation because the only way to make room for diversity of opinion is to make sure that there's diversity…

Just to clarify, you're saying this incident is illustrating that corporations have too much power?

> ...is illustrating that corporations have too much power?

Compared to employees and consumers? Yes. There aren't enough options out there to let competition correct for these kinds of cultural problems.

Of course, this might be a problem that solves itself. As expectations for fair compensation trickles through the rest of the job market, maybe transferring to an equivalent job in a medium sized company in Denver would generally be a lateral move.

Re: Sundar Pichai Should Resign as Google’s C.E.O

#290

Post by LunaSea »

mwytock wrote: post #264
chongli wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm saying that the scientific research agrees with the point of the memo. Whether or not I agree is irrelevant to the facts.

I see. Well I'm saying it does not. Obviously we disagree about what the scientific research says.

Could you link to these research papers you are mentioning?
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