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Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

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Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#621

Post by dbnoch »

reader5000 wrote: post #604
rayiner wrote: post #522

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just the history of computer science. Damore's essay was based on time-tested pseudo-scientific reasoning, the sort that has been invoked to exclude women in many different fields. When law firms offered Sandra Day O'Connor a secretarial job after she graduated third in her class at Stanford, do you think they said "we just don't like women?" Of course not. They couched their bias in appeals to the differenc…

There are more male programmers than female. Please explain how invoking genetic differences explanations is pseudo scientific, whereas invoking systematic discrimination explanations is not pseudo-scientific. Consider: There are more male rapists than female rapists. Is this because female rapists are systematically discriminated against? Does our society shamefully teach children that raping is only for boys? Or ar…

I wont answer the Consider* part of what you said because it's a straw man argument and should be treated as such.

There are more male programmers than female NOW* but that wasn't the case 50 years ago.

Systematic discrimination has been proven as fact, with palpable examples (I shouldnt have to google this for you).

The 'genetic differences' that this memo quoted have been proven wrong by science... making it psuedo-science.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#622

Post by ThomPete »

bobdole1234 wrote: post #619
ThomPete wrote: post #444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is it you don't get? He is referencing the people who claim there is no biological differences and that almost everything is social constructs. If you want to understand what he is talking about here is an example https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/06/16/how-fluid-i...

He's referring to a group that is selected based on their intelligence. In that case, it doesn't really matter what the distribution of the larger population is, because you're only talking about a group that is selected for their favorable attributes. For someone to say that people who are already in a career, that is, already selected for their ability, are less suited because of their sex is kind of absurd.

No he is referring to the claims by the left who claim that there is little biological difference and mostly social constructional. Read the whole thing and the whole sentence.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#623

Post by dmoy »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #471
dmoy wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not clear why this is being down voted, this was drilled pretty hard into my head the first time I had a job that relied on stats.

I am reasonably mathy and I don't understand the statement. That plus the topic -- sexism in tech generally, especially Damore -- makes me think the motivation for down voting it is probably "political." ie it sounds like it could be supporting Damore's position, much of the world has decided he is an evil sexist pig etc.

I was reasonably mathy too, but stats was pretty different and I only took a couple semesters of it. It wasn't until I was forced to interact with it in a job setting that the inverse relationship between type I & II errors became really apparent to me. Any time I would crank up settings to reduce type I error, keeping all other things the same, type II error would invariably creep up... and v. versa

Then when looking in to it, I saw a lot of the examples given from the medical industry as GP alludes to, where this is a real big problem (e.g. if your test is 99.999% accurate, but has a 0.001% false positive rate, then if your disease actually only affects 1/1000000 people then the overwhelming majority of people who your test select are actually healthy).

And then I went back and actually read the relevant sections on the stats textbooks for my courses and learned that

(a) it was actually in there, and (b) evidently my stats courses were way, way too easy to pass

As for the reply, I think I figured out why it was downvoted. It was a double-post, and the intended GGP was here:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16398560

Where it makes much more sense.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#624

Post by gaius »

fjsolwmv wrote: post #607
cma wrote: post #565

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He says: >that these differences may [emphasis added] explain why we don’t see equal representation of women in tech and leadership And he says one of the differences is a higher drive for status. That is one way it could change without the 80's thing being counter-evidence, if the status of practitioners and/or leadership in the field changed for some reason (maybe Bill Gates becoming the richest man in the world).…

This is well researched in the feminist sociology literature. When a "women's job" (like teaching or nursing) becomes more respected, pay goes up, and... The industry gets an influx of men working in it.

pay goes up, and... The industry gets an influx of men working in it.

But isn’t the opposite true as well? I mean, it wasn't that long ago that the IT department was at the bottom of the organisational pecking order, sometimes literally at the bottom in a dingy, windowless basement, and jokes about nerds and geeks and personal hygiene and poor fashion choices and so on were totally mainstream and acceptable. In those days, no-one said it was problematic that these losers and social lepers tended to skew male.

Obviously, everyone should be free to do any work that they want to and show an aptitude for. But you posit a one-way traffic that just isn't true.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#625

Post by tekproxy »

reader5000 wrote: post #604
rayiner wrote: post #522

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just the history of computer science. Damore's essay was based on time-tested pseudo-scientific reasoning, the sort that has been invoked to exclude women in many different fields. When law firms offered Sandra Day O'Connor a secretarial job after she graduated third in her class at Stanford, do you think they said "we just don't like women?" Of course not. They couched their bias in appeals to the differenc…

There are more male programmers than female. Please explain how invoking genetic differences explanations is pseudo scientific, whereas invoking systematic discrimination explanations is not pseudo-scientific. Consider: There are more male rapists than female rapists. Is this because female rapists are systematically discriminated against? Does our society shamefully teach children that raping is only for boys? Or ar…

Bro, I'm going to have to give you a citation for wrongthink. Take your logic and rationality elsewhere, we're busy feeling things.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#626

Post by dbnoch »

PricelessValue wrote: post #614
jakelazaroff wrote: post #596

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that Breitbart, Stephen Molynieux, etc, all basically support the least charitable interpretation of the memo (that women are genetically less predisposed to engineering), his active association with them makes the claim that the memo was a good-faith attempt to improve diversity rather hard to swallow. Examples: http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2017/08/14/haidt-google-memo-c... http://www.breitbart.com/big-govern…

> Given that Breitbart, Stephen Molynieux, etc, all basically support the least charitable interpretation of the memo (that women are genetically less predisposed to engineering) So? Are you saying you disagree? Then state your case. > his active association with them makes the claim that the memo was a good-faith attempt to improve diversity rather hard to swallow. Why does it make it hard to swallow? What does damo…

> What does damore stating a fact that women being more predisposed to more social careers rather than engineering have anything to do with his stance on diversity?

This memo only helps this narrative of 'being predisposed' and that is the issue we are trying to get at.

From your last article: "Ladies, apparently, find the aggressively competitive nature of these subjects too “uninviting,” so they drop out." So many assumptions in those articles that I had to stop reading. Please look up logical fallacies.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#627

Post by scrollaway »

ThomPete wrote: post #545
thesmallestcat wrote: post #534

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You shouldn't have replied. You and the other guy are both out of your gourds, and you don't understand how crazy you look.

I look crazy for saying he didn't learn to read when he claimed I love the alt-right based on that post I wrote? Maybe I shouldn't have replied but he was basically trying to start a mob against me. Not that I care but just wanted for the record that his claim was wrong and didn't want to engage in any civil manor when not spoken to that way either.

You failed to achieve your goals and just made things worse by replying. Block and move on.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#628

Post by ianal123 »

throwestawayer wrote: post #513

Real question: having seen that many good engineers are hesitant to work at a company with very limited diversity, we have endeavored to increase diversity by hiring qualified junior engineers from less represented groups. Is this acceptable? These are completely qualified folks, for the job of junior engineer. We purposely, from the category of all qualified junior applicants, hired those that also were from less re…

> We purposely, from the category of all qualified junior applicants, hired those that also were from less represented groups.

IANAL, but from my understanding making hiring decisions based on race, gender or religion is a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. But I really don't know what I am talking about and would be interested in hearing a lawyer's opinion.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#629

Post by [deleted] »

rayiner wrote: post #522
fzeroracer wrote: post #468

The problem with Damore's theory he posited (that the difference in traits and abilities between men and women is why you see a certain imbalance in tech) ignores the history of computer science, where in the early days of CS you had a large amount of women entering into software followed by a sharp dropoff in the 80s [1]. The 'biological differences' argument falls flat because it implies that somehow women changed…

It's not just the history of computer science. Damore's essay was based on time-tested pseudo-scientific reasoning, the sort that has been invoked to exclude women in many different fields. When law firms offered Sandra Day O'Connor a secretarial job after she graduated third in her class at Stanford, do you think they said "we just don't like women?" Of course not. They couched their bias in appeals to the differenc…

[deleted]

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#630

Post by DoreenMichele »

ThomPete wrote: post #545
thesmallestcat wrote: post #534

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You shouldn't have replied. You and the other guy are both out of your gourds, and you don't understand how crazy you look.

I look crazy for saying he didn't learn to read when he claimed I love the alt-right based on that post I wrote? Maybe I shouldn't have replied but he was basically trying to start a mob against me. Not that I care but just wanted for the record that his claim was wrong and didn't want to engage in any civil manor when not spoken to that way either.

Your reply is a case of putting out the fire with gasoline. When you know nothing else to do, but you are absolutely sure this will make things vastly worse, standing idly by and watching the fire burn is the least worst thing you can do.

Granted, it's a horrible experience.

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