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The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

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Re: The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

#291

Post by clavalle »

iotb wrote: post #151
52-6F-62 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally never called it out for sexism. I called it out for regressive-thinking as a solution based on plain fact. I can only be brief right now, but it's starting to get to me how so many people in an innovative sphere seem to have such a hard time with this. To me, it seems like it shouldn't be a second thought. If the main argument is that women do not [by nature of our scientific understanding] have minds tu…

Please define what's Regressive about plain facts... > it's starting to get to me how so many people in an innovative sphere seem to have such a hard time with this The prevailing (cultural) attitude is clearly against plain facts. The question should be why the prevailing attitude is against facts and real solutions but embraces lies and bad solutions. That is what is getting to intelligent people no matter their sp…

>Please define what's Regressive about plain facts...

I think they are saying that descriptive scientific observations have limited utility as prescriptive devices if we are to make progress because descriptions are based on how things have been rather than how things could be (or even could have been).

Especially in soft sciences, the /cause/ of what is described can be hard to reliably tease out. To assume the same cause is an unchangeable aspect of the human condition and that cause, even if true, will only ever lead to one end-state is often a mistake.

Re: The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

#292

Post by foolrush »

highfiveui wrote: post #283
foolrush wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You realize that science is ideological, epistemological, and political? Edit: I appreciate all of the vote downs. Empiricism is as guilty in choosing models according to power dynamics as any ideological endeavor. See phrenology. To suggest science isn't political and ideological is absolutely delusional.

Is science not about finding the truth above all else?

The search for truth is fundamentally epistemological. There is a fascinating dive into just what science is, when it began, etc.

One might disagree with his language, but this post is remarkably insightful to begin such a dive:

http://fucktheory.tumblr.com/post/57633497486/in-which-steve...

Re: The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

#293

Post by blahblah3 »

Seems like a lot of the controversy around these types of discussions comes from the consequences of bayesian inference.

If you know that men and women differ in a distributional sense with respect to some trait, that gives you a prior to work off-of when you meet a new individual. This is rational from bayes theorem, so simply saying "you should treat everyone as an individual" is not nuanced enough.

However, as you acquire more information about a particular individual (such as passing a difficult google interview, or knowing that they've succeeded in a reputable CS curriculum), this should quickly "swamp" the prior, causing it to contribute very little to the final inference.

The problem is the humans are not great at adjusting like this: we're not perfect at applying bayes theorem in our heads. We tend to overstate the influence of various priors when there are stronger signals at hand. Nevertheless, incorporating prior distributional information is NOT irrational, but generally overdone.

Therefore, it seems like the approach of some is to shout down information that would suggest biological distributional differences, to try guarantee that people don't overuse prior information.

Re: The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

#294

Post by rexicus »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #255
Ajedi32 wrote: post #20

Not much new here. This article is essentially just re-affirming all the scientific statements that were already made in the original memo, backed by links to scientific studies. Only difference being that the author of this article has a PhD in sexual neuroscience (so people might have a harder time accusing her of not knowing what she's talking about) and is female (so some people might have a harder time of accusi…

The problem with scientific studies is that they're great at describing a population, but generally have very little predictive power at the individual level. For example, one of the studies that showed boys were better than girls at math showed that if you chose a random boy and a random girl, there was a 55% chance that the boy was better at math. Not very much different from flipping a coin at an individual level,…

Read the memo, James made this distinction numerous times.

Re: The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

#295

Post by rwcarlsen »

zzalpha wrote: post #278
Ajedi32 wrote: post #20

Not much new here. This article is essentially just re-affirming all the scientific statements that were already made in the original memo, backed by links to scientific studies. Only difference being that the author of this article has a PhD in sexual neuroscience (so people might have a harder time accusing her of not knowing what she's talking about) and is female (so some people might have a harder time of accusi…

I'm just gonna copy another comment I made elsewhere: The problem is that the gender differences cited cannot, in aggregate, explain the 70/30 bias toward men in the industry. There's a real similarity to the global warming debate, here. There are many factors that affect global mean temperature. For example, over the very long term, the sun will get brighter. But that can only account for an astonishingly tiny fract…

I don't think he has a gross misunderstanding of the science. If you look at the example cartoon distributions he draws for gender differences - there is huge overlap. From my reading, he is advocating for non-discriminatory methods of trying to fix that gap. He's basically saying we shouldn't try to fix discrimination (that we think is bad) with discrimination (that we excuse as good).

Re: The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

#296

Post by omikun »

jorgemf wrote: post #203
52-6F-62 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally never called it out for sexism. I called it out for regressive-thinking as a solution based on plain fact. I can only be brief right now, but it's starting to get to me how so many people in an innovative sphere seem to have such a hard time with this. To me, it seems like it shouldn't be a second thought. If the main argument is that women do not [by nature of our scientific understanding] have minds tu…

> If the main argument is that women do not [by nature of our scientific understanding] have minds tuned to engineering prowess to the extent that men do for whatever cause, then just how does that itself prescribe that we should stop pushing for an expansion there? You are wrong in this assumption. I am going to try to explain it. We have group A and group B with different genetics. We measure everybody in the group…

You are missing the trees for the forest. Your argument is on individual skills in a distribution within a gender. Have you considered how gender distribution within a team may affect productivity? This is the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Even if we hire more of group B and we end up with a lower average of a particular skill in the team, if productivity goes up as a result, then it is still a good hiring practice.

The memo, and your argument, is all about summing the parts instead of measuring the whole.

Re: The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

#297

Post by and0 »

mistermann wrote: post #190
and0 wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

W.. what? Literally your post. I'd have to quote the whole thing. "many people's first instinct". It wasn't many people's first instinct. Again, I read the article, many others read the article and wrote detailed responses. It's not my job to point these out. Someone making a stupid argument does not obligate anyone to engage or correct them. A massive popular backlash against a shitty idea isn't "trying to shut it d…

> A massive popular backlash against a shitty idea isn't "trying to shut it down". If the backlash is devoid of logic and facts, consisting mainly of character attacks and shaming....ya, that's "shutting it down". And if that's not enough, how about being fired from your job? It's amazing how differently people perceive the very same facts.

The backlash is not devoid of logic and facts. Again, a shitty argument does not merit a thesis on it's shittyness from everyone who dismisses it, and there are plenty of in-depth critiques that you would've sought out if your agenda was to actually look into it and better yourself.

Also, Google firing him did not shut the argument down. He can happily draft more memos or expand on it. Google Docs is free.

Re: The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

#298

Post by brighteyes »

foolrush wrote: post #275
brighteyes wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are reasonable arguments on both sides, which rational people can debate. That's the bigger point here. Not that there is a slam dunk argument on the side of biology or society, but that we don't know where the exact truth lies, and we need to be open to discussion about it in order to find out. As scientists have been saying all along, both biological and societal factors matter. What I hope we can all agree i…

Would phrenology be acceptable to "debate"? Or race based "debates"? It is remarkable how the need for debate is disproportionately forwarded from the side with power.

We are talking here about reasonable scientific claims believed by large parts of the population and by scientists. You can disagree with them, but you also need to live in a society with them. We need to find a way to work together, even as we disagree on things.

It's not like phrenology or Nazis which are tiny minorities we can just cast out and ignore.

And I'm not sure I agree with you on which side has power here. Look who got fired.

Re: The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

#299

Post by dsfjksdf »

zamalek wrote: post #222
dsfjksdf wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that is not related to "shortage of women in tech/STEM". More women in management wouldn't change that. Maybe it is just difficult to put managers without experience in the trenches in front of people? That is, managers who have no tech skills as such?

> That is, managers who have no tech skills as such? There was an article on the front page earlier about how you simply shouldn't put people with no tech expertise in charge of people who have - so far as tech goes. There is another problem here: the wage gap across industries. Some of our most important workers (teachers, nurses) are paid a pittance, whereas one industry that invents problems to solve is paid the m…

Wages are determined by market forces. Most nurses may earn less than techies, but their work might be more rewarding to them. They are helping human beings get better, not optimizing ads.

Nobody is forced to choose Nursing over Tech, so if they are unhappy with the salary, why do people choose Nursing? Presumably more people choose Nursing than Tech, so the salary is lower as per supply and demand (and of course demand is dependent on other factors as well - but if fewer people went into Nursing, prices surely would go up).

Nobody is entitled to any kind of job they want. Jobs exist because people need jobs done, and they are willing to pay for them being done.

Tech has historically not been awful to women. The social networks are full of the reports on how early programmers were all women. Even today tech is not awful to women. They get a red carpet rolled out for them.

Re: The Google memo isn’t sexist or anti-diversity, it’s science

#300

Post by isk517 »

snowwrestler wrote: post #33

The article hides a common but incorrect assumption. Look at this paragraph: > As mentioned in the memo, gendered interests are predicted by exposure to prenatal testosterone – higher levels are associated with a preference for mechanically interesting things and occupations in adulthood. Lower levels are associated with a preference for people-oriented activities and occupations. This is why STEM (science, technolog…

I would imagine it is the Peter Principal to blame for lack of woman management. Even tech companies cannot seem to grasp the idea that management is its own separate skill set and simply promoting your best developers isn't going to guarantee you quality management.
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