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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

#351

Post by Joeri »

I have always felt very ambivalent about affirmative action. It is a form of discrimination and therefore furthers the message that discerning based on gender or race is acceptable. You can make a strong argument that it is harmful, which is what the memo did.

However...

In the kingdom of Belgium at some point the rule was introduced that half of all political candidates for election must be women and had to receive equally prominent placement on ballots (by alternating male and female candidates). People were still free to vote men into office, but the idea was that it would give women a fairer chance. The same criticisms were said. Before you saw a low percentage of women in politics, like most countries. This was attributed to women having less of an affinity for politics. And yet, after a few election cycles this caused a shift in mindset as well as quality of female candidates and who was elected. Women are no longer perceived to be less suited for politics, the most popular politician is a woman, and gender has gone away as a divisive issue in politics. So, it actually worked. By making people so used to women politicians the issue went away, and you could probably get rid of the quotas and still see a 50% split in the next election.

So maybe our genetic predispositions matter far less than we think, and we can change mindsets through affirmative action. But it has to be all-in 50/50 % split, so that it will change people's perception of normal.

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

#352

Post by atilaneves »

tenaciousDaniel wrote: post #70
megous wrote: post #36

What I find interesting about all this is how many people take personal offense from statistics. (and conclusions drawn from statistics) The author seems to put an effort into explaining statistical distribution and what it means and what not. He's explicit that statistical observations can't be used to judge particular individuals. Draws a graph of overlapping distributions to drive the point home even more. I'm not…

Also interesting is that it's one of the things social justice activists constantly criticize others for. I can't count how many times I've heard the following: "when we say men are privileged, we don't mean any and all men are privileged to the same extent." Or "when we say white people are racist, we're not talking about every single individual white person." And it makes sense. Yet when it comes time for someone t…

The difference is that the "on average" vs "the individual" in the memo is scientific. Which doesn't mean it's the gospel truth, by all means go and criticise the papers linked to. But at least it's science. In the case of privilege or the lack thereof, it's an opinion. As far as I know anyway, I'd be happy to be pointed in the direction of scientific studies on privilege.

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

#353

Post by notacoward »

Smaug123 wrote: post #350
notacoward wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, that's a total misrepresentation of what I said. I'm saying whether he's right on that one point is irrelevant, because he tries to make a hundred others that are just as bad. But thanks for showing how Damore's supporters are just as guilty of "virtue signaling" as they accuse others of being.

If you want people to understand you, you should avoid attacking them when they try. I will not converse further with you.

Good. If you had wanted to engage constructively, you wouldn't have led with a strawman. The response - not attack - was no more or less than such a non-contribution deserved.

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

#354

Post by mmirate »

omikun wrote: post #250
curiousgeorgio wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it arrived at grossly inappropriate conclusions Which conclusions were inappropriate, specifically? The memo I read made several suggestions that would only help women in tech. If that's "inappropriate", then it proves his broader point: our biggest diversity problem is really the lack of diversity of thought. If any of the conclusions are wrong, then no amount of shouting or complaining should be necessary; just r…

You must have missed the parts in the end where he advocated measures that systemically undermined diversity measures (let's not make this a moral issue, have less empathy, be more rational). While all of those arguments make sense individually, together they take down any diversity in thought: left side brain good, right side brain bad. What we need more in this discussion is more emotional intelligence, not less.

> left side brain good, right side brain bad

We're programmers/engineers, not painters/artists. Hence I don't see where that statement doesn't hold absolutely true for us. (Except perhaps for management, team leads and entrepreneurs.)

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

#355

Post by atilaneves »

yAnonymous wrote: post #71
jamesrcole wrote: post #15

What disturbs me most about this incident is how many people's first instinct, when faced with views they strongly disagree with, is to try and suppress those views and the person speaking them. Not to engage with the argument or to try and argue against it, just to shut the other person down. It's a totalitarian kind of response.

In my experience, most people who act like that lack the intelligence to make valid points in an argument or there are no good arguments that support their point of view. I think a lot of this has to do with parenting. When crying always gets you everything, you don't learn to work hard or have a debate to get what you want. There's a whole generation of full-grown babies.

> most people who act like that lack the intelligence

That's not true. _Everyone_ acts like this, including me and you (except we don't notice it when we do). The key factor is whether or not there's emotion involved in the beliefs that are challenged when presented with facts to the contrary, which then provokes cognitive dissosance. Look up "the backfire effect".

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

#356

Post by Lon7 »

tptacek wrote: post #325
Lon7 wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for this great response. I think you've covered why the 'manifesto' cannot be supported on a scientific basis very well. There's another issue with the manifesto that I don't think is talked about as much. And that's the human element. All the cited science in the manifesto is irrelevant in my opinion. As an engineer you work with other people. You probably spend 40 or 50 hours a week with them. They may or…

I understand the arguments about how valuable interpersonal skills are to software development, but I don't like talking about them for a couple reasons: 1. The effect sizes we're talking about are tiny. A randomly selected cohort of men and women can routinely be expected to produce more women innately skilled at math, or more men innately skilled at negotiation. It's one of the more galling aspects of the debate ab…

> Attempts to break down aptitude by gender tend to imagine computer science in terms of compiler theory and algorithm design, when in reality 90% of all software development is repeated iterations of "wire this database column into this UI table".

I think computer scientists tend to apply the same skills and techniques to social issues that they do to compiler theory and algorithm design. And that's how you end up with these 'manifestos'. I don't think that many people are offended by the science. They are offended that he has turned women in tech into a technical problem that he can solve with his logical reasoning.

It appears that he thinks he's the only one who's read the studies. It's arrogant. Everyone interested in the issue has already read those studies. They also have enough interpersonal skills to know that you can't just apply studies to your coworkers.

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

#357

Post by jahaja »

tptacek wrote: post #101

This defense of the "manifesto" is flawed just like the others. It picks out a small subset of the claims made in the document, discards the context and all the other claims, and then harangues us for having a problem with "science". I could argue "water is composed of two hydrogen molecules and one oxygen molecule, so women are bad at software development", and my argument would just be a difference of degree worse…

This is what I don't understand in all these HN threads. How can some kind of vaguely related science paper(s), albeit perhaps accurate per se, make people so absolutely sure that there's some kind of _causal & scientific_ cause to the issue at hand - as it requires a really long jump. I assume it's just confirmation bias wreaking havoc. Thanks for a good summary too.

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

#358

Post by travmatt »

monochromatic wrote: post #327
travmatt wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Didn't a republican congressman literally commit a violent assault on a reporter, and then win accolades by the right and get rewarded for it? Do you believe violent assaults chill free speech?

I didn't say 100%.

And didn't the president promise to pay the legal defense of supporters of his who committed violence on his behalf to intimidate a free press?

It seems you have an odd system of weighting where college kids policing language is weighted very heavily, and elected officials committing and advocating violence to further political goals weighs very lightly.

I'm beginning to suspect your analysis is more driven by how you feel than tangible consequences.

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

#359

Post by unityByFreedom »

dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #46
alkonaut wrote: post #10

Why can't the memo be both sexist and science? Arguing that there are differences between genders that make one gender unsuitable for a task can be as scientific as you want, it's still sexist. It's no different from doing the same but replacing gender with race - it's racist no matter how carefully and scientifically you worded it. It's almost as if the person writing this article believes that if the manifesto is f…

Science by definition can't be sexist. In science there is no place for prejudices, beliefs and biases - only facts. It's human attitudes interpreting these facts that can be sexist, racist and so on. Second, the author didn't argue there are differences between genders or sexes that make one unsuitable for a given task. That's one of the most gross and unfair misrepresentations of the memo.

> Second, the author didn't argue there are differences between genders or sexes that make one unsuitable for a given task. That's one of the most gross and unfair misrepresentations of the memo.

The memo wrote that women generally have a harder time leading. His cited sources don't back that up. How is it a misrepresentation to say he said women generally are not as good at certain roles, like leading? That statement is word for word in the memo,

"This leads to women generally having a harder time negotiating salary, asking for raises, speaking up, and leading."

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

#360

Post by mbfg »

My experience has been that i get about 10-1 resumes from men vs women. Is it possible that they are being unfairly filtered by head hunters before i receive them? Could be.. i wouldn't think so, but i don't know. Of the candidates resume's i receive, the candidates that are women tend to be good, probably better than the average male candidate i get. But they are not 10x better, so at the end of the day, following the natural course there wouldn't be an equal base of candidates.

Being just one sample, mine, it is completely statistically irrelevant. But it's the only thing i personally can go on. I want good candidates, if you can find me more good women candidates, that would be great.

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