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What do you know about women in CS in Iran? How many of them end up working in CS? I wouldn't jump to conclusions just because you find such outliers. Some weir

What do you know about women in CS in Iran? How many of them end up working in CS? I wouldn't jump to conclusions just because you find such outliers. Some weird mechanisms might be driving such numbers (like people not being given a choice what to study, people being forced to study something useful because they can't afford to study literature or gender studies for fun, women studying just to meet men to marry, men having mostly died in a recent war, and so on...). Edit: I am not allowed to comment anymore, so this Eintagsfliege (mayfly) will die now. Bye.

smb06 9y ago
> I wouldn't jump to conclusions just because you find such outliers. Some weird mechanisms might be driving such numbers
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- eintagsfiege 9y ago
  Well do you know anything about what is going on in Iran? Then please share.
  - spaceseaman 9y ago
    He's pointing out that you can use your argument as a counter-argument to yourself. As a result, your point is more or less moot, and all that remains is an appeal to cognitive bias (women enter these fields for "fun" or to find a husband, while men do it for the "real reasons" or something like that [1]) [1] The beauty of your vagueness is that it allows someone to inject whatever they believe is the "real cause" of the problem in the United States, perfectly allowing them to project their own bias upon your post as well. It also makes it difficult for someone else to counter it since they're not entirely sure what you're trying to say at all. An intriguing approach I must say.
  - smb06 9y ago
    I've had dozens of Iranian friends, most of them women engineers. All of them in it for the love of science and engineering.
spaceseaman 9y ago
- you mean political and sociological forces that unnaturally perturb so called "natural trends"? If you claim Iran could potentially have such factors that encourage women to enter the field in "above-average" numbers, what allows you to wholesale eliminate similar factors when examining the situation within the borders of the United States that could cause women to enter the field in "below-average" numbers? What allows you to directly assume that one viewpoint is inherently more palatable besides your biased worldview? Furthermore, your comment essentially only exists for you to cast doubt on the opposing viewpoint while bringing up common reactionary points of view that also have no evidence. You have no evidence that women in the United States "study literature or gender studies for fun" [1] or that "women just study something to meet men to marry". Not only are these ideas incredibly flawed, but you appear to have brought them up for no other reason that to further cast suspicion on the parent poster without actually addressing any of their claims. You just threw out ideas that people are likely to get up in a huff about. [1] While I majored in CS in college, I also pursued a minor in critical theory. The people in that classroom were not taking those courses "for fun" any more than programmers took to their classes. They felt it was incredibly important to be able to dissect the immense amount of media we have in the world today and what it means. What are video games trying to say? Or modern films? What ideas do these share with bedrock pieces of literature that we've studied in critical theory again and again? Is it really so bad to enjoy that? Furthermore, gender studies is filled with people itching to try and discuss (and come to good conclusions about) THE VERY THINGS WE ARE ARGUING ABOUT RIGHT NOW. Isn't the fact that we spend so much time discussing such things nowadays evidence that it is a very real and important thing to study and discuss?
oddlyaromatic 9y ago
You make many assumptions here, on many different levels. Regarding parent's comment: 1. Iran was but one example of the uneven rates of participation in science. Of course there may be many interesting reasons for this. There are many reasons for most things. 2. Parent didn't actually jump to many conclusions as far as I can tell. You may be projecting. What conclusion did they make based on the 70%? Finally, your list of factors that might influence the % of women studying science in Iran is weirdly general. Are those factors more prevalent in Iran than other places? Literature and gender studies are not alternatives to "useful" fields of study, they are useful. Culture matters. It's not just fun, it's hard and filled with contradictions and challenges. But you are right that it's not lucrative, and becoming less so. Maybe studying the arts is not so big in Iran as other countries and the sciences are more of a default choice? Now maybe I'm the one projecting, but it feels like you want parent commenter to discount the 70% on the basis of some weak hypothetical guesswork about possible reasons to do so. This is how cognitive bias works. Answering the 70% question is interesting, and we should see what we can learn about it, and how that compares to our instincts.
- ithkuil 9y ago
  > Literature and gender studies are not alternatives to "useful" fields of study, they are useful. Culture matters. I believe "useful" in this context refers to having a higher chance of being able to land a job with a decent pay. It's not unheard of parents of non affluent families trying hard to convince their children to pursue career paths that would give them certain economic self sufficiency rather than something they might like more, when economic success in that field is (perhaps incorrectly) perceived as a gamble.
  - oddlyaromatic 9y ago
    That makes sense. So that WAS me projecting ;)

smb06 9y ago

> I wouldn't jump to conclusions just because you find such outliers. Some weird mechanisms might be driving such numbers

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eintagsfiege 9y ago
Well do you know anything about what is going on in Iran? Then please share.
- spaceseaman 9y ago
  He's pointing out that you can use your argument as a counter-argument to yourself. As a result, your point is more or less moot, and all that remains is an appeal to cognitive bias (women enter these fields for "fun" or to find a husband, while men do it for the "real reasons" or something like that [1]) [1] The beauty of your vagueness is that it allows someone to inject whatever they believe is the "real cause" of the problem in the United States, perfectly allowing them to project their own bias upon your post as well. It also makes it difficult for someone else to counter it since they're not entirely sure what you're trying to say at all. An intriguing approach I must say.
- smb06 9y ago
  I've had dozens of Iranian friends, most of them women engineers. All of them in it for the love of science and engineering.

spaceseaman 9y ago

- you mean political and sociological forces that unnaturally perturb so called "natural trends"? If you claim Iran could potentially have such factors that encourage women to enter the field in "above-average" numbers, what allows you to wholesale eliminate similar factors when examining the situation within the borders of the United States that could cause women to enter the field in "below-average" numbers? What allows you to directly assume that one viewpoint is inherently more palatable besides your biased worldview? Furthermore, your comment essentially only exists for you to cast doubt on the opposing viewpoint while bringing up common reactionary points of view that also have no evidence. You have no evidence that women in the United States "study literature or gender studies for fun" [1] or that "women just study something to meet men to marry". Not only are these ideas incredibly flawed, but you appear to have brought them up for no other reason that to further cast suspicion on the parent poster without actually addressing any of their claims. You just threw out ideas that people are likely to get up in a huff about. [1] While I majored in CS in college, I also pursued a minor in critical theory. The people in that classroom were not taking those courses "for fun" any more than programmers took to their classes. They felt it was incredibly important to be able to dissect the immense amount of media we have in the world today and what it means. What are video games trying to say? Or modern films? What ideas do these share with bedrock pieces of literature that we've studied in critical theory again and again? Is it really so bad to enjoy that? Furthermore, gender studies is filled with people itching to try and discuss (and come to good conclusions about) THE VERY THINGS WE ARE ARGUING ABOUT RIGHT NOW. Isn't the fact that we spend so much time discussing such things nowadays evidence that it is a very real and important thing to study and discuss?

oddlyaromatic 9y ago

You make many assumptions here, on many different levels. Regarding parent's comment: 1. Iran was but one example of the uneven rates of participation in science. Of course there may be many interesting reasons for this. There are many reasons for most things. 2. Parent didn't actually jump to many conclusions as far as I can tell. You may be projecting. What conclusion did they make based on the 70%? Finally, your list of factors that might influence the % of women studying science in Iran is weirdly general. Are those factors more prevalent in Iran than other places? Literature and gender studies are not alternatives to "useful" fields of study, they are useful. Culture matters. It's not just fun, it's hard and filled with contradictions and challenges. But you are right that it's not lucrative, and becoming less so. Maybe studying the arts is not so big in Iran as other countries and the sciences are more of a default choice? Now maybe I'm the one projecting, but it feels like you want parent commenter to discount the 70% on the basis of some weak hypothetical guesswork about possible reasons to do so. This is how cognitive bias works. Answering the 70% question is interesting, and we should see what we can learn about it, and how that compares to our instincts.

ithkuil 9y ago
> Literature and gender studies are not alternatives to "useful" fields of study, they are useful. Culture matters. I believe "useful" in this context refers to having a higher chance of being able to land a job with a decent pay. It's not unheard of parents of non affluent families trying hard to convince their children to pursue career paths that would give them certain economic self sufficiency rather than something they might like more, when economic success in that field is (perhaps incorrectly) perceived as a gamble.
- oddlyaromatic 9y ago
  That makes sense. So that WAS me projecting ;)