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> gender differences don't have any significant impact on women's capacity to perform any job--even physically strenuous jobs, with the right training That see

> gender differences don't have any significant impact on women's capacity to perform any job--even physically strenuous jobs, with the right training That seems just plain wrong considering so many women fail Marine fitness tests: http://thehill.com/policy/defense/284252-report-6-out-of-7-female-recruits-fail-new-marines-fitness-test-for-combat http://thehill.com/policy/defense/284252-report-6-out-of-7-f... And FDNY had to relax physical fitness requirements in order to hire more women firefighters: https://www.bustle.com/articles/53536-fdny-wants-more-women-firefighters-but-is-cutting-strength-requirements-the-way-to-do-it https://www.bustle.com/articles/53536-fdny-wants-more-women-... Women also have to be separated from men in professional sports, otherwise in many sports it wouldn't even be close (e.g. the aged, #203-ranked male tennis player walloping both Williams sisters in their prime: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karsten_Braasch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karsten_Braasch). There's nothing wrong with admitting there are basic biological differences between men and women relating to strength.

yawaramin 9y ago
Sure. That's why I said women are capable of performing those jobs. Some women pass the Marine fitness tests and firefighter physical requirements. Hence, women are capable of performing any physically strenuous job. But again, this is completely the wrong rabbit hole in the context of this discussion. It has nothing to do with the fact that men and women have equal capacity to do any mental work.
- mcappleton 9y ago
  Why does it all have to be equal? Why can't we acknowledge that men and women have different strengths and weaknesses in different areas? The whole point of diversity is not to make everyone the same, it is to appreciate the differences everyone brings.
  - yawaramin 9y ago
    Like I keep saying in this thread--you've misunderstood the point of diversity and have gone down the wrong rabbit hole. You can acknowledge and celebrate everyone's differences. You just need to realise that those differences don't make a solitary bit of difference in their capacity to perform a job.
    - canoebuilder 9y ago
      So differences exist, but those differences don't make any difference? Do any differences ever make a difference in performance? Like a particular tribe of Kenyans utterly dominate distance running events, west Africans utterly dominate sprinting events what accounts for those differences? What's lost in all this and that I have seen zero evidence presented for is that I am in no way convinced that the population groups that are "under-represented" as software professionals have much interest in being software professionals. Whatever differences in capacity that may exist among groups the differences in interests are surely just as big or bigger.
      - breeny592 9y ago
        I think it's a pretty bad false equivalence to liken physical sports to ability in the workplace, purely because one is specifically _the peak of human ability_ and the other is outcome driven. Taking your example of say, sprinting - the outcome is to cross the line 100m down the track. I would say pretty much everyone is capable of doing that one way or another. When you apply a performance lense that says you need to do it in X seconds, then you're saying "we only want our definition of the best to do this task". Bringing it back to the workplace, a lot of jobs in tech (and other sectors too), suffer from trying to apply a one size fits all performance lense over the actual outcomes. "Sure this person did their job, but did they do these metrics that we've decided we value". A large part of diversity is acknowledging that the lense that you view people through is not going to apply to everyone, and accepting that you need to focus on the outcomes.
        canoebuilder 9y ago
        So on several readings of this, it sounds like you're saying that corporations should function as some sort of jobs program and that should take precedence over their function as a profit making enterprise and that some groups should have lower expectations placed on them.
        yawaramin 9y ago
- ad_hominem 9y ago
  I read your wording as implying that the average woman is nearly fungible compared to the average man, with any (minimal) differences being able to be patched over with a spritz of training. Which I think doesn't give women enough credit in some physically demanding jobs, as they really have to work hard to be on par with their male counterparts. But maybe I read too much into the wording, and regardless I agree it's a rabbithole w.r.t. programming jobs so I acquiesce.
- learningram 9y ago
  Capability to do work does not mean you have the same qualifications to raise your level and become the cream of the crop...ie raises or promotions. You are the one digging the wrong rabbit hole here.
  - yawaramin 9y ago
    By 'qualifications', what do you mean? Like professional accreditations? If so, all the more reason to help women and minorities by giving them the opportunities to earn those accreditations! But if you mean 'innate ability to reach a higher level', then are you implying that women innately are incapable of climbing to the same senior engineering positions as men, and no amount of training or education will change that? Just trying to understand.
    - learningram 9y ago
      I am not sure what you call this style of arguments ? You are deviating from my point and intention. Lets take GPA for example. Do you think 2 people getting a GPA of 3.0 are of the exact same knowledge level ? Is it possible that one has the equivalent score of 3.13 and the other has 2.87 and that they were both normalized to 3 ? Same thing with the jobs. Maybe you see this at your job too. There are going to be people more skilled at what you do and people less skilled at what you do but still pulling the same salary. The salary you earn is an approximate estimate of your skill measure but not an measure of your exact skill.
- quicknir 9y ago
  It seems like you are just dancing around with the definition of "equal capacity" so that you can say things that seem to contradict the points discussed, while not contradicting them, but also not admitting that they are correct. There are women that are just as good marines as men, and there are women that are just as physically fit as men. However, despite this, it's entirely possible that statistically fewer women pass. You haven't denied this empirical data nor tried to argue that it is purely for cultural reasons that fewer women can pass these physical fitness tests. So it's possible that fewer women end up in a profession for purely biological reasons, you are conceding? Similarly, it's possible that there are women (many women) who are just as good or better programmers than many men, and enjoy it just as much and are equally capable. But, that when you look at the averages, fewer women prefer it. Then, part of that relative difference could be explained by biological factors. Again, this is not a complicated argument. There's no evidence to suggest that biological factors account for 100% of the gender gap in developers but there's also not much evidence to suggest that any factor accounts for 100% of the gap. It's likely to be a combination of factors, and we should try to honestly understand how big a role each one plays.

yawaramin 9y ago

Sure. That's why I said women are capable of performing those jobs. Some women pass the Marine fitness tests and firefighter physical requirements. Hence, women are capable of performing any physically strenuous job. But again, this is completely the wrong rabbit hole in the context of this discussion. It has nothing to do with the fact that men and women have equal capacity to do any mental work.

mcappleton 9y ago
Why does it all have to be equal? Why can't we acknowledge that men and women have different strengths and weaknesses in different areas? The whole point of diversity is not to make everyone the same, it is to appreciate the differences everyone brings.
- yawaramin 9y ago
  Like I keep saying in this thread--you've misunderstood the point of diversity and have gone down the wrong rabbit hole. You can acknowledge and celebrate everyone's differences. You just need to realise that those differences don't make a solitary bit of difference in their capacity to perform a job.
  - canoebuilder 9y ago
    So differences exist, but those differences don't make any difference? Do any differences ever make a difference in performance? Like a particular tribe of Kenyans utterly dominate distance running events, west Africans utterly dominate sprinting events what accounts for those differences? What's lost in all this and that I have seen zero evidence presented for is that I am in no way convinced that the population groups that are "under-represented" as software professionals have much interest in being software professionals. Whatever differences in capacity that may exist among groups the differences in interests are surely just as big or bigger.
    - breeny592 9y ago
      I think it's a pretty bad false equivalence to liken physical sports to ability in the workplace, purely because one is specifically _the peak of human ability_ and the other is outcome driven. Taking your example of say, sprinting - the outcome is to cross the line 100m down the track. I would say pretty much everyone is capable of doing that one way or another. When you apply a performance lense that says you need to do it in X seconds, then you're saying "we only want our definition of the best to do this task". Bringing it back to the workplace, a lot of jobs in tech (and other sectors too), suffer from trying to apply a one size fits all performance lense over the actual outcomes. "Sure this person did their job, but did they do these metrics that we've decided we value". A large part of diversity is acknowledging that the lense that you view people through is not going to apply to everyone, and accepting that you need to focus on the outcomes.
      - canoebuilder 9y ago
        So on several readings of this, it sounds like you're saying that corporations should function as some sort of jobs program and that should take precedence over their function as a profit making enterprise and that some groups should have lower expectations placed on them.
        yawaramin 9y ago
ad_hominem 9y ago
I read your wording as implying that the average woman is nearly fungible compared to the average man, with any (minimal) differences being able to be patched over with a spritz of training. Which I think doesn't give women enough credit in some physically demanding jobs, as they really have to work hard to be on par with their male counterparts. But maybe I read too much into the wording, and regardless I agree it's a rabbithole w.r.t. programming jobs so I acquiesce.
learningram 9y ago
Capability to do work does not mean you have the same qualifications to raise your level and become the cream of the crop...ie raises or promotions. You are the one digging the wrong rabbit hole here.
- yawaramin 9y ago
  By 'qualifications', what do you mean? Like professional accreditations? If so, all the more reason to help women and minorities by giving them the opportunities to earn those accreditations! But if you mean 'innate ability to reach a higher level', then are you implying that women innately are incapable of climbing to the same senior engineering positions as men, and no amount of training or education will change that? Just trying to understand.
  - learningram 9y ago
    I am not sure what you call this style of arguments ? You are deviating from my point and intention. Lets take GPA for example. Do you think 2 people getting a GPA of 3.0 are of the exact same knowledge level ? Is it possible that one has the equivalent score of 3.13 and the other has 2.87 and that they were both normalized to 3 ? Same thing with the jobs. Maybe you see this at your job too. There are going to be people more skilled at what you do and people less skilled at what you do but still pulling the same salary. The salary you earn is an approximate estimate of your skill measure but not an measure of your exact skill.
quicknir 9y ago
It seems like you are just dancing around with the definition of "equal capacity" so that you can say things that seem to contradict the points discussed, while not contradicting them, but also not admitting that they are correct. There are women that are just as good marines as men, and there are women that are just as physically fit as men. However, despite this, it's entirely possible that statistically fewer women pass. You haven't denied this empirical data nor tried to argue that it is purely for cultural reasons that fewer women can pass these physical fitness tests. So it's possible that fewer women end up in a profession for purely biological reasons, you are conceding? Similarly, it's possible that there are women (many women) who are just as good or better programmers than many men, and enjoy it just as much and are equally capable. But, that when you look at the averages, fewer women prefer it. Then, part of that relative difference could be explained by biological factors. Again, this is not a complicated argument. There's no evidence to suggest that biological factors account for 100% of the gender gap in developers but there's also not much evidence to suggest that any factor accounts for 100% of the gap. It's likely to be a combination of factors, and we should try to honestly understand how big a role each one plays.