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I must have missed the parts where he explained that women were held to a lower bar or that biological differences were holding back productivity. Perhaps you

I must have missed the parts where he explained that women were held to a lower bar or that biological differences were holding back productivity. Perhaps you could quote them, or refer to the specific sections of the document, I'll reread and then be able to have an informed response.

IanDrake 9y ago
Don't hold your breath. It's easier to regurgitate what you read somewhere else. Which seems like more than half the commenters are doing here. At just about every opportunity he used words and phrases like "average" and "in general" to make it clear that these metrics are just that, average. He clearly points out that any individual woman may be more suitable to leadership and tech than any individual man, but when forced to generalize, then we must be honest about the averages.
dymk 9y ago
here you go. > "Women, on average, have more:" > - "Neuroticism (higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance). This may contribute to the higher levels of anxiety women report on Googlegeist and to the lower number of women in high stress jobs" > - "Extraversion expressed as gregariousness rather than assertiveness. Also, higher agreeableness" > - "Openness directed towards feelings and aesthetics rather than ideas. Women generally also have a stronger interest in people rather than things, relative to men..." (Ironically, this is a good thing for an engineer to have) He provides no source for this. > "Google has created several discriminatory practices: Programs, mentoring, and classes only for people with a certain gender or race, a high priority queue and special treatment for 'diversity' candidates, hiring practices which can effectively lower the bar for 'diversity' candidates by decreasing the false negative rate." And blatant disregard for the social context that these groups exist in.
- dropstickle 9y ago
  He does a provide a source in the form of a wikipedia article that uses actual citations [1]. The version with sources (gizmodo removed them in their first publication of the memo), is located at [2]. As for your comment on his "blatant disregard for social context", he explicitly mentions that he believes that biases should be corrected and that society probably also is to blame [3], he just doesn't believe that biological factors does not play any role at all. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_psychology#Personality_traits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_psychology#... [2] http://diversitymemo.com/ http://diversitymemo.com/ [3] http://diversitymemo.com/#suggestions http://diversitymemo.com/#suggestions
  - ghort 9y ago
    > he believes that biases should be corrected So he believes in decreasing the false negative rate? I'm confused.
    - ghort 9y ago
      Guess people didn't get it. It's not believable to claim to want to correct biases when you want to remove measures that correct biases. Even more ironic is using much of the paper to argue differences between men and women just to say that men are being discriminated against because they aren't treated exactly the same as women. Therefor the program should be replaced by his own version with 4 out of 5 measure focused on women, but despite the differences between men and women doesn't discriminate against men, because he said so. The guy isn't rational, he has just come up with a lot of synonyms for "I disagree".
- ImSkeptical 9y ago
  Thank you for clarifying. Regarding the first point, about women being higher in neuroticism, the author does provide a source - wikipedia. I understand there are different versions of the document, some of which omit sources or links. The version I'm using as a reference [1] maintains a hyperlink to Wikipedia's page on sex differences in psychology. Wikipedia may not be the most reputable source, although I've always thought quite highly of it, but in this instance, Wikipedia, which does seem to support the author's contention, has it's source, an academic psychology paper. The paper's abstract [2] does also repeat the Google author's claim, that women are higher in neuroticism. As far as the Google author's sourcing goes, I believe linking to a well sourced article on Wikipedia should be a sufficient citation for the document (which wasn't intended as an academic paper but something more like an argument on a forum - per my understanding). I don't see how this claim, that women are higher in neuroticism, leads to what you alleged the author was claiming - that the biology of women hurts productivity at Google. This seems to me like a possible explanation of why there are not as many women in leadership positions, and not an argument that the women who are in leadership positions have any defect. By analogy, suppose I was asked why there were few Chinese basketball players, and I answered that height is useful in basketball, and Chinese people are shorter on average than white and black players. This may be a suitable explanation for the observed phenomenon, or it may not be, but either way you should not interpret me as claiming that Yao Ming is a short person. For your second point, this seems obviously true. The "false negative rate" presumably refers to when candidates who would be good hires are rejected for some undesirable reason. In other words, the test is generating an incorrect negative (your interview comes back "Do not hire" on a person who would make a good candidate). This false negative rate effectively "raises the bar" to get hired at Google, albeit in an undesirable way. The initiatives that the author links to in this section are presumably aimed at reducing the false negative rate for women, and thereby lowering the bar that women need to clear to get hired. Obviously it's a good thing to reduce your false negative rate. You get more qualified employees and people who are qualified get a good job. The discriminatory part of this, which the Google author is highlighting, is that Google wants to reduce the false negative rate FOR WOMEN and isn't applying these same initiatives to hiring in general. I agree that the author did not have enough regard for the social context of his post. He seems to have believed Google's lies that they cared about letting employees express themselves and share ideas to improve the company - when, of course, Google is a soulless corporation that will fire anyone with the temerity to criticize their sacred cows. I think that says roughly that the employee was a bit naive. [1] - https://www.scribd.com/document/355823379/Google-s-Ideological-Echo-Chamber#from_embed https://www.scribd.com/document/355823379/Google-s-Ideologic... [2] - http://doi.apa.org/buy/2001-01642-012 http://doi.apa.org/buy/2001-01642-012
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IanDrake 9y ago

Don't hold your breath. It's easier to regurgitate what you read somewhere else. Which seems like more than half the commenters are doing here. At just about every opportunity he used words and phrases like "average" and "in general" to make it clear that these metrics are just that, average. He clearly points out that any individual woman may be more suitable to leadership and tech than any individual man, but when forced to generalize, then we must be honest about the averages.

dymk 9y ago

here you go. > "Women, on average, have more:" > - "Neuroticism (higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance). This may contribute to the higher levels of anxiety women report on Googlegeist and to the lower number of women in high stress jobs" > - "Extraversion expressed as gregariousness rather than assertiveness. Also, higher agreeableness" > - "Openness directed towards feelings and aesthetics rather than ideas. Women generally also have a stronger interest in people rather than things, relative to men..." (Ironically, this is a good thing for an engineer to have) He provides no source for this. > "Google has created several discriminatory practices: Programs, mentoring, and classes only for people with a certain gender or race, a high priority queue and special treatment for 'diversity' candidates, hiring practices which can effectively lower the bar for 'diversity' candidates by decreasing the false negative rate." And blatant disregard for the social context that these groups exist in.

dropstickle 9y ago
He does a provide a source in the form of a wikipedia article that uses actual citations [1]. The version with sources (gizmodo removed them in their first publication of the memo), is located at [2]. As for your comment on his "blatant disregard for social context", he explicitly mentions that he believes that biases should be corrected and that society probably also is to blame [3], he just doesn't believe that biological factors does not play any role at all. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_psychology#Personality_traits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_psychology#... [2] http://diversitymemo.com/ http://diversitymemo.com/ [3] http://diversitymemo.com/#suggestions http://diversitymemo.com/#suggestions
- ghort 9y ago
  > he believes that biases should be corrected So he believes in decreasing the false negative rate? I'm confused.
  - ghort 9y ago
    Guess people didn't get it. It's not believable to claim to want to correct biases when you want to remove measures that correct biases. Even more ironic is using much of the paper to argue differences between men and women just to say that men are being discriminated against because they aren't treated exactly the same as women. Therefor the program should be replaced by his own version with 4 out of 5 measure focused on women, but despite the differences between men and women doesn't discriminate against men, because he said so. The guy isn't rational, he has just come up with a lot of synonyms for "I disagree".
ImSkeptical 9y ago
Thank you for clarifying. Regarding the first point, about women being higher in neuroticism, the author does provide a source - wikipedia. I understand there are different versions of the document, some of which omit sources or links. The version I'm using as a reference [1] maintains a hyperlink to Wikipedia's page on sex differences in psychology. Wikipedia may not be the most reputable source, although I've always thought quite highly of it, but in this instance, Wikipedia, which does seem to support the author's contention, has it's source, an academic psychology paper. The paper's abstract [2] does also repeat the Google author's claim, that women are higher in neuroticism. As far as the Google author's sourcing goes, I believe linking to a well sourced article on Wikipedia should be a sufficient citation for the document (which wasn't intended as an academic paper but something more like an argument on a forum - per my understanding). I don't see how this claim, that women are higher in neuroticism, leads to what you alleged the author was claiming - that the biology of women hurts productivity at Google. This seems to me like a possible explanation of why there are not as many women in leadership positions, and not an argument that the women who are in leadership positions have any defect. By analogy, suppose I was asked why there were few Chinese basketball players, and I answered that height is useful in basketball, and Chinese people are shorter on average than white and black players. This may be a suitable explanation for the observed phenomenon, or it may not be, but either way you should not interpret me as claiming that Yao Ming is a short person. For your second point, this seems obviously true. The "false negative rate" presumably refers to when candidates who would be good hires are rejected for some undesirable reason. In other words, the test is generating an incorrect negative (your interview comes back "Do not hire" on a person who would make a good candidate). This false negative rate effectively "raises the bar" to get hired at Google, albeit in an undesirable way. The initiatives that the author links to in this section are presumably aimed at reducing the false negative rate for women, and thereby lowering the bar that women need to clear to get hired. Obviously it's a good thing to reduce your false negative rate. You get more qualified employees and people who are qualified get a good job. The discriminatory part of this, which the Google author is highlighting, is that Google wants to reduce the false negative rate FOR WOMEN and isn't applying these same initiatives to hiring in general. I agree that the author did not have enough regard for the social context of his post. He seems to have believed Google's lies that they cared about letting employees express themselves and share ideas to improve the company - when, of course, Google is a soulless corporation that will fire anyone with the temerity to criticize their sacred cows. I think that says roughly that the employee was a bit naive. [1] - https://www.scribd.com/document/355823379/Google-s-Ideological-Echo-Chamber#from_embed https://www.scribd.com/document/355823379/Google-s-Ideologic... [2] - http://doi.apa.org/buy/2001-01642-012 http://doi.apa.org/buy/2001-01642-012
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