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This is the first fair and balanced article on this topic I've seen. > In his memo, Damore cites a series of studies, making the case, for example, that men te

This is the first fair and balanced article on this topic I've seen. > In his memo, Damore cites a series of studies, making the case, for example, that men tend to be more interested in things and women more interested in people. (Interest is not the same as ability.) I've been trying to hammer this point to all my colleagues (in private of course, I wouldn't dare to post it on public channel due to high probability of getting decapitated!): interests/preferences not abilities. Every time someone says the memo is denigrating women by telling them they are unfit or incapable of working in tech it makes me want to scream! It is not about any individual's ability but about preferences of a group. It might as well be that the arguments don't support the conclusion. But I haven't seen anyone offering a reasonable rebuttal that doesn't involve name-calling and blanket statements like "the author clearly doesn't understand gender".

GreaterFool 9y ago
Meanwhile there's been an ongoing campaign to discredit Stephen Miller based on his looks. I found this portrayal shocking: https://youtu.be/ej_5vyDkZgU?t=280 https://youtu.be/ej_5vyDkZgU?t=280 He's been labeled "a creep" for no reason by those who claim to be righteous and politically correct and fighting for the marginalized.
- where_do_i_live 9y ago
  There are plenty of reasons to discredit Stephen Miller on the things he says. That other people make fun of him for his looks is pretty boring and I'll leave them to their antics - hardly like this type of behavior doesn't happen with _any_ large group.
- akhilcacharya 9y ago
  He's already a creep for his views (Muslim ban, opposition to Hart-Cellar). His looks (and prior statements) just don't help.
humanrebar 9y ago
> Interest is not the same as ability. I'll make a subtle point in a discussion that clearly can't handle the subtleties it already has. Interest is not the same thing as ability, but interest is a great indicator of ability in technology, especially fast moving technology. In fact, I know plenty of people who are underemployed or underpaid that I say, "You, know, with your skills, you'd be great at writing software. Maybe you should develop an interest in coding." Similarly, people ask me, "How do I get a job in software?" and I suggest something very basic (tryruby.org, say) as a way for them to quickly figure out if they are interested. If they don't like problem solving and coding, they might be able to force themselves into qualifying for a job, but I'm not sure that's a good career strategy. Point being, to some degree, interest is one key component of ability in software and some other kinds of technology work.
evolve2017 9y ago
I'm finding this to be a fascinating look at how people, as a group, do literary criticism. I think, if we step back from the actual words on the paper and examine the author's intent, his choice of evidence, and the mere fact that he chose to write this, we can learn just as much as from trying to decide whether or not he was talking about a population effect when talked about women before mentioning Google employees. This is totally different from wondering about the biology. As a biologist, I think it's preposterous to start to infer biological bases to the types of psychology experiments cited. I do, however, think this could be open to debate. I feel that the undertone to the author's message is likely less unclear.
- jshevek 9y ago
  "examine the author's intent" That's tricky. Do we take the author at face value when they make claims about their intent? Many critics seem to think they can see the author's "true intent", and when they can't substantiate their claim, blame others for failing to see what they see.
  - evolve2017 9y ago
    I think that's an issue that a lot of science-minded folks disagree with. I happen to think there's a lot about the author's time/mental state/life circumstances that one can find in the words themselves. A much more light-hearted example is Quentin Tarrantino's insistence that he hasn't watched the Truffaut film 'And the bride wore black' - even though Kill Bill is an eerily similar remake. Should I believe the author's product or his rationalization?
clavalle 9y ago
First, the author of this article is David Brooks -- a well known, very conservative, commentator. So, it might be fair and balanced in a Fox News sense of the phrase but not fair and balanced as most people would understand the phrase. And for the general population skew in interests/preferences to make any difference whatsoever to the makeup of Google's technical and leadership staff the argument would have to be that the population that makes up the part of the interest curve on the 'high interest' part of the graph for the underrepresented groups is completely exhausted or would be completely exhausted before parity is reached. I'd bet big that Google could completely fill their entire company with underrepresented people that rank very high on the interest/preference curve and never make a dent in that population. There are over 7 billion people in the world. That's a big pool. Even the thinner parts of the graph represent huge numbers of people. And Google completely controls their hiring so they can pick and choose -- they are not pulling people at random from that general population. They can easily pick people that compare very favorably with any other colleague on the interest/preference scale.
- ameister14 9y ago
  I take issue with your first point but not your second. I don't believe that the fact that a commentator is conservative means they are spewing propaganda as Fox News is. Fox News is conservative, and Fox News is unfair and unbalanced. The conservative nature of Fox News is not why it is unfair and unbalanced. Totally agree on the second part, though. Huge pool of candidates, honestly ridiculous to think that this would explain the imbalance at Google.
- humanrebar 9y ago
  So "conservative" is the same as "unfair and/or unbalanced"? The New York Times (not exactly conservative) has considered him worth printing for quite some time now. Isn't this attitude more or less what Damore was concerned about in his memo?
  - clavalle 9y ago
    No, but he has an agenda that he's promoting with this opinion piece, which, as someone who disagrees with him, has some pretty obvious holes which I point out.

GreaterFool 9y ago

Meanwhile there's been an ongoing campaign to discredit Stephen Miller based on his looks. I found this portrayal shocking: https://youtu.be/ej_5vyDkZgU?t=280 https://youtu.be/ej_5vyDkZgU?t=280 He's been labeled "a creep" for no reason by those who claim to be righteous and politically correct and fighting for the marginalized.

where_do_i_live 9y ago
There are plenty of reasons to discredit Stephen Miller on the things he says. That other people make fun of him for his looks is pretty boring and I'll leave them to their antics - hardly like this type of behavior doesn't happen with _any_ large group.
akhilcacharya 9y ago
He's already a creep for his views (Muslim ban, opposition to Hart-Cellar). His looks (and prior statements) just don't help.

humanrebar 9y ago

> Interest is not the same as ability. I'll make a subtle point in a discussion that clearly can't handle the subtleties it already has. Interest is not the same thing as ability, but interest is a great indicator of ability in technology, especially fast moving technology. In fact, I know plenty of people who are underemployed or underpaid that I say, "You, know, with your skills, you'd be great at writing software. Maybe you should develop an interest in coding." Similarly, people ask me, "How do I get a job in software?" and I suggest something very basic (tryruby.org, say) as a way for them to quickly figure out if they are interested. If they don't like problem solving and coding, they might be able to force themselves into qualifying for a job, but I'm not sure that's a good career strategy. Point being, to some degree, interest is one key component of ability in software and some other kinds of technology work.

evolve2017 9y ago

I'm finding this to be a fascinating look at how people, as a group, do literary criticism. I think, if we step back from the actual words on the paper and examine the author's intent, his choice of evidence, and the mere fact that he chose to write this, we can learn just as much as from trying to decide whether or not he was talking about a population effect when talked about women before mentioning Google employees. This is totally different from wondering about the biology. As a biologist, I think it's preposterous to start to infer biological bases to the types of psychology experiments cited. I do, however, think this could be open to debate. I feel that the undertone to the author's message is likely less unclear.

jshevek 9y ago
"examine the author's intent" That's tricky. Do we take the author at face value when they make claims about their intent? Many critics seem to think they can see the author's "true intent", and when they can't substantiate their claim, blame others for failing to see what they see.
- evolve2017 9y ago
  I think that's an issue that a lot of science-minded folks disagree with. I happen to think there's a lot about the author's time/mental state/life circumstances that one can find in the words themselves. A much more light-hearted example is Quentin Tarrantino's insistence that he hasn't watched the Truffaut film 'And the bride wore black' - even though Kill Bill is an eerily similar remake. Should I believe the author's product or his rationalization?

clavalle 9y ago

First, the author of this article is David Brooks -- a well known, very conservative, commentator. So, it might be fair and balanced in a Fox News sense of the phrase but not fair and balanced as most people would understand the phrase. And for the general population skew in interests/preferences to make any difference whatsoever to the makeup of Google's technical and leadership staff the argument would have to be that the population that makes up the part of the interest curve on the 'high interest' part of the graph for the underrepresented groups is completely exhausted or would be completely exhausted before parity is reached. I'd bet big that Google could completely fill their entire company with underrepresented people that rank very high on the interest/preference curve and never make a dent in that population. There are over 7 billion people in the world. That's a big pool. Even the thinner parts of the graph represent huge numbers of people. And Google completely controls their hiring so they can pick and choose -- they are not pulling people at random from that general population. They can easily pick people that compare very favorably with any other colleague on the interest/preference scale.

ameister14 9y ago
I take issue with your first point but not your second. I don't believe that the fact that a commentator is conservative means they are spewing propaganda as Fox News is. Fox News is conservative, and Fox News is unfair and unbalanced. The conservative nature of Fox News is not why it is unfair and unbalanced. Totally agree on the second part, though. Huge pool of candidates, honestly ridiculous to think that this would explain the imbalance at Google.
humanrebar 9y ago
So "conservative" is the same as "unfair and/or unbalanced"? The New York Times (not exactly conservative) has considered him worth printing for quite some time now. Isn't this attitude more or less what Damore was concerned about in his memo?
- clavalle 9y ago
  No, but he has an agenda that he's promoting with this opinion piece, which, as someone who disagrees with him, has some pretty obvious holes which I point out.