4 ms·

Sure it is, and a number of scientists in the relevant fields have spoken up and said so. Here's a start for you: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/no-the

Sure it is, and a number of scientists in the relevant fields have spoken up and said so. Here's a start for you: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/no-the-google-manifesto-isnt-sexist-or-anti-diversity-its-science/article35903359/ https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/no-the-google-manife...

frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
No it's not. Here's a start: https://www.quora.com/What-do-scientists-think-about-the-biological-claims-made-in-the-anti-diversity-document-written-by-a-Google-employee-in-August-2017/answer/Suzanne-Sadedin?share=13d40fd1&srid=Q https://www.quora.com/What-do-scientists-think-about-the-bio...
- submersiveblue 9y ago
  What's funny about that link is that when she refers to the scientific claims she mostly seems to agree that they are well founded. Apart from that she seems to reading a lot of stuff into the memo that Damore probably wouldn't agree is there, and getting offended. I.e. he is a racist/sexist/alt-right bigot.
  - frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
    You mean she agrees that there are differences between men and women? Sure, most people do. But she doesn't agree that there is a basis for the idea that men would make better programmers than women because of something at the biological or genetic level, which is really the contention around Damore's memo. >Apart from that she seems to reading a lot of stuff into the memo that Damore probably wouldn't agree is there, i.e. he is a racist/sexist/alt-right bigot. Well his first interview was with Stefan Molyneux and he's done another with Jordan Peterson. I'm assuming Mike Cernovich and Lauren Southern are next? Come on. The thing about writing a dogwhistling document like his memo is you have to keep your true beliefs secret. By running straight to some of the darlings of the alt-right he's exposed himself a bit and his dogwhistles become clear as exactly that.
    - submersiveblue 9y ago
      >men would make better programmers than women because of something at the biological or genetic level, which is really the contention around Damore's memo. Where does he say this? As for the interviewers, so what? Either the claims are supported by the facts or not, who's agenda is served by those facts is an entirely separate issue.
      - frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
        I’m simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes and that these differences may explain why we don’t see equal representation of women in tech and leadership. Many of these differences are small and there’s significant overlap between men and women, so you can’t say anything about an individual given these population level distributions. The "and abilities" part is the important bit because it's where he makes a logical leap. So here's what I'm going to ask of you as someone who seems to like Damore's document and likes the scientific process behind it. Can you find me scientific evidence that men are biologically predisposed to have greater tech abilities?
        submersiveblue 9y ago
        I'm not sure what Damore is referring to in that specific quote, but there is evidence of relevant differences, especially if you're talking about recruitment numbers for a company like Google: "A 2005 study by Ian Deary, Paul Irwing, Geoff Der, and Timothy Bates, focusing on the ASVAB showed a significantly higher variance in male scores, resulting in more than twice as many men as women scoring in the top 2%" ..."the study indicated that, while boys and girls performed similarly on average, boys were over-represented among the very best performers as well as among the very worst." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_intelligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_intelligenc...
        DrScump 9y ago
        Has there ever been an independent study of how well ASVAB results correlate to later professional success in tech? I took the ASVAB as a teen, and I was relentlessly pursued by military recruiters for years afterward.
  - egonschiele 9y ago
    > when she refers to the scientific claims she mostly seems to agree that they are well founded. What part of this answer makes you say that? She is quoting directly from the paper a bunch of times, offering refutations, and providing sources. I agree that she is reading into the memo. I don't agree that she is agreeing with the science -- she's spent thousands of words doing the exact opposite.
BinaryIdiot 9y ago
You know, every single person on the internet that I've seen argue that the science is solid in the Google memo point to this article in The Globe and Mail. It's bizarre. I've tried to toe the line and not get into the argument as much as I can because, as evidenced by the previous HN thread [1], it's just two sides yelling past each. Some are citing scientific papers stating they are correct (which a single paper does not make), others are arguing based on remembering other scientific papers and virtually no one seems to be an expert but are all commenting as such. What I would like to point out is the article in question isn't very well sourced. It points to "four - academic studies" [2] [3] [4] [5] but none of those are actual studies; they're all replies to a single study (Sex beyond the genitalia: The human brain mosaic [6]) and none include a methodology to how they came to their reply conclusion as the full text barely contains anything additional to the extract. Now I'm not writing them off as wrong but those are being misrepresented as studies without having the proper information a study or research paper would require. Unless it's available elsewhere? It's unclear at least to me and appears, again to me, as very misleading. Ultimately there is a boat load of research out there. Some of it is going to support the Google memo writing. Some of it will not. Some of it can be used to represent both sides of the argument. I think a better article, should one exist, should be used to defect your viewpoint should you side with the Google memo. Much of science requires a consensus and rock solid testing methodologies and I'm just not seeing that sourced in the article. Again, I am not an expert but this is my impression from this article. Feel free to make any corrections to my statement :) [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14952787 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14952787 [2] http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1968.extract http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1968.extract [3] http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1971.extract http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1971.extract [4] http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1966.extract http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1966.extract [5] http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1965.full.pdf http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1965.full.pdf [6] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4687544/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4687544/
- Spivak 9y ago
  That article is circulated because it showed up here and, unlike a lot of the blogspam, the author has the credentials to have an informed opinion about the current research. Here's another one, but from a Psychologist rather than a neurologist. https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/08/07/contra-grant-on-exaggerated-differences/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/08/07/contra-grant-on-exagge...

frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago

No it's not. Here's a start: https://www.quora.com/What-do-scientists-think-about-the-biological-claims-made-in-the-anti-diversity-document-written-by-a-Google-employee-in-August-2017/answer/Suzanne-Sadedin?share=13d40fd1&srid=Q https://www.quora.com/What-do-scientists-think-about-the-bio...

submersiveblue 9y ago
What's funny about that link is that when she refers to the scientific claims she mostly seems to agree that they are well founded. Apart from that she seems to reading a lot of stuff into the memo that Damore probably wouldn't agree is there, and getting offended. I.e. he is a racist/sexist/alt-right bigot.
- frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
  You mean she agrees that there are differences between men and women? Sure, most people do. But she doesn't agree that there is a basis for the idea that men would make better programmers than women because of something at the biological or genetic level, which is really the contention around Damore's memo. >Apart from that she seems to reading a lot of stuff into the memo that Damore probably wouldn't agree is there, i.e. he is a racist/sexist/alt-right bigot. Well his first interview was with Stefan Molyneux and he's done another with Jordan Peterson. I'm assuming Mike Cernovich and Lauren Southern are next? Come on. The thing about writing a dogwhistling document like his memo is you have to keep your true beliefs secret. By running straight to some of the darlings of the alt-right he's exposed himself a bit and his dogwhistles become clear as exactly that.
  - submersiveblue 9y ago
    >men would make better programmers than women because of something at the biological or genetic level, which is really the contention around Damore's memo. Where does he say this? As for the interviewers, so what? Either the claims are supported by the facts or not, who's agenda is served by those facts is an entirely separate issue.
    - frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
      I’m simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes and that these differences may explain why we don’t see equal representation of women in tech and leadership. Many of these differences are small and there’s significant overlap between men and women, so you can’t say anything about an individual given these population level distributions. The "and abilities" part is the important bit because it's where he makes a logical leap. So here's what I'm going to ask of you as someone who seems to like Damore's document and likes the scientific process behind it. Can you find me scientific evidence that men are biologically predisposed to have greater tech abilities?
      - submersiveblue 9y ago
        I'm not sure what Damore is referring to in that specific quote, but there is evidence of relevant differences, especially if you're talking about recruitment numbers for a company like Google: "A 2005 study by Ian Deary, Paul Irwing, Geoff Der, and Timothy Bates, focusing on the ASVAB showed a significantly higher variance in male scores, resulting in more than twice as many men as women scoring in the top 2%" ..."the study indicated that, while boys and girls performed similarly on average, boys were over-represented among the very best performers as well as among the very worst." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_intelligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_intelligenc...
        DrScump 9y ago
        Has there ever been an independent study of how well ASVAB results correlate to later professional success in tech? I took the ASVAB as a teen, and I was relentlessly pursued by military recruiters for years afterward.
- egonschiele 9y ago
  > when she refers to the scientific claims she mostly seems to agree that they are well founded. What part of this answer makes you say that? She is quoting directly from the paper a bunch of times, offering refutations, and providing sources. I agree that she is reading into the memo. I don't agree that she is agreeing with the science -- she's spent thousands of words doing the exact opposite.

BinaryIdiot 9y ago

You know, every single person on the internet that I've seen argue that the science is solid in the Google memo point to this article in The Globe and Mail. It's bizarre. I've tried to toe the line and not get into the argument as much as I can because, as evidenced by the previous HN thread [1], it's just two sides yelling past each. Some are citing scientific papers stating they are correct (which a single paper does not make), others are arguing based on remembering other scientific papers and virtually no one seems to be an expert but are all commenting as such. What I would like to point out is the article in question isn't very well sourced. It points to "four - academic studies" [2] [3] [4] [5] but none of those are actual studies; they're all replies to a single study (Sex beyond the genitalia: The human brain mosaic [6]) and none include a methodology to how they came to their reply conclusion as the full text barely contains anything additional to the extract. Now I'm not writing them off as wrong but those are being misrepresented as studies without having the proper information a study or research paper would require. Unless it's available elsewhere? It's unclear at least to me and appears, again to me, as very misleading. Ultimately there is a boat load of research out there. Some of it is going to support the Google memo writing. Some of it will not. Some of it can be used to represent both sides of the argument. I think a better article, should one exist, should be used to defect your viewpoint should you side with the Google memo. Much of science requires a consensus and rock solid testing methodologies and I'm just not seeing that sourced in the article. Again, I am not an expert but this is my impression from this article. Feel free to make any corrections to my statement :) [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14952787 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14952787 [2] http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1968.extract http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1968.extract [3] http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1971.extract http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1971.extract [4] http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1966.extract http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1966.extract [5] http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1965.full.pdf http://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1965.full.pdf [6] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4687544/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4687544/

Spivak 9y ago
That article is circulated because it showed up here and, unlike a lot of the blogspam, the author has the credentials to have an informed opinion about the current research. Here's another one, but from a Psychologist rather than a neurologist. https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/08/07/contra-grant-on-exaggerated-differences/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/08/07/contra-grant-on-exagge...