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> You can't dismiss his points just because you're tired of talking about them You can, and some people have, and that's okay. It's not clear whether you're ma

> You can't dismiss his points just because you're tired of talking about them You can, and some people have, and that's okay. It's not clear whether you're making the implication here, but commonly it's implied that "if you walk away from the debate therefore you are wrong", which is fallacious. Nobody owes you a debate. > I'm talking about handling what Damore claimed in an intellectually honest way Then the initial argument needs to start from a place of "intellectual honesty". Damore presented evidence to support his claim that women are on average less able than men in areas relevant to engineering. He didn't discuss veracity, or contradictory evidence. That's textbook confirmation bias, not intellectual honesty. Damore then started making HR policy proposals. We use a 50/50 gender ratio as an indicator that a particular field is free from bias. It's one thing to propose that 50/50 is not the natural ratio to end up with, but until Damore can propose a model that predicts another number then proposing HR policy changes put the cart before the horse. This indicates that the policy changes are what James in interested in, not the evidence. More confirmation bias. Further, Damore's proposals discuss diversity as a whole (race not just gender) without a single word of justification, let alone evidence. That's either more confirmation bias or conscious sleight-of-hand, either way, it's certainly not intellectual honesty. I don't bear Damore any ill will, he should be forgiven, but this memo was a mistake and showed poor judgement and more than a little bias. These studies may be good science, but stringing them together to confirm a conclusion you'd already set your sights in making is bad science.

weberc2 9y ago
Having unconscious bias or otherwise being incorrect doesn't make you intellectually dishonest. Whether or not his claims are true, Damore presented a much more metered and reasonable argument than virtually all of his detractors or even published social pundits.
- richmarr 9y ago
  > Having unconscious bias or otherwise being incorrect doesn't make you intellectually dishonest. If you purport to be a (competent) scientist in the 21st century then personally I expected you to be highly aware of biases such as publication bias & confirmation bias and act accordingly. That speaks either to his discipline/understanding or his honesty, I don't know which. > Whether or not his claims are true, Damore presented a much more metered and reasonable argument than virtually all of his detractors or even published social pundits. Damore was metered, but understandably triggered a threat response in the people who his memo targeted as being below "the bar". You may have read a selection of counter-arguments, some of which will be less "metered and reasonable" than his. Unfortunately the emotional tenor of an argument is not the measure of its merit.
  - Seenti 9y ago
    >That speaks either to his discipline/understanding or his honesty, I don't know which. You're holding him to an unbelievably high standard that is never applied to those making the case that gender disparities are due to societal discrimination. I can't imagine you're being driven to apply this standard to him by anything other than a preconceived notion that women are underrepresented in engineering due to sexism and that anyone that disagrees is a misogynist. >Damore was metered, but understandably triggered a threat response in the people who his memo targeted as being below "the bar". Damore did not target anyone as below the bar. He made a statistical observation about the distribution of personality types among gender groups and how that would play out in gender representation in various occupations, to counter the discrimination-as-cause-of-disparity narrative. No individual was cast as below the bar due to their gender. The threat response was immature.
    - richmarr 9y ago
      > You're holding him to an unbelievably high standard that is never applied to those making the case that gender disparities are due to societal discrimination. No, this is wrong. Societal discrimination is directly measurable at the point of hiring. There are a mountain of studies measuring this. It simply doesn't require modelling the effect as it propagates through society. As I've mentioned elsewhere, nobody is claiming that bias is the only factor involved, but it's one we can measure and act on. > Damore did not target anyone as below the bar... The threat response was immature Aside from explicitly saying "lowers the bar", explicitly saying "I’m simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes" and making multiple references to lower drive, mathematical ability, etc. Please. As you know, threat responses aren't driven by 'maturity' they're driven by percieved threat. Damore's clumsy language caused people at Google to be afraid, and justifiably so. He may have intended to spark a dialog but his words are confrontational. Don't confront people on this topic because you'll often get a fight/flight response. Instead you must engage and build trust.
      - weberc2 9y ago
        As I understand it, the data about discrimination in hiring are mixed, but I'm interested in learning more. Your threat response point seems like dressing up a group's overreaction to make it justifiable. It's also another example of different standards being applied to liberal groups vs conservatives groups (offending conservative groups is basically a sacrament, but saying anything that can be remotely twisted into an offensive statement toward a liberal group is nearly criminal). I've never seen anyone make any sort of threat-response/justifiable-offense argument when conservatives are upset about, say, "blasphemy day" or just the constant misrepresentation in the media. In particular though, there's nothing which should remotely cause offense, even in the selection of quotes you shared (but good on you for quoting and not taking offense at strawman--very few of Damore's critics have been so kind). Damore's arguments (however factual) were better than I could make, but it's ridiculous that the criticism is that he didn't successfully prevent everyone from taking offense. He couldn't have done more to prevent offense without damaging his own case. I think this is another case of the left refusing to be pacified by anything less than complete political capitulation. Meanwhile any sort of expression from liberal groups, even defamation or riots, are defended, and any one who criticizes them have impossible standards. The double standards here should be unbelievable.
keganunderwood 9y ago
Yes you can walk away but no you can't say "you're {{}}phobe and then walk away. Take my example. I have not read the memo. I shouldn't say the memo is unscientific and homophobic because I have no clue what it says.
barrkel 9y ago
Damore then started making HR policy proposals. We use a 50/50 gender ratio as an indicator that a particular field is free from bias. It's one thing to propose that 50/50 is not the natural ratio to end up with, but until Damore can propose a model that predicts another number then proposing HR policy changes put the cart before the horse. I deeply disagree with this approach. You're essentially saying that unless you can come up with an alternative scientific theory, complete with predictions, it's not possible to criticise an existing theory about the world. There's many plausible explanations why an absence of a 50:50 gender representation could be caused for reasons other than bias or average ability. That's enough to put a nail in that model of discovering bias. Coming up with a way of predicting what the right ratio is, isn't necessary to discard that metric.
- comex 9y ago
  I agree with your statement, but... I think part of the problem is what the memo says and what it doesn’t say. It’s entirely plausible that the ‘natural’ ratio is not exactly 50:50. But as of last year, among Google tech workers, the ratio was 81:19, and that’s with all the affirmative-actiony programs Damore wanted to back off on; in the past it was higher. It’s quite a bit less plausible that intrinsic differences could explain all or even most of that big a discrepancy, especially combined with the many anecdotes of discrimination we hear about. Now, to be fair, the memo never explicitly claims that it does; indeed, at one point it specifically says “in part”. But the tone of the memo, the relative lack of time spent acknowledging the large role played by cultural factors, makes it sound like Damore thinks the natural ratio is at least pretty close to the current one. And that’s simply wrong.
  - bluecalm 9y ago
    How do you know it's wrong? If the ratio among CS graduates is 80-20 then it's natural it's still 80-20 when hiring at Google (not taking into account other factors which may tilt it even more in direction of men). You may ask why it's 80-20 among CS graduates. One hypothesis is that women are just less interested in tech and in presence of many other choices they choose different paths. In the past there weren't as many choices that's why women were forced to go into programming (that's why there were more women in programming several decades ago).
Al-Khwarizmi 9y ago
Damore presented evidence to support his claim that women are on average less able than men in areas relevant to engineering. He didn't. He just claimed that they are on average less interested in those areas. There is no mention at all of ability in the memo, only in the manipulated press pieces.
- salvar 9y ago
  He did not state that women had a harder time leading than men? That seems like a mention of ability.
  - yorwba 9y ago
    Google apparently already had a women-only program that was predicated on the assumption that women have a harder time leading than men. So it doesn't seem like Damore's claim was particularly unusual within Google.
    - salvar 9y ago
      My comment was to refute the statement that Damore never mentioned ability in his memo.
- christinamltn 9y ago
  He did: > 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.
Houshalter 9y ago
>Damore presented evidence to support his claim that women are on average less able than men in areas relevant to engineering. His claim was that women are statistically less likely to be interested in computer science. He said nothing about ability. >It's one thing to propose that 50/50 is not the natural ratio to end up with, but until Damore can propose a model that predicts another number then proposing HR policy changes put the cart before the horse. He gave lots of numbers. 20% is about the percentage of female computer science graduates. Targeting anything above that would necessarily require discriminating against men. >Damore's proposals discuss diversity as a whole (race not just gender) without a single word of justification I don't see any mention of race in the memo. When Damore is talking about "diversity" he always is talking about gender diversity. >>He didn't discuss veracity, or contradictory evidence. That's textbook confirmation bias, not intellectual honesty. >This indicates that the policy changes are what James in interested in, not the evidence. More confirmation bias. >it's certainly not intellectual honesty... >stringing them together to confirm a conclusion you'd already set your sights in making is bad science. I've been asked to edit my comment to make it less argumentative. Could you do the same for yours? Calling someone you disagree with "intellectually dishonest", etc, is not good taste. It's very easy to learn about biases like confirmation bias, and fall into the trap of only applying that knowledge to other people. "He only disagrees with me because of confirmation bias. He's just intellectually dishonest." You can't possibly know the thought process behind another person. As far as we know Damore did the research and found these facts convincing and developed his view. Not the other way around. Or at least someone presented these facts to him and then he developed the view he has. In any case, this is how all debates work. People present evidence for their beliefs and the other side responds with refutations and evidence for theirs. There is nothing wrong or intellectually dishonest about this.
- dang 9y ago
  Your comments have been crossing into incivility and flamewar. Would you please make a u-turn and fix that? These threads are divisive enough without careless commenting.
  - Houshalter 9y ago
wwweston 9y ago
> Damore then started making HR policy proposals. We use a 50/50 gender ratio as an indicator that a particular field is free from bias. It's one thing to propose that 50/50 is not the natural ratio to end up with, but until Damore can propose a model that predicts another number then proposing HR policy changes put the cart before the horse. This seems to assume that the only way to measure or achieve equitable hiring is to measure the representation of identity groups across a given position and make sure it tracks their makeup in the general population. It's not clear to me that there aren't other acceptable methods of trying to make things equitable. For example, you could check that applicants from different identity groups succeed in being hired at about the same rate. That's a practice that should direct an organization towards equitable results whether the reality is that women are underrepresented because of sexism in hiring or the reality is that women are represented in different proportion because of the endeavors they tend to prefer. And also for a reality that's a mix of both (which I suspect is the way of things). Also: if the primary accepted standard becomes to match representation in a position with an identity's representation in the population, it seems pretty likely that over time it would become more difficult over time to predict a "natural" ratio.
- smallnamespace 9y ago
  Or just make the entirely hiring process completely gender and race blind by hiding the name and salient biographical details of the applicant. This solves two problems: 1) the hiring process is blinded and 2) you can demonstrate to the whole world that it's blinded. As a side bonus, you get to eliminate other implicit biases that are part of the hiring process, like people preferring people who act like them.
  - brenschluss 9y ago
    But you don't get to account for systematic bias, such as who has had opportunities and encouragement to even apply in the first place.
    - smallnamespace 9y ago
      But practically speaking, the hiring process is not the right place to rectify those disparities. Fix problems at the source, don't apply hack after hack to route around it.
nicolashahn 9y ago
> You can, and some people have, and that's okay. Ok, no one owes anyone a debate, unless you're going to call it wrong, sexist, harmful, etc. Then in that case, I'd like some reasoning behind it. Either don't debate, or do and do it right. > women are on average less able Please don't do this. What he claimed was that women have less inclination to go into tech due to various pressures, some biological. If you're referring to his referencing the 'big five' personality traits, you'll note that he addresses both positively and negatively associated traits of both men and women in regards to working with software. He never stated that the combination of differences makes one gender better than the other. >until Damore can propose a model that predicts another number Why? All he did was put forth evidence and suggest that 50/50 might not be ideal, why must another number be presented in order to have a discussion on the subject? Speculation on my part, but is it because it's an easier target to shoot down if you can point to an exact number and claim it's wrong for your own variety of reasons? Obviously, policy changes are going to be a goal if Damore's evidence is proved right (Policy is at the root of the problem according to Damore). Why are you presenting them like two separate things? You're not even considering the fact that the evidence might support his conclusions. >diversity as a whole(race not just gender) Because whenever diversity is discussed, it is almost done so as a whole. Obviously Damore wanted to focus on gender, but diversity initiatives virtually always include both. It would seem awkward to avoid race entirely. And he never made any claims on just race, go to the memo and ctrl-f "race". Every time it appears, it's accompanied by "and/or gender". In several of these cases, it's because a study he's citing mentions both. I would call that being thorough, not intellectually dishonest. >These studies may be good science, but stringing them together to confirm a conclusion you'd already set your sights in making is bad science. You can make this claim about any paper that claims something not trivially arguable from scientific studies. To say this, you have to go through piecewise and show why the connections he's making from solid scientific studies don't apply to his arguments.
- richmarr 9y ago
  > Ok, no one owes anyone a debate, unless... I'd like... This is still just about what you'd like to happen. The rest of that argument is circular. > Please don't do this. What he claimed was that women have less inclination... Damore specifically mentions "abilities" although others have debated his exact intention in that line. I don't see value in reopening that. Regardless, what you're missing is that interest, ability and environment are far from mutually exclusive traits. See my other comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15026234 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15026234 > Why? All he did was put forth evidence and suggest that 50/50 might not be ideal... Because Damore went as far as policy changes. To make an HR policy you need objectives, or at least direction... to know whether you should be aiming for a 49:51 gender ratio or a 10:90 gender ratio. If there's no proposed effect size how does Google's HR team know if they're heading in the right direction? Some people may not want employers like Google to get into 'social engineering' as Damore puts it, but the reality is that there's a mountain of evidence that hiring bias has a large effect, so the idea that a company like Google wouldn't try to measure and optimise in that area is clearly not going to fly.
thinkfurther 9y ago
> commonly it's implied that "if you walk away from the debate therefore you are wrong", which is fallacious. Nobody owes you a debate. You might be wrong, you might be right, either way that does mean forfeiting the debate. It's like folding in poker -- yeah, you might have great cards, but you folded, and nobody owes you any of the money on the table. > Then the initial argument needs to start from a place of "intellectual honesty". Uhm, no. Might as well say assuming a 50/50 ratio to be free of bias is not intellectually honest, so "they started it". And then those could in turn point to someone else, and so on.
- richmarr 9y ago
  > ...you might have great cards, but you folded, and nobody owes you any of the money on the table. No. Damore had to win. His opponents just had to not lose. Google has invested massive resources and thought into their hiring process. The debate for change was started clumsily. Damore triggered a threat response that caused a good portion of one side to walk away from the debate, but he was pushed out too. So the status quo persists.
  - thinkfurther 9y ago
    His opponents have egg on their faces, and they just keep spreading it around more. Like that cartoon dog reading sitting in a burning house saying "this is fine". That's what I see. They painted themselves into a corner they're now too cowardly to get out of, and other cowards is all they now have. Damore on the other hand is still a bright young (and cute) guy with his integrity intact.
bostonscott 9y ago
"but this memo was a mistake and showed poor judgement and more than a little bias" "openness" and "freedom" are core values of Google. Even in a scenario where someone made effective arguments refuting all of James' key points, a "one strike and you're out" policy seems antithetical to Google's culture. Or any healthy culture for that matter. If James wrote what you said he did above (I think you mischaracterize him greatly), and if his ideas are as poorly constructed as you suggest they are, surely Google employs someone intelligent enough to go point by point through his memo and really school him. Such a response would do more to build a case for the worldview you appear to espouse than the lazy, generalized retorts being lobbed his way.
- richmarr 9y ago
  > If James wrote what you said he did above, (I think you mischaracterize him greatly)... By all means ignore the part relating to honesty/competence, I'd probably apologise to him for that if I met him so probably shouldn't have written it. Most of my comments however speak to his actions so are not a matter of characterisation. > ...surely Google employs someone intelligent enough to go point by point through his memo and really school him They do. They have. However, Damore violated Google's code of conduct and by extension his conditions of employment. That's not a line any employer of thousands can play coy with in the name of educating one individual. > Such a response would do more to build a case for the worldview you appear to espouse than the lazy, generalized retorts being lobbed his way. Who's mischaracterising now? Sorry boss, you haven't read the right responses. I link to some better ones from mine: https://medium.com/finding-needles-in-haystacks/we-need-to-talk-about-james-2ca1143dbae4 https://medium.com/finding-needles-in-haystacks/we-need-to-t...

weberc2 9y ago

Having unconscious bias or otherwise being incorrect doesn't make you intellectually dishonest. Whether or not his claims are true, Damore presented a much more metered and reasonable argument than virtually all of his detractors or even published social pundits.

richmarr 9y ago
> Having unconscious bias or otherwise being incorrect doesn't make you intellectually dishonest. If you purport to be a (competent) scientist in the 21st century then personally I expected you to be highly aware of biases such as publication bias & confirmation bias and act accordingly. That speaks either to his discipline/understanding or his honesty, I don't know which. > Whether or not his claims are true, Damore presented a much more metered and reasonable argument than virtually all of his detractors or even published social pundits. Damore was metered, but understandably triggered a threat response in the people who his memo targeted as being below "the bar". You may have read a selection of counter-arguments, some of which will be less "metered and reasonable" than his. Unfortunately the emotional tenor of an argument is not the measure of its merit.
- Seenti 9y ago
  >That speaks either to his discipline/understanding or his honesty, I don't know which. You're holding him to an unbelievably high standard that is never applied to those making the case that gender disparities are due to societal discrimination. I can't imagine you're being driven to apply this standard to him by anything other than a preconceived notion that women are underrepresented in engineering due to sexism and that anyone that disagrees is a misogynist. >Damore was metered, but understandably triggered a threat response in the people who his memo targeted as being below "the bar". Damore did not target anyone as below the bar. He made a statistical observation about the distribution of personality types among gender groups and how that would play out in gender representation in various occupations, to counter the discrimination-as-cause-of-disparity narrative. No individual was cast as below the bar due to their gender. The threat response was immature.
  - richmarr 9y ago
    > You're holding him to an unbelievably high standard that is never applied to those making the case that gender disparities are due to societal discrimination. No, this is wrong. Societal discrimination is directly measurable at the point of hiring. There are a mountain of studies measuring this. It simply doesn't require modelling the effect as it propagates through society. As I've mentioned elsewhere, nobody is claiming that bias is the only factor involved, but it's one we can measure and act on. > Damore did not target anyone as below the bar... The threat response was immature Aside from explicitly saying "lowers the bar", explicitly saying "I’m simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes" and making multiple references to lower drive, mathematical ability, etc. Please. As you know, threat responses aren't driven by 'maturity' they're driven by percieved threat. Damore's clumsy language caused people at Google to be afraid, and justifiably so. He may have intended to spark a dialog but his words are confrontational. Don't confront people on this topic because you'll often get a fight/flight response. Instead you must engage and build trust.
    - weberc2 9y ago
      As I understand it, the data about discrimination in hiring are mixed, but I'm interested in learning more. Your threat response point seems like dressing up a group's overreaction to make it justifiable. It's also another example of different standards being applied to liberal groups vs conservatives groups (offending conservative groups is basically a sacrament, but saying anything that can be remotely twisted into an offensive statement toward a liberal group is nearly criminal). I've never seen anyone make any sort of threat-response/justifiable-offense argument when conservatives are upset about, say, "blasphemy day" or just the constant misrepresentation in the media. In particular though, there's nothing which should remotely cause offense, even in the selection of quotes you shared (but good on you for quoting and not taking offense at strawman--very few of Damore's critics have been so kind). Damore's arguments (however factual) were better than I could make, but it's ridiculous that the criticism is that he didn't successfully prevent everyone from taking offense. He couldn't have done more to prevent offense without damaging his own case. I think this is another case of the left refusing to be pacified by anything less than complete political capitulation. Meanwhile any sort of expression from liberal groups, even defamation or riots, are defended, and any one who criticizes them have impossible standards. The double standards here should be unbelievable.

keganunderwood 9y ago

Yes you can walk away but no you can't say "you're {{}}phobe and then walk away. Take my example. I have not read the memo. I shouldn't say the memo is unscientific and homophobic because I have no clue what it says.

barrkel 9y ago

Damore then started making HR policy proposals. We use a 50/50 gender ratio as an indicator that a particular field is free from bias. It's one thing to propose that 50/50 is not the natural ratio to end up with, but until Damore can propose a model that predicts another number then proposing HR policy changes put the cart before the horse. I deeply disagree with this approach. You're essentially saying that unless you can come up with an alternative scientific theory, complete with predictions, it's not possible to criticise an existing theory about the world. There's many plausible explanations why an absence of a 50:50 gender representation could be caused for reasons other than bias or average ability. That's enough to put a nail in that model of discovering bias. Coming up with a way of predicting what the right ratio is, isn't necessary to discard that metric.

comex 9y ago
I agree with your statement, but... I think part of the problem is what the memo says and what it doesn’t say. It’s entirely plausible that the ‘natural’ ratio is not exactly 50:50. But as of last year, among Google tech workers, the ratio was 81:19, and that’s with all the affirmative-actiony programs Damore wanted to back off on; in the past it was higher. It’s quite a bit less plausible that intrinsic differences could explain all or even most of that big a discrepancy, especially combined with the many anecdotes of discrimination we hear about. Now, to be fair, the memo never explicitly claims that it does; indeed, at one point it specifically says “in part”. But the tone of the memo, the relative lack of time spent acknowledging the large role played by cultural factors, makes it sound like Damore thinks the natural ratio is at least pretty close to the current one. And that’s simply wrong.
- bluecalm 9y ago
  How do you know it's wrong? If the ratio among CS graduates is 80-20 then it's natural it's still 80-20 when hiring at Google (not taking into account other factors which may tilt it even more in direction of men). You may ask why it's 80-20 among CS graduates. One hypothesis is that women are just less interested in tech and in presence of many other choices they choose different paths. In the past there weren't as many choices that's why women were forced to go into programming (that's why there were more women in programming several decades ago).

Al-Khwarizmi 9y ago

Damore presented evidence to support his claim that women are on average less able than men in areas relevant to engineering. He didn't. He just claimed that they are on average less interested in those areas. There is no mention at all of ability in the memo, only in the manipulated press pieces.

salvar 9y ago
He did not state that women had a harder time leading than men? That seems like a mention of ability.
- yorwba 9y ago
  Google apparently already had a women-only program that was predicated on the assumption that women have a harder time leading than men. So it doesn't seem like Damore's claim was particularly unusual within Google.
  - salvar 9y ago
    My comment was to refute the statement that Damore never mentioned ability in his memo.
christinamltn 9y ago
He did: > 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.

Houshalter 9y ago

>Damore presented evidence to support his claim that women are on average less able than men in areas relevant to engineering. His claim was that women are statistically less likely to be interested in computer science. He said nothing about ability. >It's one thing to propose that 50/50 is not the natural ratio to end up with, but until Damore can propose a model that predicts another number then proposing HR policy changes put the cart before the horse. He gave lots of numbers. 20% is about the percentage of female computer science graduates. Targeting anything above that would necessarily require discriminating against men. >Damore's proposals discuss diversity as a whole (race not just gender) without a single word of justification I don't see any mention of race in the memo. When Damore is talking about "diversity" he always is talking about gender diversity. >>He didn't discuss veracity, or contradictory evidence. That's textbook confirmation bias, not intellectual honesty. >This indicates that the policy changes are what James in interested in, not the evidence. More confirmation bias. >it's certainly not intellectual honesty... >stringing them together to confirm a conclusion you'd already set your sights in making is bad science. I've been asked to edit my comment to make it less argumentative. Could you do the same for yours? Calling someone you disagree with "intellectually dishonest", etc, is not good taste. It's very easy to learn about biases like confirmation bias, and fall into the trap of only applying that knowledge to other people. "He only disagrees with me because of confirmation bias. He's just intellectually dishonest." You can't possibly know the thought process behind another person. As far as we know Damore did the research and found these facts convincing and developed his view. Not the other way around. Or at least someone presented these facts to him and then he developed the view he has. In any case, this is how all debates work. People present evidence for their beliefs and the other side responds with refutations and evidence for theirs. There is nothing wrong or intellectually dishonest about this.

dang 9y ago
Your comments have been crossing into incivility and flamewar. Would you please make a u-turn and fix that? These threads are divisive enough without careless commenting.
- Houshalter 9y ago

wwweston 9y ago

> Damore then started making HR policy proposals. We use a 50/50 gender ratio as an indicator that a particular field is free from bias. It's one thing to propose that 50/50 is not the natural ratio to end up with, but until Damore can propose a model that predicts another number then proposing HR policy changes put the cart before the horse. This seems to assume that the only way to measure or achieve equitable hiring is to measure the representation of identity groups across a given position and make sure it tracks their makeup in the general population. It's not clear to me that there aren't other acceptable methods of trying to make things equitable. For example, you could check that applicants from different identity groups succeed in being hired at about the same rate. That's a practice that should direct an organization towards equitable results whether the reality is that women are underrepresented because of sexism in hiring or the reality is that women are represented in different proportion because of the endeavors they tend to prefer. And also for a reality that's a mix of both (which I suspect is the way of things). Also: if the primary accepted standard becomes to match representation in a position with an identity's representation in the population, it seems pretty likely that over time it would become more difficult over time to predict a "natural" ratio.

smallnamespace 9y ago
Or just make the entirely hiring process completely gender and race blind by hiding the name and salient biographical details of the applicant. This solves two problems: 1) the hiring process is blinded and 2) you can demonstrate to the whole world that it's blinded. As a side bonus, you get to eliminate other implicit biases that are part of the hiring process, like people preferring people who act like them.
- brenschluss 9y ago
  But you don't get to account for systematic bias, such as who has had opportunities and encouragement to even apply in the first place.
  - smallnamespace 9y ago
    But practically speaking, the hiring process is not the right place to rectify those disparities. Fix problems at the source, don't apply hack after hack to route around it.

nicolashahn 9y ago

> You can, and some people have, and that's okay. Ok, no one owes anyone a debate, unless you're going to call it wrong, sexist, harmful, etc. Then in that case, I'd like some reasoning behind it. Either don't debate, or do and do it right. > women are on average less able Please don't do this. What he claimed was that women have less inclination to go into tech due to various pressures, some biological. If you're referring to his referencing the 'big five' personality traits, you'll note that he addresses both positively and negatively associated traits of both men and women in regards to working with software. He never stated that the combination of differences makes one gender better than the other. >until Damore can propose a model that predicts another number Why? All he did was put forth evidence and suggest that 50/50 might not be ideal, why must another number be presented in order to have a discussion on the subject? Speculation on my part, but is it because it's an easier target to shoot down if you can point to an exact number and claim it's wrong for your own variety of reasons? Obviously, policy changes are going to be a goal if Damore's evidence is proved right (Policy is at the root of the problem according to Damore). Why are you presenting them like two separate things? You're not even considering the fact that the evidence might support his conclusions. >diversity as a whole(race not just gender) Because whenever diversity is discussed, it is almost done so as a whole. Obviously Damore wanted to focus on gender, but diversity initiatives virtually always include both. It would seem awkward to avoid race entirely. And he never made any claims on just race, go to the memo and ctrl-f "race". Every time it appears, it's accompanied by "and/or gender". In several of these cases, it's because a study he's citing mentions both. I would call that being thorough, not intellectually dishonest. >These studies may be good science, but stringing them together to confirm a conclusion you'd already set your sights in making is bad science. You can make this claim about any paper that claims something not trivially arguable from scientific studies. To say this, you have to go through piecewise and show why the connections he's making from solid scientific studies don't apply to his arguments.

richmarr 9y ago
> Ok, no one owes anyone a debate, unless... I'd like... This is still just about what you'd like to happen. The rest of that argument is circular. > Please don't do this. What he claimed was that women have less inclination... Damore specifically mentions "abilities" although others have debated his exact intention in that line. I don't see value in reopening that. Regardless, what you're missing is that interest, ability and environment are far from mutually exclusive traits. See my other comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15026234 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15026234 > Why? All he did was put forth evidence and suggest that 50/50 might not be ideal... Because Damore went as far as policy changes. To make an HR policy you need objectives, or at least direction... to know whether you should be aiming for a 49:51 gender ratio or a 10:90 gender ratio. If there's no proposed effect size how does Google's HR team know if they're heading in the right direction? Some people may not want employers like Google to get into 'social engineering' as Damore puts it, but the reality is that there's a mountain of evidence that hiring bias has a large effect, so the idea that a company like Google wouldn't try to measure and optimise in that area is clearly not going to fly.

thinkfurther 9y ago

> commonly it's implied that "if you walk away from the debate therefore you are wrong", which is fallacious. Nobody owes you a debate. You might be wrong, you might be right, either way that does mean forfeiting the debate. It's like folding in poker -- yeah, you might have great cards, but you folded, and nobody owes you any of the money on the table. > Then the initial argument needs to start from a place of "intellectual honesty". Uhm, no. Might as well say assuming a 50/50 ratio to be free of bias is not intellectually honest, so "they started it". And then those could in turn point to someone else, and so on.

richmarr 9y ago
> ...you might have great cards, but you folded, and nobody owes you any of the money on the table. No. Damore had to win. His opponents just had to not lose. Google has invested massive resources and thought into their hiring process. The debate for change was started clumsily. Damore triggered a threat response that caused a good portion of one side to walk away from the debate, but he was pushed out too. So the status quo persists.
- thinkfurther 9y ago
  His opponents have egg on their faces, and they just keep spreading it around more. Like that cartoon dog reading sitting in a burning house saying "this is fine". That's what I see. They painted themselves into a corner they're now too cowardly to get out of, and other cowards is all they now have. Damore on the other hand is still a bright young (and cute) guy with his integrity intact.

bostonscott 9y ago

"but this memo was a mistake and showed poor judgement and more than a little bias" "openness" and "freedom" are core values of Google. Even in a scenario where someone made effective arguments refuting all of James' key points, a "one strike and you're out" policy seems antithetical to Google's culture. Or any healthy culture for that matter. If James wrote what you said he did above (I think you mischaracterize him greatly), and if his ideas are as poorly constructed as you suggest they are, surely Google employs someone intelligent enough to go point by point through his memo and really school him. Such a response would do more to build a case for the worldview you appear to espouse than the lazy, generalized retorts being lobbed his way.

richmarr 9y ago
> If James wrote what you said he did above, (I think you mischaracterize him greatly)... By all means ignore the part relating to honesty/competence, I'd probably apologise to him for that if I met him so probably shouldn't have written it. Most of my comments however speak to his actions so are not a matter of characterisation. > ...surely Google employs someone intelligent enough to go point by point through his memo and really school him They do. They have. However, Damore violated Google's code of conduct and by extension his conditions of employment. That's not a line any employer of thousands can play coy with in the name of educating one individual. > Such a response would do more to build a case for the worldview you appear to espouse than the lazy, generalized retorts being lobbed his way. Who's mischaracterising now? Sorry boss, you haven't read the right responses. I link to some better ones from mine: https://medium.com/finding-needles-in-haystacks/we-need-to-talk-about-james-2ca1143dbae4 https://medium.com/finding-needles-in-haystacks/we-need-to-t...