7 ms·

Yes, I saw that. It is yet another of the posts which basically say "the science is not saying that the differences are 100% certain, so somehow that means that

Yes, I saw that. It is yet another of the posts which basically say "the science is not saying that the differences are 100% certain, so somehow that means that Damore is totally wrong". I actually did a half-way pickthrough of that post on twitter, not gonna repeat it here. Annoying enough with 140-character per message limitation. I'm done with this memo.

ubernostrum 9y ago
Well, Damore made some strongly-worded and poorly-cited claims in an attempt to pass off his "science" as somehow uncontroversial and irrefutable. The fact that multiple people have chimed in pointing out that A) it's very far from uncontroversial/irrefutable and B) his arguments are based on studies whose effect sizes would not produce the results we see, is a pretty convincing rebuttal. Also it's telling that "the differences are not 100% certain" is your comment while it's still taken by people on the internet to mean "Damore was absolutely right about everything ever and we should all stop diversity efforts since women are too hobbled by their genetic ladybrains to work in tech in large numbers anyway".
- deepnotderp 9y ago
  >"Damore was absolutely right about everything ever and we should all stop diversity efforts since women are too hobbled by their genetic ladybrains to work in tech in large numbers anyway" Do you want to build a strawman? All we are resisting is being told we are sexist for not having a higher proportion of females in our industry despite having approximately the same proportion of which there are female graduates.
  - pron 9y ago
    No one is asking the tech industry to hire more women engineers than there are graduates. It might just be nice to have a bit fewer women report such horrible experiences working in the industry, so that maybe we'll have more graduates, which everybody should agree is a good thing.
    - deepnotderp 9y ago
      Then, in concrete terms, what DO you want.
    - mpweiher 9y ago
      > No one is asking the tech industry to hire more women engineers than there are graduates Factually wrong. > horrible experiences The plural of anecdote is not data. Here is some data: ACM survey: https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2008/2/5453-women-and-men-in-the-it-profession/fulltext https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2008/2/5453-women-and-men-in-... Overall, women report slightly higher support from companies then men do. Women Leaving Engineering: https://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/NSF_Stemming%20the%20Tide%20Why%20Women%20Leave%20Engineering.pdf https://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/NSF_Stemming%20the%20Tid... #1 reason: "Don't like the actual work". Also, a significant number leave engineering for management. And of course the Ceci/Williams study showing a 2:1 hiring advantage for women for tenure track positions in STEM fields.
      - deepnotderp 9y ago
        SEXIST. /s
      - pron 9y ago
        > #1 reason: "Don't like the actual work". Also, a significant number leave engineering for management. Huh? I don't understand your argument at all. Of course hostile culture isn't the #1 cause! Very rarely are very serious social problems -- even the most serious social problems -- the #1 cause of pain. Poverty and crime aren't the number one causes of death. Lack of jobs isn't the #1 cause of illness etc. What percentage of women experiencing an inhospitable culture (let alone leaving because of it) do you consider acceptable? > And of course the Ceci/Williams study showing a 2:1 hiring advantage for women for tenure track positions in STEM fields. What does this have to do with anything? I don't think you understand what the issue is at all.
        deepnotderp 9y ago
        > > And of course the Ceci/Williams study showing a 2:1 hiring advantage for women for tenure track positions in STEM fields. What does this have to do with anything? I don't think you understand what the issue is at all. His point is that there is no "hand on the other part of the scale holding down women" or whatever quasi-poetic phrase you use.
pron 9y ago
As I explained in another comment (chemical plant pollution), Damore is totally wrong regardless of the merit of the couple of papers he (a layman with zero knowledge or interest in the field) picked. My problem with that medium post is that an actual scientist shouldn't argue with some random dude on the internet who's clearly not interested in learning about the subject, while using actual science (and the very careful, measured wording that is common in this very inexact science). After all, anyone who chooses to believe someone as uncredentialed as Damore, and his explicit non-research in the first place, is unlikely to be persuaded by actual scholarship. I also I would rather we stop treating Damore as someone other than a dude who wrote some memo in an afternoon. He did no original research, no secondary research, and expresses not a single idea we have not read hundreds of times since at least the eighteenth century. Just last week I read a text from 1795 by a Scottish minister who translated some of Leonhard Euler's work, where he says that maybe it's time people would stop repeating the claim that women are naturally incapable of doing science and using that as an excuse to exclude them from learning it. I also think it is misguided to debate the effect size of biological causes just because Damore happened to say something about that, while not starting the discussion with the much better established social causes. Like my pollution analogy, we know social causes exist, we want to fix them as they cause harm, and once we do we can scientifically debate whether nature has indeed decided to imbue women, blacks and Asians with such flawed intelligence, and why the Jews and the French are so smarter than everyone.
- mpweiher 9y ago
  When you have to lie about what your opponent is saying in order to score your points, you’re rarely in the right. In fact, you may be missing that you are actually in agreement.
  - ubernostrum 9y ago
    Before we proceed, please provide a clear, coherent, short summary of what you personally believe Damore's argument is, and then agree to personally commit to that belief for the duration of debate. 99% of the problem of this debate is that his "memo" was so vague in places -- despite being so allegedly well-written! -- that we end up being able to attribute zero claims and zero positions to him, since any alleged position can be disclaimed on vagueness/indirectness, leading to the conclusion that, until someone will commit to interpreting him as making a claim, he apparently wrote a memo which said literally nothing whatsoever.

ubernostrum 9y ago

Well, Damore made some strongly-worded and poorly-cited claims in an attempt to pass off his "science" as somehow uncontroversial and irrefutable. The fact that multiple people have chimed in pointing out that A) it's very far from uncontroversial/irrefutable and B) his arguments are based on studies whose effect sizes would not produce the results we see, is a pretty convincing rebuttal. Also it's telling that "the differences are not 100% certain" is your comment while it's still taken by people on the internet to mean "Damore was absolutely right about everything ever and we should all stop diversity efforts since women are too hobbled by their genetic ladybrains to work in tech in large numbers anyway".

deepnotderp 9y ago
>"Damore was absolutely right about everything ever and we should all stop diversity efforts since women are too hobbled by their genetic ladybrains to work in tech in large numbers anyway" Do you want to build a strawman? All we are resisting is being told we are sexist for not having a higher proportion of females in our industry despite having approximately the same proportion of which there are female graduates.
- pron 9y ago
  No one is asking the tech industry to hire more women engineers than there are graduates. It might just be nice to have a bit fewer women report such horrible experiences working in the industry, so that maybe we'll have more graduates, which everybody should agree is a good thing.
  - deepnotderp 9y ago
    Then, in concrete terms, what DO you want.
  - mpweiher 9y ago
    > No one is asking the tech industry to hire more women engineers than there are graduates Factually wrong. > horrible experiences The plural of anecdote is not data. Here is some data: ACM survey: https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2008/2/5453-women-and-men-in-the-it-profession/fulltext https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2008/2/5453-women-and-men-in-... Overall, women report slightly higher support from companies then men do. Women Leaving Engineering: https://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/NSF_Stemming%20the%20Tide%20Why%20Women%20Leave%20Engineering.pdf https://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/NSF_Stemming%20the%20Tid... #1 reason: "Don't like the actual work". Also, a significant number leave engineering for management. And of course the Ceci/Williams study showing a 2:1 hiring advantage for women for tenure track positions in STEM fields.
    - deepnotderp 9y ago
      SEXIST. /s
    - pron 9y ago
      > #1 reason: "Don't like the actual work". Also, a significant number leave engineering for management. Huh? I don't understand your argument at all. Of course hostile culture isn't the #1 cause! Very rarely are very serious social problems -- even the most serious social problems -- the #1 cause of pain. Poverty and crime aren't the number one causes of death. Lack of jobs isn't the #1 cause of illness etc. What percentage of women experiencing an inhospitable culture (let alone leaving because of it) do you consider acceptable? > And of course the Ceci/Williams study showing a 2:1 hiring advantage for women for tenure track positions in STEM fields. What does this have to do with anything? I don't think you understand what the issue is at all.
      - deepnotderp 9y ago
        > > And of course the Ceci/Williams study showing a 2:1 hiring advantage for women for tenure track positions in STEM fields. What does this have to do with anything? I don't think you understand what the issue is at all. His point is that there is no "hand on the other part of the scale holding down women" or whatever quasi-poetic phrase you use.

pron 9y ago

As I explained in another comment (chemical plant pollution), Damore is totally wrong regardless of the merit of the couple of papers he (a layman with zero knowledge or interest in the field) picked. My problem with that medium post is that an actual scientist shouldn't argue with some random dude on the internet who's clearly not interested in learning about the subject, while using actual science (and the very careful, measured wording that is common in this very inexact science). After all, anyone who chooses to believe someone as uncredentialed as Damore, and his explicit non-research in the first place, is unlikely to be persuaded by actual scholarship. I also I would rather we stop treating Damore as someone other than a dude who wrote some memo in an afternoon. He did no original research, no secondary research, and expresses not a single idea we have not read hundreds of times since at least the eighteenth century. Just last week I read a text from 1795 by a Scottish minister who translated some of Leonhard Euler's work, where he says that maybe it's time people would stop repeating the claim that women are naturally incapable of doing science and using that as an excuse to exclude them from learning it. I also think it is misguided to debate the effect size of biological causes just because Damore happened to say something about that, while not starting the discussion with the much better established social causes. Like my pollution analogy, we know social causes exist, we want to fix them as they cause harm, and once we do we can scientifically debate whether nature has indeed decided to imbue women, blacks and Asians with such flawed intelligence, and why the Jews and the French are so smarter than everyone.

mpweiher 9y ago
When you have to lie about what your opponent is saying in order to score your points, you’re rarely in the right. In fact, you may be missing that you are actually in agreement.
- ubernostrum 9y ago
  Before we proceed, please provide a clear, coherent, short summary of what you personally believe Damore's argument is, and then agree to personally commit to that belief for the duration of debate. 99% of the problem of this debate is that his "memo" was so vague in places -- despite being so allegedly well-written! -- that we end up being able to attribute zero claims and zero positions to him, since any alleged position can be disclaimed on vagueness/indirectness, leading to the conclusion that, until someone will commit to interpreting him as making a claim, he apparently wrote a memo which said literally nothing whatsoever.