5 ms·

Sure, my point is why does that matter? The correlation with ice hockey could be a career relevant detail because of correlation with discipline and pain toler

Sure, my point is why does that matter? The correlation with ice hockey could be a career relevant detail because of correlation with discipline and pain tolerance. If it tracks all such signals, I don’t see the problem. That it also has a circumstantial correlation with races isn’t inherently problematic — it could be that different groups of people are differently qualified. There seems to be a position that culture is uncorrelated to job success, and that’s just nonsense. When people can show me these biases are correlated to race or sex once controlling for culture, then we have a problem.

TheCoelacanth 7y ago
Good luck with that argument in court.
michaelmior 7y ago
Race and culture are two very different things. There certainly can be some correlation, but drawing conclusions of suitability for employment based on race is a problem.
- FakeComments 7y ago
  I agree — race and culture are very different things. That’s why it’s only meaningful to draw these conclusions once you control for cultural variation. No one has shown that they drew conclusions based on race: they drew conclusions based on written words, which correlated with race. The claim is that this demonstrates racial discrimination. However, an equally valid explanation is culture as a confounding variable correlated with both race and hiring, and which is the actual causative factor. My point is that no one has shown this is hiring based on race, because the only things being judged are cultural artifacts. It’s merely presumed that anything correlated with race is inherently racist, when that’s not true. No one has even remotely tried to address that, including yourself, preferring to merely assume it’s racism or special pleading like “well, there is some correlation — but without doing the math, I know that can’t be it!” (All these same point apply to sexism.)
  - michaelmior 7y ago
    You're right, I didn't try to address it. I also didn't make any assumptions of racism in my comment. However, generally speaking, I don't think one culture is better than another either and discrimination based on culture is also a problem. (I understand that this is an opinion and many would disagree with me on that point.)
    - FakeComments 7y ago
      It’s an absolute nonsense opinion, because there are obviously cultural beliefs that have an impact on work performance, particularly over a lifetime — eg, beliefs in honesty, hard work, and obtaining education. Different cultures place different values on these things, and it leads to different outcomes — even just looking at the impact of cultural drift over time, among a single people. I also find it absolutely abhorrent to claim there is no ethical difference in whether or not groups of humans cut the clitorises off young girls or own slaves, as you’ve done here. That’s what it means to say you don’t believe some cultures are better: that it’s just fine to mutilate children and own other humans, because hey, that’s just a cultural belief. You’re so woke, your brain broke.
      - dang 7y ago
        If you keep doing ideological flamewars on HN we will ban you. Also, if you keep doing personal attacks on HN we will ban you. Please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and follow the rules when posting here from now on.
        FakeComments 7y ago
        Again, I wish you would admit to ideological censorship: You’re simply using etiquette as a guise for people who don’t want to have an honest discussion about the relevant philosophy (or in this case, the actual logic involved in the inference) to shut it down in favor of group think. This problem is so widespread among the tech community, Congress is talking about it. Just look at how fast this was downvoted and flagged — the point is to silence wrongthink. Censorship for etiquette has always been used as a tool of political coercion — and I simply don’t take your vague claims I broke decorum, which always target one side of a sensitive issue, seriously. You can absolutely use your power in your fiefdom; but you can’t use it to make me not talk honestly about issues — only remove me. You’re just a political thug, who doesn’t like honest, blunt language. Show me. Ed: There’s hundreds of comments like this without a peep, because they’re rightthink: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19763553 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19763553
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

TheCoelacanth 7y ago

Good luck with that argument in court.

michaelmior 7y ago

Race and culture are two very different things. There certainly can be some correlation, but drawing conclusions of suitability for employment based on race is a problem.

FakeComments 7y ago
I agree — race and culture are very different things. That’s why it’s only meaningful to draw these conclusions once you control for cultural variation. No one has shown that they drew conclusions based on race: they drew conclusions based on written words, which correlated with race. The claim is that this demonstrates racial discrimination. However, an equally valid explanation is culture as a confounding variable correlated with both race and hiring, and which is the actual causative factor. My point is that no one has shown this is hiring based on race, because the only things being judged are cultural artifacts. It’s merely presumed that anything correlated with race is inherently racist, when that’s not true. No one has even remotely tried to address that, including yourself, preferring to merely assume it’s racism or special pleading like “well, there is some correlation — but without doing the math, I know that can’t be it!” (All these same point apply to sexism.)
- michaelmior 7y ago
  You're right, I didn't try to address it. I also didn't make any assumptions of racism in my comment. However, generally speaking, I don't think one culture is better than another either and discrimination based on culture is also a problem. (I understand that this is an opinion and many would disagree with me on that point.)
  - FakeComments 7y ago
    It’s an absolute nonsense opinion, because there are obviously cultural beliefs that have an impact on work performance, particularly over a lifetime — eg, beliefs in honesty, hard work, and obtaining education. Different cultures place different values on these things, and it leads to different outcomes — even just looking at the impact of cultural drift over time, among a single people. I also find it absolutely abhorrent to claim there is no ethical difference in whether or not groups of humans cut the clitorises off young girls or own slaves, as you’ve done here. That’s what it means to say you don’t believe some cultures are better: that it’s just fine to mutilate children and own other humans, because hey, that’s just a cultural belief. You’re so woke, your brain broke.
    - dang 7y ago
      If you keep doing ideological flamewars on HN we will ban you. Also, if you keep doing personal attacks on HN we will ban you. Please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and follow the rules when posting here from now on.
      - FakeComments 7y ago
        Again, I wish you would admit to ideological censorship: You’re simply using etiquette as a guise for people who don’t want to have an honest discussion about the relevant philosophy (or in this case, the actual logic involved in the inference) to shut it down in favor of group think. This problem is so widespread among the tech community, Congress is talking about it. Just look at how fast this was downvoted and flagged — the point is to silence wrongthink. Censorship for etiquette has always been used as a tool of political coercion — and I simply don’t take your vague claims I broke decorum, which always target one side of a sensitive issue, seriously. You can absolutely use your power in your fiefdom; but you can’t use it to make me not talk honestly about issues — only remove me. You’re just a political thug, who doesn’t like honest, blunt language. Show me. Ed: There’s hundreds of comments like this without a peep, because they’re rightthink: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19763553 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19763553

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]