3 ms·

You'd dare to be wrong: http://134.173.180.115/berger/pdf/Halpern2007.SciSexDif.Pub.pdf http://134.173.180.115/berger/pdf/Halpern2007.SciSexDif.Pub....

by moldbug 14y ago

asciilifeform 14y ago
Do you see any evidence that the rank-and-file software developer lives on the far-right-edge of the bell curve? Software developers are largely male for the same reason that construction crews and prisoners are - rather than the reason Nobel Prize winners in Physics are. What, if anything, there is to be gained by encouraging women to join men in wasting their lives away in the IT salt mines, is another question entirely.
- rada 14y ago
  What, if anything, there is to be gained by encouraging women to join men in wasting their lives away in the IT salt mines, is another question entirely. You make more than your peers and your boss. It takes a couple days to land multiple job offers, in any economy, all you have to do is stop saying no. The work is intellectually gratifying and the results are immediately visible. You are largely immune from corporate politics. The list goes on and on. How can you be stuck in the salt mines when it's been the programmers' market for so long? I am genuinely interested - I hear this sentiment every once in a while and it always baffles me. I've done web development for 10 years (NYC/Midwest) and it's been nothing but gravy. Some lumps, yes, but gravy nonetheless.
  - asciilifeform 14y ago
    > How can you be stuck in the salt mines... > The work is intellectually gratifying Most likely, this is where we differ. The only programming work that I find truly gratifying happens to be my 100%-non-monetizable life project. (http://www.loper-os.org http://www.loper-os.org) Everything else is just a way to pay the bills. That is to say, salt mine labor. In order to eat and pay rent, I burn my prime waking hours working on things other than my life project. I understand that, given our present social structure, this is unavoidable. But I don't have to pretend to like it. I suppose this makes me a "bad prostitute," rather than a "good" one. Programming sucks. So I am not particularly upset that there aren't more women doing the work, just as the lack of female coal miners is likewise not a cruel injustice.
    - secoif 14y ago
      Sounds like you desperately need a new profession. If you don't do it for love, you're wasting your life.
      - cellis 14y ago
        This sounds pretty naive. Just because someone doesn't do something they love now, doesn't mean they're wasting their life. It may simply mean they like eating rather than starving.
      - asciilifeform 14y ago
        I don't think you really understood my reply. I have a life project. What is sometimes called a calling. (If you don't, you probably cannot process what I am saying and should disregard this post.) So whenever I am doing some other work - anything at all - other than my calling - to pay for food and housing - I am acting under duress. Which isn't much fun. Of course, some kinds of forced labor suck more than others. I could be felling trees, or laying pipes, or something even more physically unpleasant. So overall, programming for money is far from the worst among possible fates. And often, even persons who lack a calling and for whom all work is just work, "just switching professions" is not an option. For a different perspective on why many programmers stay in their line of work despite hating it, consider this book: "Desperate Journeys, Abandoned Souls: True Stories of Castaways and Other Survivors" (http://books.google.com/books/about/Desperate_Journeys_Abandoned_Souls.html?id=X0_S5AtHuY0C http://books.google.com/books/about/Desperate_Journeys_Aband...). It is largely about shipwrecked sailors. One of the more interesting facts about these is how many kept at their profession despite suffering wreck after wreck - witnessing murder, cannibalism, and various other unpleasant things. The explanation offered by the author is that sailors typically entered their trade during childhood, and were largely unfit (by their own estimate as well as that of others) for any other work. I started programming when I was nine years old. And perhaps you did so, or know those who did, at an even earlier age. This is not necessarily true for all such people, but switching professions after having your whole development as a person wrapped around computing can be like being asked to switch to being left- (or right-, as the case may be) handed, late in life.
    - 14y ago

You'd dare to be wrong: http://134.173.180.115/berger/pdf/Halpern2007.SciSexDif.Pub.pdf http://134.173.180.115/berger/pdf/Halpern2007.SciSexDif.Pub....

by moldbug 14y ago

You'd dare to be wrong: http://134.173.180.115/berger/pdf/Halpern2007.SciSexDif.Pub.pdf http://134.173.180.115/berger/pdf/Halpern2007.SciSexDif.Pub....

asciilifeform 14y ago

Do you see any evidence that the rank-and-file software developer lives on the far-right-edge of the bell curve? Software developers are largely male for the same reason that construction crews and prisoners are - rather than the reason Nobel Prize winners in Physics are. What, if anything, there is to be gained by encouraging women to join men in wasting their lives away in the IT salt mines, is another question entirely.

rada 14y ago
What, if anything, there is to be gained by encouraging women to join men in wasting their lives away in the IT salt mines, is another question entirely. You make more than your peers and your boss. It takes a couple days to land multiple job offers, in any economy, all you have to do is stop saying no. The work is intellectually gratifying and the results are immediately visible. You are largely immune from corporate politics. The list goes on and on. How can you be stuck in the salt mines when it's been the programmers' market for so long? I am genuinely interested - I hear this sentiment every once in a while and it always baffles me. I've done web development for 10 years (NYC/Midwest) and it's been nothing but gravy. Some lumps, yes, but gravy nonetheless.
- asciilifeform 14y ago
  > How can you be stuck in the salt mines... > The work is intellectually gratifying Most likely, this is where we differ. The only programming work that I find truly gratifying happens to be my 100%-non-monetizable life project. (http://www.loper-os.org http://www.loper-os.org) Everything else is just a way to pay the bills. That is to say, salt mine labor. In order to eat and pay rent, I burn my prime waking hours working on things other than my life project. I understand that, given our present social structure, this is unavoidable. But I don't have to pretend to like it. I suppose this makes me a "bad prostitute," rather than a "good" one. Programming sucks. So I am not particularly upset that there aren't more women doing the work, just as the lack of female coal miners is likewise not a cruel injustice.
  - secoif 14y ago
    Sounds like you desperately need a new profession. If you don't do it for love, you're wasting your life.
    - cellis 14y ago
      This sounds pretty naive. Just because someone doesn't do something they love now, doesn't mean they're wasting their life. It may simply mean they like eating rather than starving.
    - asciilifeform 14y ago
      I don't think you really understood my reply. I have a life project. What is sometimes called a calling. (If you don't, you probably cannot process what I am saying and should disregard this post.) So whenever I am doing some other work - anything at all - other than my calling - to pay for food and housing - I am acting under duress. Which isn't much fun. Of course, some kinds of forced labor suck more than others. I could be felling trees, or laying pipes, or something even more physically unpleasant. So overall, programming for money is far from the worst among possible fates. And often, even persons who lack a calling and for whom all work is just work, "just switching professions" is not an option. For a different perspective on why many programmers stay in their line of work despite hating it, consider this book: "Desperate Journeys, Abandoned Souls: True Stories of Castaways and Other Survivors" (http://books.google.com/books/about/Desperate_Journeys_Abandoned_Souls.html?id=X0_S5AtHuY0C http://books.google.com/books/about/Desperate_Journeys_Aband...). It is largely about shipwrecked sailors. One of the more interesting facts about these is how many kept at their profession despite suffering wreck after wreck - witnessing murder, cannibalism, and various other unpleasant things. The explanation offered by the author is that sailors typically entered their trade during childhood, and were largely unfit (by their own estimate as well as that of others) for any other work. I started programming when I was nine years old. And perhaps you did so, or know those who did, at an even earlier age. This is not necessarily true for all such people, but switching professions after having your whole development as a person wrapped around computing can be like being asked to switch to being left- (or right-, as the case may be) handed, late in life.
  - 14y ago