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I gather you assign a lower prior to cognitive variations - that's fine. No point debating that at the moment, it's just an example to show what evidence might

I gather you assign a lower prior to cognitive variations - that's fine. No point debating that at the moment, it's just an example to show what evidence might look like: a downward sloping graph with your predictor on the X-axis and %female on the Y. You don't have that graph. All you have is vague theories like "bog-standard human behavior prevents women from entering a field". This theory predicts that every historically male field should remain historically male, which is false.

tptacek 12y ago
Every historically male field will remain male in the absence of a focused effort to improve balance, which is what happened in the demanding (and often quantitatively rigorous) professions that improved women's participation, and what's being contested in computer science. I am not making an extraordinary claim. I am looking at the numbers for female participation in CS, noticing that they are anomalous, all the more so given the relative size of the CS professions (they are enormous, which should have helped smooth out the anomaly), noting the incentives for participation (CS professions are, relative to the effort it takes to enter the field, well compensated, flexible, geographically well distributed, and not physically demanding) and observing that there are only two logical explanations: (a) Social and process factors are having the effect of encouraging male participation and discouraging female participation, or (b) Women are intrinsically sharply less capable of performing in software development despite a demonstrated ability to perform in law, accounting, medicine, and even other STEM fields. In the absence of something much more compelling than a blog post on slatestarcodex, I feel pretty comfortable ruling out (b).
- yummyfajitas 12y ago
  So where is your evidence that quantitative fields did not have this "focused effort", but non-quantitative fields did? Can you present some evidence of focused effort in medicine, law and biology but none in computing and aerospace engineering? I.e., do you have an upward sloping graph with focused effort on the X and %female on the Y?
  - tptacek 12y ago
    You can for instance read through 'rayiner's comments on how this happened in law.
    - yummyfajitas 12y ago
      I skimmed his comments, he hints it was discriminatory affirmative action but doesn't say much in detail. It's hardly clear that engineering and STEM didn't do the same thing - in fact, we know they have done this for some time. I find it a bit surprising that you are so unconvinced by Scott Alexander's actual quantitative data (not to mention all the other academic studies I linked to), yet find vague hints at a single datapoint to be proof positive of an alternate hypothesis.
      - tptacek 12y ago
        In the face of a gigantic participation gap, I am not persuaded by numerology. I don't find the data you have on this issue to be particularly compelling. I think it relies primarily on a vain misconception a lot of people have about the demands on software developers. I think you find it persuasive because you work in a small specialty of CS that is particularly math-oriented (even if I don't buy that your facts apply to your particular specialty).
        yummyfajitas 12y ago
        So in the face of weak but suggestive data, we should instead accept an alternate hypothesis with a single data point vaguely alluded to?
        tptacek 12y ago
        "Single data point vaguely alluded to". That's funny. Women compromise 20% of the software development workforce. For every woman developer, there are four men. Against that fact, you've got statistical studies on the variance of quantitative ability between men and women which purport to explain why women don't chair math departments and win Fields Medals, and which you'd also like to use to explain why there are four men writing SQL queries to every woman.

tptacek 12y ago

Every historically male field will remain male in the absence of a focused effort to improve balance, which is what happened in the demanding (and often quantitatively rigorous) professions that improved women's participation, and what's being contested in computer science. I am not making an extraordinary claim. I am looking at the numbers for female participation in CS, noticing that they are anomalous, all the more so given the relative size of the CS professions (they are enormous, which should have helped smooth out the anomaly), noting the incentives for participation (CS professions are, relative to the effort it takes to enter the field, well compensated, flexible, geographically well distributed, and not physically demanding) and observing that there are only two logical explanations: (a) Social and process factors are having the effect of encouraging male participation and discouraging female participation, or (b) Women are intrinsically sharply less capable of performing in software development despite a demonstrated ability to perform in law, accounting, medicine, and even other STEM fields. In the absence of something much more compelling than a blog post on slatestarcodex, I feel pretty comfortable ruling out (b).

yummyfajitas 12y ago
So where is your evidence that quantitative fields did not have this "focused effort", but non-quantitative fields did? Can you present some evidence of focused effort in medicine, law and biology but none in computing and aerospace engineering? I.e., do you have an upward sloping graph with focused effort on the X and %female on the Y?
- tptacek 12y ago
  You can for instance read through 'rayiner's comments on how this happened in law.
  - yummyfajitas 12y ago
    I skimmed his comments, he hints it was discriminatory affirmative action but doesn't say much in detail. It's hardly clear that engineering and STEM didn't do the same thing - in fact, we know they have done this for some time. I find it a bit surprising that you are so unconvinced by Scott Alexander's actual quantitative data (not to mention all the other academic studies I linked to), yet find vague hints at a single datapoint to be proof positive of an alternate hypothesis.
    - tptacek 12y ago
      In the face of a gigantic participation gap, I am not persuaded by numerology. I don't find the data you have on this issue to be particularly compelling. I think it relies primarily on a vain misconception a lot of people have about the demands on software developers. I think you find it persuasive because you work in a small specialty of CS that is particularly math-oriented (even if I don't buy that your facts apply to your particular specialty).
      - yummyfajitas 12y ago
        So in the face of weak but suggestive data, we should instead accept an alternate hypothesis with a single data point vaguely alluded to?
        tptacek 12y ago
        "Single data point vaguely alluded to". That's funny. Women compromise 20% of the software development workforce. For every woman developer, there are four men. Against that fact, you've got statistical studies on the variance of quantitative ability between men and women which purport to explain why women don't chair math departments and win Fields Medals, and which you'd also like to use to explain why there are four men writing SQL queries to every woman.