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Tom and I disagree on how much of the underrepresentation of women in tech is due to skill deficits. His new platform can answer that question quite effectively

Tom and I disagree on how much of the underrepresentation of women in tech is due to skill deficits. His new platform can answer that question quite effectively. My disagreement with you stems from the fact that I don't believe in any privileged population groups - I only believe in individual rights. I may or may not disagree with you about "power" but so far you've yet to provide a clear definition of it. (I did read your wikipedia links, but they provided multiple disparate and unclear definitions.)

pron 12y ago
> His new platform can answer that question quite effectively. Assuming his game tests for skill and skill alone. Though even if so, it wouldn't explain the difference -- just report it. > I don't believe in any privileged population groups - I only believe in individual rights I don't understand. One of these things is normative (individual rights) and the other is positive (privileged population groups). The existence of privileged population groups is a matter of fact[1] -- no one thinks they should (normatively) exist. As to individual rights -- everybody believes in them, too. The question is what would be their nature. For example, I believe that if the wealthy were allowed to wield their power (money) over the poor unhindered, then the poor should be allowed to wield their power (numbers) unhindered over the rich as well. The point is that power, by definition (see next paragraph), means restricting in some way the freedom of others, so to obtain freedom you must either restrict all power or unloose all power. > they provided multiple disparate and unclear definitions. Perhaps, but not different enough or unclear enough to preclude study or reasoning. The gist of it is, power = the ability to bend (or sway) others to your will. Power is measured by how many people you can sway, and to what degree you can sway them. [1]: For example, that white men are more privileged in America than black men is a fact.
- yummyfajitas 12y ago
  The existence of privileged population groups is a matter of fact[1] -- no one thinks they should (normatively) exist. As a person who cares only about individual rights, I don't care if membership in some particular group is correlated with lack of privilege. If you want to argue that lack of privilege is an individual injustice, fine - but then you need to stop discussing race since there are plenty of privileged blacks/women and underprivileged asians/males. ...not different enough or unclear enough to preclude study or reasoning. You assert that white men are more privileged than black men. The definitions you've provided are insufficient for me to concretely state a test we could run to to disprove that. For example, being black will sway college admissions officers for you but police against you. How do any of these definitions allow me to say that on balance, these things are negative? At what magnitude would the balance become positive? Anyway, this is completely tangential to starfighter.
  - pron 12y ago
    > I don't care if membership in some particular group is correlated with lack of privilege. And what if lack of privilege is caused by association with the group? > If you want to argue that lack of privilege is an individual injustice You may believe in individual rights, but you can't deny group injustice. Blacks were made slaves not due to any individual selection. > For example, being black will sway college admissions officers for you but police against you. How do any of these definitions allow me to say that on balance, these things are negative? At what magnitude would the balance become positive? You can't possibly be serious. But just in case you are, there are clear tests to measure power: money, positions of control in the private and public sectors, positions of control in the media. QED
    - yummyfajitas 12y ago
      I don't deny group injustice. I don't believe injustice based on group membership is worse than any other kind - slavery is an injustice even if it's equal opportunity. Insofar as having bad schools or bad parents is not an injustice, it's also not an injustice if some group has more of them than another. And insofar as such a thing is an injustice, the fact that it's correlated with some group is irrelevant to me. If the only way power can be measured is via outcomes (in this case, I guess a high developer salary?), then I'm not sure why we need a new word to describe it. I also don't get what your point is. I guess you are arguing that smart people don't "deserve" the money/control that comes with a developer job any more than dumb people, and therefore starfighter is a bad thing?
      - pron 12y ago
        Well, group injustice is just individual injustice done to many individuals. And, I think, you would not consider it unfair to demand a robber to pay back the money he's stolen. The problem with underprivileged groups is not the reality of the offense against them, nor the identity of the victim, but the identity of the perpetrator, and this is where study and of power comes in. Because the reality is that human society, like gas molecules, performs many acts not as individuals but as a group (even collective property preceded the invention the first private property), and therefore the perpetrator in the offenses of underprivilege is society as a whole. The actions under discussion are not as acts of nature but acts like for men, acting as a group (and collective action is a positive fact). Assigning individual responsibility is as futile as assigning individual responsibilty to specific gas molecules in expanding a balloon; doing so is just an ineffective model. And what society has stolen as a group (from individuals!) it must pay back as a group. Identifying the victims as a group is just a matter of statistical convenience as well as an aid in the description of the dynamics. That an electron is measured through its effect does not mean that we don't need to describe the electron itself. In fact, it is crucial that we do in order to understand its action. Same thing for power: you almost never observe it directly, but its study, and the term itself, are required in order to understand the workings of society. And as to this game, I don't think it's inherently bad at all, but if its role in society is not studied it might become an unwilling accomplice to injustice. And, if, one day it is somehow discovered that abilities that convey power are dominantly genetic, I do not think that we should give certain jobs to people unsuited to them, but our society is judged not by the achievements of those born to privilege, but by how it takes care of those who lack it. Exactly how this moral obligation should be carried out is a complex matter in itself, and far beyond what I can write here.

pron 12y ago

> His new platform can answer that question quite effectively. Assuming his game tests for skill and skill alone. Though even if so, it wouldn't explain the difference -- just report it. > I don't believe in any privileged population groups - I only believe in individual rights I don't understand. One of these things is normative (individual rights) and the other is positive (privileged population groups). The existence of privileged population groups is a matter of fact[1] -- no one thinks they should (normatively) exist. As to individual rights -- everybody believes in them, too. The question is what would be their nature. For example, I believe that if the wealthy were allowed to wield their power (money) over the poor unhindered, then the poor should be allowed to wield their power (numbers) unhindered over the rich as well. The point is that power, by definition (see next paragraph), means restricting in some way the freedom of others, so to obtain freedom you must either restrict all power or unloose all power. > they provided multiple disparate and unclear definitions. Perhaps, but not different enough or unclear enough to preclude study or reasoning. The gist of it is, power = the ability to bend (or sway) others to your will. Power is measured by how many people you can sway, and to what degree you can sway them. [1]: For example, that white men are more privileged in America than black men is a fact.

yummyfajitas 12y ago
The existence of privileged population groups is a matter of fact[1] -- no one thinks they should (normatively) exist. As a person who cares only about individual rights, I don't care if membership in some particular group is correlated with lack of privilege. If you want to argue that lack of privilege is an individual injustice, fine - but then you need to stop discussing race since there are plenty of privileged blacks/women and underprivileged asians/males. ...not different enough or unclear enough to preclude study or reasoning. You assert that white men are more privileged than black men. The definitions you've provided are insufficient for me to concretely state a test we could run to to disprove that. For example, being black will sway college admissions officers for you but police against you. How do any of these definitions allow me to say that on balance, these things are negative? At what magnitude would the balance become positive? Anyway, this is completely tangential to starfighter.
- pron 12y ago
  > I don't care if membership in some particular group is correlated with lack of privilege. And what if lack of privilege is caused by association with the group? > If you want to argue that lack of privilege is an individual injustice You may believe in individual rights, but you can't deny group injustice. Blacks were made slaves not due to any individual selection. > For example, being black will sway college admissions officers for you but police against you. How do any of these definitions allow me to say that on balance, these things are negative? At what magnitude would the balance become positive? You can't possibly be serious. But just in case you are, there are clear tests to measure power: money, positions of control in the private and public sectors, positions of control in the media. QED
  - yummyfajitas 12y ago
    I don't deny group injustice. I don't believe injustice based on group membership is worse than any other kind - slavery is an injustice even if it's equal opportunity. Insofar as having bad schools or bad parents is not an injustice, it's also not an injustice if some group has more of them than another. And insofar as such a thing is an injustice, the fact that it's correlated with some group is irrelevant to me. If the only way power can be measured is via outcomes (in this case, I guess a high developer salary?), then I'm not sure why we need a new word to describe it. I also don't get what your point is. I guess you are arguing that smart people don't "deserve" the money/control that comes with a developer job any more than dumb people, and therefore starfighter is a bad thing?
    - pron 12y ago
      Well, group injustice is just individual injustice done to many individuals. And, I think, you would not consider it unfair to demand a robber to pay back the money he's stolen. The problem with underprivileged groups is not the reality of the offense against them, nor the identity of the victim, but the identity of the perpetrator, and this is where study and of power comes in. Because the reality is that human society, like gas molecules, performs many acts not as individuals but as a group (even collective property preceded the invention the first private property), and therefore the perpetrator in the offenses of underprivilege is society as a whole. The actions under discussion are not as acts of nature but acts like for men, acting as a group (and collective action is a positive fact). Assigning individual responsibility is as futile as assigning individual responsibilty to specific gas molecules in expanding a balloon; doing so is just an ineffective model. And what society has stolen as a group (from individuals!) it must pay back as a group. Identifying the victims as a group is just a matter of statistical convenience as well as an aid in the description of the dynamics. That an electron is measured through its effect does not mean that we don't need to describe the electron itself. In fact, it is crucial that we do in order to understand its action. Same thing for power: you almost never observe it directly, but its study, and the term itself, are required in order to understand the workings of society. And as to this game, I don't think it's inherently bad at all, but if its role in society is not studied it might become an unwilling accomplice to injustice. And, if, one day it is somehow discovered that abilities that convey power are dominantly genetic, I do not think that we should give certain jobs to people unsuited to them, but our society is judged not by the achievements of those born to privilege, but by how it takes care of those who lack it. Exactly how this moral obligation should be carried out is a complex matter in itself, and far beyond what I can write here.