To a small, vocal group.
> By doing it in an anti-science, anti-evidence way
There were good reasons for doing it that had nothing to do with science or evidence.
There are women working at Google who do not need to be reminded of the genetic and biologic differences they have from their cishet male counterparts.
If Damon had issues with the policies at Google there were many other channels open to him that didn't involve circulating a manifesto. He brought it upon himself. Once word of that memo leaked there was nothing for Google to do but fire him.
I'm a white male. I know that the average Asian has a higher IQ than the average white man. This means positively nothing when comparing me with a given Asian, however.
That is the root of this discussion that so many so profoundly miss. The average Google male is not the average male. The average Google female is not the average female. He was not saying that women who work at Google are at a biological disadvantage, in any way, and that is a perverse misreading. He was saying that on the whole there's a biological reason when you roll the dice enough that more males are suitable for that work. In the scientific community this is utterly indisputable, in the same way that there are far more exceptional males (and autistic males), just as there are far more mentally handicapped males. That doesn't preclude handicapped or exceptional females, it's just less common.
I don't understand what you said there, can you elaborate? What is the difference between males being more biologically suitable and females being at a disadvantage? From my perspective, you just contradicted yourself, can you help me understand why it's not a contradiction?
What the memo proposed is that it's "possible" there are fewer women in tech right now because of the biological differences. He may not have claimed it as fact, but he implied it. The problem I have with the implication is that it's obvious that evolutionary forces are not the primary causes of the current distribution, because the distribution of women in tech has changed drastically in the last 50 years faster than evolution's say in the matter. It's not possible that the current distribution is primarily caused by biological differences, and it's exceedingly likely that it is caused by social issues. But he suggested it is possible, and followed that by suggesting we should stop treating it like a social issue because it's possible.
And all of this so far is ignoring that the memo unironically takes the opposite stance on the minority group of conservatives.
So what is the root part that I'm missing?
The IQ distribution of men and women is slightly different, and this is essentially settled science (it really is, however much we might pontificate -- our genetic past rolls the dice more with males). The male curve is slightly fatter, yielding larger numbers of exceptionally high and exceptionally low members. This means absolutely nothing if you have a male with an IQ of 140 and a female with an IQ of 140, however. Nor does it mean a 100 IQ male should be working at Google because there are slightly more high IQ males born.
We are smart enough to understand the difference between set probabilities and individual traits. Right?
because the distribution of women in tech has changed drastically in the last 50 years faster than evolution's say in the matter
Obviously there are social factors. That is indisputable. But at a point the gains in leveling the sexes for some domains become harder to get because there are confounding factors. Women in engineering has stayed virtually constant for several decades now.
2) "IQ" (or math ability, or whatever) does not measure if someone is an effective engineer, which is what Google actually wants.
3) Women are also underrepresented throughout software engineering, at places far less rarified than Google. You don't have to be a genius to write a CRUD app--but somehow it's still mostly dudes. I wonder if there could be any other effects that would discourage women from taking those jobs?
4) Have you ever asked a women in tech--any woman, grab the nearest one--if she's had negative experiences in tech? Say, being dismissed, ignored, talked over, harassed?
Your third point again is based on a bogus premise. To get those CRUD jobs the developers often went through a gauntlet of CS (or shining independently through projects, etc), hiring selectivity (everyone hires the "top 2%", etc). Even if the job is banal, the road to get there is often very demanding.
As to your fourth, I have no doubt that many women in tech have negative experiences. Having said that, many males in tech have negative experiences. I'm a fairly outgoing, obstinate, outspoken type of person and I know in my career I've left a wake of male coworkers who were dismissed and talked over. This industry tends to be hierarchical, and when it's a male that's life, and when it's a female that's sexism.
Quite frankly: many people do. Some of them are at Google. James chose to run headlong into this discussion without any practical knowledge of the discourse. His point was poorly delivered precisely because it leaves open such radical room for misrepresenting it.
Discussions of social issues MUST be informed by the social discourse they enter, even if armed with science and evidence. To suggest otherwise is obviously wrong.
No one owes James a charitable reading. And if you think the "mobs" of liberals are misrepresenting his point, you should see where MRA/goreans are going with it.
A charitable reading isn't something that's owed. It's something that almost universally helps discourse. Communication is hard.
We're always willing to give Us a charitable reading, and it's a damned shame people are so unwilling to afford that to Them, regardless which side of anything you're on.
addendum: Irrational people misinterpreting a text is precisely that. Surely you can't be saying that a text having a fairly high bar for intelligent interpretation and discussion is reason for that text to not exist?
How can you be sure that it's the average Asia, as opposed to the average Asian in the US? IMO a better example would be to use Ashkenazi Jews... or are they too white to count?
Of course Asians in the US are smart. There is a high bar for foreigners entering the US.
This is the genius behind "Give me your tired, your poor". We actually end up taking the hard working, wealthy ones who've gotten into college by passing tests in their second language at the same age as we go to school.
This includes Japanese, Chinese, both Koreans, Taiwanese, and Mongolians. Commonly, anyone with epicanthic folds.
In this case, I don't think the OP was talking about biological differences. It's widely known that the aforementioned cultures (especially Japan and China) are very big on having their careers and studies at the center of their lives.
In this case, it would be nurture giving these groups an advantage over their Western counterparts. Who, ignoring the top-tiers, on average are not known for their industry.
That's part of the problem.
Lots of people associate Google with research and discourse akin to a college campus without realizing that, unlike a college campus, they and their free discourse are not protected in any meaningful way.
"Let's be open and transparent and have an open and transparent culture... but don't say things that might hurt our shareholders."
Google is beginning to remind me a bit too much of the 'Bright & Shinys" from the movie 'Bubble Boy'[0]. Happy go lucky do-gooder cult that holds that image until you cross them. Things get darker after that point. That initial positive image is all that matters.
This article from 2013 is an example
http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2013/01/...
“What we try to do is bring the same level of rigor to people decisions that we do to engineering decisions. Our mission is to have all people decisions be informed by data.”
Damore's memo may look idiotic to people who work in "normal" workplaces, but it is consistent with Google's previous rhetoric on what sort of company it wants to be: namely, one that isn't normal.
Of course we can't reasonably assess how large these groups are, when we are all - liberals and conservatives alike - being told not to express our opinions by leaders in universities, media, and tech companies.
It's like Sundar declaring that most employees supported him - after he fired someone for questioning management.
Did he really expect honest answers?
Was that necessary? A) The women working at Google are predominantly also cishet and B) gay guys can be misogynistic too (sometimes even more, as they dont need women in any way).
