Cherry Picking
Happy Monday!
03/05/2018
I recently watched a video on YouTube entitled, "James Damore at Portland State (02/17/2018)", https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCrQ3EU8_PM&t=3628s, and ever since I've been mulling over how I want to respond. I want to respond.
So this is it.
Just to briefly summarize, Damore was a Google Engineer who wrote a ten-page memo denouncing affirmative action for women at Google. It is obvious from reading the memo he worked backwards from an agenda with the science he cited. His memo falls into the category of, 'there are lies, damn lies, and statistics' science writing. His agenda is to simply say that a woman's place in science is fait de complete, there is nothing left to do as we've hit a biological
equilibrium. Therefore, in Damore's mind, there is no need for any affirmative action and let the chips fall where they may.
I've already written one blog post about Damore, but I wanted to write another blog post, but not about Damore, but his support.
My concern with the current Damore situation is similar to my concern with Trump. Trump clearly has mental health challenges, most notably his narcissism. To me the concern with Trump is not Trump, but the voters who voted for him. And my concern with Damore is not Damore, but the platform and support he is getting in the scientific community.
They say not to get to close to your heroes because you'll be disappointed and I'm really disappointed in the scientific community in this regard.
1. Damore is not an expert. He's a guy who's read some books and lazily picked out science he agrees with, nothing more, nothing less. Lots of people get fired every day for being just as intellectually lazy and do not get invited to speak on campuses. I see nothing about Damore or his arguments that warrant anything more than a harrumph. Big deal. Anyone can cherry pick science and lots do. There is nothing original or compelling about him. Damore is a hackneyed stereotype just ranting a modern day version of women can't do math. It is a really old routine. Can't we just move on?
2. Damore is not holding up well. He's clearly not cut out for public speaking and as a result most of his answers come off rehearsed. He's either not comfortable or not able to answer questions on the fly. He's not doing any favors to the people who are supporting him.
3. And finally, shame on you. You should know better.
I'd like to issue a challenge to the scientific community that is promoting Damore: invite me to be your opposition and I will show up and bury the cherries you picked off the Damore tree with the entire mountain of human-nature science cherries that you didn't pick, guaranteed.
Probably the dumbest argument going from the evolutionary biologist is that men and women are biologically different. Duh. Just sit down already ready. When evolutionary biologists take to the stage and start in on an argument that women and men are biologically different it becomes one of those head in hand moments for those of us not in the field: seriously? We're paying evolutionary biologists to tell us THIS?
You know who the evolutionary biologists should remind me of? The kinda fun times Elon Musk is having with the Flat Earth Society. Come on. Everyone knows the Earth is round. It is just a stupid form of fun to entertain these Flat Earth Society folks. No one takes it serious. Not even them, they admit Mars is round. Elon Musk's tweets takes any otherwise nasty Twitter feed and lightens the mood for a moment. Yeah.
But come on. That's not what is happening with the evolutionary-biology scientists pushing back on "Men Are Women" society folks. No one honestly believes men and women are the same so why take the "Men Are Women" society serious at all? Just ignore them, they aren't worth anybody's time, unless you are Elon Musk and it is all in good fun on Twitter.
So what I thought I'd do is respond to Damore's cherry picking with some of the human-nature science that should go into the affirmative action arguments for women that has been left out.
1. Capitalism is predatory. Men are more aggressive and also higher risk takers than women. Two key components in being predatory. Social science studies have shown for over a century that this is universally true. In a capitalist system then the game is rigged against women.
2.Money is an interest. This is where I really want to say "fuck off" to Damore and to the evolutionary biologists who argue job interest is the reason why most of us have the job we do. So fuck off. Really. Engineers make a lot of money. A lot of money. This job-interest myth that the Damore crowd is promoting is religious in both its make up and in its compelling need to mock as a bad idea and to say fuck off. News flash, people pursue careers and do so quite well solely for the money. Hello, doctor, lawyer anyone?
3. Posers exist at Google. This is a corollary to the aforementioned "money is an interest." Tech resumes are so full of exaggerations that they are almost not worth reading. Therefore this 'all engineers at Google are the best-and-brightest" is a religious myth that needs debunked.
4. Interests change over time. Social studies have shown that the average person changes careers three times over a life-time. Three times. Careers. That means interests. So, if you hired somebody five-years-ago, ten-years-ago, and then guess what: they may have morphed into a poser soaking up dollars because the pay is good. This makes "interests change over time" a corollary of "posers exist at Google". But here's the real kicker, if my experience in the industry is any indication of posers then the biggest posers are not the ones you hired and then who lost interest over time, but rather the upper management, "celebrities" in the industry who made a name for themselves decades ago and are brought in due to their reputation. Well, guess what: their interest and their talent is in everyone's rear-view mirror. They are posers. They are not the best, now.
5. The best and the brightest is a losing formula. You all should so be ashamed of yourselves promoting this tripe that a company should only hire the best and brightest. In the book, "The Mythical Man Month", Fred Brooks lays out a "Plato's Republic" configuration of desired roles in software projects similar to Plato's recipe for roles of warriors, politicians and administrators for a Republic. And guess what: it ain't everyone is the best and brightest. In fact, quite the opposite. Fred Barns recommends that the smartest only represent 10-20% of the over-all team and that testers, bug fixers, minor feature enhancers and maintainers make up the the bulk of your software project members. You need software engineers for all of those roles.
5. Only the best and the brightest is a losing formula. I'm repeating this because it is worth repeating for the evolutionary biologists who do not seem to know this. Recent studies have shown that hiring only the best and the brightest in general and not specific to tech is a losing strategy. Why? Oh, I don't know, egos? Arrogance? Personality? The science on this is not new, but recent studies have shown yet again shown this to be the case. You need a healthy mix of talent spectrum as a best strategy.
6. Death by a thousand cuts. Okay, the previous five aforementioned topics are all major human-nature reasons contributing to the mountain of cherries in human-nature science that should be considered for women in STEM. But, there are thousands of lesser ones. For these I recommend one Ed "Too Tall" Jones. Sorry, Ed "Too Tall" Jones is a football player with the same name as a social scientist I read in college, Ed Jones. Ed was the kinda guy who studied subtle differences between men and women.
For example, take painting a room the color red. When you paint a room red then humans will get into more arguments and be angrier. And, you guessed it, women less so then men.
Or take non-verbal communication. I believe Damore might have mentioned this in his memo: men interrupt more than women. Men interrupt women more than men. We have a word for this, mansplaining. And for the record ,ladies, men do this to each other. And it is every bit as boring and frustrating but since men or more competitive then women it doesn't impact us the same way.
Or take one of the studies Ed Jones did that is one of my favorites, a study in personal space. See, a study was done decades ago to test the hypothesis that given an extra room in a house then a marriage is better off if the man gets a man cave. Turns out the study results were counter-intuitive: a marriage is probably better off giving the women the extra room. Why, because a mom's need for isolation is more than a man's due to kids. Men get away from the kids more on average.
And so it goes. I could go on-and-on-and-on-and-on with the tens-of-thousands of things involving human nature and the differences between the sexes that should go into any discussion about affirmative action for women.
I could, but I shouldn't have to if only the evolutionary biologists were doing their jobs by pointing out the *thousands of differences* already studied last century and not just those Damore cherry picked.
So, I issue a challenge to the scientific community that is promoting Damore: invite me to be your opposition and I will show up and bury those cherries you picked off the Damore tree with an entire mountain of human nature science that you didn't pick, guaranteed.
Politics as Science!
Demand Irreni World Scale!
Anti-theism is feminism!
Think disruption!
Empathy for all!
Moral relativity: think it, breath it!
Prove it or lose it!
Conversations equal consensus!
Welcome to the 21st century!
Scale your empathy, scale the world!
Find your tribe!
Be sexy people!
The future is coming!
Innovate at a rapid pace!
Slow speed ahead!
Well come! and well met!
Cheers!
-Mybrid
03/05/2018
I recently watched a video on YouTube entitled, "James Damore at Portland State (02/17/2018)", https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCrQ3EU8_PM&t=3628s, and ever since I've been mulling over how I want to respond. I want to respond.
So this is it.
Just to briefly summarize, Damore was a Google Engineer who wrote a ten-page memo denouncing affirmative action for women at Google. It is obvious from reading the memo he worked backwards from an agenda with the science he cited. His memo falls into the category of, 'there are lies, damn lies, and statistics' science writing. His agenda is to simply say that a woman's place in science is fait de complete, there is nothing left to do as we've hit a biological
equilibrium. Therefore, in Damore's mind, there is no need for any affirmative action and let the chips fall where they may.
I've already written one blog post about Damore, but I wanted to write another blog post, but not about Damore, but his support.
My concern with the current Damore situation is similar to my concern with Trump. Trump clearly has mental health challenges, most notably his narcissism. To me the concern with Trump is not Trump, but the voters who voted for him. And my concern with Damore is not Damore, but the platform and support he is getting in the scientific community.
They say not to get to close to your heroes because you'll be disappointed and I'm really disappointed in the scientific community in this regard.
1. Damore is not an expert. He's a guy who's read some books and lazily picked out science he agrees with, nothing more, nothing less. Lots of people get fired every day for being just as intellectually lazy and do not get invited to speak on campuses. I see nothing about Damore or his arguments that warrant anything more than a harrumph. Big deal. Anyone can cherry pick science and lots do. There is nothing original or compelling about him. Damore is a hackneyed stereotype just ranting a modern day version of women can't do math. It is a really old routine. Can't we just move on?
2. Damore is not holding up well. He's clearly not cut out for public speaking and as a result most of his answers come off rehearsed. He's either not comfortable or not able to answer questions on the fly. He's not doing any favors to the people who are supporting him.
3. And finally, shame on you. You should know better.
I'd like to issue a challenge to the scientific community that is promoting Damore: invite me to be your opposition and I will show up and bury the cherries you picked off the Damore tree with the entire mountain of human-nature science cherries that you didn't pick, guaranteed.
Probably the dumbest argument going from the evolutionary biologist is that men and women are biologically different. Duh. Just sit down already ready. When evolutionary biologists take to the stage and start in on an argument that women and men are biologically different it becomes one of those head in hand moments for those of us not in the field: seriously? We're paying evolutionary biologists to tell us THIS?
You know who the evolutionary biologists should remind me of? The kinda fun times Elon Musk is having with the Flat Earth Society. Come on. Everyone knows the Earth is round. It is just a stupid form of fun to entertain these Flat Earth Society folks. No one takes it serious. Not even them, they admit Mars is round. Elon Musk's tweets takes any otherwise nasty Twitter feed and lightens the mood for a moment. Yeah.
But come on. That's not what is happening with the evolutionary-biology scientists pushing back on "Men Are Women" society folks. No one honestly believes men and women are the same so why take the "Men Are Women" society serious at all? Just ignore them, they aren't worth anybody's time, unless you are Elon Musk and it is all in good fun on Twitter.
So what I thought I'd do is respond to Damore's cherry picking with some of the human-nature science that should go into the affirmative action arguments for women that has been left out.
1. Capitalism is predatory. Men are more aggressive and also higher risk takers than women. Two key components in being predatory. Social science studies have shown for over a century that this is universally true. In a capitalist system then the game is rigged against women.
2.Money is an interest. This is where I really want to say "fuck off" to Damore and to the evolutionary biologists who argue job interest is the reason why most of us have the job we do. So fuck off. Really. Engineers make a lot of money. A lot of money. This job-interest myth that the Damore crowd is promoting is religious in both its make up and in its compelling need to mock as a bad idea and to say fuck off. News flash, people pursue careers and do so quite well solely for the money. Hello, doctor, lawyer anyone?
3. Posers exist at Google. This is a corollary to the aforementioned "money is an interest." Tech resumes are so full of exaggerations that they are almost not worth reading. Therefore this 'all engineers at Google are the best-and-brightest" is a religious myth that needs debunked.
4. Interests change over time. Social studies have shown that the average person changes careers three times over a life-time. Three times. Careers. That means interests. So, if you hired somebody five-years-ago, ten-years-ago, and then guess what: they may have morphed into a poser soaking up dollars because the pay is good. This makes "interests change over time" a corollary of "posers exist at Google". But here's the real kicker, if my experience in the industry is any indication of posers then the biggest posers are not the ones you hired and then who lost interest over time, but rather the upper management, "celebrities" in the industry who made a name for themselves decades ago and are brought in due to their reputation. Well, guess what: their interest and their talent is in everyone's rear-view mirror. They are posers. They are not the best, now.
5. The best and the brightest is a losing formula. You all should so be ashamed of yourselves promoting this tripe that a company should only hire the best and brightest. In the book, "The Mythical Man Month", Fred Brooks lays out a "Plato's Republic" configuration of desired roles in software projects similar to Plato's recipe for roles of warriors, politicians and administrators for a Republic. And guess what: it ain't everyone is the best and brightest. In fact, quite the opposite. Fred Barns recommends that the smartest only represent 10-20% of the over-all team and that testers, bug fixers, minor feature enhancers and maintainers make up the the bulk of your software project members. You need software engineers for all of those roles.
5. Only the best and the brightest is a losing formula. I'm repeating this because it is worth repeating for the evolutionary biologists who do not seem to know this. Recent studies have shown that hiring only the best and the brightest in general and not specific to tech is a losing strategy. Why? Oh, I don't know, egos? Arrogance? Personality? The science on this is not new, but recent studies have shown yet again shown this to be the case. You need a healthy mix of talent spectrum as a best strategy.
6. Death by a thousand cuts. Okay, the previous five aforementioned topics are all major human-nature reasons contributing to the mountain of cherries in human-nature science that should be considered for women in STEM. But, there are thousands of lesser ones. For these I recommend one Ed "Too Tall" Jones. Sorry, Ed "Too Tall" Jones is a football player with the same name as a social scientist I read in college, Ed Jones. Ed was the kinda guy who studied subtle differences between men and women.
For example, take painting a room the color red. When you paint a room red then humans will get into more arguments and be angrier. And, you guessed it, women less so then men.
Or take non-verbal communication. I believe Damore might have mentioned this in his memo: men interrupt more than women. Men interrupt women more than men. We have a word for this, mansplaining. And for the record ,ladies, men do this to each other. And it is every bit as boring and frustrating but since men or more competitive then women it doesn't impact us the same way.
Or take one of the studies Ed Jones did that is one of my favorites, a study in personal space. See, a study was done decades ago to test the hypothesis that given an extra room in a house then a marriage is better off if the man gets a man cave. Turns out the study results were counter-intuitive: a marriage is probably better off giving the women the extra room. Why, because a mom's need for isolation is more than a man's due to kids. Men get away from the kids more on average.
And so it goes. I could go on-and-on-and-on-and-on with the tens-of-thousands of things involving human nature and the differences between the sexes that should go into any discussion about affirmative action for women.
I could, but I shouldn't have to if only the evolutionary biologists were doing their jobs by pointing out the *thousands of differences* already studied last century and not just those Damore cherry picked.
So, I issue a challenge to the scientific community that is promoting Damore: invite me to be your opposition and I will show up and bury those cherries you picked off the Damore tree with an entire mountain of human nature science that you didn't pick, guaranteed.
Politics as Science!
Demand Irreni World Scale!
Anti-theism is feminism!
Think disruption!
Empathy for all!
Moral relativity: think it, breath it!
Prove it or lose it!
Conversations equal consensus!
Welcome to the 21st century!
Scale your empathy, scale the world!
Find your tribe!
Be sexy people!
The future is coming!
Innovate at a rapid pace!
Slow speed ahead!
Well come! and well met!
Cheers!
-Mybrid
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