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Comment by hedgew | Hacker News Reader

It is an undeniable, world-wide phenomenon that there is a gender imbalance in programming that can not be explained by pure chance. Since we have no laws and few social structures that force men into programming or prevent women from doing it, we have to conclude that the explanation is more likely psychological.

There are also gender imbalances in other fields; nursing, for example, has about as few men as programming has women.

The fact that we have not been able to reach an agreed upon explanation for this skewed distribution is an indicator of our inability to transcend gender issues for the sake of truth and betterment.

Using satire to sideline the possibility that millions of years of evolution may have shaped our brains in ways that affect our behavior is not truth-seeking - it's misleading.

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I think "few social structures...that prevent women from doing [programming]" is the assumption you make that most people on the other side of the issue would disagree with.

The example you provide, men in nursing, is a poor one for your case, as men historically shied away from nursing because it was socially associated with femininity, not because of genetic predisposition. Through concerted efforts over the last fifteen years, the proportion of men in nursing has sharply increased. So the story of men in nursing is parallel to the claim you dismiss, that women are turned away from programming by its association with "masculinity" and that a concerted effort could increase the proportion of women in the field.

I do not know whether there is a genetic element to the skewed distribution of vocations, and I am actually inclined to agree with you that their probably is.

However, we cannot simply look at the present distribution and assume it is entirely caused by genetics. We do not live in a perfect meritocracy or a society that gives all people equal opportunity and support in following their callings. Other explanations for these gender imbalances are staring us in the face: the poor behavior of many men in the tech world, the subtle implications that girls should not work hard at math, or the teasing directed toward men who study nursing.

We should be trying to change these things, not for the abstract goal of having a perfectly equal gender distribution, but for the sake of individual people who are suited to these fields even though they are in the minority gender. I have a male friend who is a nurse and perhaps not suited to be a doctor who, had he been born thirty years earlier, would almost certainly have taken some other job and not lived up to his potential. I don't want that to happen to young women who are in school today and would make great programmers.

Perhaps some day we will overcome these social biases so that all people are equally encouraged to do any work they are capable of learning. On that day there may still be skewed distributions of genders in each profession, and we will fairly say that those are caused by evolution and other factors we can't control.

But while there are still factors in our control, preventing people from answering their callings? Let's fix them!

While I don't want to undermine the difficulties many people undoubtedly face due to harmful beliefs shared by the society at large, we have to face the issue that gender imbalances are in fact larger in countries that are more meritocratic and gender-equal, such as Norway.

Fixing poor views about gender and reducing discrimination are good steps towards a better future, but what happens after we've improved on those and the job market is still segregated in terms of gender?

Will we start seeing racism and discrimination everywhere, in places where they doesn't exist - blaming and labeling people for injustices they haven't done?

See, that's the beauty of the whole situation. Instead of arguing philosophy about the causes of gender imbalance, we can decide that what we're actually worried about are concrete people who should get a chance to do what they're good at, and concrete cases of poor behavior that prevent that.

We can stop arguing about this issue, and go out and mentor kids who are interested in what we do, and create communities where abuse and low expectations are inappropriate regardless of who they're directed at, and make the world a better place. And that strategy will work regardless of which theory is right! Craziness.

Let's go do it.

Others would disagree that there are no social structures supporting a gender imbalance.

Enough work has been done to show that teachers (particularly female ones) impede female students in mathematics at the elementary and primary levels. It is entirely possible that similar mechanisms exist in Computer Science. Certainly this has not been ruled out, and therefore one cannot conclude that any difference is due to innate ability.

The article mocks not the idea that men and women have innate differences in skills, but the facile reasoning that attempts to justify holding such a view. To put it simply, it is entirely possible that innate differences are the reason for the gender imbalance, but any article that attempts to use evolutionary biology and some sort of idea of historical gender roles resulting in a gender's predisposition to a task is likely suspect.

> we have no laws and few social structures that force men into programming or prevent women from doing it

We have plenty of social structures that discourage women from programming.

Programming first arose as a profession in the mid-20th century, at a time when the vast majority of scientists, mathematicians and engineers were male. Naturally, the first programmers mostly came from those fields, so they were mostly male. Over time this became self-reinforcing, both because the programming community has historically been hostile towards women (and still is today, but to a lesser extent) and because the perception of programming as "mens' work" means that teachers and advisers encourage women to choose other paths.

You may not agree with the above argument, but it's the main argument against your position, and I'm sure that you must have heard of it at some point. It seems strange to me that your post completely ignored it.

There has been an enormous amount of work put into these questions. It is clear that there is some variation between genders in both physical and mental capability. However, it is ALSO clear that variation within genders far, far exceeds variation between genders. Like, it's not even close.

What small variation has been detected between genders is not adequate to explain the massive variation seen in gendered employment like nursing, secretaries, CEOs, programmers.

Millennia of treating women as property, the fact that e.g. women's suffrage was not widely implemented until the 20th century, the frequency with which traits seen as universal 'jump' genders, and similar indicators offer a promising avenue for an alternate explanation.

Could you refer us to the "work" results (studies) that conclude (mathematically) that the variation you refer to, are "not adequeate" to explain the variation in "gendered employment"? I'm particularly interested what traits were measured between the groups and how (the hell) did those traits have anything to do with programming.

Since we have no laws and few social structures that force men into programming or prevent women from doing it

You're assuming that the counter to your argument is false; the position of those who disagree with is that there are substantial social structures in place that influence the gender imbalance that we see.

Evopsych is mostly esoteric. But denying a influence of evolution on psychology (nature vs nurture) and/or differences based on that is for the left wing what creationism is for the right. Evolution denialism seems to be very popular in the states.

Totally, just like how black people are evolutionarily more suited to menial labor and crime.

(I do not believe the above claim, in case that is unclear to anyone reading this.)

If i could downvote you, I would. Mocking a statement that says that mocking does not help to prove your point is pretty much the worst thing you can do in a conversation.

I have fairly low tolerance for racism and sexism. I'm ok with mocking it, even if you dress it up as pseudoscientific psychobabble. If that bothers you, tough beans.

Where is the sexism in that post? Or racism?

The sexism is the position, sans evidence, that psychology is the most likely explanation for the difference in women and men in programming.

Ok, Occams razor is sexist?

/edit: Also there is sound evidence that psychology tends to biases the interest in technical stuff toward the male gender.

/edit 2: I'd like to answer, but it seem I'm banned.

There is my reply:

I'm not saying that this is necessarily the simplest explanation. But it's looks like a far simpler explanation than a worldwide cultural conspiracy against women.

Also, in my personal experience the environment in school and in university always encouraged women and girls to do "computer stuff" and yet the quota was about 10%. But that do also mean, as far as i could witness it, encouragement by male and female peers. I know, it's purely anecdotal, but make me think of this can't be that simple.

I'm sorry about the quotes. If i could quote i would have done it earlier, but i have atm no access to the scientific search engines. I'm not suggesting there is a consensus, but labeling this off as absurd... is absurd. If you are lucky enough to have access to papers search for "gender differences newborn" yields to several results. And, as far as i can remember, differences in language development, in preference pictures of faces or abstract pictures.

That said, I'm not a fan of evo psych. It's highly inductive, and often far from the simplest explanation.

There are parasites, Toxoplasma gondii, that do change human behavior to the point of making suicide more likely and cause mensurable changes in social interaction. (These do depend on gender aswell). If you think that the vastly different hormones in the human body do not affect social interaction, while a simple infection can, that seems to me something you have to prove and not something i have to disprove.

No assuming that the simplest explanation is that women are genetically less suited is sexist.

Gender imbalances in society is just as simple of an explanation. Your use of Occam's razor here is essentially just a sexist "common sense argument."

> Ok, Occams razor is sexist?

Assuming "because they have two X chromosomes" is the simplest answer (rather than, oh, the environment around them constantly suggests not to do technical things for such sterling reasons as "math is hard") is stupid. Doing it to circle the wagons and keep the tech-bruvs happy is sexist.

> /edit: Also there is sound evidence that psychology tends to biases the interest in technical stuff toward the male gender.

I read a lot about both evolutionary psych and gender and I've never seen this seriously buttressed. Where's your cites? Plural?

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