[AUDIO FIXED] The Truth Cannot be Sexist - Steven Pinker on the biology of sex differences

Whenever this comes up, I like to mention this video [0]. The video speaks for itself, but generally it advances the position that human behavior and preferences are a distribution, and the distributions for women are in some cases different from the distributions for men (in the sense that summary statistics like mean and variance differ), but there is always significant overlap. The position that men and women are indistinguishable behaviorally and in their preferences is not taken seriously. A notable point advanced in the video is that there is a difference in the summary statistics (not the entire distributions) which indicate men prioritize status and family different from women (with men more likely to prioritize status at the expense of family , the opposite of women). Another notable difference (again in the summary statistics, not the entire distribution) is that men prefer careers that are thing -centered over people -centered. I wish statistics were better understood by the general population. [0] ▶ this video

In short, yes. You should look up the book which is cited in this video, and you should listen to the discussion of the prologue: ▶ this video Since the human brain and its interaction with culture is very complicated, more research is needed. But a fair reading of what we have so far would seem to indicate: it's both. Beware of ideological just-so stories that make you feel good. Also, if it sounds messy and complicated, it sounds like actual biology and psychology.

And what, specifically, would those differences be? The balance of the evidence, is that there are some biological differences in preferences. Both biological and cultural factors are at play. As groups, women and men are about the same in terms of average IQ, however, men tend to have a higher population of the extreme outliers. (Both extremely smart men and extremely stupid men.) ▶ this video link link

I read what he wrote. It was (mostly) ugly but contained a lot of truth. Many of the media interpretations of what James Damore wrote were very biased, and effectively amounted to hit pieces. His use of terms like "Trait Neuroticism" were direct uses of psychological terms which just sound bad as everyday English. Evolutionary Biology also tends to have a "dismal" feeling to it, like Economics can. One can't take fields like Evolutionary Biology and Economics as morally prescriptive. In that direction lies madness, clearly. However, to then take a knee-jerk ideological stance towards science and declare that everyone must be equal inside is just the West's version of Lysenkoism. link As is usually the case, reality is complex, requires a nuanced understanding, and might sound depressing if you give it a pessimistic read: link ▶ this video

You're welcome :) If you are a bit interested in more references (those claims sound horrible, but they are not as far-fetched as they sound), have a look at ▶ this video . It's a presentation by Steven Pinker that explains a lot about what science actually has to say about biological differences, and in an aside at the end even mentions stereotypes. I already mentioned it in a subthread to this post, no harm intended.

If you want to see to which points science does have something to say, you might be interested in watching ▶ this video . This presentation by Steven Pinker got posted yesterday in one of the other comment threads, and I found it to be an excellent pre-existing discussion of the merits of the memo.

> The "scientific consensus" is that women are inherently genetically hard-coded to not be as good at or interested in computer programming? I did not say that, did I? The scientific consensus is that there are biological differences that have an influence on job fit and job choices. But we are talking statistics here, there are always people from the other sex that are a good fit for a specific work. Did you watch the video I linked? ▶ this video . Really, watch it. Also, the Google memo explicitly did not say that women should not be coders. If you think that, this is the warped media representation of the memo you are talking about, not its actual content.

I think the spirit of the memo even in that section is perfectly acceptable. > Note, I’m not saying that all men differ from all women in the following ways or that these differences are “just.” I’m simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes and that these differences may explain why we don’t see equal representation of women in tech and leadership. Many of these differences are small and there’s significant overlap between men and women, so you can’t say anything about an individual given these population level distributions. It is also not an extremist position to take, it's the scientific consensus. See ▶ this video for an example stating the same thing with almost the same words. And that's not coming from someone unqualified.

If you're looking for a more scientifically inclined video about this topic, take a look here: ▶ this video (The Truth Cannot be Sexist - Steven Pinker on the biology of sex differences)

Alright, I'll bite. But, I've never heard of any research suggesting women have a different cognitive capacity than men. I read some research a number of years ago suggesting cross-culturally women had better language skills than men, but I don't know if this is still considered to be true. I can't remember reading anything in the manifesto which suggested women are less capable as software engineers. The essay did suggest women were less interested in programming than men (obviously true - see enrolment figures) and that at least some of the effect size is due to biological factors (probably true - see below). --- None of these links suggest any capacity difference. Only that there is a biologically influenced gender difference in interests. Here's an essay contextualising and summarising the historical specifics of male and female gender roles in society: link Here's a study of how prenatal androgen effects psychological thing vs people orientation, and how it influences career choice: link A summary of studies looking at big 5 personality distributions and other effects. Of note is the long section describing blindspots in current research: "Gender Differences in Personality and Interests: When, Where and Why?" link Here's a Dutch documentary where they send a camera crew around asking different researchers about gender differences: link The full documentary is great. Their conclusion is that biological factors result in an overlapping but different distribution of

I certainly agree with the goal of giving individuals their freedom and to have the right to act in an atypical way. But let's keep a hold on reality here. Women carry babies, not men. Women breastfeed, not men. Women have higher trait agreeableness and exhibit maternal behaviors at all ages in all cultures ever [1]. These aren't "gender essentialism", they're biology. There is a difference between saying "this kind of person usually does this" and "this kind of person must only do this". The first is often correct, the second is the one that's problematic. Women will always be more linked to children, and that's fine. We shouldn't try to hammer humans into an ideologically-defined artificial shape, even if it's "equal". That's a recipe for great sadness. Just let people be. [1] - ▶ this video

I'm sorry but this is pure myth. There has never been a human society where primary political/executive power was vested in women, except some developed and recent examples. The idea of tribes controlled by women just never happened; not once. It's wishful revisionism motivated by modern politics. Pinker discusses this a bit in this speech ▶ this video And of course other have noted the male dominance in pretty much all the similar primate species. Human are brute animals, nothing more. And no, just because (pre)historically it was this way doesn't mean I'm saying it ought to be this way everywhere and forever. Natural != ideal.

I am little tired of this. The research is interesting but there should be more consideration for alternate hypotheses. There is lot of evidence that girls are biologically wired to prefer people jobs, while boys prefer jobs with things. I really recommend Steven Pinker talk: ▶ this video But even if this was cultural, who are we to dictate preferences of people? I think the whole nature vs nurture debate is a non-sequitur. The article talks specifically about three reasons: 1. Self-doubt. It's well known that it affects girls more. But maybe it's how the brain presents risk-aversion to us? Or maybe it's actually needed for the job? Computers can be unforgiving. 2. Assholes. Sexism goes both ways. I label an asshole as an asshole, a girl might generalize it to "men are sexist". 3. Interesting work. Not much people in computing do world-changing work, you have to fight for it. It seems to me that there was a tacit expectation that someone will bring interesting work to you, which is IMHO false. The fact is nobody is preventing those girls to have a Github account. I am all for removing barriers, but at some point, when we just can't see any, we will have to declare that it is a matter of personal preferences. If people are indeed happier in some other job, why not just call it a day?

The thing is, in a lot of ways those gender roles actually are universal. Not among individuals, of course, but among societies, there are no exceptions to these: "M&F seen as having different natures" "F->M direct child care" "M->F more competitive" "M->F greater spatial range" etc Steven Pinker talks about this (and much else) in this speech. Skip to 26:56 for this particular point. ▶ this video An objective truth doesn't have to apply to every individual without exception, to be an objective truth. It just has to be a consistent trend. So M/F differences like the above really are objective truths, the same as "men are taller than women" or "cougars are more dangerous than goats". (edit: this is not to say anything prescriptive about what ought to be done; it's simply a descriptive statement. Of course Pinker covers all this ground; I recommend the whole talk)