I agree he does say "possible" and "may" in a few places, but he's inconsistent. Overwhelmingly, he makes deterministic statements, including when he gives interviews (for example at 5:32 in one with CNN [1])
As the evolutionary biologist notes,
1. There are conflicting results with the research showing gender differences in personality traits
2. The research doesn't actually show that these trait differences are biological
3. "It is a massive leap to conclude that a slight difference in average personality must undermine women's professional abilities in software engineering"
> And so on and so forth in tedious repetitiveness.
The full response [2] is well worth a read. It is the most comprehensive point-by-point reply by a scientist to Damore to date.
[1] http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/15/technology/culture/james-dam...
[2] https://www.quora.com/What-do-scientists-think-about-the-bio...
No it is not saying "is" a factor when it actually says could be a factor (in the outcomes).
This is elementary school english.
That biology "is" a factor in the differences between men and women is not really debatable at this point. If you believe different, read The Blank Slate by Stephen Pinker.
From the memo:
"Possible non-bias causes of the gender gap in tech"
and
"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"
So "could", "in part", "may". None of this either-or dichotomy that the critic somehow inserts.
Similar for the wired article.
'But trying to use that data to explain gender disparities in the workplace is irrelevant at best. “I would assume that women in technical positions at Google are more thing-oriented than the average woman,” '
No shit, Sherlock! This is about explaining the gender gap, so the people not at Google.
"forecloses the possibility of changing sex roles and representation at Google"
No, he does the reverse. He proposes changes to increase representation. Whether these proposals are any good is a different story (I don't know), but the claim is a simple lie.
And so on and so forth in tedious repetitiveness.