Re:My Experiences as a Female Software Engineer
by dennisgorelik on Monday January 17, 2011 @05:08PM
(#2113679)
1) Would our own experience in school serve as a good confirmation that discussions and competitiveness are not really promoted in schools?
2) Women are not bad at abstractions. They are just not interested in dealing with abstractions as much as men do. That explains why there are so few women in software development.
Re:My Experiences as a Female Software Engineer
by btilly on Monday January 17, 2011 @06:30PM
(#2113884)
My personal experience is not consistent with #1.
My personal experience of women who choose to go on in advanced mathematics (of which there are almost as many as there are men) is strongly at odds with your claim #2.
Re:My Experiences as a Female Software Engineer
by forensic on Wednesday January 19, 2011 @08:28PM
(#2122134)
Why are you replying to things I didn't say?
I never mentioned abstractions because I think that is irrelevant.
You literally clicked "reply" to me and then did not respond to a single point I made.
And it is getting away from the main point. Which is the claim that women are bad at abstraction, versus my concrete evidence that they are capable of it.
If you need another data point, back when I was in grad school something like 40% of graduate students in math were women. From my experience, they weren't the bottom 40%. And were quite capable at abstraction.
I truly don't believe that women aren't in CS because it is too hard for their pretty little heads. OK, sure, most women wouldn't succeed in CS for that reason. But the same is true of most men.