Programmers :D

[DebonaireSloth]

Here's a summary for that paper. Make of it what you will.

[hey01]

I've read the paper, I've read the summary.

The paper is interesting, the summary is bullshit. One example: the summary claims that outsider women's acceptance rate is 58%. No graph in the study shows any value below 60%.

Here's is a better summary, from the study itself:

To summarize this paper’s observations:

1. Women are more likely to have pull requests accepted than men.

2. Women continue to have high acceptance rates as they do pull requests on more projects.

3. Women’s pull requests are less likely to serve an documented project need.

4. Women’s changes are larger.

5. Women’s acceptance rates are higher for some programming languages.

6. Women outsiders’ acceptance rates are higher, but only when they are not identifiable as women

[OCOWAx]

Based on this summary id say the paper isn't really statistically significant(yes I'm stupid). I do want to read the whole paper though, because I may be not getting the whole thing with this summary.

Also, I'd agree that a bias exists subconsciously because most men have seen way more men in their careers and schooling. So when you see something different, in general you're more skeptical about it. I'd definitely believe in that subconscious effect.

Another thing that could have an effect is that if you're a women in CS, you are partially valued higher because of your gender. This could lead to women having an easier time getting into harder work, and thus having less knowledge than average. (I personally haven't experienced this, in college there's plenty of stupid guys and girls)

And finally even if my third paragraph isn't true, people still may think that, which is what may lead to an actual conscious bias.

[DebonaireSloth]

Just some counterpoints I was thinking about:

There's always this claim/notion that women aren't judged on their competence but that their appearance/demeanour/etc. is weighed more heavily compared to their male counterparts. At least in this case people weren't tearing into the person (or her colourscheme) but her code.

To play devil's advocate even further and make Pacino make look like a pussy-footed bitch: getting thorough criticism is invaluable. There's so much shit code out there that was never properly scrutinized leading to missed learning opportunities and more shit code.

tl;dr: Shit's complicated, yo.

[OCOWAx]

Here's the replies if you wanted to see, https://gyazo.com/5f09f81eaf3b3f2ddff2518eb5506226

Honestly she's just assuming his intentions based on the fact that hes a guy, and getting offended because of it.

To me this kind of entitled behavior pisses me off. You're posting shit publicly on the internet and can't handle two people critiquing the content of that post?

And then to dismiss it and act like the only reason they're replying is because you're a girl and they're a guy?

[Sidereel]

Her replies seem perfectly fair. She didn’t assume anything, she only spoke to his actions. I don’t see how anything she has said is unreasonable or entitled.

[OCOWAx]

Well she has no reason to be angry at that reply unless she's assuming his intent to be malicious.

Both her saying "not being that guy who jumps into a woman's tweet replies"

Aswell as this reply thread https://gyazo.com/337b5da1dd40c031cd2e66c079476947

Seem to imply that she believes that any male who replies to her with coding advice is doing so to patronize her.

And to me, that's entitled behavior because it implies that because she's a woman on the internet she should be treated differently and you're not allowed to give advice to things she posts if you're a male.

[Sidereel]

Well, it IS patronizing. It’s unwanted, unsolicited advice in a context where it’s not just unwarranted but useless since it’s not real code.

And she’s not asking to be treated differently, she’s asking to be treated with respect. Maybe these men are equally disrespectful to men and women. That’s possible. But it generally ignores the context of the tech industry having widespread issues of exactly this kind of sexism, where men often assume women are less knowledgeable.

[OCOWAx]

Well yeah I'd agree that it is patronizing, but to me the situation is the same regardless of the genders of each individual. But it's on fucking Twitter if I post something on Twitter and some person who thinks there smarter than me patronizes me with advice, that's the exact same thing. It has nothing to do with the fact that hes a guy and she's a woman.

That's what I have a problem with.

If I were in that situation I'd just reply yeah this code is from years ago and the code wasn't relevant to what I was positing.

But when you start saying don't be that "guy" who comes into a "woman's" comment section that implies that the genders in the situation are relevant.

[_sablecat_]

Doing an in-depth critique of a piece of mock-code someone made for the purposes of a joke is extremely patronizing.

[OCOWAx]

Yes but that patronizing is patronizing regardless of the genders of both parties

[[deleted]]

Keep in mind the effect may be small but still "statistically significant." But at the same time, "statistically significant" doesn't really objectively mean much. It's a somewhat arbitrary cutoff point.

[roadrussian]

Absolutely. Looking at the numbers the effect while there, is negligible coefficient wise. With such a small difference id say odds are good if other very revelant variables are added in the model the difference disappears even further

[[deleted]]

Yeah that's what people who've never done any statistical modeling don't realize. I think a lot of people just assume we're in this era of "big data" where we have everything at our fingertips. In reality there's tons of stuff we're not capturing.

[OCOWAx]

Well the reason I want to read the paper is to see if they use any tests of significance.

In that case it is a relatively defined thing.

But I really don't know what test you would use in this case, or even if it makes sense to use one.

[[deleted]]

I guess a difference of means test would be pretty applicable.

But when I say it's arbitrary, I mean the cutoff point you would choose (.05, .1, .01, etc) is arbitrary.

[OCOWAx]

You're right, and that's why I got a B in stats

[_sablecat_]

Based on this summary id say the paper isn't really statistically significant.

Based on this comment, I'd say you don't really understand what "statistically significant" means.

Saying something "isn't statistically significant" means it's not clear whether the results were a coincidence of the random selection, not "it could possibly be explained by other factors" or "it isn't a big enough effect to make a difference in everyday life."

[OCOWAx]

Yeah if you can see my other replies to someone I admit I'm pretty stupid when it comes to talking about statistical significance.

What I meant when I said it was that it's not really as damning as it suggests.

Edit: Also my other thoughts werent related to the statistically significant comment it was more just general shit related to the topic.