[Grustaf]

I’m not saying hiring managers should favour men for developer jobs. I’m saying many more men are into computers, so it’s natural that people hire more male developers.

You are aware that men are much more likely to be autistic, right? Don’t you feel that it’s at least conceivable that men are also more likely to be interested in spending their day writing instructions to computers?

[wsy]

Yes, I think it is conceivable. But at the same time, I have a hard time explaining a 10%/90% distribution just with biological differences. It seems to me that the biological differences are too small to explain such a huge skew. In particular, because the gender distribution for programmers was very different in the 1940s/1950s. At the same time, the cultural biases seem so obvious to me, that I think acknowledging them too would be a better basis for further discussion.

[Grustaf]

Why do you find such a skew unbelievable? For example, close to 95% of colorblind people are men. 80%+ of people with autism and like 99.9% of bald people.

But it’s not all bad, men have 20 times more testosterone, which makes them stronger and faster. So clearly there are lots of biological differences with a 90/10 distribution.

[wsy]

We are talking about software developers. In the 1950s, most programmers were female. It doesn't seem to be a profession where male biological characteristics are essential to be successful. All the examples you mentioned are non-essential for being a good software developer.

[Grustaf]

We were talking about the existence of gender based 90/10 skews.

As to femle programmers in the 1950’s, do you really think that is comparable?

[wsy]

Yes, in the context of a program to educate women specifically about how to code.

Comparable to what? I mentioned programming in the 1950s because all traits labeled in this discussion as "boys/males biologically have more of it than girls/women" have been as important for programming in the 1950s as they are now, it seems to me

[Grustaf]

So you think the women that worked as “computers” in the fifties entered the field because they had a passion for electronic machines?