From a 1990 essay comes the insight
"The ability to get ahead in an organization is simply another talent, like the ability to play chess, paint pictures, do coronary bypass operations or pick pockets. There are some people who are extraordinarily good at manipulating- organizations to serve their own ends. The Russians, who have suffered under such people for centuries, have a name for them-- apparatchiks. It was an observer of apparatchiks who coined the maxim, 'The scum rises to the top.' "

http://bobshea.net/empire_of_t...

It is as insightful in its own way as "The Mythical Man-Month".

Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted is a solid resource.

Poul Anderson pointed out in a 1967 story that a supernova could have devastating electromagnetic pulse effects.

Since then, we've found that supernova explosions are asymmetrical. There is plasma moving at very high speeds near a new neutron star's magnetic field and not in a neat way where the effects cancel out.

How far away would you have to be in order not to have all your electronics fried?

There's no good way to match the rate of high explosive delivery a battleship could implement in support of an amphibious attack.

Two 2,000 pound shells every minute from each of 9 guns is throughput an F-35 just can't touch.

Starting in 1999. There was no corresponding drop in autism rates. That fact alone, all by itself, tells you all you really need to know on the subject.

You *have* to get them a peer group made up of real peers including people more intelligent than they are.

When the company was still run ethically, the ethics included opening the engineering department to women, not just on paper but in real life.

The word spread. Women in engineering schools knew where to apply when they graduated. HP had a larger pool of bright people to choose from, people who were shying away from their competitors.

There's more to being open than sticking the phrase "Equal Opportunity Employer" on the recruiting ads. Get it right, though, and it's sound business.

Weirdly enough, women were quite well represented in technology before the 80s. Clearly there was an interest - so what's changed?

Women in other countries are somewhat more well represented in technology and more likely to go into STEM fields - so what are those other countries doing differently?

There are a number of things that make a strong case for the reasons women aren't well represented in tech being related to artificial issues rather than natural tendencies.

Tech isn't singled out as the one and only important field, by the way. I'm not sure where you get that idea from, but if you look at most any field with a lopsided gender ratio you'll see concern about the gender imbalance and efforts to remedy it. Nursing programs will aggressively pursue male candidates, same for elementary teaching, for example.

In any case, my guess as to why tech is singled out is not that tech is singled out, but that you're probably primarily reading tech sites where this gets discussed, so it just seems that way.

A willingness to give partial credit for work shown, even if the ultimate answer was wrong, and other things like that. They may be more willing, in this case, to assume that the boy with the wrong answer was on the right track, while the girl with the wrong answer was just flailing around and guessing, even when the provided answers and work were the same.

I see, it's not just ignorance - it's willful ignorance that forms the basis for your factually incorrect opinions, and when challenged on your ignorance, you lash out incoherently.

I'm sure you imagine you have a point - given that your stated opinions have no basis in fact, you probably imagine all kinds of crazy things are true. Please also feel free to imagine that you've put me in my place, if you like. I certainly don't see any point to continuing this discussion; I won't try to reason with someone clearly lacking it.

Except that there is a push to get more men into elementary teaching. And there is a push to get more men in to other industries dominated by women, like nursing.

You seem to have a very strongly held opinion (at least one that's strong enough to comment about and bash "SJW"s) that is clearly based at least in part on ignorance. I'd suggest learning more - not only will it help you avoid embarrassing yourself by displaying your ignorance, but it might even help you revise your opinions.

Also, side note, one of the reasons nobody gives much of a shit about there not being enough white players on pro basketball teams is because, statistically speaking, it isn't remotely relevant. How many pro NBA players are there? Now compare that to fields like software development or IT. Which one of those groups is more relevant for the average person who wishes to achieve upward mobility and has better odds?

Additionally, you're also ignoring the fact that white people were not, historically speaking, forbidden from playing in professional sports leagues and were not harassed and threatened (at least not for their race) when they joining the leagues. The fact that you so blithely ignore historical fact, once again, says to me that you form your opinions out of ignorance. Again, I suggest learning more so that you don't embarrass yourself by spouting off your uninformed nonsense.

Exactly that.

The extra information is irrelevant. It doesn't matter that his idiot identified as a feminist, and it didn't matter that the creep I described identified as a men's right's activist. They are an idiot and a creep, respectively, and it says absolutely nothing about other people who may have some label in common.

Given that I didn't say whatever it is you think I said, I'm not entirely sure why you seem so miffed.

I said that by changing the way they presented the company they were able to appeal to a segment of the workforce that previously had not been applying. I said nothing about what men value or that men stopped applying, just that more women began applying after they emphasized certain existing benefits.

In fact, given that I described the company's engineering group as mostly married men with children, and those benefits were already existing, one could infer that men can (and do) value child care and work/life balance.

You need to socialize with real human beings more if you think a minor disagreement with you on an internet forum is enough to ruin someone's day, princess.

Thank you for demonstrating my point perfectly.

You have zero problem saying feminists as a group (a group you don't belong to) are stupid/crazy fucks, yet you get your panties in a twist because someone does a similar thing about men's rights activists (a group you pretty clearly belong to).

The thing is - when I see your stupid/crazy stuff, I just dismiss YOU as being a stupid/crazy person. I don't dismiss all men or all men who are in the men's rights activist movement.

My entire point with my anecdote was that by putting in the (completely irrelevant, in my opinion) fact that the perv in question was in the men's rights movement is a painfully obvious attempt to paint an entire group of people as being fucked up by association, and that's pretty fucked up. Thank you for being a lovely demonstration of how easy it is to manipulate people.