Women in computer science

[Cat]

"We're knights of the round table, we're in-de-fati-gable"...

So I *did* know it. I was probably in 8th grade the year that came out!

[ASTDan]

I know Edison didn't invent the light bulb, I choose that analogy in particular figuring someone would pick up on it. And it was my better half who did..."better half" I have to come up with a better articulation for that.

I am a big fan of Tesla, especially the documentary I saw on him and his most controversal invention...his cloner.

(the movie is not a documentary, it is a joke he never made a cloner...or did he...no, no he did, but maybe...)

Waaaa! Tesla isn't David Bowie! Ziggy Stardust and Alternating current! I am crushed.

[PaulG.]

Waaaa! Tesla isn't David Bowie! Ziggy Stardust and Alternating current! I am crushed.

Bowie played a great Tesla but I thought The Prestige was boring. I'm hoping someone will do a movie about the supposed correlation between the Tunguska event and Tesla testing his Death Ray.

[Black Pearl]

Tough topic, but face the situation: Computer 'geeks' have no idea about 'gender-studies', and 'gender-studies'-persons have no ideas of computers/geeks. And this is based on simple equations like 'gender-studies'=females(historical feminist background required) and 'computers/geeks'=males(we already call it software, what else do you girls want from us?). But I just want to leave this challenge to the academia staff to solve.

Here just some info I can throw in:

* In CS the western countries have a very bad gender ration about (guess) 95% male: 5% female, while in such anti-women countries as Iran you have over 50% women in CS

* a friend of mine (woman studying CS) tells me, that most of those 5% are non-western (coming from arabic or asian countries)

-> so this seems to be a cultural issue

* another friend of mine (she was trying tom revive women power) realized, that in 'free`communities such as Open Source projects, the gender ratio is even worse than in average CS industries (geek factor?)

* a recent study showed that girls confronted with predjudices (girls are bad at math) performed worse in math tests than girls that were not confronted with these.

* In engineering, a very big gain is community (think about our lovely LAVA community), but community building is gendered to women. How can we perform at all with that lack of female influence?

BTW: My sister is VHDLing robots in a big company, geek?

Felix

[crelf]

BTW: My sister is VHDLing robots in a big company, geek?

More of a nerd than a geek - hasn't she heard about LabVIEW FPGA?

[Black Pearl]

When they moved into their new house, they didn't like the door bell. I did fix it, but blamed here: you are the EE! This ain't not me domain! She propably realized it and now here husband is taking care of the kids...

Felix

[Daklu]

"We're knights of the round table, we're in-de-fati-gable"...

I introduced my (then) 11-yo daughter to the Holy Grail at the beginning of her spring break last April. She loved it--watching it about a dozen times before the week was out. Recently she's started identifying herself as a gamer. I can't complain about that... games are what steered me into technology. And it's way better than the Goth route she started down a couple months ago.

[Daryl]

More of a nerd than a geek - hasn't she heard about LabVIEW FPGA?

+1

[Irene_he]

More of a nerd than a geek - hasn't she heard about LabVIEW FPGA?

What are the clear differences between nerd and geek? do you mean women engineers are nerd while men engineers are geek?

When they moved into their new house, they didn't like the door bell. I did fix it, but blamed here: you are the EE! This ain't not me domain! She propably realized it and now here husband is taking care of the kids...

Felix

Maybe because the "fixing the bell" is "trivial" for her education to fix. You don't expect a PhD (even a man) to repair a lamp or even setup a msn account (yes, I am talking about my brother in law , he works in Munich for BMW), but we can't say he is not capable. Fixing the bell is indeed not her domain.

Edited December 18, 2009 by Irene_he

[Grampa_of_Oliva_n_Eden]

What are the clear differences between nerd and geek? do you mean women engineers are nerd while men engineers are geek?

...

Clear?

I believe the term geek originally (? used to ) refered to a wlidman in a circus sideshow that would bit the heads off of live chikens. Anything but appealing. But on the other hand any women whose eyes do not glaze over when the conversation gets technical is by definition "hot" so geek really can not be applied to women.

But for a man he could be one or the other or both. No, geeks are not a sub-set of nerd, since someone could be a geek with being technical.

Of course the above is subject to the typical hob-nobbing that happens here.

Ben

[Gary Rubin]

What are the clear differences between nerd and geek? do you mean women engineers are nerd while men engineers are geek?

Gotta love the topics of conversation on LAVA!

[Daklu]

What are the clear differences between nerd and geek? do you mean women engineers are nerd while men engineers are geek?

My take on it:

Geeks are social misfits because they like technology.

Nerds are social misfits because... they're social misfits.

Geeks become your boss.

Nerds become your waiter.

Geeks expect to give technology tips to those they interact with.

Nerds expect to receive monetary tips from those they interact with.

Geeks are comfortable with who they are.

Nerds are comfortable imagining they are someone else.

Nerd/Geek status crosses gender boundaries, though in general I think it's easier for a boy to be considered a nerd than a girl. Once you reach adulthood the nerd label usually isn't applied any more. Then you're just "weird."

[Cat]

any women whose eyes do not glaze over when the conversation gets technical is by definition "hot"

I like that!

Back in the Olden Days when I was growing up, there was no such thing as a "geek". All of the social misfits were called "nerds". There was a sub-set of nerds called "media nerds". These were the guys who were in the Media Club, set up the AV equipment for the school, hung out in the only classroom with an actual modem in it (had to put the phone handset down on the rubber cups). I think they morphed into today's "geeks". So I would have to (respectfully!) disagree -- I think geeks are a subset of nerds.

[asbo]

My take on it:

Geeks are social misfits because they like technology.

Nerds are social misfits because... they're social misfits.

Geeks become your boss.

Nerds become your waiter.

Geeks expect to give technology tips to those they interact with.

Nerds expect to receive monetary tips from those they interact with.

Geeks are comfortable with who they are.

Nerds are comfortable imagining they are someone else.

Nerd/Geek status crosses gender boundaries, though in general I think it's easier for a boy to be considered a nerd than a girl. Once you reach adulthood the nerd label usually isn't applied any more. Then you're just "weird."

Odd, I would have totally swapped your definitions here.

[crelf]

My take on it:

Nicely put!

...when I was growing up, there was no such thing as a "geek". All of the social misfits were called "nerds".

and hence the geek was born - originally they were all nerds because they were social misfits, but then the technology they were obsessing over became socially acceptable (in some cases even something that the social mean admired) and became geeks. Those who obsess over technology that changes our lives are geeks, those who obsess over technology that is irrelevant are nerds.

Odd, I would have totally swapped your definitions here.

Then you'd be just like you were on the racquetball court yesterday: very very wrong.

[Gary Rubin]

Then you'd be just like you were on the racquetball court yesterday: very very wrong.

Trash-talking on LAVA?

"You call that a wire! I've seen better wiring from a 3-year-old! I'll show you a real wire!".

"Your mother was a global, and your father smelled of sequence structures! I GOOP in your general direction!"

[James Beleau]

I too reverse those definitions.

Geek is the pecular/dislikeable person. It is associated with a particularly singular obsessive personality. Starwars and star trek followers would be a geek. Intellegence is not a prerequisite. Excessive knowledge about their obsessive subject is.

Nerd is a derogatory term for intellegent people to call them unattractive, which is one of its meanings. These would be the people that forsook social standing for the pursuit of academics in general and tend to be the ones that end up high paying careers.

[jzoller]

Of course, the term geek originally meant a circus performer who bit the heads off small, live animals.

Such an odd word permutation.

Joe Z.

[Cat]

Geek is the pecular/dislikeable person.

Them's fightin' words...

It is associated with a particularly singular obsessive personality. Starwars and star trek followers would be a geek.

I can't disagree with that.

Intellegence is not a prerequisite. Excessive knowledge about their obsessive subject is.

"Obsessive" by who's definition?

I called a cow-orker a "dunsel" once. I was making a reference to a Star Trek episode.

Cow-orker #2 remembered much more about the episode than I did.

Cow-orker #3 remembered everything about the episode including the title.

Which one of us knows enough about Star Trek to qualify as a "geek"?

Nerd is a derogatory term for intellegent people to call them unattractive, which is one of its meanings. These would be the people that forsook social standing for the pursuit of academics in general and tend to be the ones that end up high paying careers.

Now this I agree with. I suspect the non-geeky nerds I went to school with ended up runing the financial world. And before anyone says those nerds weren't smart enough to avoid the current crisis, just remember, they are so smart that despite all the havoc they have wreaked they are still making more money than 99.9% of the rest of us.

[Irene_he]

Now this I agree with. I suspect the non-geeky nerds I went to school with ended up runing the financial world. And before anyone says those nerds weren't smart enough to avoid the current crisis, just remember, they are so smart that despite all the havoc they have wreaked they are still making more money than 99.9% of the rest of us.

Mencius says: Those who works with the mind, rule. Those who works with physical labor, being ruled. Well , Some people may critique this saying to under value the labor work, but it seems the world is working with this rule.

[James Beleau]

I mean obsessive by saying to be a geek there needs to be a target for the geekyness. How 'obsessive' they are could be their measure of geek-dom I guess. The point was that to be a geek, there must be something over which a person obsesses which also puts them into the catagory of 'pecular', ie strange to the general public. Such as biting the heads off things, which the term originated from.

[Irene_he]

Clear?

I believe the term geek originally (? used to ) refered to a wlidman in a circus sideshow that would bit the heads off of live chikens.

Thanks for the story. Then definitely don't want to be a geek. Let others who like it to claim the title.

But on the other hand any women whose eyes do not glaze over when the conversation gets technical is by definition "hot"

Ben

That sounds nice.

[Francois Normandin]

Which one of us knows enough about Star Trek to qualify as a "geek"?

Is there such a thing as a geek "coming-out"?

I've read 100+ Star Trek novels, not all shown here.

And got 38% (Major Geek) in the geek test. So I think I qualify...

I too reverse those definitions.

Geek is the pecular/dislikeable person. It is associated with a particularly singular obsessive personality. Starwars and star trek followers would be a geek. Intellegence is not a prerequisite. Excessive knowledge about their obsessive subject is.

My girlfriend calls me "My favorite geek", and I would probably find it offensive if she called me "My favorite Nerd"...

So I'd have to go with Daklu's definition. There might be something lost in translation...

[PJM_labview]

Since we are side tracking into SF...

I just watched Avatar (in 3d) yesterday and this is a visually amazing movie.

All of you geek/nerd (pick the one you like the best ) should go and see it.

PJM

[PaulG.]

My take on it:

Geeks are social misfits because they like technology.

Nerds are social misfits because... they're social misfits.

Geeks become your boss.

Nerds become your waiter.

Geeks expect to give technology tips to those they interact with.

Nerds expect to receive monetary tips from those they interact with.

Geeks are comfortable with who they are.

Nerds are comfortable imagining they are someone else.

Nerd/Geek status crosses gender boundaries, though in general I think it's easier for a boy to be considered a nerd than a girl. Once you reach adulthood the nerd label usually isn't applied any more. Then you're just "weird."

Odd, I would have totally swapped your definitions here.

Me, too. When I think of "nerd" I think of Weird Al Yankovich in "White and Nerdy", Bill Gates ... and one of my nephews. I don't know about Al or Bill but my nephew (he describes himself as a "nerd") is extremely popular with the ladies. He wants to be a nerd, that's fine with me.

Geeks are geeks. Pencil-neck chicken head biter-offers. (or something like that)