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Why Are Too Few Females in Robotics? Could It Be the Robots? - Page 7 — Parallax Forums

Why Are Too Few Females in Robotics? Could It Be the Robots?

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  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    What? Boys sewing? Shocking I tell you.

    As the late great Fred Dibnah said:

    "Teaching boys to bake cakes? That's no way to maintain an industrial empire."

    OK, I have to come out on that one. When I was 11 years old I could knit. We knitted our own custom woolly bobble hats to wear on fishing trips. It's something I kept quite about for decades. Then recently I learned that young snowboarding dudes also knit their own woolly hats.

    erco,
    ...what if I'm a hardware guy, trapped in a software guy's body?
    Easy, just write HDL for FPGAs and ASICs :)
  • WhitWhit Posts: 4,191
    erco wrote: »
    I couldn't afford most of their stuff, but a company named Frostline Kits sold affordable DIY gear. I sewed lots of kits making booties, gaiters, jacket and even a tent! I still have the 60/40 jacket I sewed over 40 years ago, works great.

    That's really cool! Thanks for the link - great stuff - I wish some of the kit stuff would come back. I know there are still some great kits out there for all sorts of stuff. It is great idea.

  • Yep!

    Priceless! :)
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,256
    Almost. ;)
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,256
    Whit wrote: »
    erco wrote: »
    I couldn't afford most of their stuff, but a company named Frostline Kits sold affordable DIY gear. I sewed lots of kits making booties, gaiters, jacket and even a tent! I still have the 60/40 jacket I sewed over 40 years ago, works great.

    That's really cool! Thanks for the link - great stuff - I wish some of the kit stuff would come back. I know there are still some great kits out there for all sorts of stuff. It is great idea.

    I had to get this vintage gaiter kit. Almost as rare as an unbuilt Heathkit!

    http://www.ebay.com/itm/Frostline-Gaiters-Kit-111-Unisex-/253075493560

  • MikeDYurMikeDYur Posts: 2,176
    edited 2017-08-28 12:42
    Not robotics, but a very special group of women chosen for a complicated task.


    Unearthing the legacy of Harvard's female 'computers' -

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-40879870
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,256
    Has the movie "Hidden Figures" been mentioned yet? A great mostly true story.
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    edited 2017-08-28 17:04
    One of those Harvard "computers" that did become a little bit known is Henrietta Swan Leavitt.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henrietta_Swan_Leavitt

    After much analysis of photographic plates over years she figured out a way to tell how far away galaxies are.

    Her data was used by Hubble to show that the universe is expanding.


  • WhitWhit Posts: 4,191
    @erco - Yes, I loved Hidden Figures!

    @Heater - Fastenating info!
  • To go a little back to the original question.

    Women are great, and often get underestimated. I - personally - can look back at the line of my family and, gosh, it all depended on the women. If one would be missing I would not be here, today.

    There is some saying about Men always being children, so face it guys, we men have sometimes more in common with any 10-year old boy then with our female counterparts.

    It's not 'different upbringing', nor 'different chances'. It's different interests.

    So I ask the question "Are there Too Few Females in Robotics?"

    Gosh, I like @Amanda and her creations as much as you all do, or @Carol Hazlet ones. Just the two of them build more stuff as I even thought about building.

    But I am sort of unhappy with the general idea that all positions/jobs/occupations/hobbies/desires and dreams have to be filled by the equal number of people split up in equal parts by gender, race, number of children or number of felonies.

    There are differences, more men then women do robotics, and more women then men do Yoga. Sure. But:

    There is nothing wrong about it. It's OK!.

    Enjoy!

    Mike
  • But I am sort of unhappy with the general idea that all positions/jobs/occupations/hobbies/desires and dreams have to be filled by the equal number of people split up in equal parts by gender, race, number of children or number of felonies.

    There are differences, more men then women do robotics, and more women then men do Yoga. Sure. But:
    Amen!
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,256
    Much to its credit, the Parallax BoE-Bot name is not gender specific. Bo Derek and Bo Jackson could feel equally good assembling and programming one.
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    msrobots,
    But I am sort of unhappy with the general idea that all positions/jobs/occupations/hobbies/desires and dreams have to be filled by the equal number of people split up in equal parts by gender, race, number of children or number of felonies.

    There are differences, more men then women do robotics, and more women then men do Yoga. Sure. But:
    Careful there. Recently Google fired James Damore for making such statements. Which became something of a scandal. https://www.cnet.com/au/news/fired-google-engineer-says-company-is-trying-to-smear-him-diversity-memo-james-davore/
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    eroco,
    ... the Parallax BoE-Bot name is not gender specific...
    That is good.

    What makes me chuckle is that "bot" might take on a different meaning in the UK. As in "Get you bot off the table".



  • ercoerco Posts: 20,256
    Heater. wrote: »
    "Get you bot off the table".

    Possibly my wife's most often-uttered phrase.

  • ercoerco Posts: 20,256
    Gender equality: Pink girly robot fires machine gun just like boy bots do.



    Feminists may prefer that to FemiSapien's sashay.



  • RaymanRayman Posts: 14,550
    My daughter did like the colors I picked for printing out our second BOTTO robot:
    1632 x 1224 - 674K
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    I sometimes wonder about the "gender gap", if I can call it that.

    Where do the interests, wants, desires, attitudes, abilities of boys and girls start to diverge? Assuming they start from an equal footing at birth. Ultimately leading to questions such as "Why Are Too Few Females in Robotics?" or the current scandal surrounding Google and James Damore.

    Then, walking into a Toys"R"Us store it hits you in the face.

    There is a very clear, and loud, demarcation between toys for boys and toys for girls. Everything in the girls section is in that sickly shade of vomit inducing, fluorescent, purpley pink. Not even a nice shade of pink.

    I don't particularly have a thing against purpley pink. But really, the demarcation between boys and girls is clearly there in Toys"R"Us. And targeted at a very young age.

    Any parents out there like to suggest at what age and how this gets programmed into us?






  • I may be a little different than a lot of women but I hate the new "princess colors" on everything. But it is not genetic,
    my grandgirls and great grandgirls all love it. One of my Grandgirls, who is in her 20's will only buy things with pink
    and/or purple in them! UGH! I am actually offended by it because the marketers are saying we know what you want
    more than you do! I like black and red myself.
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,256
    I like black and red myself.

    What's not to like?

    img_4106.jpg

  • ercoerco Posts: 20,256
    Rayman wrote: »
    My daughter did like the colors I picked for printing out our second BOTTO robot:

    Beautimous, Rayman! Are those pegs LEGO-compatible?

  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    Rayman,

    Don't get me wrong. I think your BOTTO has a wonderful pinky/puple color scheme.

  • RaymanRayman Posts: 14,550
    Nibs are supposed to be Duplo compatible. They work OK. Maybe could be better, but good enough.

    1632 x 1224 - 685K
  • RaymanRayman Posts: 14,550
    The legs are actually "neon magenta". But, daughter thinks it's pink, so we're all happy.
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    "neon magenta"

    That is a shade of pink is it not?
  • RaymanRayman Posts: 14,550
    I have no idea... Didn't have much luck on Wikipedia...

    But, google helped me find that it is an official color of Korean girl band:



  • Heater. wrote: »
    One of those Harvard "computers" that did become a little bit known is Henrietta Swan Leavitt.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henrietta_Swan_Leavitt

    After much analysis of photographic plates over years she figured out a way to tell how far away galaxies are.

    Her data was used by Hubble to show that the universe is expanding.
    I'm not trying to take this thread off-topic again, but I thought I'd point out a recent and excellent book on this topic: The Glass Universe by Dava Sobel. Modern astronomy and astrophysics owe a lot to the ladies of Harvard Observatory.

  • jones wrote: »
    Heater. wrote: »
    One of those Harvard "computers" that did become a little bit known is Henrietta Swan Leavitt.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henrietta_Swan_Leavitt

    After much analysis of photographic plates over years she figured out a way to tell how far away galaxies are.

    Her data was used by Hubble to show that the universe is expanding.
    I'm not trying to take this thread off-topic again, but I thought I'd point out a recent and excellent book on this topic: The Glass Universe by Dava Sobel. Modern astronomy and astrophysics owe a lot to the ladies of Harvard Observatory.

    Yup, that got mentioned about 20 posts ago.


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