All human problem solving (especially the male approach) tends to be a exercise in discovery, generally done by making an approximate solution, testing it against the reality of use, then refining this until it's "good". Different people have different skills in this regard, some are good at overall designs, some at details.
Since everyone is going to ask, the female approach is to exchange opinions about the elephant's skin texture, color, smell, etc. until the elephant falls asleep from boredom, upon which point the women can drape the elephant in colorful cloth and decorate it tastefully.
OK, all three female Slashdotters can flame me at once now. I'm ready...
By analogy, it would take two blind people to survey the surface skin of an elephant, and then two other men to explore the functionality and limitations of its genitalia. It would take the remaining two men to successfully handle the wrinkles of the situation in such a way that they could harvest the productions of the elephant's workflow.
In short, Zoology is a fascinating area of fascination. And I truly believe that the analogous contents of its correlation t
(And this is quite important, so please don't flame me for being politically incorrect or whatever)...
Men tend to solve problems in this way, defining approximate solutions, slicing the problem into pieces and delegating the smaller tasks, focussing relentlessly on technical details, until the elephant has been hunted, killed, skinned, chopped, carried back, eaten, and the fat melted down into candle wax.
Women tend to solve problems by exchanging points of view and information, and arriving at approximate solutions by averaging the solutions they have learned about.
The difference is crystal clear: technical problems cannot be solved by "averages", social problems cannot be solved by "analysis" (unless you're a genius for understanding people).
Of course there are many man who think like women, and vice versa. Gender roles are not iron-clad, they are poles to which people stick more or less.
Both types of problem-solving skill are necessary in solving real-world problems, which are as often social as physical. I.e. if it's a real elephant you're hunting, it's a man's job. If you're constructing a new house, you really need to have a lot of discussion first.
Well-organized teams therefore mix women and men not because they are equal and equivalent (we are not), but because we're complementary.
As you said, lots of Men think the way women do - so why categorize the styles of thinking in terms of sexes and not in terms of the thought patterns?
It does no good to mix women and men on a project if all you get are people that think the same. The best idea is to mix a number of different styles on a projectt, even if that means all men or all women.
Personally I find the Meyers-Briggs definition for personality types to be pretty accurate - many companies have employees take this test to "learn how to
why categorize the styles of thinking in terms of sexes...
Because it's simple and accurate and honest. Personality differences are not random or accidental, people are adapted to working in social teams of various kinds and the primary factor deciding what "role" someone will take is gender.
Since most teams are not built by psychologists, and most people are more complex than it is possible to pinpoint with a "category", profiling people with psychological tests prior to placing them in teams simply doe
This is not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
And the corollary is... (Score:1, Flamebait)
OK, all three female Slashdotters can flame me at once now. I'm ready...
Re:And the corollary is... (Score:1)
(As a sidenote, I almost made the funniest typo ever; "Tarding Spaces"
Re:And the corollary is... (Score:1)
Punk.
Re:This is not surprising (Score:1)
Some people can figure out the overall shape, and the other two can deal with the wrinkles?
I like this metaphor..
Re:This is not surprising (Score:1)
By analogy, it would take two blind people to survey the surface skin of an elephant, and then two other men to explore the functionality and limitations of its genitalia. It would take the remaining two men to successfully handle the wrinkles of the situation in such a way that they could harvest the productions of the elephant's workflow.
In short, Zoology is a fascinating area of fascination. And I truly believe that the analogous contents of its correlation t
And a second collorary is... (Score:5, Interesting)
Men tend to solve problems in this way, defining approximate solutions, slicing the problem into pieces and delegating the smaller tasks, focussing relentlessly on technical details, until the elephant has been hunted, killed, skinned, chopped, carried back, eaten, and the fat melted down into candle wax.
Women tend to solve problems by exchanging points of view and information, and arriving at approximate solutions by averaging the solutions they have learned about.
The difference is crystal clear: technical problems cannot be solved by "averages", social problems cannot be solved by "analysis" (unless you're a genius for understanding people).
Of course there are many man who think like women, and vice versa. Gender roles are not iron-clad, they are poles to which people stick more or less.
Both types of problem-solving skill are necessary in solving real-world problems, which are as often social as physical. I.e. if it's a real elephant you're hunting, it's a man's job. If you're constructing a new house, you really need to have a lot of discussion first.
Well-organized teams therefore mix women and men not because they are equal and equivalent (we are not), but because we're complementary.
You've got it way to gender based (Score:2)
It does no good to mix women and men on a project if all you get are people that think the same. The best idea is to mix a number of different styles on a projectt, even if that means all men or all women.
Personally I find the Meyers-Briggs definition for personality types to be pretty accurate - many companies have employees take this test to "learn how to
Re:You've got it way to gender based (Score:2)
Because it's simple and accurate and honest. Personality differences are not random or accidental, people are adapted to working in social teams of various kinds and the primary factor deciding what "role" someone will take is gender.
Since most teams are not built by psychologists, and most people are more complex than it is possible to pinpoint with a "category", profiling people with psychological tests prior to placing them in teams simply doe
Re:And a second collorary is... (Score:2)
I think it's what you get when you spend all day programming while drinking coffee, smoking and eating doughnuts.
graspee