There IS a pattern of group similarities. It's not some prejudice or discrimination or anything bad, it's just a simple fact that makes no sense to pretend to be blind to.

The same is also true for any number of other common properties like culture and language and age. But the question was not about that. the question was "I'm totally boggled, why would sex change anything about how people tend to code?"

I don't rule out the possibility. But I do place a low likelihood on it.

Also, I was not claiming any nefarious reasoning here. You introduced that verbiage.

There are an infinite number of ways to solve any problem, be it in the world or in code.

A common stereotype example (whether it's true or not, it still serves as an example of a difference in approach to a problem) would be how a male would more often choose to deal with some problem directly while a female will more often find some indirect way. Some people might say that as honest vs manipulative, or simple vs smart depending on their own bias and which approach they want to portray as more admirable.

I say the "manipulator" (female) way has a lot in common with what I as a male admire in the most "elegant" engineering solutions. Getting something to happen by itself from a small input vs a more direct brute force less flexible way. It can be bad, because one form of this indirect action is to manipulate people, but that is just one expression of it. The same thing also just means seeking and being willing to employ compromises and bargaining, being willing to give an complete asshole what they want to get what you need and not caring so much about your own pride or whatever. I myself am far less likely to do that. I judge and I don't compromise or bargain unless forced, and I rationalize it as not necessarily toxic because I don't think it makes the world a better place to let people get away with some things, I think it's important and worth it in the long run to absorb some difficulty to push back, precisely because many won't and someone should.

But intellectually I can recognize that there are these two different ways to attack the same problem, and they both get results, and so they are both valid, including the approach I myself don't usually choose.

Neither is better or worse or has a better or worse value necessarily. They are different ways to successfully get from the same A starting point to the same B ending point. But they are different.

In code there is practical infinity. Like preferring functions vs objects, implicit vs explicit, imperative vs declarative... countless different paths to arrive at a desired final result.

And they are not all equally random. Males and females absolutely have bell curves of how they are more or less likely to interpret some data or problem or process, and how they go about breaking the job up to get from a to b.

Other things like culture would have it's effect too, but that's just it's own seperate thing. We have studied ourselves thoroughly enough for long enough that even with all the bad and biased studies, we still just have overwhelming and ridiculously obvious data that there is a pattern of difference attached to sex regardless of all other factors.

None of the rest of what you mention here changes my priors, though. I expect that some differences could be seen between different sexes in many things. Outside of childbirth and physical strength, I fully expect most would be driven by culture far more than any brain difference.

You obviously have different priors. Seeming to expect that there will be differences in thought work.

And you know what? That is fine. I'm surprised by your priors here, yes. You are obviously surprised by my priors, as well. That is fine.

So, to that end, I'll note I was not trying to say this shouldn't be studied. I do not dismiss that it could be, out of hand. I do fully expect that it is not the case. But it would be far from the first time my expectations were irrelevant.