[Procyona]

Very true Irene, good point at that. Also the way we define what is female and male comes from the same cognitive process.   

[Andrei]

I'm agree that everyone is a combination of different components, and we could not make conclusions about "all" men or "all" women, but from my experience, there are very small number of programmers among women.
My conclusion is that women's thinking is not adapted for such abstraction used in programming.

And the thing is not in education, but in the peculiarity of a woman's brain.   

[Gra-ach]

@Procyona: It is. People have a picture of what women's jobs are and what are men's. And any step in other direction is deemed inappropriate. The same is with MA training - in most people's opinion it's not women's job to fight. So people tend to look funny on girls who decide to study it.

@Andrei:Well, talking about women programmers - the first programmer was a woman But I wanted to say something different. There's a mindset that programming is a men's prerogative. And it doesn't really have much to do with natural inclinations of a person. Kids choose this profession because they expect high salaries for a dream they have about doing stuff which really have nothing to do with reality. Being a good programmer requires lots of studying on a daily basis, learning something new every day, creating things. That's the reason why there aren't that many really good programmers who can create new things, not just reuse something they already know over and over again. There are more boys than girls in the field because of the patters of thinking, not because girls are unable to understand stuff. And lets say that all the girls-programmers I know are really good at what they do, but most of boys-programmers are just coders. And teaching students I can tell you that girls grasp the concept of abstraction quicker than boys - at least I haven't heard from a girl that address is derived from a bank

So I think it's a question of personal integrity and courage - to continue on the course you've set on despite the obstacles of what someone else thinks, deems inappropriate or unladylike. If you like doing it, you do it and everyone be damned   

[Haveunique]

I totally agree with you Ira on the doing part It's all getting down to balancing your own spiritual, physical and life together as one, and realizing yourself in each as much as possible. When all of these are opened and being realized, the question is only about how to do what you do in a better way each new day.

And then, how many of us have at least thought about balancing our lives? From professional, personal, physical points? And just considering this is only the first step in the direction of self-realization.   

[Procyona]

Good point Irene and Tetyana, it is about doing what you most feel like doing, regardless the view of others

Talking about balance and female/male division, is there even such a thing then? Should we talk about females and males or just people with different attributes?

The more I think of this now, the more it seems that sex is a bizarre thing, which comes forward in the balance of hormones of two counterparts. In the hormone level, which decides the sex in humans when they are born, there are two sides the swing can go to, but there is also much variance in between. But the level of the hormones can later change, making the variance of characteristic wider, and sex - male/female axis - does not matter as much on the personal level.   

[Haveunique]

I think - and it's just my opinion - of course we perceive each other as personalities. However, I wouldn't disregard the fact that there are men and women. It's all about how we understand ourselves and others, and what meaning we put there.