Diiv

Staff/Principal Engineer @ Apple. B.S. EECS Berkeley. M.S. CS GaTech. Malaysian-American. Childhood hometown: Boise, Idaho. Happily Married. Opinions my own.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

@VideoGameHstry This will probably be me if I have kids and my future kid(s) put(s) on Zelda Ocarina of Time.

OoT always be my greatest game of all time.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

Nigerian Americans and many other African immigrants to America have very low crime rates even lower crime rates than native born White Americans so it’s not a race thing imo but probably due to historical systemic forces imo.

A good example are the subset of Tamil people who got out of the Malaysian rubber plantations whose ancestors were initially brought by the British as indentured workers in late 1800s/early 1900s (my Dad is 4th generation Malaysian and descends from this group in fact he was born in the plantation and got out as an adult, he’s an engineer himself)

In Malaysia they had formed a stereotype that this group formed gangs and committed crimes. But the reality is that it wasn’t their race causing them to commit crimes but rather historical discriminatory polices against their darker skin tones and other factors.

We know this because Tamils are known in India has having a State with low crime rates and high literacy rates and aptitude in mathematics and it’s where a lot of Tech manufacturing is located.

They were also a successful minority group in Sri Lanka and of course here in America they fill the ranks of PhDs and in STEM companies (you can look these up yourself).

And famous mathematicians like Srinivasan Ramanujan who worked with GH Hardy on Number Theory in 1800s.

So it’s the same generic race but with wildly different outcomes.

And nowadays in both Malaysia and Singapore most are doing quite well with low crime rates and in educated occupations.

This indicates that it was more due to systemic forces of discrimination rather than actual genetics than was causing some of the earlier problems.

That’s why so many Nigerian Americans for example are successful here in many fields in STEM and economics and doing better than many native born groups.

The Nigerians who grew in areas of Nigeria with good education systems and perhaps wealthier families didn’t have those systemic forces that gave them subpar educational resources or culture as children.

I think if as a nation we focus on reforming our impoverished regions with a better culture on ethics and education then we’ll generate more homegrown American born talent of all races and honestly that is ideally what we should be doing instead of current strategy of just finding talent overseas to mask our lack of desire to reform our K-12 educational systems.

And I’m optimistic it will happen. Our education systems here in America will keep getting better and well educated great homegrown talent of all ethnicities. It’ll take time but it’ll happen.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

Well respectfully I’m not “doing the meme” since I never equated my personal experience with statistical reality I was just sharing my personal/anecdotal experience.

In terms of actual data I think both you and I are more than capable of looking for whatever set of statistics fit our personal motivations and biases.

The CATO institute studies show immigrants overall to be a net economic positive (it includes both legal and illegal ones) and with lower crime rates than the native born here in the United States (this is not true in other countries like Japan where immigrant crime rates are higher than native born), and there’s other similar agencies with similar statistics,

But again the CATO institute has its own libertarian economic biases

Similar to any organization with opposite proclivities.

So even if the statistics were collected faithfully you can always design studies with sampling criteria to get what you want.

In the end from a personal life point of view perhaps the “anec-data” is what matters more when it comes to the real world as opposed being in forums online. Who knows?

Anyway take care you seem like an interesting person.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

Yeah I respect your perspective even if my personal experience was different here in America.

But I’m obviously biased on immigration to some extent since my Malaysian born parents immigrated here from Malaysia back in the early 90s and all their neighbors in Idaho loved them and they loved their neighbors. And when they became U.S. citizens they renounced (gave up) their Malaysian citizenship. They were proud to become Americans.

If they didn’t sell everything they had in Malaysia and use that money to come and make a life here, I wouldn’t be here today as an American myself. So I’m forever thankful and grateful for that.

Also here in California in the SF Bay Area I’ve met immigrants from all over the world of all races and religions and overall they have all been nice and I love trying out food from different cultures and I don’t even have to travel outside the country to do that I can get it all here in the Bay Area.

So yeah my experience with immigrants has been a good one which colors my perspective on the issue.

But all that being said we probably should be prioritizing Americans for entry level jobs before needing to look elsewhere for labor needs I think every nation on the planet does that, especially in times of a tough economy or job market. But that’s off topic.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

@Forbes Correction 1800s not 1900s.

Wow even earlier than I thought.

It’s not some big pharma scam people, humans have been drinking pasteurized milk for over a century it seems.

It’s safe.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

Idaho seems to have a changed a lot since I left in 2010.

In the 90s and 2000s when I went to public school (elementary, middle, and high school) they asked my parents to show vaccination records and all that,

And in school we learned about the brilliant French guy Louis Pasteur and how he invented Pasteurization in the early 1900s and how it eliminated most raw milk based sickness/illness,

And why we mostly drink pasteurized milk.

And it went from that to this?

[Diiv @Diivanand]

Yeah that’s a valid a fair point. And there’s probably reforms needed on that aspect.

I think one tough thing people don’t get is that you can’t have both a welfare state and uncontrolled immigration at the same time. You can only choose one or the other really.

Because such a system can’t scale and will bankrupt itself for obvious economic/math reasons.

Many rich European and Middle Eastern countries maintain their opulent social welfare systems because they make sure those systems mostly only apply to their citizens and they make the path to citizenship very difficult. Because you always need to make sure the tax revenues you gain via capitalism

Is enough to afford and fund the socialist safety net of government benefits you give out to the population.

It’s a delicate balancing act.

And in the olden days when such systems didn’t exist that same situation wasn’t there.

All that being said though I think a lot of data shows that immigrant tax revenues even after subtracting off whatever benefits apply to them is a net positive I think? Probably can ask grok.

So overall I believe the U.S. is mostly gaining tax revenue from the young labor force which also includes immigrants I think?

But yeah I agree with you it’s much more complicated math/economics on whether it’s actually “good for the country” compared to 100 years ago.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

@Diamond_Combat_ @minnesota_jen @AlecStapp Yeah you’re not a person who talks in good faith.

Americans and our college education system produces overall better engineers than other countries. I strongly believe that.

But you’re a troll that’s why you don’t show your face or real name.

Have a nice day.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

@Diamond_Combat_ @minnesota_jen @AlecStapp That’s not at all what I said in fact it’s almost the exact opposite.

Why do people on the internet always do this.

Take one comment and spin it into something else.

No offense or disrespect.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

@Diamond_Combat_ @minnesota_jen @AlecStapp That’s not at all what I said in fact it’s almost the exact opposite.

Why do people on the internet always do this.

Take one comment and spin it into something else.

No offense or disrespect.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

“Being Indian” isn’t the reason for their success imo. Anyone saying that is wrong.

Usually people who attribute race or ethnicity or religion or class/caste to success are people who don’t have personal skills/merit/ethics on their own so they want to ride on the coattails of other successful humans who just happen to have the same race/region/ethnicity/class/caste.

What’s probably a more accurate reason for success of many immigrant groups is because it’s mostly a skilled labor visa system,

That’s why you see Nigerians/Africans, Chinese, Indians, South Americans, and Eastern Europeans who come here being on average very smart/capable (I’m not counting those who manage slip through cracks and get in via fraud or cronyism or cheap labor/visa loop holes which of course should be fixed but the actual ones who studied and worked hard in whatever their field or expertise was and have high ethics and hopefully those who come via fraud are caught and sent back that’s the US government’s job)

If there’s a Gaussian bell curve of talent, and you pick from closer to the right half of that Gaussian curve for immigration purposes,

Then of course you’ll get success numbers like this.

It’s a biased selection/sampling of the “best” humans from these regions.

These merit numbers don’t reflect the overall populations of these groups back in their home countries, and there’s tons of data that show this btw it’s not a secret.

It’s a biased selection of the right half of the Gaussian curve in general. [any potential fraud or loopholes or even other non-merit visa systems can potentially impact this but that’s a different discussion].

[Diiv @Diivanand]

It’s the similar reason to why many hardworking and intelligent Southern Italians of the early 1900s came here instead of “doing that in Southern Italy” and same reasoning for many Eastern Europeans back then as well.

Their home countries or regions within their home countries had economic or political corruption issues that prevented optimal economic achievement or in some cases were endangering to their life due to their faith.

Like the cartels/mafias in Southern Italy during that time period was a big drain on economic and social development as well as a danger to many Southern Italian families.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

@shriyanevatia No worries. If you have recommendations of South Asian places in America that meet your standard for cuisine excellence please share!

If I ever have the chance I’d want to visit them.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

While probably somewhat true, I don’t think this is true among the highly competent and ethical subsets of humans within each of these groups you mention (although this applies to any race/ethnicity/religion not just South Asians).

Using Clanism, nativism, communalism, and in general “in-group” social connections to obtain goals or resources or to get into conflicts with others are usually strategies used only by humans (of any race, ethnicity, or religion) to achieve resources only because the merit-only score/ability or competency of that particular human wasn’t enough to earn/obtain that resource.

If you’ve had the privilege to study or work at any highly selective institution (either public or private company, university, government agency etc etc) that has maintained a reputation of both high regard for ethics as well as high regard for merit,

Then most of the humans in that institution tend to get along even if they are diverse by race/ethnicity/religion.

Because those humans care more about the passion of maintaining, building, creating, and improving the institution as opposed to more primitive selfish/individualistic goals which can cause tension and division and toxicity.

But in the comment sections of Twitter/X which I’m assuming are of a lower competency on average since it’s closer human general averages,

Then yes you’re right you’ll find some of what you’re describing all that group fighting between each other etc etc.

Since the censorship was removed by Musk in a sense we know have a more accurate view of perhaps base-level humans of every culture

But it is important to remember it’s probably not representative if you happen to live in a more economically and educationally privileged area with an existing culture for strong morality and ethics.

So that’s how I contrast what I see on social media versus what I see in reality.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

I wrote “fire” not “fine” as in really good.

But I’ve had really good places in both Seattle and Bay Area but usually not in the cities themselves but in hole in the wall local spots in the surrounding Asian-heavy suburbs.

Can you share the names of Indian restaurants here in America that meet your expectations of being “really good”?

[Diiv @Diivanand]

@shriyanevatia The service and atmosphere in the places with good food is usually very bare bones and simple so you have to get over appearances.

But if you can then the food is usually fire.

Like this one in Fremont:

[Diiv @Diivanand]

That’s not true if you consider places in Fremont, Union City, Milpitas and Dublin/Pleasanton.

(Also lots of really good Chinese and Malaysian places in these cities)

And to lesser extent some parts around Sunnyvale, Santa Clara, Cupertino, and San Jose.

It’s only bad if you look outside these areas like in SF (San Francisco).

[Diiv @Diivanand]

@peter_mott @DnlYn2892212345 @PAHoyeck Ah ok Wikipedia called him “English born” but maybe Ireland was under British occupation during that time so maybe that’s why?

[Diiv @Diivanand]

Ah ok that explains it. I probably just read the 2nd one.

It’s been over 16 years sadly since I stopped reading all that political and economic philosophy type stuff so a lot of the details are becoming fuzzier but I remember the high level points.

Once I got into college my reading habits changed a lot into engineering books and pure math books and has continued to this day. Although there were some engineering ethics, feminist, and some philosophy of religions classes I took since I had humanities requirements to fulfill so I did get some tiny minor spread of humanities in college.

It was actually my Mom who encouraged me to be as broad as possible at the high school level because she warned once you go to college there’s a risk you’ll end up specializing so much and as you build expertise and intuition into your chosen speciality you may neglect every subjects of human knowledge.

She was right. I met many classmates in my engineering major who lacked understanding of politics, philosophy, and economics but they had stronger math skills initially because they specialized in high school instead of college.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

@DnlYn2892212345 @PAHoyeck Ok now I see. I mixed up Montesquie with Alexis de Tocqueville who did visit America.

[Diiv @Diivanand]

@DnlYn2892212345 @PAHoyeck Looks like Montesquie didn’t visit America either.