The definitions that you put forth is certainly accurate when being applied across across anisogamous species (including humans). You seem to greatly favor the first, and it does account for the handful of species that can undergo a differentiation into M or F after being born due to environmental factors. And that definition states "phenotype that produces" which can be interpreted to mean is currently capable of producing (which in that definition is probably the intention) or can be interpreted as will at some point be capable of.
I don't see the second reference providing a definition quite as narrow as the first, their definition reads: "in a system with two markedly different gamete sizes, we define females to be the sex that produces the larger gametes and vice-versa for males". Again this definition uses the term produces which could be taken in a literal sense to mean present tense, or could be taken (as I learned as a Zoology major in the 1970s) to mean will be able to, does, or did produce. We also learned that there were anatomical differences for the sexes of an anisogamous species that would correspond to being able to produce the associated gamete, and allow the physical aspects of reproduction to occur during the times of the organisms life it was reproductively active. Thus sex determination (or phenotype) of an individual was not limited (with rare exceptions) to the life stage of a individual, and would be predictive of the physical development of the individual.
Since humans are mammals, we are not one of those rare exceptions in that based on our sex observed at birth (or these days often observed in utero), we are born with the appropriate anatomy and physiological function to develop into reproductive maturity and produce the gametes associated with out sex. There are to be sure a very very small number of individuals that have disorders that will produce anomolies that will preclude them from being able to reproduce. And a small subset of these that will have ambiguity between gonads and other aspects of reproductive and genitalia.
I question legislatures spending time on this type of legislation, but I guess we may have come to this point. Writing legislation based on terminology such as anisogamous and phenotypes may have resonance with for someone focused on definitions in use by evolutionary biologists with a specialty in evolution of gametes, or someone focused on philosophical discussions that center on semantics. However, legislation meant to govern humans based on human characteristics is going to require language understandable by the general public in terms that they can relate to. So the language in this legislation does give an accurate description of the phenotype in humans (or any mammal) that produces large gametes. So I guess they could have included first the definition you like, but to make it useable, they would have had to include the language they did.
They did effectively account for the disorders I mention. I don't see any weaknesses that gender ideologs could leverage. And they are talking strictly about gender.
What are the real problems here? Or is it just that Wright endorsed this, and you seem to have a major bone to pick with him?
> “... that definition states ‘phenotype that produces’ which can be interpreted to mean is currently capable of producing (which in that definition is probably the intention) or can be interpreted as will at some point be capable of ...”
Yes, I think that -- “currently capable of producing” -- is, in fact, the rather clear intention. Seems more or less politically or emotionally motivated to say otherwise. You may wish to take a gander at my post “Rerum cognoscere causas” [To understand the causes of things] on the apparent philosophical justifications for that “interpretation” – mostly based on a Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article on “Mechanisms in Science [and biology]”:
> “... or could be taken (as I learned as a Zoology major in the 1970s) to mean will be able to, does, or did produce. ...”
If you take a close look at that “Rerum” post then I think you’ll see that there’s a great deal of justification for only the “does produce”. What sex is a newly hatched clownfish if it will be able to produce both large and small gametes, even if sequentially? How about if it did produce small gametes but is now producing large ones?
You in particular might like an PhilPapers by Paul Griffiths -- lately of the University of Sydney, philosophy of science, co-author of “Genetics and Philosophy – titled “What are biological sexes?” Of particular note, a quote of evolutionary biologist, and transwoman, Joan Roughgarden:
PG: “But no general definition of sexes can rely on these features [chromosomes, sex organs, hormones] because, as Roughgarden puts it, ‘the criteria for classifying an organism as male or female have to work with worms to whales, with red seaweed to redwood trees.’ ....”
That is biology’s, and science’s, claim to fame and fortune – universalizing definitions for the “natural kinds” that are their bread and butter. There aren’t different definitions for “electron” if they’re parts of different elements.
> “However, legislation meant to govern humans based on human characteristics is going to require language understandable by the general public in terms that they can relate to.”
Agreed. But that doesn’t mean that scientific theories and terminology should be bastardized and corrupted to pander to the vanities and cognitive distortions of the hoi polloi. Should we “teach the controversy” that, maybe, the Earth is only 6000 years old? That is basically what Wright and Company are doing – there are solid reasons for the biological definitions which he clearly hasn’t got a clue about.
Apropos of which, you might enjoy another of Griffiths’ articles, this one from Aeon magazine, these bits in particular:
“Sex Is Real: Yes, there are just two biological sexes. No, this doesn’t mean every living thing is either one or the other.
On the other hand, whatever its shortcomings as an institutional definition [e.g., in law], the concept of biological sex remains essential to understand the diversity of life. It shouldn’t be discarded or distorted because of arguments about its use in law, sport or medicine. That would be a tragic mistake."
> “What are the real problems here? Or is it just that Wright endorsed this, and you seem to have a major bone to pick with him?”
Good questions. That Wright has banned me from RLS – for the next 100 years, though that might be down to 98 by now ... – might have something to do with it ... 😉🙂
But he’s actually more or less on the right side of history – he’s made some good points, and he has provided, me at least, with much food for thought, notably on the difference between polythetic and monothetic categories. See my “Binarists Vs. Spectrumists” for some details:
Why it’s rather “exasperating” that he’s basically snatching defeat from the jaws of victory by peddling what is only marginally better than folk-biology. It may have some social utility, but it ain’t biology.
But, as you put it, the “real problems” are that most people haven’t a flaming clue what it takes to qualify as male and female – most seem not to have progressed much past the Kindergarten Cop definitions: “boys (males) have penises, and girls (females) have vaginas”. Provides fertile ground for various charlatans and grifters – which includes Wright and Company – to peddle their own idiosyncratic and politically motivated versions. Why the erstwhile reputable biological journal Cell asked, apparently in all seriousness, “Is ‘sex’ a useful category?”:
The biological definitions are the only ones that have solid philosophical, biological, and epistemological reasons behind them. They’re something in the way of a line in the sand in the face of various “trans-gressions”, even if they’re not terribly useful for the social engineering purposes that many, including Wright and Company, wish to press them into doing.
I don't agree with your stance but upvotes for persistence I guess..!
The definition is the way it is because it runs across all sexual species, some of which do all sorts of interesting things including arbitrariness in sex development (eg temperature). But it's not necessary for sex across all species to be a natural kind with a single definition, it is remarkable that evolution is so consistent in maintaining the similarities through distinct lines of development.
Humans are easy and don't need the looser time-bound definition that you prefer, they are men or women or intersex throughout their lives. Unless you are not the same Steersman as you were in the womb?
Anyway just throwing that out there, no time to discuss it now.
"But it's not necessary for sex across all species to be a natural kind with a single definition ... "
Yeah, I think it is. Many biological journals, encyclopedias, and dictionaries seem to think likewise -- I don't see any qualifications, any special dispensations for different species. But see also:
Stanford: "Scientific disciplines frequently divide the particulars they study into kinds and theorize about those kinds. To say that a kind is natural is to say that it corresponds to a grouping that reflects the structure of the natural world rather than the interests and actions of human beings."
That's what Wright and Company are doing -- creating a social category based on the "interests and actions of human being". May have some social value but it ain't biology.
As for men and women, if Missouri and Heritage want to define them as "adult human penis-havers" and "vagina-havers" -- as Freddy deBoer did -- then fine, go big. But they want to claim, rather fraudulently, the cachet and swag of being connected to biology.
Don't think Wright and Company have given any thought at all to consequences of having two sets of quite antithetical definitions for the sexes, particularly in our schools. One set for the kiddies in their social studies classes, and another set for their biology classes? Idiots.
As for me from womb to now? Of course I've changed -- put on 140 pounds, probably went through puberty, gained and lost most of my hair. "Identity" isn't something fixed, it's a process of changing states. If anything is fixed it's the awareness of changing states.
Many thanks SCA. Though something of a case of making a virtue out of a necessity -- some sticky time constraints. But I'll take it as (another) case of a "word to the wise". 😉🙂
But it really chaps my hide that a bunch of so-called biologists and philosophers are engaged in bastardizing and corrupting standard biological definitions that have much more utility than anything they're peddling.
I understand your feelings. I myself have no use for any philosophers who haven't been dead for at least 300 years. And I think a considerable part of the problem with those causing you to spend far too much on calamine lotion is their fear of offending insane people. They want to be beautifully rational to all comers.
It's always a direct route to quicksand when one uses too many words to try to explain the basic, in my view. Neither mice nor men need exquisite definitions in order to fulfil biological imperatives. And the mice may be more fortunate because any of 'em with disorders of sexual development or peculiar mental afflictions don't know it. They live, or die, and fulfil mouseness or they don't and fairly soon thereafter go thereaftering.
Morons of Science always have a brave new expertise to exercise until they've been proven to be morons; this is the story of the elegant professions and it always will be.
Doctors will sacrifice patients; parents will sacrifice children; the determined of any age group will determine themselves straight into mutilation or lifelong dysfunction and there isn't that much society can ever do to change that.
Common sense is the only cure for most of this and we know how scarce that is.
"calamine lotion" -- 🙂 indeed. Some reason for "fear of offending insane people", though pigheaded ignorance of bedrock philosophical and biological principles -- particularly damning in many so-called biologists & philosophers -- is maybe a bigger factor. Somewhat apropos of which, you might have some interest in a recent exchange I had with Stella O'Malley on Francis Bacon and Confucius -- both dead for well over 300 years 🙂:
As for "fulfilling biological imperatives", I kinda think that that is somewhat secondary to the "imperatives" of biology itself -- which is, to a large extent, to understand the evolutionary consequences of anisogamy, of the fact that some 99% of all eukaryotes produce sexually, through the fusion of two types of gametes:
This seems to be something of foundational principle of biology -- and probably of many other sciences:
Wikipedia: "In biology, taxonomy (from Ancient Greek τάξις (taxis) 'arrangement', and -νομία (-nomia) 'method') is the scientific study of naming, defining (circumscribing) and classifying groups of biological organisms based on shared characteristics."
That "shared characteristics" is the principle that Heritage Foundation, Missouri, Wright, Hilton, Hooven, Byrne, and too many others are all busily engaged in repudiating. Or "sacrificing" on the altar of social policy.
As for "common sense" -- quite agree. There's been quite a pile of codswallop peddled by various philosophers and scientists over the millennia -- for example, see:
But we HAVE made some progress over that time -- some reason to defend that against the depredations of various charlatans, grifters, scientific illiterates, and political opportunists.
"But we HAVE made some progress over that time -- some reason to defend that against the depredations of various charlatans, grifters, scientific illiterates, and political opportunists."
-----------------------
I'm always relieved when you give me something I can completely agree with...
The definitions that you put forth is certainly accurate when being applied across across anisogamous species (including humans). You seem to greatly favor the first, and it does account for the handful of species that can undergo a differentiation into M or F after being born due to environmental factors. And that definition states "phenotype that produces" which can be interpreted to mean is currently capable of producing (which in that definition is probably the intention) or can be interpreted as will at some point be capable of.
I don't see the second reference providing a definition quite as narrow as the first, their definition reads: "in a system with two markedly different gamete sizes, we define females to be the sex that produces the larger gametes and vice-versa for males". Again this definition uses the term produces which could be taken in a literal sense to mean present tense, or could be taken (as I learned as a Zoology major in the 1970s) to mean will be able to, does, or did produce. We also learned that there were anatomical differences for the sexes of an anisogamous species that would correspond to being able to produce the associated gamete, and allow the physical aspects of reproduction to occur during the times of the organisms life it was reproductively active. Thus sex determination (or phenotype) of an individual was not limited (with rare exceptions) to the life stage of a individual, and would be predictive of the physical development of the individual.
Since humans are mammals, we are not one of those rare exceptions in that based on our sex observed at birth (or these days often observed in utero), we are born with the appropriate anatomy and physiological function to develop into reproductive maturity and produce the gametes associated with out sex. There are to be sure a very very small number of individuals that have disorders that will produce anomolies that will preclude them from being able to reproduce. And a small subset of these that will have ambiguity between gonads and other aspects of reproductive and genitalia.
I question legislatures spending time on this type of legislation, but I guess we may have come to this point. Writing legislation based on terminology such as anisogamous and phenotypes may have resonance with for someone focused on definitions in use by evolutionary biologists with a specialty in evolution of gametes, or someone focused on philosophical discussions that center on semantics. However, legislation meant to govern humans based on human characteristics is going to require language understandable by the general public in terms that they can relate to. So the language in this legislation does give an accurate description of the phenotype in humans (or any mammal) that produces large gametes. So I guess they could have included first the definition you like, but to make it useable, they would have had to include the language they did.
They did effectively account for the disorders I mention. I don't see any weaknesses that gender ideologs could leverage. And they are talking strictly about gender.
What are the real problems here? Or is it just that Wright endorsed this, and you seem to have a major bone to pick with him?
Thanks for your comments – some good questions and good points.
> “... handful of species that can undergo a differentiation into M or F”
Kind of think it’s much more than a “handful”. For examples, see:
Wikipedia: “About 75% of the 500 known sequentially hermaphroditic fish species are protogynous and often have polygynous mating systems ...”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sequential_hermaphroditism
> “... that definition states ‘phenotype that produces’ which can be interpreted to mean is currently capable of producing (which in that definition is probably the intention) or can be interpreted as will at some point be capable of ...”
Yes, I think that -- “currently capable of producing” -- is, in fact, the rather clear intention. Seems more or less politically or emotionally motivated to say otherwise. You may wish to take a gander at my post “Rerum cognoscere causas” [To understand the causes of things] on the apparent philosophical justifications for that “interpretation” – mostly based on a Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article on “Mechanisms in Science [and biology]”:
https://humanuseofhumanbeings.substack.com/p/rerum-cognoscere-causas
> “... or could be taken (as I learned as a Zoology major in the 1970s) to mean will be able to, does, or did produce. ...”
If you take a close look at that “Rerum” post then I think you’ll see that there’s a great deal of justification for only the “does produce”. What sex is a newly hatched clownfish if it will be able to produce both large and small gametes, even if sequentially? How about if it did produce small gametes but is now producing large ones?
You in particular might like an PhilPapers by Paul Griffiths -- lately of the University of Sydney, philosophy of science, co-author of “Genetics and Philosophy – titled “What are biological sexes?” Of particular note, a quote of evolutionary biologist, and transwoman, Joan Roughgarden:
PG: “But no general definition of sexes can rely on these features [chromosomes, sex organs, hormones] because, as Roughgarden puts it, ‘the criteria for classifying an organism as male or female have to work with worms to whales, with red seaweed to redwood trees.’ ....”
https://philarchive.org/rec/GRIWAB-2
That is biology’s, and science’s, claim to fame and fortune – universalizing definitions for the “natural kinds” that are their bread and butter. There aren’t different definitions for “electron” if they’re parts of different elements.
> “However, legislation meant to govern humans based on human characteristics is going to require language understandable by the general public in terms that they can relate to.”
Agreed. But that doesn’t mean that scientific theories and terminology should be bastardized and corrupted to pander to the vanities and cognitive distortions of the hoi polloi. Should we “teach the controversy” that, maybe, the Earth is only 6000 years old? That is basically what Wright and Company are doing – there are solid reasons for the biological definitions which he clearly hasn’t got a clue about.
Apropos of which, you might enjoy another of Griffiths’ articles, this one from Aeon magazine, these bits in particular:
“Sex Is Real: Yes, there are just two biological sexes. No, this doesn’t mean every living thing is either one or the other.
On the other hand, whatever its shortcomings as an institutional definition [e.g., in law], the concept of biological sex remains essential to understand the diversity of life. It shouldn’t be discarded or distorted because of arguments about its use in law, sport or medicine. That would be a tragic mistake."
https://aeon.co/essays/the-existence-of-biological-sex-is-no-constraint-on-human-diversity
> “What are the real problems here? Or is it just that Wright endorsed this, and you seem to have a major bone to pick with him?”
Good questions. That Wright has banned me from RLS – for the next 100 years, though that might be down to 98 by now ... – might have something to do with it ... 😉🙂
But he’s actually more or less on the right side of history – he’s made some good points, and he has provided, me at least, with much food for thought, notably on the difference between polythetic and monothetic categories. See my “Binarists Vs. Spectrumists” for some details:
https://humanuseofhumanbeings.substack.com/p/binarists-vs-spectrumists
Why it’s rather “exasperating” that he’s basically snatching defeat from the jaws of victory by peddling what is only marginally better than folk-biology. It may have some social utility, but it ain’t biology.
But, as you put it, the “real problems” are that most people haven’t a flaming clue what it takes to qualify as male and female – most seem not to have progressed much past the Kindergarten Cop definitions: “boys (males) have penises, and girls (females) have vaginas”. Provides fertile ground for various charlatans and grifters – which includes Wright and Company – to peddle their own idiosyncratic and politically motivated versions. Why the erstwhile reputable biological journal Cell asked, apparently in all seriousness, “Is ‘sex’ a useful category?”:
https://humanuseofhumanbeings.substack.com/p/is-sex-a-useful-category
The biological definitions are the only ones that have solid philosophical, biological, and epistemological reasons behind them. They’re something in the way of a line in the sand in the face of various “trans-gressions”, even if they’re not terribly useful for the social engineering purposes that many, including Wright and Company, wish to press them into doing.
I don't agree with your stance but upvotes for persistence I guess..!
The definition is the way it is because it runs across all sexual species, some of which do all sorts of interesting things including arbitrariness in sex development (eg temperature). But it's not necessary for sex across all species to be a natural kind with a single definition, it is remarkable that evolution is so consistent in maintaining the similarities through distinct lines of development.
Humans are easy and don't need the looser time-bound definition that you prefer, they are men or women or intersex throughout their lives. Unless you are not the same Steersman as you were in the womb?
Anyway just throwing that out there, no time to discuss it now.
Thanks -- I guess ... 😉🙂 However:
"But it's not necessary for sex across all species to be a natural kind with a single definition ... "
Yeah, I think it is. Many biological journals, encyclopedias, and dictionaries seem to think likewise -- I don't see any qualifications, any special dispensations for different species. But see also:
Stanford: "Scientific disciplines frequently divide the particulars they study into kinds and theorize about those kinds. To say that a kind is natural is to say that it corresponds to a grouping that reflects the structure of the natural world rather than the interests and actions of human beings."
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/natural-kinds/
That's what Wright and Company are doing -- creating a social category based on the "interests and actions of human being". May have some social value but it ain't biology.
As for men and women, if Missouri and Heritage want to define them as "adult human penis-havers" and "vagina-havers" -- as Freddy deBoer did -- then fine, go big. But they want to claim, rather fraudulently, the cachet and swag of being connected to biology.
Don't think Wright and Company have given any thought at all to consequences of having two sets of quite antithetical definitions for the sexes, particularly in our schools. One set for the kiddies in their social studies classes, and another set for their biology classes? Idiots.
As for me from womb to now? Of course I've changed -- put on 140 pounds, probably went through puberty, gained and lost most of my hair. "Identity" isn't something fixed, it's a process of changing states. If anything is fixed it's the awareness of changing states.
Loved the title and subtitle and appreciated the unusual brevity!
Many thanks SCA. Though something of a case of making a virtue out of a necessity -- some sticky time constraints. But I'll take it as (another) case of a "word to the wise". 😉🙂
But it really chaps my hide that a bunch of so-called biologists and philosophers are engaged in bastardizing and corrupting standard biological definitions that have much more utility than anything they're peddling.
I understand your feelings. I myself have no use for any philosophers who haven't been dead for at least 300 years. And I think a considerable part of the problem with those causing you to spend far too much on calamine lotion is their fear of offending insane people. They want to be beautifully rational to all comers.
It's always a direct route to quicksand when one uses too many words to try to explain the basic, in my view. Neither mice nor men need exquisite definitions in order to fulfil biological imperatives. And the mice may be more fortunate because any of 'em with disorders of sexual development or peculiar mental afflictions don't know it. They live, or die, and fulfil mouseness or they don't and fairly soon thereafter go thereaftering.
Morons of Science always have a brave new expertise to exercise until they've been proven to be morons; this is the story of the elegant professions and it always will be.
Doctors will sacrifice patients; parents will sacrifice children; the determined of any age group will determine themselves straight into mutilation or lifelong dysfunction and there isn't that much society can ever do to change that.
Common sense is the only cure for most of this and we know how scarce that is.
"calamine lotion" -- 🙂 indeed. Some reason for "fear of offending insane people", though pigheaded ignorance of bedrock philosophical and biological principles -- particularly damning in many so-called biologists & philosophers -- is maybe a bigger factor. Somewhat apropos of which, you might have some interest in a recent exchange I had with Stella O'Malley on Francis Bacon and Confucius -- both dead for well over 300 years 🙂:
https://stellaomalley.substack.com/p/episode-3-feminine-boy-to-gay-man/comment/47536705
As for "fulfilling biological imperatives", I kinda think that that is somewhat secondary to the "imperatives" of biology itself -- which is, to a large extent, to understand the evolutionary consequences of anisogamy, of the fact that some 99% of all eukaryotes produce sexually, through the fusion of two types of gametes:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anisogamy
This seems to be something of foundational principle of biology -- and probably of many other sciences:
Wikipedia: "In biology, taxonomy (from Ancient Greek τάξις (taxis) 'arrangement', and -νομία (-nomia) 'method') is the scientific study of naming, defining (circumscribing) and classifying groups of biological organisms based on shared characteristics."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxonomy_(biology)
That "shared characteristics" is the principle that Heritage Foundation, Missouri, Wright, Hilton, Hooven, Byrne, and too many others are all busily engaged in repudiating. Or "sacrificing" on the altar of social policy.
As for "common sense" -- quite agree. There's been quite a pile of codswallop peddled by various philosophers and scientists over the millennia -- for example, see:
https://thingstoread.substack.com/p/philosophy-is-a-residuum-of-failure
https://web.maths.unsw.edu.au/~jim/wrongthoughts.html
But we HAVE made some progress over that time -- some reason to defend that against the depredations of various charlatans, grifters, scientific illiterates, and political opportunists.
"But we HAVE made some progress over that time -- some reason to defend that against the depredations of various charlatans, grifters, scientific illiterates, and political opportunists."
-----------------------
I'm always relieved when you give me something I can completely agree with...
🙂 Building consensus, one step at a time ... 😉🙂
Hand in hand and squabbling over every other step...