You say that a “broken clock” is an oxymoron by assuming the truth of the point you want to prove—-that only fully functional clocks can properly be defined as clocks. Same with “impotent male.” It is utterly self referential.
You say design or intent “doesn’t really cut the mustard.” Not sure what that means. I think it’s central. The physicality of the thing as a “clock” occurs because that is what it was designed to do. Ok it happens not to work because someone dropped it in the swimming pool. Now it’s a subcategory of clock, a broken one, but still a clock by its design. By the way, you never answered my question about what category “broken clocks” belong to if they are not a subcategory of clocks.
Same is true for males and females. Joe was a reproductive male until his drug addiction made him impotent. But he is still a male by evolutionary design that is physically expressed. By physically expressed I mean that he always has a prostrate and testes and likely some kind of penis. That will never change from the day he is born til the day he dies.
So I stick with my original systems definition. Still open to being proven wrong. You are a really smart guy.
The question is, though, Are you having fun? Hope so.
"But if we remove the gonads then their owners have their membership cards "revoked", they no longer qualify as males and females. We have "excised" ALL the sex out of them; they're sexLESS."
This is called "begging the question," or assuming the answer in your question. You may be right, but it is not a productive form of argument. The question you are "begging" is what needs to be surgically excised to make them sexless.
You are right; I would contend that a more invasive form of surgery is required.
I would hate to be with you while stranded on a remote desert isle. Instead of catching fish and climbing for coconuts, you would be sitting there wondering “what is a fish?” and “”what is a coconut?” “Do we eat the monothetic version or the poythetic version?” Until we starve to death.
The answer to your quandary is utilitarian and lies within anisogametic plumbing and is pretty obvious.
Have to continue here, Dr Kari turned comments off (shrug). I think a boy is a male and if standard definitions don't account for it, they should.
Again I've laid my cards out but I still don't know what your thoughts are, the definitions wrong, or we need to stop assuming people have sex unless they're a functional adult?
Steersman, I keep reading your comments but get no closer to understanding your position. If this is a push towards Socratic inquiry all the power to you, but I have long since stopped blaming myself for not understanding other peoples ideas because I realised most often it was the writer's failure to communicate them, which in turn reflected that they did not know what they're talking about.
Now, i think you highlight valid issues with sex definitions for individuals. A point in time definition of sex won't do - obviously a boy is a potential man, and post-menopausal woman is a women. So the definition needs that.
Next, people can have various genetic issues that mean they are not functional in terms of reproduction. This necessitates a kind of polythetic, or family resemblances, definition which you might call spectrum-lite. Clearly lacking some capability with placenta growth or some such, but in all other aspects having the right apparatus doesn't exclude you from being a woman, or shooting blanks not make you a man.
Next, there are intersex people with both male and female sex characteristics, but usually a lack of functional capability in terms of reproduction. Biologically, these individuals are the third-sex, not male or female, but neither.
Next, life is social and so in an important sense, though not exclusively, are the categories women/man. We do not do DNA tests for assigning into sex based groups or do genital tests for entry into toilets so somebody who has been living as a woman all her life in the social sense, yet is not a biological woman (being intersex) naturally is 'socially' a woman, if they have passed by virtue of accruing enough of the secondary sex characteristics.
Which brings us to the slippery slope. If a man, say, has female characteristics through hormones and considers themselves a woman, should they be accommodated under the social category? A brief aside-note the case of intersex is a social accommodation - it's not consequence free to appear as if you're a biological sex that you don't really belong to, in dating for example people might find it a betrayal to find out at the last, the actual truth of someone being intersex but presenting as a man or woman. But because of the family resemblances belonging, someone who can not have children for some specific genetic reason still belongs to the actual category, not just the social category - this would invoke disappointment but not the same sense of betrayal/confusion.
What makes the family resemblances delineation possible is that there is a real thing that exists, the sex binary, man and woman are not just arbitrary names we apply to create the categories (ie nominalism). Most of us fall cleanly into either category and it should be possible to assign those close to the full set of attributes to the category, while pushing some people into the no-sex category.
But back to the slippery slope of the social category and what degree of accommodation is possible. Well, if you believe that there are real differences between biological men and women, despite natural variation within them, then you might not want to accept someone into the social category just because they have some characteristics and identify in their heads as such. There is a real difference between choosing a sex (or having it chosen for you) because you're intersex and your life would likely be more difficult not to choose a social category, and choosing a sex based on the idea you're a different sex than you actually are.
How have I done, is this some of the thing you're pointing to?
Please *explain* to me, or be explicit that you want people to engage socratically with it.
Quote: "Consequently, it would seem to help a great deal to recognize that the definitions for the categories “male” and “female” — for such are they — are somewhat arbitrary, are context dependent, *depend on exactly what objectives we have in mind.*" - emphasis added.
When we classify things, there is some (possibly implicit) purpose behind the classification, i.e. the classification has to be useful in some contexts. In biology, the concept of sex and the terms male and female, have been designed with the purpose of explaining sexual reproduction across all the myriad species that employ sexual reproduction to propagate themselves. Defining sex, male and female strictly in terms of small vs large gamete production in the present presumably works well for this purpose.
However, the debate around "what is a (wo)man?" and trans rights is a rather different context. The terms 'man' and 'woman' are being contested - with sex being contested as a consequence. I suspect the reason why Hilton, Wright et al opt for definitions of sex that are more aligned with 'colloquial' definitions/intuitions reflects the fact that we routinely talk about adult humans being either men or women (or young humans being either boys or girls).
The fact that we have mens vs womens toilets, changing rooms, prisons, sports teams, etc where segregation is based on 'colloquial' sex is precisely what many GCs are trying to preserve in the face of the gender ideologists redefinition of the terms men and women to be completely unrelated to reproductive biology. It seems to me the biological definition of sex means that only a subset of men (as the term is commonly used) are males, the rest of them are infertile/sexless, but nevertheless visually/anatomically indistinguishable from other men. A similar point can be made about women/females. I'd add that we don't perform fertility tests before we decide that someone is a man or a woman - we generally infer that from their appearance.
It's thus not a straightforward matter to use biologically sex to defend e.g. the traditional women only spaces/services that GCs wish to defend because the biological definition of female excludes many women who are, by choice or otherwise, infertile. This raises some questions, e.g. how does one go about mounting such a defence given this state of affairs? Do we need a new concept to use in place of or alongside biological sex?
I'll just say that if for some reason we were being forced to walk from one end of the world to the other, and dying somewhere in between was gonna be a bad option, I'd want you as my walking partner because even if we weren't quite sure where we were going, the stamina is the essential quality. I could probably survive hearing you talk about this the whole trip, since I'd have the surety nothing could make you give up anywhere along the way.
You say that a “broken clock” is an oxymoron by assuming the truth of the point you want to prove—-that only fully functional clocks can properly be defined as clocks. Same with “impotent male.” It is utterly self referential.
You say design or intent “doesn’t really cut the mustard.” Not sure what that means. I think it’s central. The physicality of the thing as a “clock” occurs because that is what it was designed to do. Ok it happens not to work because someone dropped it in the swimming pool. Now it’s a subcategory of clock, a broken one, but still a clock by its design. By the way, you never answered my question about what category “broken clocks” belong to if they are not a subcategory of clocks.
Same is true for males and females. Joe was a reproductive male until his drug addiction made him impotent. But he is still a male by evolutionary design that is physically expressed. By physically expressed I mean that he always has a prostrate and testes and likely some kind of penis. That will never change from the day he is born til the day he dies.
So I stick with my original systems definition. Still open to being proven wrong. You are a really smart guy.
The question is, though, Are you having fun? Hope so.
"But if we remove the gonads then their owners have their membership cards "revoked", they no longer qualify as males and females. We have "excised" ALL the sex out of them; they're sexLESS."
This is called "begging the question," or assuming the answer in your question. You may be right, but it is not a productive form of argument. The question you are "begging" is what needs to be surgically excised to make them sexless.
You are right; I would contend that a more invasive form of surgery is required.
I would hate to be with you while stranded on a remote desert isle. Instead of catching fish and climbing for coconuts, you would be sitting there wondering “what is a fish?” and “”what is a coconut?” “Do we eat the monothetic version or the poythetic version?” Until we starve to death.
The answer to your quandary is utilitarian and lies within anisogametic plumbing and is pretty obvious.
Have to continue here, Dr Kari turned comments off (shrug). I think a boy is a male and if standard definitions don't account for it, they should.
Again I've laid my cards out but I still don't know what your thoughts are, the definitions wrong, or we need to stop assuming people have sex unless they're a functional adult?
Steersman, I keep reading your comments but get no closer to understanding your position. If this is a push towards Socratic inquiry all the power to you, but I have long since stopped blaming myself for not understanding other peoples ideas because I realised most often it was the writer's failure to communicate them, which in turn reflected that they did not know what they're talking about.
Now, i think you highlight valid issues with sex definitions for individuals. A point in time definition of sex won't do - obviously a boy is a potential man, and post-menopausal woman is a women. So the definition needs that.
Next, people can have various genetic issues that mean they are not functional in terms of reproduction. This necessitates a kind of polythetic, or family resemblances, definition which you might call spectrum-lite. Clearly lacking some capability with placenta growth or some such, but in all other aspects having the right apparatus doesn't exclude you from being a woman, or shooting blanks not make you a man.
Next, there are intersex people with both male and female sex characteristics, but usually a lack of functional capability in terms of reproduction. Biologically, these individuals are the third-sex, not male or female, but neither.
Next, life is social and so in an important sense, though not exclusively, are the categories women/man. We do not do DNA tests for assigning into sex based groups or do genital tests for entry into toilets so somebody who has been living as a woman all her life in the social sense, yet is not a biological woman (being intersex) naturally is 'socially' a woman, if they have passed by virtue of accruing enough of the secondary sex characteristics.
Which brings us to the slippery slope. If a man, say, has female characteristics through hormones and considers themselves a woman, should they be accommodated under the social category? A brief aside-note the case of intersex is a social accommodation - it's not consequence free to appear as if you're a biological sex that you don't really belong to, in dating for example people might find it a betrayal to find out at the last, the actual truth of someone being intersex but presenting as a man or woman. But because of the family resemblances belonging, someone who can not have children for some specific genetic reason still belongs to the actual category, not just the social category - this would invoke disappointment but not the same sense of betrayal/confusion.
What makes the family resemblances delineation possible is that there is a real thing that exists, the sex binary, man and woman are not just arbitrary names we apply to create the categories (ie nominalism). Most of us fall cleanly into either category and it should be possible to assign those close to the full set of attributes to the category, while pushing some people into the no-sex category.
But back to the slippery slope of the social category and what degree of accommodation is possible. Well, if you believe that there are real differences between biological men and women, despite natural variation within them, then you might not want to accept someone into the social category just because they have some characteristics and identify in their heads as such. There is a real difference between choosing a sex (or having it chosen for you) because you're intersex and your life would likely be more difficult not to choose a social category, and choosing a sex based on the idea you're a different sex than you actually are.
How have I done, is this some of the thing you're pointing to?
Please *explain* to me, or be explicit that you want people to engage socratically with it.
Twenty three comments but only two likes? Your post is a bit meandering, but I'm quite happy to make the likes number three!
https://thingstoread.substack.com/p/how-many-genders-are-there
Quote: "Consequently, it would seem to help a great deal to recognize that the definitions for the categories “male” and “female” — for such are they — are somewhat arbitrary, are context dependent, *depend on exactly what objectives we have in mind.*" - emphasis added.
When we classify things, there is some (possibly implicit) purpose behind the classification, i.e. the classification has to be useful in some contexts. In biology, the concept of sex and the terms male and female, have been designed with the purpose of explaining sexual reproduction across all the myriad species that employ sexual reproduction to propagate themselves. Defining sex, male and female strictly in terms of small vs large gamete production in the present presumably works well for this purpose.
However, the debate around "what is a (wo)man?" and trans rights is a rather different context. The terms 'man' and 'woman' are being contested - with sex being contested as a consequence. I suspect the reason why Hilton, Wright et al opt for definitions of sex that are more aligned with 'colloquial' definitions/intuitions reflects the fact that we routinely talk about adult humans being either men or women (or young humans being either boys or girls).
The fact that we have mens vs womens toilets, changing rooms, prisons, sports teams, etc where segregation is based on 'colloquial' sex is precisely what many GCs are trying to preserve in the face of the gender ideologists redefinition of the terms men and women to be completely unrelated to reproductive biology. It seems to me the biological definition of sex means that only a subset of men (as the term is commonly used) are males, the rest of them are infertile/sexless, but nevertheless visually/anatomically indistinguishable from other men. A similar point can be made about women/females. I'd add that we don't perform fertility tests before we decide that someone is a man or a woman - we generally infer that from their appearance.
It's thus not a straightforward matter to use biologically sex to defend e.g. the traditional women only spaces/services that GCs wish to defend because the biological definition of female excludes many women who are, by choice or otherwise, infertile. This raises some questions, e.g. how does one go about mounting such a defence given this state of affairs? Do we need a new concept to use in place of or alongside biological sex?
I'll just say that if for some reason we were being forced to walk from one end of the world to the other, and dying somewhere in between was gonna be a bad option, I'd want you as my walking partner because even if we weren't quite sure where we were going, the stamina is the essential quality. I could probably survive hearing you talk about this the whole trip, since I'd have the surety nothing could make you give up anywhere along the way.
Rigorous and thought-provoking as always!