10 ms·

Seriously? If you think that men and women don't differ by more than their genitals, then you have to ignore all modern science.

door 9y ago
read "myths of gender" or "delusions of gender" on this subject, which thoroughly debunk this essentialist nonsense about "biological" gender difference. anyone in any sociology or anthropology department will tell you how incredibly obviously false the biological essentialist position of gender is. it's literally only white men in tech or right-wing white male biologists writing outside their field of expertise who defend that position
- throwanem 9y ago
  Sociology and anthropology being, of course, fields particularly noted for their peerless objectivity and rigor...
  - door 9y ago
    uh yeah i'd rather trust people who study society for a living for their opinions on social theory than some computer science major who has never taken a soft science class in his life
    - throwanem 9y ago
      No doubt you would. Why should I? Because appeal to authority? Or is there a reason why their frequently regrettable track records must not be considered an indictment of any sort?
    - remarkEon 9y ago
      So your comment is (rightly) getting downvoted. I think readers here tend to reject anecdotal arguments and rely on data. The critiques of sociology and anthropology are legitimate: those fields are not like technical fields and they lend themselves to weird conclusions that don't get peer reviewed in a way that's different from, say, math or physics.
      - door 9y ago
        that's because data isn't 100% appropriate for social sciences. you can't measure everything. shocking as it may be for STEM majors (full disclosure: i have a physics degree), people's feelings and subjective experiences matter, and forms of reason that are not-numerical (ie, philosophy, politics, law, etc) are rigorous and have value. it's weird that this is a radical perspective in this culture.
        throwanem 9y ago
        I'm not sure what the whole deal is about "STEM majors" and "computer science majors", but can it maybe not be such a thing? I don't see why it matters one way or another, and having never gone to school, I can't imagine how whatever intellectual canalization you seem to be hinting at would be applicable here in any case. It just seems to be adding a lot more heat than light, and I'm really not seeing what it brings to the conversation that makes that in any way worthwhile.
        door 9y ago
        I was a STEM major (physics) and I work in tech. I'm attacking from inside, not outside. I think that there is a specific culture in STEM whereby white men who are incredibly gifted and successful in math/science/whatever think that their natural brilliance gives them the ability to speak on all social issues with authority, and that they can speak from a purely rational perspective. My point is that things like your upbringing, your social group, your race, gender, class, etc all have an important impact on how you think, and STEM people should keep that in mind. They should have more humility, and be more open to listening to the stories of people instead of just trying to think of things in terms of Numbers.
        remarkEon 9y ago
        Stop mischaracterizing what I'm saying. I'm simply noting that biology is real, and informs a lot of what we do. I'm sorry, but "stories" don't mean anything to me, and again I think it's really strange that people who work in tech, who ostensibly should be more acquainted with data-based decision making, seem to use anecdotes to make what are basically political arguments. I think I'm pretty much done with the Left at this point. I find this rejection of basic scientific inquiry to be really strange and dangerous.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
- factsaresacred 9y ago
  Nah. > In her preface to the first edition, Halpern wrote: “At the time, it seemed clear to me that any between-sex differences in thinking abilities were due to socialization practices, artifacts and mistakes in the research, and bias and prejudice. ... After reviewing a pile of journal articles that stood several feet high and numerous books and book chapters that dwarfed the stack of journal articles … I changed my mind.” > Why? There was too much data pointing to the biological basis of sex-based cognitive differences to ignore, Halpern says. For one thing, the animal-research findings resonated with sex-based differences ascribed to people. These findings continue to accrue. In a study of 34 rhesus monkeys, for example, males strongly preferred toys with wheels over plush toys, whereas females found plush toys likable. It would be tough to argue that the monkeys’ parents bought them sex-typed toys or that simian society encourages its male offspring to play more with trucks. A much more recent study established that boys and girls 9 to 17 months old — an age when children show few if any signs of recognizing either their own or other children’s sex — nonetheless show marked differences in their preference for stereotypically male versus stereotypically female toys > Many of these cognitive differences appear quite early in life. “You see sex differences in spatial-visualization ability in 2- and 3-month-old infants,” Halpern says. Infant girls respond more readily to faces and begin talking earlier. Boys react earlier in infancy to experimentally induced perceptual discrepancies in their visual environment. In adulthood, women remain more oriented to faces, men to things. https://stanmed.stanford.edu/2017spring/how-mens-and-womens-brains-are-different.html https://stanmed.stanford.edu/2017spring/how-mens-and-womens-...
  - hjrnunes 9y ago
    Who'd a known? Repeated observations in all types of human societies everywhere for thousands and thousands of years turn out to be true. Thank god we have science to confirm that to us!
    - door 9y ago
      Turns out confirmation bias is real!
- noddy1 9y ago
  Anyone who knows anything about biology or genetics knows that it is absurd that there would be zero phenotypic difference between males and females. There are simply different factors driving each gender's reproductive success, and therefore the XX and XY chromosomal difference will push different traits. Sociology and anthropology depts can't handle this because they aren't interested in science.
  - door 9y ago
    both "myths of gender" and "delusions of gender" were written by scientists. the fact that you still think of sex as a binary difference between xx and xy shows how far outdated your ideas about the science of sex differences are. even "biological sex" (not even gender) is a spectrum influenced by a variety of different factors
    - SamReidHughes 9y ago
      Sex is in fact a binary difference, transgender folk are a tiny proportion of the population.
      - door 9y ago
        This is an increasingly outdated view. http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2015/02/24/sex-biology-redefined-genes-dont-indicate-binary-sexes/ http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2015/02/24/sex-biology-redefin...
        SamReidHughes 9y ago
        The page you linked gives the proportion 1/100. Is there something I'm missing?
      - Pulcinella 9y ago
        "Truth values are in fact a binary difference, fuzzy logic is a tiny portion of mathematics." "Light switches are in fact a binary difference, dimmer switches are a small portion of all switches." "Life is in fact a binary difference, brain death patients are a tiny portion of all patients."

door 9y ago

read "myths of gender" or "delusions of gender" on this subject, which thoroughly debunk this essentialist nonsense about "biological" gender difference. anyone in any sociology or anthropology department will tell you how incredibly obviously false the biological essentialist position of gender is. it's literally only white men in tech or right-wing white male biologists writing outside their field of expertise who defend that position

throwanem 9y ago
Sociology and anthropology being, of course, fields particularly noted for their peerless objectivity and rigor...
- door 9y ago
  uh yeah i'd rather trust people who study society for a living for their opinions on social theory than some computer science major who has never taken a soft science class in his life
  - throwanem 9y ago
    No doubt you would. Why should I? Because appeal to authority? Or is there a reason why their frequently regrettable track records must not be considered an indictment of any sort?
  - remarkEon 9y ago
    So your comment is (rightly) getting downvoted. I think readers here tend to reject anecdotal arguments and rely on data. The critiques of sociology and anthropology are legitimate: those fields are not like technical fields and they lend themselves to weird conclusions that don't get peer reviewed in a way that's different from, say, math or physics.
    - door 9y ago
      that's because data isn't 100% appropriate for social sciences. you can't measure everything. shocking as it may be for STEM majors (full disclosure: i have a physics degree), people's feelings and subjective experiences matter, and forms of reason that are not-numerical (ie, philosophy, politics, law, etc) are rigorous and have value. it's weird that this is a radical perspective in this culture.
      - throwanem 9y ago
        I'm not sure what the whole deal is about "STEM majors" and "computer science majors", but can it maybe not be such a thing? I don't see why it matters one way or another, and having never gone to school, I can't imagine how whatever intellectual canalization you seem to be hinting at would be applicable here in any case. It just seems to be adding a lot more heat than light, and I'm really not seeing what it brings to the conversation that makes that in any way worthwhile.
        door 9y ago
        I was a STEM major (physics) and I work in tech. I'm attacking from inside, not outside. I think that there is a specific culture in STEM whereby white men who are incredibly gifted and successful in math/science/whatever think that their natural brilliance gives them the ability to speak on all social issues with authority, and that they can speak from a purely rational perspective. My point is that things like your upbringing, your social group, your race, gender, class, etc all have an important impact on how you think, and STEM people should keep that in mind. They should have more humility, and be more open to listening to the stories of people instead of just trying to think of things in terms of Numbers.
        remarkEon 9y ago
        Stop mischaracterizing what I'm saying. I'm simply noting that biology is real, and informs a lot of what we do. I'm sorry, but "stories" don't mean anything to me, and again I think it's really strange that people who work in tech, who ostensibly should be more acquainted with data-based decision making, seem to use anecdotes to make what are basically political arguments. I think I'm pretty much done with the Left at this point. I find this rejection of basic scientific inquiry to be really strange and dangerous.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
factsaresacred 9y ago
Nah. > In her preface to the first edition, Halpern wrote: “At the time, it seemed clear to me that any between-sex differences in thinking abilities were due to socialization practices, artifacts and mistakes in the research, and bias and prejudice. ... After reviewing a pile of journal articles that stood several feet high and numerous books and book chapters that dwarfed the stack of journal articles … I changed my mind.” > Why? There was too much data pointing to the biological basis of sex-based cognitive differences to ignore, Halpern says. For one thing, the animal-research findings resonated with sex-based differences ascribed to people. These findings continue to accrue. In a study of 34 rhesus monkeys, for example, males strongly preferred toys with wheels over plush toys, whereas females found plush toys likable. It would be tough to argue that the monkeys’ parents bought them sex-typed toys or that simian society encourages its male offspring to play more with trucks. A much more recent study established that boys and girls 9 to 17 months old — an age when children show few if any signs of recognizing either their own or other children’s sex — nonetheless show marked differences in their preference for stereotypically male versus stereotypically female toys > Many of these cognitive differences appear quite early in life. “You see sex differences in spatial-visualization ability in 2- and 3-month-old infants,” Halpern says. Infant girls respond more readily to faces and begin talking earlier. Boys react earlier in infancy to experimentally induced perceptual discrepancies in their visual environment. In adulthood, women remain more oriented to faces, men to things. https://stanmed.stanford.edu/2017spring/how-mens-and-womens-brains-are-different.html https://stanmed.stanford.edu/2017spring/how-mens-and-womens-...
- hjrnunes 9y ago
  Who'd a known? Repeated observations in all types of human societies everywhere for thousands and thousands of years turn out to be true. Thank god we have science to confirm that to us!
  - door 9y ago
    Turns out confirmation bias is real!
noddy1 9y ago
Anyone who knows anything about biology or genetics knows that it is absurd that there would be zero phenotypic difference between males and females. There are simply different factors driving each gender's reproductive success, and therefore the XX and XY chromosomal difference will push different traits. Sociology and anthropology depts can't handle this because they aren't interested in science.
- door 9y ago
  both "myths of gender" and "delusions of gender" were written by scientists. the fact that you still think of sex as a binary difference between xx and xy shows how far outdated your ideas about the science of sex differences are. even "biological sex" (not even gender) is a spectrum influenced by a variety of different factors
  - SamReidHughes 9y ago
    Sex is in fact a binary difference, transgender folk are a tiny proportion of the population.
    - door 9y ago
      This is an increasingly outdated view. http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2015/02/24/sex-biology-redefined-genes-dont-indicate-binary-sexes/ http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2015/02/24/sex-biology-redefin...
      - SamReidHughes 9y ago
        The page you linked gives the proportion 1/100. Is there something I'm missing?
    - Pulcinella 9y ago
      "Truth values are in fact a binary difference, fuzzy logic is a tiny portion of mathematics." "Light switches are in fact a binary difference, dimmer switches are a small portion of all switches." "Life is in fact a binary difference, brain death patients are a tiny portion of all patients."