4 ms·

For data collection purposes, a "sex" field is more informative than a "pronoun" field. That's not to say a "pronoun" field wouldn't be informative, only that p

For data collection purposes, a "sex" field is more informative than a "pronoun" field. That's not to say a "pronoun" field wouldn't be informative, only that pronouns supervene on sex except in outlier cases.

feoren 4y ago
For what data collection purposes? You care more about whether I have a penis or vagina than whether I associate more with football and trucks or with dresses and makeup? If you want to know which ads to show me, the latter is going to be much more informative for you, even though gender is a weak signal for that. It's crazy to say that sex is more informative for all purposes. When I'm registering for some online service, why in the hell would you care whether I have a penis or a vagina?
- florbo 4y ago
  I know that the differences between sexes is very relevant in a multitude of sciences. I'm not sure what gender identity is relevant to other than behavioral science and psychology, primarily applied to marketing. I would like to know more, though, so please share if you have any insight.
  - feoren 4y ago
    How much of that is because they forced it to be relevant? It's one of the few obvious ways to separate people into groups, so they did that for their studies. A popular categorization of humans before the mid 20th century was into three groups: "Caucasoid", "Mongoloid", and "Negroid". If that continued today, then there'd be tons of studies in the social sciences about how these three groups differ from one another, and it'd be therefore "very relevant" to a multitude of sciences. But we abandoned that false-trichotomy long enough ago that science does not miss it now that it's gone. It wasn't made relevant, so it's not. Of course the arrangement of my internal organs is relevant to doctors and medical sciences. As is my blood type and my cholesterol level. That doesn't mean you should be asking for my blood type when I'm registering for an online service (unless, of course, that service involves blood donation or something). That's the whole point -- it's really, genuinely, just not relevant to the vast majority of cases where it's asked.
    - florbo 4y ago
      Oh, yeah, no disagreement with your assessment on whether or not a service should be asking in the first place. Just noting that biological sex is very relevant for something like disease susceptibility, along with a vast multitude of other things. It all comes down to those chromosomes.

feoren 4y ago

For what data collection purposes? You care more about whether I have a penis or vagina than whether I associate more with football and trucks or with dresses and makeup? If you want to know which ads to show me, the latter is going to be much more informative for you, even though gender is a weak signal for that. It's crazy to say that sex is more informative for all purposes. When I'm registering for some online service, why in the hell would you care whether I have a penis or a vagina?

florbo 4y ago
I know that the differences between sexes is very relevant in a multitude of sciences. I'm not sure what gender identity is relevant to other than behavioral science and psychology, primarily applied to marketing. I would like to know more, though, so please share if you have any insight.
- feoren 4y ago
  How much of that is because they forced it to be relevant? It's one of the few obvious ways to separate people into groups, so they did that for their studies. A popular categorization of humans before the mid 20th century was into three groups: "Caucasoid", "Mongoloid", and "Negroid". If that continued today, then there'd be tons of studies in the social sciences about how these three groups differ from one another, and it'd be therefore "very relevant" to a multitude of sciences. But we abandoned that false-trichotomy long enough ago that science does not miss it now that it's gone. It wasn't made relevant, so it's not. Of course the arrangement of my internal organs is relevant to doctors and medical sciences. As is my blood type and my cholesterol level. That doesn't mean you should be asking for my blood type when I'm registering for an online service (unless, of course, that service involves blood donation or something). That's the whole point -- it's really, genuinely, just not relevant to the vast majority of cases where it's asked.
  - florbo 4y ago
    Oh, yeah, no disagreement with your assessment on whether or not a service should be asking in the first place. Just noting that biological sex is very relevant for something like disease susceptibility, along with a vast multitude of other things. It all comes down to those chromosomes.