The sexes don’t feel pain the same way • Hacker News Board

Re: The sexes don’t feel pain the same way

#131

Post by dang » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 9:08 PM UTC

Raphmedia wrote: post #114

torpilla wrote: post #86

My wife also seems to handle physical pain quite well, since she knows it's coming from a place of love, but she doesn't do as well with temperature, especially spending the night outside, in the yard. Especially in the winter.

If this is a joke, this is incredibly distasteful. If this isn't, please seek help. There is no such thing as hitting your wife "from a place of love". If this is a boast on your consensual sex life, then this is merely pathetic.

Please don't reply to egregious comments (a.k.a. please don't feed the trolls). This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

It's good that you flagged the comment. We review and deal with most of those, but it takes time. In egregious cases you can also email hn@ycombinator.com.

Re: The sexes don’t feel pain the same way

#132

Post by Raphmedia » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 9:20 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #131

Raphmedia wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this is a joke, this is incredibly distasteful. If this isn't, please seek help. There is no such thing as hitting your wife "from a place of love". If this is a boast on your consensual sex life, then this is merely pathetic.

Please don't reply to egregious comments (a.k.a. please don't feed the trolls). This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html . It's good that you flagged the comment. We review and deal with most of those, but it takes time. In egregious cases you can also email hn@ycombinator.com.

Apologies, I should know better. That's good to know for the email, the [flag] button didn't appear until recently and I couldn't bring myself to move on without doing anything.

Re: The sexes don’t feel pain the same way

#133

Post by dang » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 3:00 AM UTC

Raphmedia wrote: post #132

dang wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don't reply to egregious comments (a.k.a. please don't feed the trolls). This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html . It's good that you flagged the comment. We review and deal with most of those, but it takes time. In egregious cases you can also email hn@ycombinator.com.

Apologies, I should know better. That's good to know for the email, the [flag] button didn't appear until recently and I couldn't bring myself to move on without doing anything.

Thanks for the reply. Flag links appear with karma > 30 so you should have been seeing them for ages. However, flag links on comments only appear on the comment's own page (which one gets to by clicking on its timestamp), so they're not always obvious. Maybe that explains it.

Re: The sexes don’t feel pain the same way

#134

Post by Dylan16807 » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 3:35 AM UTC

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #88

Godel_unicode wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nothing makes a human being's life more important than the life of a lab mouse. Is this hyperbole, or do you seriously believe this?

From an objective view point, it is completely and obviously true. There is no intrinsic quality of humanity that makes our lives more valuable than that of any other organism, or indeed, anything else in the universe. Which isn't to say that we necessarily should be interacting with the rest of the universe as though everything is human, because... well honestly I'm not sure I can express the concept in a way that i…

> From an objective view point, it is completely and obviously true. There is no intrinsic quality of humanity that makes our lives more valuable than that of any other organism, or indeed, anything else in the universe.

The only "obvious" answer I could see from the perspective of the entire universe is that the value of a single life is zero.

But that perspective isn't useful for most moral decisions.

If you evaluate that mouse = human = nonzero, I don't think that's "completely and obviously true" at all.

Let's remove the issue of human exceptionalism, even. It is not "completely and obviously true" that mouse = tapeworm = nonzero, either.

A lot of your argument is just that humans are not categorically different, which is not the same discussion as whether different species have different multipliers.

Re: The sexes don’t feel pain the same way

#135

Post by mamon » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 3:43 AM UTC

kranner wrote: post #65

mamon wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It all comes down to the level of self awarenes and emotional development demonstrated by species. Some primates come close enough to young human children in that regard to cast at least some doubt, but mice? Yes, we probably shouldn't kill them for fun, but saying that their lives are worth as much as human lives is ridiculous and insulting to all humans.

> It all comes down to the level of self awarenes and emotional development demonstrated by species. Why does it come down to self awareness and emotional development? Because of suffering? Nothing about this is obvious, but I believe (given lack of evidence to the contrary and given that mice and human brains are similar enough) that mice suffer as much as humans. This is my belief -- not an argument intended to con…

Some people become vegetarian for this exact reason, but then why stop there? is there a reason to declare life of the plants that you eat less valuable? Stop eating them, these apples or carrots they all have families, dreams, plans for their future.

The level of self awareness is pretty much the only thing we can grade life. I might even like mice, but their lives are endless cycle of eat - fuck - sleep - shit. Human lives are much more productive, creative, interesting and therefore more valuable. And all of that starts with self-awareness.

Re: The sexes don’t feel pain the same way

#136

Post by sullyj3 » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:45 PM UTC

foldr wrote: post #129

switch_kickflip wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would be surprised if you could find an example of anyone at all prominent or influential on the left expressing in writing the position that you quote. How about this for a prominent and influential source: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-00677-x The headline is "Neurosexism: the myth that men and women have different brains" Under the sub-heading "Cultural paths": "So if it’s not brain hard-wiring, h…

That's the headline. The actual content of the article consists in discussion of various instances in which male/female brain differences have been exaggerated. The brain is a bit of a red herring here. We know little about the brain -- far too little to be able to draw any conclusions from whatever differences there may be between average male and female brains. We do, however, have reliable behavioral evidence of s…

Why does the headline get a free pass?

Re: The sexes don’t feel pain the same way

#137

Post by Raphmedia » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 1:57 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #133

Raphmedia wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apologies, I should know better. That's good to know for the email, the [flag] button didn't appear until recently and I couldn't bring myself to move on without doing anything.

Thanks for the reply. Flag links appear with karma > 30 so you should have been seeing them for ages. However, flag links on comments only appear on the comment's own page (which one gets to by clicking on its timestamp), so they're not always obvious. Maybe that explains it.

Oh, that explains it. I had saved the comment to see if it was getting deleted, I was a bit worried not to see it turn gray. I'll know what to do now!

Re: The sexes don’t feel pain the same way

#138

Post by classicsnoot » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 4:06 PM UTC

foldr wrote: post #129

switch_kickflip wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would be surprised if you could find an example of anyone at all prominent or influential on the left expressing in writing the position that you quote. How about this for a prominent and influential source: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-00677-x The headline is "Neurosexism: the myth that men and women have different brains" Under the sub-heading "Cultural paths": "So if it’s not brain hard-wiring, h…

That's the headline. The actual content of the article consists in discussion of various instances in which male/female brain differences have been exaggerated. The brain is a bit of a red herring here. We know little about the brain -- far too little to be able to draw any conclusions from whatever differences there may be between average male and female brains. We do, however, have reliable behavioral evidence of s…

It feels like you keep moving the goalposts and your initial argument was "I have no personal experience with [x] so I don't believe [x] is a thing."

I can't leave links to my life experiences, but as I finish my undergrad I have heard every type of teacher and student maintain that the only differences between men and women are socially constructed. It is common knowledge and thus not really debated. The one time I saw a teacher maintain otherwise, it was a guy in the biology department who was retiring. The class session dissolved into a shouting match between students with the teacher looking on.

Re: The sexes don’t feel pain the same way

#139

Post by foldr » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 10:14 PM UTC

classicsnoot wrote: post #138

foldr wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the headline. The actual content of the article consists in discussion of various instances in which male/female brain differences have been exaggerated. The brain is a bit of a red herring here. We know little about the brain -- far too little to be able to draw any conclusions from whatever differences there may be between average male and female brains. We do, however, have reliable behavioral evidence of s…

It feels like you keep moving the goalposts and your initial argument was "I have no personal experience with [x] so I don't believe [x] is a thing." I can't leave links to my life experiences, but as I finish my undergrad I have heard every type of teacher and student maintain that the only differences between men and women are socially constructed. It is common knowledge and thus not really debated. The one time I…

If that is a common point of view, it should be easy to provide a reference to someone expressing it in writing.

I suspect that you weren't listening very carefully to what people were actually saying.

Re: The sexes don’t feel pain the same way

#140

Post by foldr » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 10:15 PM UTC

sullyj3 wrote: post #136

foldr wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the headline. The actual content of the article consists in discussion of various instances in which male/female brain differences have been exaggerated. The brain is a bit of a red herring here. We know little about the brain -- far too little to be able to draw any conclusions from whatever differences there may be between average male and female brains. We do, however, have reliable behavioral evidence of s…

Why does the headline get a free pass?

Because it typically wouldn't be written by the author of the article.