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How Can There Still Be a Sex Difference, Even When There Is No Sex Difference?

psychologytoday.com

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Re: How Can There Still Be a Sex Difference, Even When There Is No Sex Difference?

#121

Post by golemotron »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #98
golemotron wrote: post #36

I'm surprised to see this ranking so high on HN. Sex-based difference is the biggest taboo of our time. The current educational and political system is organized toward exclusively presenting the view that gender is a cultural construct and there are no differences between men and women other than plumbing. Men and women, on average, differ significantly on career choice, likes, dislikes, and motivation. And, it has…

A large part of the problem is the failure to distinguish between the aggregate and the individual. For the sake of argument let's say that the population of individuals who would make good engineers is 60% male and 40% female. From an aggregate level that's a huge difference. Once you gather enough of people that statistical inferences can be made, the difference becomes obvious. In a classroom, for instance. But at…

Actually, no. When you pick out an individual there's still a 60% chance than one is better than the other given no other information than their sex. That's how statistics works.

But I agree that it's better not to make the prejudgement at all. The problem is that there are many things that are true in the aggregate but we can't acknowledge them because we are scared of demotivating people. Is that the best we can do?

Re: How Can There Still Be a Sex Difference, Even When There Is No Sex Difference?

#122

Post by jerf »

hiou wrote: post #112
mikeash wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That really is the crux of the matter. Everyone should be given an equal chance with no prejudice, and then if population differences still emerge, that's OK. Unfortunately there isn't much room for this middle ground. People who want to acknowledge sex difference want to use sex as a filter, e.g. "no women in combat roles." People who want to give everybody a chance also want to even things out, e.g. "Allow women in…

I hesitate to bring up extreme cases, but the relationship between social darwinism and the rise of the nazi party make many people, including myself, very hesitant to speak about differences in sex etc. Not because we deny their existence, but because we've seen how far large groups of uninformed electorate can be persuaded into supporting some scary stuff because of it. It's just a very tricky subject when it comes…

It's not the masses you need to be worried about, hiou. It wasn't the masses gassing people by the millions... it was the elites, who got a few people to go along with them. "The masses" organize poorly... it's the people who are smart enough to successfully do something with their bad idea, but not smart enough to see through the bad idea, that must be feared.

The deep-rooted fear of academia isn't that the masses may do something stupid with the idea of gender differences... it's the fear that they, the academics, will do something stupid. (Again. Although, not the same literal people, of course.)

Re: How Can There Still Be a Sex Difference, Even When There Is No Sex Difference?

#123

Post by [deleted] »

hiou wrote: post #112
mikeash wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That really is the crux of the matter. Everyone should be given an equal chance with no prejudice, and then if population differences still emerge, that's OK. Unfortunately there isn't much room for this middle ground. People who want to acknowledge sex difference want to use sex as a filter, e.g. "no women in combat roles." People who want to give everybody a chance also want to even things out, e.g. "Allow women in…

I hesitate to bring up extreme cases, but the relationship between social darwinism and the rise of the nazi party make many people, including myself, very hesitant to speak about differences in sex etc. Not because we deny their existence, but because we've seen how far large groups of uninformed electorate can be persuaded into supporting some scary stuff because of it. It's just a very tricky subject when it comes…

[deleted]

Re: How Can There Still Be a Sex Difference, Even When There Is No Sex Difference?

#124

Post by duaneb »

golemotron wrote: post #36

I'm surprised to see this ranking so high on HN. Sex-based difference is the biggest taboo of our time. The current educational and political system is organized toward exclusively presenting the view that gender is a cultural construct and there are no differences between men and women other than plumbing. Men and women, on average, differ significantly on career choice, likes, dislikes, and motivation. And, it has…

> The current educational and political system is organized toward exclusively presenting the view that gender is a cultural construct and there are no differences between men and women other than plumbing.

Gender is, by current academic definition, a cultural construct, an identity. Sex, i.e. "plumbing", is the definition of the difference between biological men and women. People with trans operations do not deny their chromosomes, and I'm sure they'd be the first to assure you about the hormonal differences between the sexes.

The problem people are grappling with is ascribing identity assumptions based on sex. You haven't listened carefully enough to understand the difference between gender, sex, identity, etc.

Re: How Can There Still Be a Sex Difference, Even When There Is No Sex Difference?

#125

Post by damoncali »

DamnYuppie wrote: post #109
dataker wrote: post #92

Scientifically studying sex should be a top priority for our society. In both ends of the spectrum, but particularly in radical feminists, theories are influenced by ideologies and politics, hurting society at large. Recently, a feminist(president of a feminist university group) told me males were incomplete females(XY would be an incomplete version of XX) and, for that reason, they should have their instincts and be…

That sounds quite radical. Do you happen to have a link to this article? If so I would be interested in writing the board of trustees for that institution.

It's not too hard to find some pretty far out folks from all walks of life where I went to school (CU Boulder). I heard the same thing and more from the students there, and that was 20 years ago. I got a chuckle out of it at the time, but they were very serious about it.

Re: How Can There Still Be a Sex Difference, Even When There Is No Sex Difference?

#126

Post by rtpg »

bildung wrote: post #74
rtpg wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Psychologically, the more relevant variable for success in live is motivation. Which is still pretty small compared to who your parents are (in terms of the upbringing offered to you and the connections it offers).

> > Psychologically, the more relevant variable for success in live is motivation. > Which is still pretty small compared to who your parents are (in terms of the upbringing offered to you and the connections it offers). It quite looks like it, yes. That's why I prefixed that with "Psychologically". I actually had written more or less your answer after that, but then deleted it because I didn't want to derail the thr…

Sorry, might have been looking for controversy ;)

Re: How Can There Still Be a Sex Difference, Even When There Is No Sex Difference?

#127

Post by [deleted] »

danmaz74 wrote: post #97

The first paragraph in the article sounded wrong. It says that "the brain of a woman is composed of two different types of cells. One type has an X chromosome inherited from her mother, and another type of cell has an X chromosome from her father", but I remembered that all cells in a woman have both X chromosomes. It turns out the correct paragraph should say: "One type has an ACTIVE X chromosome inherited from her…

[deleted]

Re: How Can There Still Be a Sex Difference, Even When There Is No Sex Difference?

#128

Post by mikeash »

jerf wrote: post #122
hiou wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hesitate to bring up extreme cases, but the relationship between social darwinism and the rise of the nazi party make many people, including myself, very hesitant to speak about differences in sex etc. Not because we deny their existence, but because we've seen how far large groups of uninformed electorate can be persuaded into supporting some scary stuff because of it. It's just a very tricky subject when it comes…

It's not the masses you need to be worried about, hiou. It wasn't the masses gassing people by the millions... it was the elites, who got a few people to go along with them. "The masses" organize poorly... it's the people who are smart enough to successfully do something with their bad idea, but not smart enough to see through the bad idea, that must be feared. The deep-rooted fear of academia isn't that the masses m…

Did you really manage to blame academics for the Holocaust in a mere four sentences? That's really impressive!

Re: How Can There Still Be a Sex Difference, Even When There Is No Sex Difference?

#130

Post by mikeash »

hiou wrote: post #112
mikeash wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That really is the crux of the matter. Everyone should be given an equal chance with no prejudice, and then if population differences still emerge, that's OK. Unfortunately there isn't much room for this middle ground. People who want to acknowledge sex difference want to use sex as a filter, e.g. "no women in combat roles." People who want to give everybody a chance also want to even things out, e.g. "Allow women in…

I hesitate to bring up extreme cases, but the relationship between social darwinism and the rise of the nazi party make many people, including myself, very hesitant to speak about differences in sex etc. Not because we deny their existence, but because we've seen how far large groups of uninformed electorate can be persuaded into supporting some scary stuff because of it. It's just a very tricky subject when it comes…

What is the relationship between darwinism (what a ridiculous term, by the way) and the rise of the Nazis?
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