What is this "there no fish" thing? The blog link takes to a British show.
It says in the wikipedia article that the quote comes from the show.
There's no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) (2021)
51–60 of 67 posts
Re: There's no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) (2021)
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
Non tree plants still require you assume what a tree is.
Ok, but all plants have leaves so you would only have to agree on what a plant is. You are trying to make a point but it makes no sense. EDIT: you could also have totally separate definitions on what wood and leaves are without talking about trees or plants, don't you think?
Sure. But when most people think of plants they already use a tree like thing as mental model.
People who have only seen non tree plants doesn't exist.
And nor does any non tree plant leaves help you generate a tree leaf.
Re: There's no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) (2021)
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
What does the term "man" mean in the assertion, "I am a man!" Two interpretations: 1) It has a literal meaning: the speaker has the characteristics of adult human males. 2) It is has a social-asserting meaning: the speaker wants to be perceived as "the kind of person who makes those assertions" For asserting-meanings like (2) to make sense, literal meanings (1) have to be available. Consider, "I'm not a crook!" For i…
Thank you =) I would say that "a man" is someone who presents, or deeply wishes to present, in the way the society has generally dictated people who have been assigned male at birth have to. For example, I have a friend who is a trans man. I would class them as "a man", since they wish to present, and exist in society, in the same way that people who have been assigned male at birth would. As such, they have short ha…
Sex is "reframed" to a matter of performance / visibility (Gender) because your friends emotional well-being depends on it. The recent-ish gender theory is all about accommodating people with these kind of feelings. From that perspective, the "What is a Man/Woman" discussions make much more sense than they currently do.
Re: There's no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) (2021)
#54> First, what is a tree? It’s a big long-lived self-supporting plant with leaves and wood. Hmm. This is a circular definition. You need to invoke tree to define leaves and wood.
No you don't. Lots of plants have leaves. A few don't, some primitive because they hadn't evolved them yet (e.g. algae) and a few because they lost them (broom, cacti). If there were no trees and nobody had ever seen a tree you could still explain leaves. Lots of plants have wood. Things that aren't trees have wood. They're called bushes. Wood is a thing separate from trees. Not all trees have wood: bananas grow on r…
Yeah. But that wood and that leaves of plant don't get you a tree. You are filling in the blanks that makes something a tree with information you already know about trees.
Re: There's no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) (2021)
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you =) I would say that "a man" is someone who presents, or deeply wishes to present, in the way the society has generally dictated people who have been assigned male at birth have to. For example, I have a friend who is a trans man. I would class them as "a man", since they wish to present, and exist in society, in the same way that people who have been assigned male at birth would. As such, they have short ha…
The issue with this analysis is that it cannot explain the use of the term "man" in most contexts, nor literal claims to being a man. In the first case, take a law about pensions -- the law-writer wasnt giving masculine-presenting people fewer years of their pension than feminine-presenting people; they were applying it to adult males. This applies very generally across many uses of man/woman -- the speaker just does…
I wouldn't say "I am a woman because I am perceived to be the same as the people who qualify", I would say "I am a woman because I am choosing to present in the same way that is generally associated with those assigned female at birth". It is a label created by society that I would want to conform to
Re: There's no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) (2021)
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
Edit: Removed. I would delete but I can't, because there's a reply now.
Even though you might not want the answer to the question you only accidentally asked, I think it's useful to answer it for others.
It looks like this post was second-chanced, and already has a few better answers than what I had written here a few days ago.
I only answered because nobody else had commented on this post at the time.
Re: There's no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) (2021)
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
The issue with this analysis is that it cannot explain the use of the term "man" in most contexts, nor literal claims to being a man. In the first case, take a law about pensions -- the law-writer wasnt giving masculine-presenting people fewer years of their pension than feminine-presenting people; they were applying it to adult males. This applies very generally across many uses of man/woman -- the speaker just does…
I wouldn't say "I am a woman because I am perceived to be the same as the people who qualify", I would say "I am a woman because I am choosing to present in the same way that is generally associated with those assigned female at birth". It is a label created by society that I would want to conform to
Transgender people would also be taking hormones and get surgery(/ies), changing their bodies to be closer to the sex they weren't born as. I get what you're saying, but am just clarifying because it sounds too close to the "hairy bearded man in a dress" stereotype.
Re: There's no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) (2021)
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
The issue with this analysis is that it cannot explain the use of the term "man" in most contexts, nor literal claims to being a man. In the first case, take a law about pensions -- the law-writer wasnt giving masculine-presenting people fewer years of their pension than feminine-presenting people; they were applying it to adult males. This applies very generally across many uses of man/woman -- the speaker just does…
I wouldn't say "I am a woman because I am perceived to be the same as the people who qualify", I would say "I am a woman because I am choosing to present in the same way that is generally associated with those assigned female at birth". It is a label created by society that I would want to conform to
The question is whether there is a gap between the people who qualify and the people who are perceived to qualify given the language of the law, ie., can we make any sense out of the pension officer who then says, "choosing to present this way doesnt qualify you for a pension under this law"?
You can redefine the terms to eliminate any non-presentational meaning, but it seems quite implausible to say that the people who wrote that law mean to make it a choice as to whether you qualify for a pension.
When they said, "women qualify for a pension at age 66", they were not using the word "woman" which would have any sense of a choice associated with it, right?
Giving the terms "woman", "man" etc. only a presentational meaning renders a vast amount of our discourse using these terms absolute bizarre, at the very least. Law makers of 1940s setting pension ages were not handing the qualification criteria to individuals to decide, right? The law is not encouraging people to present-as-women, it's not saying: if you choose to present as adult females, we'll give you a few more years pension! Indeed, its hard to imagine any law-maker involved ever thought that qualification for a pension could turn on any choice an individual could make.
You can argue that people should not use "woman" to refer to "adult human females" in most contexts, or that it is better to take the rhetorical meaning of "woman" as the primary one (ie., the ones in which one claims to-be-like literal women) ---- but I cannot really see how you could claim the law makers of the 1940s were writing pension grants based on how people happened to present.
Likewise the same goes for medical textbooks, biology textbooks, etc. And a vast amount of social conversation. If bob says "I'm only interested in dating women", and eve replies, "I present in all the ways adult females do!", bob isnt mistaken to say, "no, i'm looking for someone to start a family with".
It's really really strange to say that when bob said, "i'm interested in dating women" he was confused when he thought being pregnant wasn't ordinarily entailed by the term "woman".
Again, you can try to change how these words are used. But the claim that lawmakers, doctors, biologists, ...people going on dates... that everyone is either confused or "always meant" making-choices-over-presentation.. is a very strange view that just seems patently at odds with what people mean.
Re: There's no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) (2021)
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wouldn't say "I am a woman because I am perceived to be the same as the people who qualify", I would say "I am a woman because I am choosing to present in the same way that is generally associated with those assigned female at birth". It is a label created by society that I would want to conform to
The question is whether there is a gap between the people who qualify and the people who are perceived to qualify given the language of the law, ie., can we make any sense out of the pension officer who then says, "choosing to present this way doesnt qualify you for a pension under this law"? You can redefine the terms to eliminate any non-presentational meaning, but it seems quite implausible to say that the people…
I have no idea why there is a disparity in pension ages between men and women. And if a trans woman is dating a cis man, generally she will make it clear that she is trans. For some men this isn't a problem, for some it is, hence why its a good idea to be upfront with it. And I feel like there is a difference between "I want to date a woman" and "I want to start a family". I personally don't want to start a family, but I would like to date women. You can start a family by adopting, so the gender of your partner, or even if they exist at all, doesn't matter
Re: There's no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) (2021)
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
The question is whether there is a gap between the people who qualify and the people who are perceived to qualify given the language of the law, ie., can we make any sense out of the pension officer who then says, "choosing to present this way doesnt qualify you for a pension under this law"? You can redefine the terms to eliminate any non-presentational meaning, but it seems quite implausible to say that the people…
I have no idea why there is a disparity in pension ages between men and women. And if a trans woman is dating a cis man, generally she will make it clear that she is trans. For some men this isn't a problem, for some it is, hence why its a good idea to be upfront with it. And I feel like there is a difference between "I want to date a woman" and "I want to start a family". I personally don't want to start a family, b…
The issuing I'm addressing isn't whether its possible to define man/woman in a way that makes these just presentational terms -- but whether that's what people actually mean, or have always meant.
It doesn't really make sense to me to say that "this is what people have always meant", nor much sense to say today, "most people mean this". We can change the terms, or adopt a kinda rhetorical practice where we don't use them literally, but its hard to imagine that's what most people have meant in most usages of these terms.
It rubs people up the wrong way when people try to tell others what their words mean in order to win an argument, so it comes across as bad-faith/manipulative to assert that this is what people mean. The reason i use pensions as an example is just because its neutral and specific, but people use man/woman in exactly those ways all the time.
It's straightforward to have an open argument about how to integrate people into society who present-as-women (, -as-men) etc. whether/when these class of people should be treated as-if a part of the relevant sexual class. But this requires giving arguments, being understanding of people who are sceptical, trying to persuade people, etc.
It comes across bad faith when people try to say, instead, "the very words you're using already mean i'm right" -- not only isnt this a very plausible account of the history of the terms, or of what people using them intend them to mean, it's alienating to people who would otherwise be quite tolerant. It turns a discussion of how to change society to be accepting into one about how everyone is profoundly mistaken about the words they use, and control over the meaning of these words "really" lies with others, who have happened to define them in ways that make most common thoughts about the issue incoherent.
Fyi, i dont think you are doing that -- ie., acting in bad faith. i'm just explaining why it rubs people the wrong way