"There is no genetic test that can conclusively determine a person’s sex or gender."

[Macareaux]

...according to s letter signed by 700 biologists and 100 scientists.

This is the sort of thing thrown at us - how does one argue against such a weight of opinion

I can't help feeling that people have been so indoctrinated by gender ideology and that they hate everything Trump does in principle that critical faculties have gone out of the window.

I know a psychologist who describes himself as a "scientist" and uses the appeal to authority logical fallacy to defend his virtue-signalling sjw misogyny.

Tbf, some psychologists are scientists, particularly those working in areas that overlap with biology, neuroscience, etc. and use regular experimental methods. I'm an academic in a STEM field and have collaborators in psychology departments who publish in biology journals, for instance.

Clinical psychologists in practice: not scientists (closer to medics). Psychologists who hand out questionnaires or use qualitative methods: not scientists (social scientists, maybe).

Sex is binary. We literally would not exist if it weren't as two distinctly sexed gametes are required for sexual reproduction. Like all biological mechanisms, sex development sometimes goes wrong and intersex conditions (disorders of sexual development) can result. We are no different to any other mammals in that regard.

Gender is whatever behaviour society wants it to be. Looking for a biological basis for gender is like looking for a biological basis for politeness: sure, you'll probably find some correlates, but you're chasing a phantom as the target behaviour is subjective. A polite behaviour in one society is a rude behaviour in another; a male behaviour in one society is a female behaviour in another. Say someone claimed they had isolated a gene that was correlated with liking soccer: in British society, that would be interpreted as a male behaviour; in American society, it would be interpreted as a female behaviour. Ditto for studiousness, which was considered a male province up to the 20th century and female university students outnumber male. Would any such gene say anything about the biological basis of gender? Absolutely not. But it would be spun as such.

Gah, should have said:
and now female university students outnumber male.

geeka, said psychologist-acquaintance works for as an editor for an academic journal.

You can trace the man’s ancestry through the Y chromosome because it isn’t shuffled during meiosis. A man basically inherits his dad’s Y chromosome largely intact.

You can trace men and women’s maternal line back through the mitochondria. Mitochondrial DNA isn’t shuffled either; we, male or female alike, inherit it from our mother.

Trying to find a gender gene is like trying to find the gene for using chopsticks.

Sure, there will be correlations: brown eyes, black hair, hard earwax.

But those correlations reflect the most common phenotypes where chopsticks are more widely used.

There isn’t a chopstick gene.

If that is true then all IVF clinics should stop offering gender/sex selection because no genetic test can determine the sex of an embryo!

Tuner syndrome can be catastrophic. Many miscarriages are due to Turner syndrome and a family member of mine died in her twenties due to complications from having Turner syndrome - infertility was not her most pressing health concern and she spent a lot of time under health care due to it. Chromosomal disorders are complex and effect individuals with varying degrees of severity.

I should also add that my acquaintance claims that his colleagues don't know how to tell the difference between male and female mice.

I’ve dealt with an awful lot of lab mice in my time.

Males are obvious. Ruddy great balls, differently shaped genital area entirely. You’d need to be a very un observant person to not tell.

Or stupid.

I should also add that my acquaintance claims that his colleagues don't know how to tell the difference between male and female mice.

Luckily mice don’t have that difficulty.

Luckily mice don’t have that difficulty.

Damn right. 😁

disrespect A pure psychology journal (not necessarily science) or a biology/neuro journal (should be science)?

dis Missed your post about the mice! So he's an animal psychologist then? Mind-blowing if so.

Are all their mice nonbinary or something?

his colleagues don't know how to tell the difference between male and female mice.

They shouldn’t be working with them then. Accurate sexing was part of the home office licence holder training we all had to do before were allowed to work with mice.

A pure psychology journal (not necessarily science) or a biology/neuro journal (should be science)?

The former.

The logic of this just does my head in.

If there is no biology to it then why do all these people want to change their physical form?? Can ANYONE explain that to me.

If there is no female or male sex differentiated form - and it's just an internal sense - then why are people trying to change their physical form to the other form which definitely can't be described as a sex??

What am I missing that makes this logic - supported by allegedly intelligent people - makes sense????

Are all their mice nonbinary or something?

Hah! That must be it.

They shouldn’t be working with them then.

I agree. When he made that comment I had to bite my lip to avoid saying something to that effect.

Manier, who helped draft the letter, reiterated that there is no genetic test that could conclusively determine a person’s sex or gender

And yet we all somehow manage to work out who we need to use contraception with???

Does. My. Head. In.

I was talking to a primary school teacher, whose eyes were glowing with interest and excitement as she talked about the wonderful training she had been on and how science now knows that gender is innate inside us before we are even born. She also used the phrase ' sex assigned at birth'. Gives me the rage that tax money is being spent on ideology presented as science.

If there is no biology to it then why do all these people want to change their physical form??

I suspect that the answer has something to do with validation, ie their external selves need to match their internal selves so that society recognises them the way they want to be recognised

I suspect that the answer has something to do with validation, ie their external selves need to match their internal selves so that society recognises them the way they want to be recognised

But that's my point - isn't that based on the premise that sex is based on physical form? i.e. that's what I don't get about the logic. How can you argue that you need physical changes but then say that sex is not based on physical form??

I just can't wrap my head around the logic?

There is no logic. It’s faith

ok then.

My daughter is a scientist, well she says she is and she has test tubes and pipettes. Mind you she knows if someone has a willy then he is a boy and I am struggling to get through to her that girls can have short hair and boys can have long hair. But she is only 2.5 years old. Why do adults just not get it?! It’s not that complicated folks.

If there is no biology to it then why do all these people want to change their physical form??

More importantly, why are they telling children they have to change their physical form?

Why is it so important to block puberty if puberty isn’t the maturation of a binary sex phenotype?