Science says there's no simple answer to define 'woman.' USA Today

[Whatamesssss]

Who are these Scientists and can I see their qualifications?

eu.usatoday.com/story/life/health-wellness/2022/03/24/marsha-blackburn-asked-ketanji-jackson-define-woman-science/7152439001/

Woman. Its a complete mystery.

Hi @GingerPCatt - a variety of ways - firstly on the skeleton - pelvis, cranium, mandible, long bones. That is usually enough and very reliable (around 95% accurate) if all the skeleton is present.

If that's not conclusive due to damage/key attributes missing/immaturity, we can obtain XX/XY from tooth enamel with pretty much 100% accuracy - cheaper, quicker and better preserved usually than DNA but doesn't quantify how many X or Y is present, i.e. in disorders of sexual development (e.g. XXX or XXY) which is very rare. For that, yes, you would have to do DNA analysis - and hope preservation/survival was good enough - it isn't always - petrous and ear ossicles (inner ear bones) are best or teeth sometimes.

If they don’t know what one is - what exactly are these folks deciding they are then?

Of course what they mean is, they know and everyone else knows it's adult human females and politically a group of TQ+ people of both sexes who would like the immersive fiction of being in fact the other sex than the one they are, and who do not appreciate such material reality being stated anywhere at any time and have successfully made this group politically afraid to say so.

Regardless of the impact upon the entire half of the human race who are adult human females and bloody need this reality unobscured.

So it's adult human females

And:
At times adult human females who would like to be known as men, NB or other chosen words
and at times adult human males who would like be known as women.

However both above groups rely on everyone actually knowing woman means adult human female, in order to either identify them into or identify out of the category they would like everyone to treat them as being.

But you mustn't say so out loud.

@NecessaryScene
"Science doesn't determine definitions. It chooses definitions to help it determine facts."

I disagree. I would say that science uses facts to arrive at definitions. Are you suggesting that a scientific hypothesis is equivalent to a definition?

Is it as hard for them to define 'female'?

DontLikeCrumpets and NecessaryScene - I think you are agreeing with each other. Definitions are not to be found in the world, but instead we (scientists) choose them either to better describe what we observe or to express hypotheses and experiments we wish to test and carry out.

@Agrona

If no one can define what a woman is, how can anyone identify as a woman?

If you cannot define something (and a 'feeling' is not a definition of a sexed body) clearly then would it not be impossible to identify as and then attempt to live as a nebulous concept?

There's usually a distinction between sex and gender, sex would be biological but gender is a social contract so it's generally very open to interpretation.

Can’t even be bothered to read the article. Yawn.

This will be the Democrats downfall. As with Labour here.
Fuck 'em. They've been warned.

@Mytholmroyd

Hi *@GingerPCatt* - a variety of ways - firstly on the skeleton - pelvis, cranium, mandible, long bones. That is usually enough and very reliable (around 95% accurate) if all the skeleton is present.

If that's not conclusive due to damage/key attributes missing/immaturity, we can obtain XX/XY from tooth enamel with pretty much 100% accuracy - cheaper, quicker and better preserved usually than DNA but doesn't quantify how many X or Y is present, i.e. in disorders of sexual development (e.g. XXX or XXY) which is very rare. For that, yes, you would have to do DNA analysis - and hope preservation/survival was good enough - it isn't always - petrous and ear ossicles (inner ear bones) are best or teeth sometimes.

Apologies for the derail but could not help it! @Mytholmroyd - I used to sex skeletons too! DNA analysis of the amelogenin gene from ancient teeth

@IamAporcupine Did you? Small world!

It's not DNA but peptides - residual fragments of the sex-linked enamel-forming amelogenin protein - very elegant - but only present in enamel.

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1714926115

[quote Mytholmroyd]@IamAporcupine Did you? Small world!

It's not DNA but peptides - residual fragments of the sex-linked enamel-forming amelogenin protein - very elegant - but only present in enamel.

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1714926115[/quote]
Oh wow, mass spec! Funnily enough I was going to ask you if the old amelogenin PCR amplification plus agarose gel was still being used, as I worked on this 20 years ago!!

I guess we've just outed ourselves...

Funnily enough I was going to ask you if the old amelogenin PCR amplification plus agarose gel was still being used, as I worked on this 20 years ago!!

Not sure but I could ask - next gen sequencing is what everyone does now for human research at least. But we do still use PCR for some work and teaching. It's not my field - I'm a mass spec girl!

I guess we've just outed ourselves...wink
Haha maybe - but I've been on mumsnet off and on for 20 years - I think I've probably done that more than once!