Sam Killermann's TEDx Talk on Gender

[Owyn_Merrilin]

It has continually amused me how the terms Sex (binary) and Gender (when people often actually mean 'gender roles' or similar)

This right here is what annoys me about the whole thing. Gender /is/ biological. Gender /roles/ and gender /identities/ are socially constructed. They're separate but related concepts, or at least they used to be.

 

[Rosiv]

It has continually amused me how the terms Sex (binary) and Gender (when people often actually mean 'gender roles' or similar)

This right here is what annoys me about the whole thing. Gender /is/ biological. Gender /roles/ and gender /identities/ are socially constructed. They're separate but related concepts, or at least they used to be.

Actually, sex is biological. Gender is the socially constructed part. That's not to say that there aren't sex-based differences in brain structure, but as Killerman says in this talk, gender refers to how you interpret and express those differences, and how your interpretation and expression of them is formed by the society in which you live.

I thought Owyn was referring to that maybe the way we interpret / express the sex-based differences isnt based on a social
construct but something neurological, ie biological. Or maybe that's just me putting words in his mouth, i dunno. Either
way, i personally think gender is a combination of both biological(in the brain) and social influences, but the extent of
each not measurable yet, since i believe neurology, as a science, is still in its infancy.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

It has continually amused me how the terms Sex (binary) and Gender (when people often actually mean 'gender roles' or similar)

This right here is what annoys me about the whole thing. Gender /is/ biological. Gender /roles/ and gender /identities/ are socially constructed. They're separate but related concepts, or at least they used to be.

Actually, sex is biological. Gender is the socially constructed part. That's not to say that there aren't sex-based differences in brain structure, but as Killerman says in this talk, gender refers to how you interpret and express those differences, and how your interpretation and expression of them is formed by the society in which you live.

I thought Owyn was referring to that maybe the way we interpret / express the sex-based differences isnt based on a social
construct but something neurological, ie biological. Or maybe that's just me putting words in his mouth, i dunno. Either
way, i personally think gender is a combination of both biological(in the brain) and social influences, but the extent of
each not measurable yet, since i believe neurology, as a science, is still in its infancy.

I'm really just saying this whole gender/sex dichotomy (as opposed to gender/gender identity) is a relatively new thing, kind of a re-definition of an existing word. Although nature Vs. nurture is definitely a debate worth having when it comes to something like this.

 

[Rosiv]

It has continually amused me how the terms Sex (binary) and Gender (when people often actually mean 'gender roles' or similar)

This right here is what annoys me about the whole thing. Gender /is/ biological. Gender /roles/ and gender /identities/ are socially constructed. They're separate but related concepts, or at least they used to be.

Actually, sex is biological. Gender is the socially constructed part. That's not to say that there aren't sex-based differences in brain structure, but as Killerman says in this talk, gender refers to how you interpret and express those differences, and how your interpretation and expression of them is formed by the society in which you live.

I thought Owyn was referring to that maybe the way we interpret / express the sex-based differences isnt based on a social
construct but something neurological, ie biological. Or maybe that's just me putting words in his mouth, i dunno. Either
way, i personally think gender is a combination of both biological(in the brain) and social influences, but the extent of
each not measurable yet, since i believe neurology, as a science, is still in its infancy.

I'm really just saying this whole gender/sex dichotomy (as opposed to gender/gender identity) is a relatively new thing, kind of a re-definition of an existing word. Although nature Vs. nurture is definitely a debate worth having when it comes to something like this.

Yea i guess, im inclined to agree with you, but that doesnt make the concept of gender any less vaild, just new, not that im saying you imply that, its just what comes to my mind whenever people say that something is "relatively new". I mean that is how new words are formed right? They spawn from previous concepts and ideas. Anyways, sorry to single you out and i guess ill take my leave, these gender threads are toxic.

 

[The_Echo]

I kind of couldn't take him quite as seriously when he started rhyming. But, the way I understand it, biological sex = gender.

Well that's kind of factually incorrect, from a purely scientific perspective. Studies have found that transgendered people, for example, will often have the brain structures of the "opposite" gender to their biological sex, which is believed to be caused by in utero hormone levels. They quite literally have a women's brain in a male body and vice versa. Also, there exist people who have both XX and XY chromosomes, so what is their gender? Finally, unless you can explain how liking the colour pink or Barbie dolls is coded into female DNA, gender as it is socially understood cannot be considered synonymous with biological sex.

Alright, I'll concede to those with biological abnormalities. I kind of left it out in the first post for brevity's sake.

He never says that they're incorrect, he says that they're falsely considered to be intrinsically and rigidly linked to what you've got going on in your pants.

Maybe I just didn't pick up on that. Gonna be honest, his message was kind of muddled; not the best TED[x] Talk I've seen.

Gendered bullying, gender policing and gender-related rhetoric in society would disagree with you. Sam Killerman mentioned that 50% of transgendered people interviewed for a study had attempted suicide, and that 84% had considered it. The world is full of boys who get bullied for being "sissy" or "gay" or "camp," and girls who get teased and shunned for being "butch." A lot of the time, a guy can't even walk down the street in a dress without being heckled or even physically threatened. Many people still consider transgendered people or even just butch women and camp men to be genuinely perverted or sick in the head. There are multiple systems, both social and institutional, that are all built up around this idea of keeping the genders strict and separate. The very fact that people are told to "be a man" or "become a woman" implies that these things are in some way threatened or unstable, as if we have a collective paranoia about not being manly or womanly enough.

I personally haven't seen "gender policing," which sounds awfully Orwellian to me. But yeah, people get bullied, and that's obviously an issue. I don't think that compartmentalizing people into an absurd amount of different gender identities really... helps, though. It'd obviously be quite a process, but I think pushing for acceptance of girly-men and tomboys is a better solution than labeling yourself a woman in a man's body (which, biological construction aside, wouldn't really be a thing without these gender norms).

If you're cisgendered, I can see why you'd feel that why. You don't have to think about any of this stuff if you don't want to, because your sex matches up with your gender in a socially acceptable way. For transgendered, agendered, genderfluid and other LGBT+ groups, however, this kind of discussion is very necessary.

Yeah. I guess so. Just not sure it's being handled right.

 

[Darken12]

Broad in the sense that most cultures have similar gender roles- For instance in practically all societies it is the men who fight and the women who keep the home and raise the kids. That's the same in feudal Japan, Meso-America and medieval Europe- three societies which evolved in complete isolation of each other until the early modern era.

And all these cultures had extremely high infant mortality and rigid gender segregation, which naturally leads to women being kept out of dangerous situations to minimise infant mortality, which later gets dressed up in other justifications. Many cultures around the world have had different gender roles (and conceptions of gender itself, such as a third gender and the conception of two-spirit as a gender) because they developed under different circumstances. They just don't get mentioned all that often because of cultural imperialism (by the Greeks, the Romans, the Persian, the European, the Chinese and every other "I want to rule the world!" empire that ever existed).

You are vastly, vastly underestimating the power of cultural supremacism. It can and does rewrite what another culture perceives as gender.

 

[Nickolai77]

Broad in the sense that most cultures have similar gender roles- For instance in practically all societies it is the men who fight and the women who keep the home and raise the kids. That's the same in feudal Japan, Meso-America and medieval Europe- three societies which evolved in complete isolation of each other until the early modern era.

And all these cultures had extremely high infant mortality and rigid gender segregation, which naturally leads to women being kept out of dangerous situations to minimise infant mortality, which later gets dressed up in other justifications. Many cultures around the world have had different gender roles (and conceptions of gender itself, such as a third gender and the conception of two-spirit as a gender) because they developed under different circumstances. They just don't get mentioned all that often because of cultural imperialism (by the Greeks, the Romans, the Persian, the European, the Chinese and every other "I want to rule the world!" empire that ever existed).

You are vastly, vastly underestimating the power of cultural supremacism. It can and does rewrite what another culture perceives as gender.

I'm not talking about how cultural superemacism may have altered how one culture views gender issues, my point is that historically speaking gender roles were broadly similar in unrelated cultures across the world before any form of globalisation came along. The Incans had never seen white men up until the Pizzaro's conquestidor's showed up, the Africans never saw East Asians until Zeng He explored there. Up until Portuguese sailors reached India, the last time Indians had seen Europeans in military force was Alexander the Great. Yet in all these societies gender roles are not that dissimilar, despite being culturally unrelated up until around the 1500's.

You're probably going to get more differences when comparing hunter-gather societies to agrarian ones because the gender roles get harder to compare due to the different social systems. But yes, gender roles are broadly similar as you say because child-rearing is a full-time job done by women who biologically give birth to babies them and feed them- which in an era before modern medicine really is a full-time job. And men of course are physically more suited for fighting- hence why gender roles were broadly similar.

 

[Darken12]

I'm not talking about how cultural superemacism may have altered how one culture views gender issues, my point is that historically speaking gender roles were broadly similar in unrelated cultures across the world before any form of globalisation came along. The Incans had never seen white men up until the Pizzaro's conquestidor's showed up, the Africans never saw East Asians until Zeng He explored there. Up until Portuguese sailors reached India, the last time Indians had seen Europeans in military force was Alexander the Great. Yet in all these societies gender roles are not that dissimilar, despite being culturally unrelated up until around the 1500's.

There were plenty of inter-cultural exchange before those times. Cultural supremacism isn't just globalisation. It's been happening since the beginning of history. Even cultures separated by oceans have managed to make contact before the 1500s.

But yes, gender roles are broadly similar as you say because child-rearing is a full-time job done by women who biologically give birth to babies them and feed them- which in an era before modern medicine really is a full-time job. And men of course are physically more suited for fighting- hence why gender roles were broadly similar.

Both of which are the result of arbitrary cultural mores. It has always been known that breastfeeding wasn't vital for infants (even prehistoric societies knew that infants could be fed with animal milk), so it was just as possible for men to be child caretakers. And as I have stated over and over in feminism/gender threads, there have been many studies (I can send them by PM if you so desire) that indicate that a man's physical advantage is a product of how he was reared as a child, and due to the fact that there are no gender-based differences in GR levels during childhood, women have the potential to match a man's physical prowess if properly reared (and this was evidenced in some cultures, an example is here [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woman_warrior#Archaeology], with the Scythian-Sarmatian warrior burial grounds being composed of 20% women).

Gender roles are purely arbitrary, though there are always rational explanations for them. Those explanations do not make them any less arbitrary and mutable, however.

 

[Nickolai77]

I'm not talking about how cultural superemacism may have altered how one culture views gender issues, my point is that historically speaking gender roles were broadly similar in unrelated cultures across the world before any form of globalisation came along. The Incans had never seen white men up until the Pizzaro's conquestidor's showed up, the Africans never saw East Asians until Zeng He explored there. Up until Portuguese sailors reached India, the last time Indians had seen Europeans in military force was Alexander the Great. Yet in all these societies gender roles are not that dissimilar, despite being culturally unrelated up until around the 1500's.

There were plenty of inter-cultural exchange before those times. Cultural supremacism isn't just globalisation. It's been happening since the beginning of history. Even cultures separated by oceans have managed to make contact before the 1500s.

I wouldn't say those cultural exchanges were significant though. Cultures on separate continents didn't influence one another until seafaring innovations made it possible to do so. Erik the Red or Marco Polo didn't exactly have a huge societal impact on the non-European societies they encountered.

But yes, gender roles are broadly similar as you say because child-rearing is a full-time job done by women who biologically give birth to babies them and feed them- which in an era before modern medicine really is a full-time job. And men of course are physically more suited for fighting- hence why gender roles were broadly similar.

Both of which are the result of arbitrary cultural mores. It has always been known that breastfeeding wasn't vital for infants (even prehistoric societies knew that infants could be fed with animal milk), so it was just as possible for men to be child caretakers. And as I have stated over and over in feminism/gender threads, there have been many studies (I can send them by PM if you so desire) that indicate that a man's physical advantage is a product of how he was reared as a child, and due to the fact that there are no gender-based differences in GR levels during childhood, women have the potential to match a man's physical prowess if properly reared (and this was evidenced in some cultures, an example is here [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woman_warrior#Archaeology], with the Scythian-Sarmatian warrior burial grounds being composed of 20% women).

Gender roles are purely arbitrary, though there are always rational explanations for them. Those explanations do not make them any less arbitrary and mutable, however.

How can gender roles be arbitrary if there are rational explanations for them? The division of labour based on sex makes rational sense which is why it is so widespread in unrelated cultures. In a preindustrial society you're looking at a infant mortality rate of around 30-50%, where it makes economic sense to have lots of children so its no surprise that women spent a lot more time than they do now being pregnant and caring for young children. Men are in general physically stronger than women- its part of male puberty to develop muscles which makes them better fighters and suited for heavy labour. Women of course can match men physically on an individual basis, but its not something that comes as naturally because muscle growth isn't part of puberty process. That's why you don't get many pre-industrial societies such as the Scythians deploying female warriors. Funnily enough European explorers such as Columbus hoped/expected to find "Amazonian" tribes of warrior women in a continent so far removed from Europe- and of course they didn't for the reasons i'm explaining above.


In industrial societies we don't need a division of labour based on sex because women don't need to spend as much time having and raising children, but of course it still persists because thousands of years of culture doesn't go away overnight. There's also scientific evidence which you're likely to reject that suggests that sex influences our behaviour, with men being orientated towards understanding systems and processes and women empathy, which reinforces or perhaps led to sex based division of labour.

 

[Darken12]

I wouldn't say those cultural exchanges were significant though. Cultures on separate continents didn't influence one another until seafaring innovations made it possible to do so. Erik the Red or Marco Polo didn't exactly have a huge societal impact on the non-European societies they encountered.

I disagree, but it's getting quite a bit off-topic, so let's just agree to disagree.

How can gender roles be arbitrary if there are rational explanations for them? The division of labour based on sex makes rational sense which is why it is so widespread in unrelated cultures. In a preindustrial society you're looking at a infant mortality rate of around 30-50%, where it makes economic sense to have lots of children so its no surprise that women spent a lot more time than they do now being pregnant and caring for young children. Men are in general physically stronger than women- its part of male puberty to develop muscles which makes them better fighters and suited for heavy labour. Women of course can match men physically on an individual basis, but its not something that comes as naturally because muscle growth isn't part of puberty process. That's why you don't get many pre-industrial societies such as the Scythians deploying female warriors. Funnily enough European explorers such as Columbus hoped/expected to find "Amazonian" tribes of warrior women in a continent so far removed from Europe- and of course they didn't for the reasons i'm explaining above.

Arbitrary does not mean irrational. Arbitrary means "subject to individual will or judgment without restriction; contingent solely upon one's discretion", those gender roles were decided (and perpetuated, and altered) by those in power.

I am aware of the rationalities for the gender divisions, and I'm fairly certain the peoples of those ages were, too. That does not make gender roles immutable.

Also, men are not innately stronger than women. There is no difference between genders when it comes to GH levels in childhood, which is the hormone that is ultimately responsible for height, physical size, bone growth and muscle mass. Testosterone has an effect on muscle development, sure, but GH levels are increased by oestrogen, so both genders have roughly the same capacity for physical size and strength. The problem is that GH levels are dictated, above all else, by exercise (in both quantity and intensity), and the physical potential that women lose during childhood is never recovered in adulthood. If a boy is raised exercising more often and with more intensity, his size and physical potential in adulthood will be greater than that of a girl whose GH levels never matched his.

The gender roles came first, and the physical consequences followed, not the other way around. There is an entire area of genetics dedicated to the study of the environmental effects on gene expression, and it explains many common misconceptions people have to this day (this being one of them). Epigenetics and genetic plasticity are, unfortunately, not taught or spoken of as often as they should be, because they do wonders in terms of destroying biological determinism.

In industrial societies we don't need a division of labour based on sex because women don't need to spend as much time having and raising children, but of course it still persists because thousands of years of culture doesn't go away overnight. There's also scientific evidence which you're likely to reject that suggests that sex influences our behaviour, with men being orientated towards understanding systems and processes and women empathy, which reinforces or perhaps led to sex based division of labour.

I agree that the reason it persists is because it's extremely difficult to change thousands and thousands of years of the same thing being belaboured over and over. After all, we still have racism and ethnocentrism, and religion-based hate crimes, despite the fact that we should theoretically be "over" those barbaric things by now.

Also, I'm a scientist, so I'm not "likely to reject evidence". I'm likely to explain what that evidence actually states, what it means, and why you shouldn't buy into sensationalistic pop-science. You'd be surprised at the extent my field (biochemistry) gets mutilated to support this or that prejudice, sexism being one of the most common.

 

[Nickolai77]

I wouldn't say those cultural exchanges were significant though. Cultures on separate continents didn't influence one another until seafaring innovations made it possible to do so. Erik the Red or Marco Polo didn't exactly have a huge societal impact on the non-European societies they encountered.

I disagree, but it's getting quite a bit off-topic, so let's just agree to disagree.

I wouldn't know about that, the whole reason why you quoted me was because you disagreed with my assertion that gender roles were broadly similar across unrelated cultures. If anything, the stuff you write below is off-topic.

How can gender roles be arbitrary if there are rational explanations for them? The division of labour based on sex makes rational sense which is why it is so widespread in unrelated cultures. In a preindustrial society you're looking at a infant mortality rate of around 30-50%, where it makes economic sense to have lots of children so its no surprise that women spent a lot more time than they do now being pregnant and caring for young children. Men are in general physically stronger than women- its part of male puberty to develop muscles which makes them better fighters and suited for heavy labour. Women of course can match men physically on an individual basis, but its not something that comes as naturally because muscle growth isn't part of puberty process. That's why you don't get many pre-industrial societies such as the Scythians deploying female warriors. Funnily enough European explorers such as Columbus hoped/expected to find "Amazonian" tribes of warrior women in a continent so far removed from Europe- and of course they didn't for the reasons i'm explaining above.

Arbitrary does not mean irrational. Arbitrary means "subject to individual will or judgment without restriction; contingent solely upon one's discretion", those gender roles were decided (and perpetuated, and altered) by those in power.

I am aware of the rationalities for the gender divisions, and I'm fairly certain the peoples of those ages were, too. That does not make gender roles immutable.

How can you know that gender roles were decided by those in power though? The sex based division of labour occurred way before recorded human history- Possibly before "humans" existed in the first place. I get the impression you're implying that the whole idea of dividing labour by sex was a conscious decision by some early human. I think this division of labour evolved organically, stemming from the way humans biologically are. It's like why practically all human societies are hierarchical in some way. I don't think some human sat down one day and came up with the original idea that having a "leader" may be a good idea.

Also, men are not innately stronger than women. There is no difference between genders when it comes to GH levels in childhood, which is the hormone that is ultimately responsible for height, physical size, bone growth and muscle mass. Testosterone has an effect on muscle development, sure, but GH levels are increased by oestrogen, so both genders have roughly the same capacity for physical size and strength. The problem is that GH levels are dictated, above all else, by exercise (in both quantity and intensity), and the physical potential that women lose during childhood is never recovered in adulthood. If a boy is raised exercising more often and with more intensity, his size and physical potential in adulthood will be greater than that of a girl whose GH levels never matched his.

So you're saying that the only reason why women arn't equally physically strong as men is because boys exercise more at a young age? It's true that in general young boys do run around more than girls, but i wouldn't know if that is enough to significantly alter generalised levels of GH. Don't forget young girls do plenty of exercise as well, they do similar physical education classes to boys and run around at their own accord. My main gripe though is that GH is dictated solely by how much exercise a child does- is that really the case? Because i'd have thought it would have been largely dictated by DNA or a mixture of genetic and environmental factors.

Even the most physically lazy of boys will undergo puberty changes which make men on average physically stronger. Chests broaden out, muscles grow in size around the shoulder areas. That doesn't happen in girls, or at least in the same way it does in boys. Your claim seems to imply that there should be a positive correlation between childhood exercise and height or shoulder width for instance, which seems rather dubious because i'd imagine height to be mainly dictated by DNA and diet. Personally, I did a lot of exercise when i was a child but i stand at a very modest 5'7. I know that's only personal experience though- still, what's your source on this claim then?

The gender roles came first, and the physical consequences followed, not the other way around. There is an entire area of genetics dedicated to the study of the environmental effects on gene expression, and it explains many common misconceptions people have to this day (this being one of them). Epigenetics and genetic plasticity are, unfortunately, not taught or spoken of as often as they should be, because they do wonders in terms of destroying biological determinism.

This seems rather dubious as well. Males are generally taller and stronger than females in other non-human primate species, and i don't think chimpanzees at any point decided to socially condition their male offspring to exercise more often. In fact i think it's the the same general picture with mammals in general. Again this links to why i think the sex-based division of labour emerged organically. Male humans, like male guerrillas and male chimpanzees are just taller and stronger in general. Watch any nature documentary and i think many would agree that in terms of sex there are plenty of similarities between human behaviour and animal behaviour- because humans are, you know, animals as well?

In industrial societies we don't need a division of labour based on sex because women don't need to spend as much time having and raising children, but of course it still persists because thousands of years of culture doesn't go away overnight. There's also scientific evidence which you're likely to reject that suggests that sex influences our behaviour, with men being orientated towards understanding systems and processes and women empathy, which reinforces or perhaps led to sex based division of labour.

I agree that the reason it persists is because it's extremely difficult to change thousands and thousands of years of the same thing being belaboured over and over. After all, we still have racism and ethnocentrism, and religion-based hate crimes, despite the fact that we should theoretically be "over" those barbaric things by now.

Also, I'm a scientist, so I'm not "likely to reject evidence". I'm likely to explain what that evidence actually states, what it means, and why you shouldn't buy into sensationalistic pop-science. You'd be surprised at the extent my field (biochemistry) gets mutilated to support this or that prejudice, sexism being one of the most common.

Of course a lot of science concerned with human sex behaviour does get twisted by the media because it tends to be in the public interest- but i'm fairly sure not all of it's junk. Sasha Baron Cohen's research into the impact of testosterone on fetal development comes to mind for instance as an exhample of a piece of research which suggests biological factors influence sex-based behaviour. And also don't forget that this area of science is heavily loaded politically. Feminists have quite a large stake in science showing human sexual behaviours not to be biologically influenced in a significant way. Needless to say this colours how the evidence is interpreted by some.

 

[Darken12]

I wouldn't know about that, the whole reason why you quoted me was because you disagreed with my assertion that gender roles were broadly similar across unrelated cultures. If anything, the stuff you write below is off-topic.

I didn't disagree with your assertion that gender roles were broadly similar. I disagreed that those cultures are unrelated, and clearly we're not going to go anywhere on that.

How can you know that gender roles were decided by those in power though? The sex based division of labour occurred way before recorded human history- Possibly before "humans" existed in the first place. I get the impression you're implying that the whole idea of dividing labour by sex was a conscious decision by some early human. I think this division of labour evolved organically, stemming from the way humans biologically are. It's like why practically all human societies are hierarchical in some way. I don't think some human sat down one day and came up with the original idea that having a "leader" may be a good idea.

Yes, gender division was dictated based on something that was observed biologically (that genders had different reproductive organs), but everything that was based on that was decided arbitrarily. Some cultures had men doing basket-weaving and women taking care of farming and animal husbandry, some cultures had women in their armies, others had women as leaders, and so on. Not two cultures had the exact same division of jobs among their gender. And no, not even "broadly similar", as there are exceptions to any gender-based task you can think of. The only thing that they all had in common was that the divisions were based on gender. Which isn't actually all that telling or important either, because class-based divisions existed for just as long, and those weren't based on any biological trait.

So you're saying that the only reason why women arn't equally physically strong as men is because boys exercise more at a young age? It's true that in general young boys do run around more than girls, but i wouldn't know if that is enough to significantly alter generalised levels of GH. Don't forget young girls do plenty of exercise as well, they do similar physical education classes to boys and run around at their own accord. My main gripe though is that GH is dictated solely by how much exercise a child does- is that really the case? Because i'd have thought it would have been largely dictated by DNA or a mixture of genetic and environmental factors.

It's not only quantity of exercise, it's intensity and quality of exercise as well. The exercise that boys receive is not only quantitatively higher, it's also more intense and demanding. Girls are discouraged from undertaking exercise to such extents. There's also roughhousing and physical fighting, which girls are severely discouraged from engaging in, which serves to stimulate aggression in children.

I never stated that exercise was the sole stimulant of GH levels. In fact, GH is stimulated by many, many other factors. And yes, genetics do play a role in that, some people are born with genes that code for higher levels of GH, or for a higher amount of GH receptors, or for a higher amount of GH-sensitive bone cartilage. But these genes are not gender-based, they are based on familial inheritance.

Even the most physically lazy of boys will undergo puberty changes which make men on average physically stronger. Chests broaden out, muscles grow in size around the shoulder areas. That doesn't happen in girls, or at least in the same way it does in boys. Your claim seems to imply that there should be a positive correlation between childhood exercise and height or shoulder width for instance, which seems rather dubious because i'd imagine height to be mainly dictated by DNA and diet. Personally, I did a lot of exercise when i was a child but i stand at a very modest 5'7. I know that's only personal experience though- still, what's your source on this claim then?

Diet plays an absolutely crucial impact in childhood development, yes, and familial genetics can account for a vast difference in size and height, but none of this is gender-based. That was my original claim. If you take a brother and a sister, from the same family, and give them the exact same nutrition, and the exact same rigorous training during childhood and adolescence, they will both reach adulthood with similar sizes and height. This, of course, rarely happens.

I already said I'm more than willing to PM the studies to anyone interested. Send me a PM and I'll be glad to answer it with the list.

This seems rather dubious as well. Males are generally taller and stronger than females in other non-human primate species, and i don't think chimpanzees at any point decided to socially condition their male offspring to exercise more often. In fact i think it's the the same general picture with mammals in general. Again this links to why i think the sex-based division of labour emerged organically. Male humans, like male guerrillas and male chimpanzees are just taller and stronger in general. Watch any nature documentary and i think many would agree that in terms of sex there are plenty of similarities between human behaviour and animal behaviour- because humans are, you know, animals as well?

Yes, and the animal kingdom has plenty of examples where males are smaller or physically indistinguishable from females, even in primates. While there are certainly similarities in some behaviours, humans possess superior intelligence and the capacity to alter their own environment to shape their own epigenetics.

Of course a lot of science concerned with human sex behaviour does get twisted by the media because it tends to be in the public interest- but i'm fairly sure not all of it's junk. Sasha Baron Cohen's research into the impact of testosterone on fetal development comes to mind for instance as an exhample of a piece of research which suggests biological factors influence sex-based behaviour. And also don't forget that this area of science is heavily loaded politically. Feminists have quite a large stake in science showing human sexual behaviours not to be biologically influenced in a significant way. Needless to say this colours how the evidence is interpreted by some.

I agree with most of that, but something to keep in mind is that science is descriptive, not prescriptive. Science may say how something is, right now, but it says nothing on whether it should be like that or whether it has to be like that. Any scientist will tell you that biology is mutable; perhaps not immediately, but you most certainly can change something that is firmly biological. We develop medical procedures and tools all the time, with the aim to change the biological (and we change the biological over generations as well, as seen with dog/cat breeds).

My gripe is mainly with biological determinism, the idea that the biological is immutable and prescriptive. That is a gross misuse of science and I would never stand by it.

 

[Beautiful Tragedy]

I liked his presentation, and I hope it's easy enough for people to digest, and understand.

Now, after 5 days of drunken debauchery in west hollywood, i am back home and exhausted...time for a nap ;P

 

[Shadowstar38]

I liked his presentation, and I hope it's easy enough for people to digest, and understand.

Now, after 5 days of drunken debauchery in west hollywood, i am back home and exhausted...time for a nap ;P

*accusatory stare*

I require all the details.

OT: Right after watching this I went into my mom's room, yelled "Penises and vagina", and just left.

But in all seriousness, consider me educated.

 

[an annoyed writer]

I liked his presentation, and I hope it's easy enough for people to digest, and understand.

Now, after 5 days of drunken debauchery in west hollywood, i am back home and exhausted...time for a nap ;P

Sounds like good fun I too, must learn all of the details! I take it that your time with your girlfriend is going well?

 

[Nickolai77]

How can you know that gender roles were decided by those in power though? The sex based division of labour occurred way before recorded human history- Possibly before "humans" existed in the first place. I get the impression you're implying that the whole idea of dividing labour by sex was a conscious decision by some early human. I think this division of labour evolved organically, stemming from the way humans biologically are. It's like why practically all human societies are hierarchical in some way. I don't think some human sat down one day and came up with the original idea that having a "leader" may be a good idea.

Yes, gender division was dictated based on something that was observed biologically (that genders had different reproductive organs), but everything that was based on that was decided arbitrarily. Some cultures had men doing basket-weaving and women taking care of farming and animal husbandry, some cultures had women in their armies, others had women as leaders, and so on. Not two cultures had the exact same division of jobs among their gender. And no, not even "broadly similar", as there are exceptions to any gender-based task you can think of. The only thing that they all had in common was that the divisions were based on gender. Which isn't actually all that telling or important either, because class-based divisions existed for just as long, and those weren't based on any biological trait.

The point i've been making all along is that with the examples you give (women in armies, female leaders as the norm etc) such cultures are in a small minority- because there are certain tasks which men and women are biologically more suited to perform which has led humans across unrelated societies into those sorts of roles. On the whole i should say that in many areas of human activity (like basket weaving or farming for instance) are sex-neutral activities so it doesn't matter who does them, although such jobs are often influenced by other roles related to the sex division of labour. For instance medieval women prepared food for sale in the market because it was a task that could be performed inside the home so the kids could be supervised. Of course cultures arn't identical in sex divided labour- because of social, political personal and environmental factors- but that doesn't mean they're not broadly similar. For instance in ancient Britain women could inherit property, but if i remember rightly Roman women couldn't, but both societies were patriarchal even if the Celt's were more progressive. Of course there's going to be differences, but i believe there are more similarities in gender roles than differences across cultures. That's why the Sythian warrior women are such an oddity, and why patriarchal cultures are so widespread.

I never stated that exercise was the sole stimulant of GH levels. In fact, GH is stimulated by many, many other factors. And yes, genetics do play a role in that, some people are born with genes that code for higher levels of GH, or for a higher amount of GH receptors, or for a higher amount of GH-sensitive bone cartilage. But these genes are not gender-based(Surely sexed?), they are based on familial inheritance....Diet plays an absolutely crucial impact in childhood development, yes, and familial genetics can account for a vast difference in size and height, but none of this is gender-based. That was my original claim. If you take a brother and a sister, from the same family, and give them the exact same nutrition, and the exact same rigorous training during childhood and adolescence, they will both reach adulthood with similar sizes and height. This, of course, rarely happens.

I already said I'm more than willing to PM the studies to anyone interested. Send me a PM and I'll be glad to answer it with the list.

If you took dozens of brothers and sisters and lived on the same diet and exercise and so on i find it very hard to believe that on average both the males and females would have the same amount of upper body strength. It's biological that boys going through puberty develop muscles in the upper-body area, girls just don't. Please could you send me the studies? I can't promise i'll have the time to read them, but if i can i will.

This seems rather dubious as well. Males are generally taller and stronger than females in other non-human primate species, and i don't think chimpanzees at any point decided to socially condition their male offspring to exercise more often. In fact i think it's the the same general picture with mammals in general. Again this links to why i think the sex-based division of labour emerged organically. Male humans, like male guerrillas and male chimpanzees are just taller and stronger in general. Watch any nature documentary and i think many would agree that in terms of sex there are plenty of similarities between human behaviour and animal behaviour- because humans are, you know, animals as well?

Yes, and the animal kingdom has plenty of examples where males are smaller or physically indistinguishable from females, even in primates. While there are certainly similarities in some behaviours, humans possess superior intelligence and the capacity to alter their own environment to shape their own epigenetics.

I agree that humans can alter their own genes by conscious effort, but historically this hasn't happened in areas relevant to the sex division of labour, otherwise Amazonians wouldn't be the stuff of legend. Or would they even? You can't biologically change the fact that females women deliver children, which in itself probably underpins the commonalities between gender roles in unrelated cultures.

Of course a lot of science concerned with human sex behaviour does get twisted by the media because it tends to be in the public interest- but i'm fairly sure not all of it's junk. Sasha Baron Cohen's research into the impact of testosterone on fetal development comes to mind for instance as an exhample of a piece of research which suggests biological factors influence sex-based behaviour. And also don't forget that this area of science is heavily loaded politically. Feminists have quite a large stake in science showing human sexual behaviours not to be biologically influenced in a significant way. Needless to say this colours how the evidence is interpreted by some.

I agree with most of that, but something to keep in mind is that science is descriptive, not prescriptive. Science may say how something is, right now, but it says nothing on whether it should be like that or whether it has to be like that. Any scientist will tell you that biology is mutable; perhaps not immediately, but you most certainly can change something that is firmly biological. We develop medical procedures and tools all the time, with the aim to change the biological (and we change the biological over generations as well, as seen with dog/cat breeds).

My gripe is mainly with biological determinism, the idea that the biological is immutable and prescriptive. That is a gross misuse of science and I would never stand by it.

Anyone versed in philosophy should know that "is doesn't imply ought"- Just because something is the way it is in nature doesn't mean that we morally have to follow it. Human are "naturally" omnivores, does that mean that being a vegetarian is immoral? Of course not. You're not the first feminist advocate i've seen on these forums to express anxiety about prescriptivism in science.

For arguments sake lets say there's irrefutable proof that the male brain is indeed more suited for "system tasks" and females for empathy, and therefore that's why there's few female engineers and male primary school teachers. That doesn't at all mean women shouldn't be engineers- all it means is that we shouldn't be surprised if there more male engineers than female ones. It's going to be harder to get a 50/50 gender balance in those sorts of professions, the science doesn't say we should not attempt to try anyway.

 

[Darken12]

because there are certain tasks which men and women are biologically more suited to perform.

And I do not agree. At least, not in a biologically deterministic way. Sure, if you neglect to physically train women, it's obvious that they will not be suited for combat, but that's not an inherent quality of their biological sex, that's a deliberate limitation of their physical potential.

If you took dozens of brothers and sisters and lived on the same diet and exercise and so on i find it very hard to believe that on average both the males and females would have the same amount of upper body strength. It's biological that boys going through puberty develop muscles in the upper-body area, girls just don't. Please could you send me the studies? I can't promise i'll have the time to read them, but if i can i will.

Have you actually ever seen a brother and a sister receiving the same nutrition and exercise? Because I haven't. Not one case. Almost universally, girls either exercise less, suffer from some dietary deficiency (such as veganism), or perform exercises that don't favour the development of muscle mass (because our ideals of female beauty have almost never included muscles, so they aren't socially encouraged to develop muscular mass). You will note that female weightlifters are usually tall and broad-shouldered, when compared to other women. Sure, male weightlifters might surpass them (though many don't), but they show the physical potential that women can achieve.

Studies sent.

I agree that humans can alter their own genes by conscious effort, but historically this hasn't happened in areas relevant to the sex division of labour, otherwise Amazonians wouldn't be the stuff of legend. Or would they even? You can't biologically change the fact that females women deliver children, which in itself probably underpins the commonalities between gender roles in unrelated cultures.

While it's true that gender roles are often justified on biological facts (such as the fact that it's women who get pregnant), that doesn't make them immutable or somehow inherent in our biology. Just because pregnant women run the risk of miscarriage or foetal damage if they undertake physically demanding positions, it doesn't mean that they are inherently less suitable for them. And this especially holds less and less weight in our modern world, where women work in places that are far more dangerous for a foetus than combat or other physically demanding jobs. There are positions where foetal damage is guaranteed (such as working with radiation or environmental/workplace toxicology), and the measures for protecting foetuses from that kind of damage in no way stops women from performing those jobs.

Anyone versed in philosophy should know that "is doesn't imply ought"- Just because something is the way it is in nature doesn't mean that we morally have to follow it. Human are "naturally" omnivores, does that mean that being a vegetarian is immoral? Of course not. You're not the first feminist advocate i've seen on these forums to express anxiety about prescriptivism in science.

There is no prescriptivism inherent in science. There is prescriptivism in how non-scientists (or unscrupulous scientists) manipulate scientific information to support their own preconceptions.

For arguments sake lets say there's irrefutable proof that the male brain is indeed more suited for "system tasks" and females for empathy, and therefore that's why there's few female engineers and male primary school teachers. That doesn't at all mean women shouldn't be engineers- all it means is that we shouldn't be surprised if there more male engineers than female ones. It's going to be harder to get a 50/50 gender balance in those sorts of professions, the science doesn't say we should not attempt to try anyway.

Such irrefutable proof is meaningless on a social scale. It's highly possible that we unwittingly used the same techniques that we use for breeding domestic animals on our own species. Let's say that I have a society that decides that women ought to be empathetic and men ought to be good at system tasks. Women who display empathy will be seen as feminine and therefore will gain social approval, and will become primary candidates for marriage (and therefore passing on their genes). So if a woman is born with a random genetic mutation that slightly increases the size of the area of the brain in charge of empathy, she will be socially seen as more feminine, and therefore will increase her odds of being married, producing offspring, and passing down her genes (which will include the random mutation). Do this for several millennia and at some point, it's likely that the trait become gender-dependant through sheer force of selective breeding. Or perhaps the genetic trait becomes highly dependant on use-based epigenetics, so if a woman is encouraged to use that part of her brain more often, she ends up activating that specific genetic trait through epigenetics (and therefore enlarging the appropriate area of the brain), but it can also happen in a man if the right conditions are met.

There are multiple explanations for why a certain piece of biological evidence exists, and no real scientist will make categorical assertions on its nature. They will speak that "maybe" this or "possibly" that. While I agree that we should attempt to encourage both genders to pursue all professions equally, I don't think that we should have expectations one way or the other. Expectations shape our own abilities. If I don't expect to be good at something, it's very likely I won't even try (out of fear of failure, humiliation, wasting time/money, disappointing others, etc.). And if others don't expect me to be good at that, they aren't likely to encourage me to try either. Expectations matter a lot more than we think, and it might do a great deal of good to have no gender expectations on professions one way or the other.