genders

[kojikun]

Verilon, how can a person be of the other gender if there is no cultural basis for what gender is? How can a man feel like a woman or vice versa if they dont have a standard by which to judge manliness or womanliness? I can understand wanting different organs, but cultural concepts of gender roles play into what people think as gender and when theres a mismatch of what they feel and what theyre told, they're considered transgender which isnt true, theyre just not fitting the typical view of that sex.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Note how it states clearly that testosterone has specific effects on human physiology; the fact that it can act as an estrogen precursor does not remove its unique attributes. Its ability to activate androgen receptors, for example, is not shared by estrogen, and androgen is important for muscle development.

I never denied there were physical differences between men and women. I really, really hope I'm aware of that! It's the mental effects that I'm challenging--and pretty much entirely the mental effects.

[haas mark]

Verilon, how can a person be of the other gender if there is no cultural basis for what gender is? How can a man feel like a woman or vice versa if they dont have a standard by which to judge manliness or womanliness? I can understand wanting different organs, but cultural concepts of gender roles play into what people think as gender and when theres a mismatch of what they feel and what theyre told, they're considered transgender which isnt true, theyre just not fitting the typical view of that sex.

Okay, so I am a bit inconsistent with what I'm trying to say. But I did state that gender could be shown by upbringing. The other reason that I didn't say anything about culture was this: If you look back, you will see that in each time period males and females of the human species have always developed the same gender roles. So I don't think that it's necessarily cultural as much as it is intuitive and biological.

~ver

[Darth Wong]

The existence of your tits says otherwise. Females have adapted to nurture children.

There's a difference between a physical and a mental adaptation--and I'm arguing that this supposed nurture-oriented mental adaptation doesn't exist, or at least if it does it doesn't dictate behavioural roles. There's to much evidence for that. (Widespread child exposure during the Roman Empire would seem to be a heavy argument alone--why did this happen, quite willingly, at that, if women exist only to raise children? It was a large-scale cultural phenomenom that defies this so-called genetic predetermination towards childcare.. And there are, of course, many others I can cite.)

I'm sure there are. However, the fact that a cultural movement can overcome a genetic predisposition does not disprove the existence of the general predisposition any more than individual exceptions do. Did you know that the sound of a baby crying can influence hormone levels in a new mother, thus influencing her behaviour?

[Darth Wong]

Note how it states clearly that testosterone has specific effects on human physiology; the fact that it can act as an estrogen precursor does not remove its unique attributes. Its ability to activate androgen receptors, for example, is not shared by estrogen, and androgen is important for muscle development.

I never denied there were physical differences between men and women. I really, really hope I'm aware of that! It's the mental effects that I'm challenging--and pretty much entirely the mental effects.

I recognize that, but the effects of testosterone and estrogen are both physical and mental. This is also very well documented.

[jinx]

the all or nothing argument isn't going to cut it. the differing levels of testosterone & estrigen in the body do cause a slight diffrence in the though processes of the average male & female, this is true, but the impressed societal gender roles sevearly widen the gap.

[kojikun]

verilon: gender roles like birthing children or hunting for food is obviously genetic. but there are some people who dont fit their sexes usual gender role.

[haas mark]

verilon: gender roles like birthing children or hunting for food is obviously genetic. but there are some people who dont fit their sexes usual gender role.

I know. This can be shown in lons and lionesses, as well. Lionesses hunt more often than the lions themselves. In the same way, females, in their own way, tend to provide more than males do, thus setting them in a certain gender role by stereotyping themselves. However, with minor influences, society changes, and thus culture changes, and so do gender roles. However, the fact that the mothers MUST take care of their children for a certain amount of time (unless they die at birth), and that men CANNOT, there are instincts in men and women that cause them to take up their roles, whether the like and/or realize it or not.

~ver

[Darth Wong]

the all or nothing argument isn't going to cut it. the differing levels of testosterone & estrigen in the body do cause a slight diffrence in the though processes of the average male & female, this is true, but the impressed societal gender roles sevearly widen the gap.

And you base this claim on ... what?

[jinx]

I've got it around here somewhere. cut me some slack, its almost three A.M.

[Mayhem]

I'm probably not qualified to butt into this argument, but I'll give it a shot anyway.

Males and felmales of most every mammal, not just humans, show marked differences in behavior. From how they react to other members of their species, to what roles they play in childbearing. This only becomes more pronounced in social animals.

In chimps, our closest living relatives, males and females not only play different roles, but their base behavior is wildly different. Most notably in terms of agression. The males are signifigantly more agressive, both physically, verbally, and in acts of display when dealing with one another and with outside threats than the females are.

Now unless you want to claim that chimps are influenced by cultural factors... this difference in behavior is obviously based on biology.


Humans, in the end, are not terribly different from chimps. Sure, there's a lot more social baggage and our own abilty to go against a lot of our base instincts to take into consideration... but those instincts and base behavioral differences are still there.

Face it men and woman look at the world differently, not just because of how we're raised and influenced by society, but because we're "wired" differently.

And as was said earlier... equal and the same aren't necessarily the same thing.

[InnerBrat]

Bah. This all seems to boil down to nature vs nurture, which is of course, a complete pile of Tottenham.

Yes, our behaviours are effedted by the hormones coursing through our tissues and the differing structure of our brain, but it is also affected by how we see people behaving around us. Culture and biology both play complexly intertwined roles in our emotional development and position in society, and memes are equally, if not more, important than genes. Both Mike and Marina are right, in that there are some aspects of gender roles that are biologically determined, (such as immediate postnatal care), ad others that are culturally determined -such as the role of secondary caregiver (which in some societies is assumed by the father, and in others by a female relative).

And I should point out that to anthropologists, sex and gender have totally different meanings - sex is (usually) an absolute, binary biological term: male/female, while gender is societally determined.

[The Third Man]

I don't have any strong views on this but it's something I've thought on in the past

It seems to me to be a perfectly reasonable hypothesis that, just as genetics causes physiological differences between the human genders, we could expect that there exist similar observable psychological differences.

We humans are very good at determining gender based on physical appearance. There are a small number of cases (when observing adults) that we struggle with - gender is obviously not a two-state affair; there are graduations. I'd estimate that we can determine a correct answer based on physical observation in better than 99.9% of cases - this is based on my personal experience: I work with say, 1000 people; of these I can remember just one were I struggled to judge.

Matters are harder when it comes to assessing the gender of children. The younger the harder (eg when the proud mother shows you her new-born, and you have to say something along the lines of "isn't <cough>ee beautiful").

There are interesting thought experiments that you could use to test the hypothesis re psychological gender differences. You'd need to carry on a conversation with someone in conditions under which you couldn't see them, hear the pitch of voice and so on - maybe something like a Turing test, or even an Internet chat program.

I reckon, subjectively, that if there was a ban on lying and the interviewee had to answer truthfully I'd generally get the gender right, after numerous questions, and with much less than the accuracy for physiological observations. It would be interesting to try with members of different cultures (eg would a woman who had lived under the Taleban regime be easier to spot than one from the West?)

I also strongly suspect that it would be much harder to judge if you were dealing with children. (eg The interesting results yesterday when I grabbed a huge ugly toad out of the garden pond and brandished it at my next-door-neighbour and her six y.o. daughter, one was very interested whilst the other screamed and ran)

It seems to me that the inherent psychological differences between genders - that is the differences dues to genetics - would be much less significant than the differences due to culture.

Of course, an alternative interpretation would be that just as physiological differences make themselves more observable post-puberty, so do the psychological ones.