Good question, one I've puzzled over for some time.
However, it seems more logically and biologically consistent to argue that to qualify as a male or a female, one has to have functional gonads -- i.e., those producing gametes on a regular basis. Those MHR definitions both say "produces ... gametes", and "produces" is apparently "presen…
Good question, one I've puzzled over for some time.
However, it seems more logically and biologically consistent to argue that to qualify as a male or a female, one has to have functional gonads -- i.e., those producing gametes on a regular basis. Those MHR definitions both say "produces ... gametes", and "produces" is apparently "present tense indefinite":
"We use the simple present tense when an action is happening right now, or when it happens regularly (or unceasingly, which is why it’s sometimes called present indefinite)."
So, by those definitions, the prepubescent -- XXers or XYers or those of any other variations -- are neither male nor female; they're sexless and generally don't acquire a sex until they hit puberty. Similarly for the otherwise infertile -- some 7% of adult XYers are infertile and therefore sexless; likewise the transgendered who have their gonads removed.
Though it might be emphasized that most adult XXers between puberty and menopause still qualify as females since they're still producing ova "regularly", even if less frequently than adult XYers are producing sperm. Frequency itself isn't the issue, it's only the regularity -- like a car manufacturer that "produces" 10 Chevrolet Sparks a day, versus one that produces one Aston-Martin Valkyrie a month ...😉
While there's some utility in the "functional/non-functional" definitions of biologist Emma Hilton and Company -- see below -- and which more or less encompass your comments about "necessary anatomy" and simple "physiology", they often lead to some serious complications, contradictions, inconsistencies, and terminological problems when applied to other species -- problems that aren't present when using the MHR definitions.
Hilton's definitions -- from a letter-to-the-editor published by the UK Times, a decent newspaper but hardly a peer-review biology journal:
"Individuals that have developed anatomies for producing either small or large gametes, regardless of their past, present or future functionality, are referred to as 'males' and 'females', respectively."
You might be interested in my further elaborations on that theme here, particularly the quote there of Paul Griffiths -- University of Sydney, philosophy professor, co-author of Genetics & Philosophy -- published in Aeon magazine:
In some cases there aren't many consequential differences in which of those two sets of definitions we apply. But when push comes to shove -- the transgender issue in a nutshell -- then I think that the biological definitions published in the MHR have to qualify as trump, are the only game in town.
Sorry, but I think if the definition you’re referring to states that young girls and post-menopausal women aren’t female and young boys aren’t male, then it’s the definition that’s wrong. The definition needs to reflect reality, you can’t change reality to conform to the definition. More likely I think that the implicit part, that an organism has the right anatomy to produce a certain type of gamete in their lifetime, seemed so obvious that no one thought to include it in the definition. I’m not sure what you are hoping to accomplish by arguing that women over fifty aren’t women, other than making a lot of people mad!
Dee: "The definition needs to reflect reality, you can’t change reality to conform to the definition."
Think you're putting the cart before the horse, though many people do. 🙂 Basically, many people don't realize that there are NO intrinsic meanings to the words we use, "male" and "female" in particular. For example, "female" used to mean "she who suckles" -- by which Jenner and his ilk might qualify, though the milk is probably not fit for human consumption:
But there's no "reality" to those words. None of us can point to our males and females, say that their volumes are so many cubic inches, that they weigh so many ounces, and are located so many inches to the south and west of our livers. The words themselves are just abstractions, they're just labels that we more or less agree refer to certain properties.
For example, we agree "teenager" refers to those between 13 & 19, but we could agree it refers to those between 11 and 21. See my kick at the kitty of "What is a woman?" for some elaborations:
But similarly with "male" and "female". "Biologists" Colin Wright, Emma Hilton, and Heather Heying have created some rather unscientific if not anti-scientific definitions of their own that more or less correspond to what we might call "folk-biology", to what "common parlance" understands by those terms:
"Individuals that have developed anatomies for producing either small or large gametes, regardless of their past, present or future functionality, are referred to as 'males' and 'females', respectively."
Basically, they're saying that having testicles or ovaries that probably will produce, currently are producing, or used to produce sperm or ova is sufficient to qualify people as male or female, respectively.
But that is NOT what the biological definitions say -- as I've indicated above -- and the conflict between those two sets of definitions causes some serious problems.
Dee: "... not sure what you are hoping to accomplish by arguing that women over fifty aren’t women ..."
Really not trying to offend people, but a major part of the problem of transgenderism is that far too many people, on all sides, have made "male" and "female" into identities, often based on some "mythic essences" as feminist "philosopher" Jane Clare Jones once memorably, and rather cogently, put it:
But by the biological definitions, "male" and "female" are just labels that denote the presence of rather transitory reproductive abilities. Don't think we are going to resolve the transgender issue, and don't think society is going to be well-served, if we insist on policies based on rather unscientific and logically untenable definitions.
Good question, one I've puzzled over for some time.
However, it seems more logically and biologically consistent to argue that to qualify as a male or a female, one has to have functional gonads -- i.e., those producing gametes on a regular basis. Those MHR definitions both say "produces ... gametes", and "produces" is apparently "present tense indefinite":
"We use the simple present tense when an action is happening right now, or when it happens regularly (or unceasingly, which is why it’s sometimes called present indefinite)."
https://www.grammarly.com/blog/simple-present/
So, by those definitions, the prepubescent -- XXers or XYers or those of any other variations -- are neither male nor female; they're sexless and generally don't acquire a sex until they hit puberty. Similarly for the otherwise infertile -- some 7% of adult XYers are infertile and therefore sexless; likewise the transgendered who have their gonads removed.
Though it might be emphasized that most adult XXers between puberty and menopause still qualify as females since they're still producing ova "regularly", even if less frequently than adult XYers are producing sperm. Frequency itself isn't the issue, it's only the regularity -- like a car manufacturer that "produces" 10 Chevrolet Sparks a day, versus one that produces one Aston-Martin Valkyrie a month ...😉
While there's some utility in the "functional/non-functional" definitions of biologist Emma Hilton and Company -- see below -- and which more or less encompass your comments about "necessary anatomy" and simple "physiology", they often lead to some serious complications, contradictions, inconsistencies, and terminological problems when applied to other species -- problems that aren't present when using the MHR definitions.
Hilton's definitions -- from a letter-to-the-editor published by the UK Times, a decent newspaper but hardly a peer-review biology journal:
"Individuals that have developed anatomies for producing either small or large gametes, regardless of their past, present or future functionality, are referred to as 'males' and 'females', respectively."
https://twitter.com/FondOfBeetles/status/1207663359589527554
You might be interested in my further elaborations on that theme here, particularly the quote there of Paul Griffiths -- University of Sydney, philosophy professor, co-author of Genetics & Philosophy -- published in Aeon magazine:
https://humanuseofhumanbeings.substack.com/p/on-being-defrauded-by-heather-heying
In some cases there aren't many consequential differences in which of those two sets of definitions we apply. But when push comes to shove -- the transgender issue in a nutshell -- then I think that the biological definitions published in the MHR have to qualify as trump, are the only game in town.
Sorry, but I think if the definition you’re referring to states that young girls and post-menopausal women aren’t female and young boys aren’t male, then it’s the definition that’s wrong. The definition needs to reflect reality, you can’t change reality to conform to the definition. More likely I think that the implicit part, that an organism has the right anatomy to produce a certain type of gamete in their lifetime, seemed so obvious that no one thought to include it in the definition. I’m not sure what you are hoping to accomplish by arguing that women over fifty aren’t women, other than making a lot of people mad!
Dee: "The definition needs to reflect reality, you can’t change reality to conform to the definition."
Think you're putting the cart before the horse, though many people do. 🙂 Basically, many people don't realize that there are NO intrinsic meanings to the words we use, "male" and "female" in particular. For example, "female" used to mean "she who suckles" -- by which Jenner and his ilk might qualify, though the milk is probably not fit for human consumption:
https://www.etymonline.com/word/female#etymonline_v_5841
But there's no "reality" to those words. None of us can point to our males and females, say that their volumes are so many cubic inches, that they weigh so many ounces, and are located so many inches to the south and west of our livers. The words themselves are just abstractions, they're just labels that we more or less agree refer to certain properties.
For example, we agree "teenager" refers to those between 13 & 19, but we could agree it refers to those between 11 and 21. See my kick at the kitty of "What is a woman?" for some elaborations:
https://humanuseofhumanbeings.substack.com/p/what-is-a-woman
But similarly with "male" and "female". "Biologists" Colin Wright, Emma Hilton, and Heather Heying have created some rather unscientific if not anti-scientific definitions of their own that more or less correspond to what we might call "folk-biology", to what "common parlance" understands by those terms:
"Individuals that have developed anatomies for producing either small or large gametes, regardless of their past, present or future functionality, are referred to as 'males' and 'females', respectively."
https://twitter.com/FondOfBeetles/status/1207663359589527554
Basically, they're saying that having testicles or ovaries that probably will produce, currently are producing, or used to produce sperm or ova is sufficient to qualify people as male or female, respectively.
But that is NOT what the biological definitions say -- as I've indicated above -- and the conflict between those two sets of definitions causes some serious problems.
Dee: "... not sure what you are hoping to accomplish by arguing that women over fifty aren’t women ..."
Really not trying to offend people, but a major part of the problem of transgenderism is that far too many people, on all sides, have made "male" and "female" into identities, often based on some "mythic essences" as feminist "philosopher" Jane Clare Jones once memorably, and rather cogently, put it:
https://janeclarejones.com/2020/01/15/unreasonable-ideas-a-reply-to-alison-phipps/
But by the biological definitions, "male" and "female" are just labels that denote the presence of rather transitory reproductive abilities. Don't think we are going to resolve the transgender issue, and don't think society is going to be well-served, if we insist on policies based on rather unscientific and logically untenable definitions.