Tea

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@back2adhara @garylfrancione I’m not disputing that that’s an abstracted description, I’m critiquing reifying it and trying to use it to classify individuals. When you do that, arguments become circular, as in your response: all females are female. It’s a description of a population not a classification sys

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@OmegaFiveOG @tyonhakuvelvote @FondOfBeetles @bullrike Making an explanatory abstraction across a population and then trying to use that abstraction as a classifying property possessed by the individual members doesn’t work, as you’re trying to classify individuals by a property that not all the individuals have. It’s essentialism.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@tyonhakuvelvote @bullrike @FondOfBeetles No one will be able to find an all encompassing definition, because the existence of a defining something which is possessed by all members is incompatible with gradual evolution. (hence attempts to use similarity to an ideal, etc)

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@SVPhillimore @EnriqueSGMA @chetellik Presumably a similar way to the way they used to decide women were witches, etc… accuse someone, then have a ‘trial’ that confirms the accusation.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@FondOfBeetles (Making an abstraction across a population and then trying to use that abstraction as a classifying property possessed by the individual members doesn’t work, as you’re trying to classify by a property that not all the members have = essentialism.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@FondOfBeetles It’s a standard criticism of functional essentialism.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@Steven_Young1 @polaritonio That’s also an answer to whether the ship of Theseus is still the ship of Theseus by the way - that there is no Ship of Theseus essence to lose when replacing parts of the ship, so the question of whether it has lost its essence doesn’t make sense.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@Steven_Young1 @polaritonio One final thing, before I do other things. If sex is a collection of characteristics, and there is no unobservable essence, there is no argument about whether sex changes beyond sex characteristics, as there is nothing beyond the characteristics to change or not change.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@LitmusConf19810 @Steven_Young1 @polaritonio Believing physical sex characteristics are signs of an unobservable essence, and believing thoughts are signs of an unobservable essence, are both essentialism. Neither is necessary to think someone is male or female. Not everyone has essentialist beliefs.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@Steven_Young1 @polaritonio To use a river analogy, when you look at a river, you don’t need to believe it has a strategy to get to the sea, to think it is a river.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@Steven_Young1 @polaritonio I’m not talking about gender identity; I’m talking about sex characteristics. You don’t seem to be able to understand that it’s not necessary to believe sex characteristics are signs of an unobservable sex essence to think someone is male or female.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@Steven_Young1 @polaritonio That’s a proposed sex essence. You can’t observe an organisms strategy, only it’s characteristics. The idea that an organism has a strategy is a belief in something unobserved, overlayed on the observable features, which isn’t necessary to think something is male or female.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@Steven_Young1 @polaritonio It depends what you think sex is. People can believe sex characteristics are real, and that sex refers to sex characteristics without believing the observed sex characteristics are signs of immutable sex essences.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@Steven_Young1 @polaritonio You can observe the world is round, and fossils, but you can’t observe sex essences. You can observe sex characteristics, but believing those sex characteristics are signs of immutable sex essences is essentialism, and not necessary to agree that sex characteristics are real.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@Steven_Young1 @polaritonio “Physically, everyone is male or female“[...]”you can’t change sex” You’re describing essentialist beliefs about sex. Not everyone has essentialist beliefs, and it has nothing to do with whether they’re trans or not, or their views on sports, changing rooms, etc.

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@MimiAugello @apmeehan @MinnOrchia @jo_bartosch Out of interest, what do you mean by ‘gender’? A sense of self?

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@garylfrancione You could equally use that argument to go back to 1800s mixed prisons-just say the solution to male on female violence/rape in 1800s prisons isn’t to treat a subcategory of people differently/preferentially, it’s to address male on female violence/rape.Same argument you’re making

[Tea @TeaCalmZen]

@SVPhillimore You answering questions which I didn’t ask doesn’t advance an argument for rationality.