Five years ago, I gave a speech comparing sex denialism to creationism.
At the time, my partner-in-crime, Colin Wright, and I were near-lone academic voices willing to stand up and say “Biology! We have a problem!”
@SwipeWright
Reflecting, back in 2020, on that state of affairs:
“[That] there are two sexes, male and female is apparently something that biologists do not think needs to be said.
I think they are wrong.”
Since then, biologists with far more authority than an unknown developmental biologist who was trying to work out how nerves navigate over muscles and an unknown evolutionary biologist who was studying what makes insects mad have spoken up.
Several people argue that if the metrics of a trans-identified male fall "within female range", it is fair for that male to compete in female sport.
But we need to look at what's typical .v. what's exceptional.
Male traits often overlap with female traits. Height, muscle mass and so forth all generate normal distributions within sex (bell curves), where the lower end of the male range overlaps with the upper end of the female range.
This is a computer-generated series, transitioning between "hyper male" and "hyper female".
Where does your perception of the sex of the person shift?
Which face is the most ambiguous?
If you reply, please include your sex (the actual one).
OK, in the paper, the data was:
Faces 1-3: 100>97% scored "male"
Faces 5-7: 94>100% scored "female"
Face 4 was the transition face, with 68% scoring it "male".
FTR, I didn't hesitate on 4/male then 5/female.
Next set: same series, now skinned 🤣
I won't ask for responses. It is probably obvious that people were less able to detect any sharp transition from male>female, from face-on bone structure.
Note to archeologists: this doesn't mean you can't tell a male from female face, so stop pretending you can't.