Trans Women are not Women

[Ziggurat]

And obviously to anyone who understands basic reasoning that doesn't imply that at all. I'll ask you the same question I asked Zig: Why do women with high testosterone show more aggression than men with low testosterone even though the former still have lower absolute testosterone levels than the latter? The answer should be obvious: because the behavioral effects of testosterone aren't based on the absolute level of testosterone but on the individual's level relative to the normal baseline level for their sex.

Your conclusion doesn't follow from the available evidence. Aggression is not controlled by testosterone alone. Female inmates are in a different environment than male inmates. A high-T female in prison with other females is going to act differently than a high-T female in prison with males, and a low-T male in prison with males is going to act differently than a low-T male in prison with females. So you cannot directly compare a high-T female in an all-female environment with a low-T male in an all male environment and attribute all the differences to testosterone alone. That doesn't make any sense. That's not how multi-variable problems work.

 

[caveman1917]

Your conclusion doesn't follow from the available evidence. Aggression is not controlled by testosterone alone. Female inmates are in a different environment than male inmates. A high-T female in prison with other females is going to act differently than a high-T female in prison with males, and a low-T male in prison with males is going to act differently than a low-T male in prison with females. So you cannot directly compare a high-T female in an all-female environment with a low-T male in an all male environment and attribute all the differences to testosterone alone. That doesn't make any sense. That's not how multi-variable problems work.

So testosterone may affect behavior in different ways depending on the socio-cultural environment of the individual? That's funny, because I distinctly remember someone calling such argument "nonsense."

For the second point, testosterone affects behavior but that doesn't necessarily mean that it does this in the same way independent of the socio-cultural environment. The socio-cultural environment may play a significant role in which behaviors are affected and how they are affected.

This is nonsense. Again, hormone receptors are not determined by culture. You don’t seem to understand the implications of your claim.

 

[Ziggurat]

If there are no hierarchy-free human societies then why are (or rather were) they so ubiquitous that recent research has started focusing on models to explain this phenomenon? You're the clueless one Zig.

That's hilarious. Your first source is specifically talking about political power, but there are many forms of hierarchies besides politics, and they often exist in parallel. Furthermore, it looked as societies with "a low level of ranking or stratification by class". Low, not non-existent.

Your second source is a mathematical modelling paper, not an observation of actual humans. It necessarily simplified compared to real human behavior, and while it may be useful to understand factors which limit hierarchies, it does show that there are any societies without any hierarchies.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Again I don't care. I don't care if you split the human brain open and find some perfect "Dial a Gender" setting in there with 100% perfect accuracy.

I just want it to be used consistently and not only in a constant shifting game of "We can use the standards when it helps us, you can't when it doesn't" or "We can subvert the standards, but the standards aren't allowed to exist."

 

[Ziggurat]

So testosterone may affect behavior in different ways depending on the socio-cultural environment of the individual? That's funny, because I distinctly remember someone calling such argument "nonsense."

It's nonsense to think that the effects are only socio-cultural. And whether you are surrounded by all males or all females isn't a social construct, there's an obvious biological difference there. But then, you seem to be making an art form of missing the obvious.

 

[caveman1917]

That's hilarious. Your first source is specifically talking about political power, but there are many forms of hierarchies besides politics, and they often exist in parallel. Furthermore, it looked as societies with "a low level of ranking or stratification by class". Low, not non-existent.

Your second source is a mathematical modelling paper, not an observation of actual humans.it is necessarily simplified compared to real human behavior, and while it may be useful to understand factors which limit hierarchies, it does show that there are any societies without any hierarchies.

Both of them contain extensive references to papers observing such societies. Hence the need for models for them in the first place.

 

[caveman1917]

It's nonsense to think that the effects are only socio-cultural. And whether you are surrounded by all males or all females isn't a social construct, there's an obvious biological difference there. But then, you seem to be making an art form of missing the obvious.

First you accuse me of claiming that only testosterone accounts for the differences in behavior, now you accuse me of claiming that only socio-cultural environments account for the differences in behavior. All the while I have not held either of those positions, my position has been all this time that testosterone does affect behavior but that it doesn't do this directly, that the specific behaviors it affects and how those behaviors are affected depends on the socio-cultural environment. And whether you are surrounded by all males or all females is almost by definition a socio-cultural environmental difference.

 

[d4m10n]

Both of them contain extensive references to papers observing such societies. Hence the need for models for them in the first place.

What is the best example of a more-or-less egalitarian human society?

 

[caveman1917]

Also, the studies aren't limited to inmate populations, although studies in other settings are rare. A review paper of several studies notes (my highlight):

We review the literature on aggression in women with an emphasis on laboratory experimentation and hormonal and brain mechanisms. Women tend to engage in more indirect forms of aggression (e.g., spreading rumors) than other types of aggression. In laboratory studies, women are less aggressive than men, but provocation attenuates this difference. In the real world, women are just as likely to aggress against their romantic partner as men are, but men cause more serious physical and psychological harm. A very small minority of women are also sexually violent. Women are susceptible to alcohol-related aggression, but this type of aggression may be limited to women high in trait aggression. Fear of being harmed is a robust inhibitor of direct aggression in women. There are too few studies and most are underpowered to detect unique neural mechanisms associated with aggression in women. Testosterone shows the same small, positive relationship with aggression in women as in men. The role of cortisol is unclear, although some evidence suggests that women who are high in testosterone and low in cortisol show heightened aggression. Under some circumstances, oxytocin may increase aggression by enhancing reactivity to provocation and simultaneously lowering perceptions of danger that normally inhibit many women from retaliating. There is some evidence that high levels of estradiol and progesterone are associated with low levels of aggression. We highlight that more gender-specific theory-driven hypothesis testing is needed with larger samples of women and aggression paradigms relevant to women.

 

[caveman1917]

What is the best example of a more-or-less egalitarian human society?

The Batek people is a good example, though I'm not sure if it's the best - I don't know about all, or even most, hunter-gatherer societies although egalitarianism is more the norm than the exception for such societies.

 

[Belz...]

And obviously to anyone who understands basic reasoning that doesn't imply that at all.

It absolutely does.

Why do women with high testosterone show more aggression than men with low testosterone even though the former still have lower absolute testosterone levels than the latter?

1) Testosterone isn't the only chemical floating in your system.
2) Evidence please.

The answer should be obvious: because the behavioral effects of testosterone aren't based on the absolute level of testosterone but on the individual's level relative to the normal baseline level for their sex.

What does that even mean? How would that even work? Why would an individual woman's system care about the statistical baseline?

 

[Ziggurat]

Both of them contain extensive references to papers observing such societies. Hence the need for models for them in the first place.

None of them are hierarchy-free societies. Their political hierarchies are pretty (but not completely) flat, but that doesn't make them hierarchy-free. Hierarchies are built into our DNA, from well before we were humans, or even mammals. Your link about Japanese rugby players even supports that: testosterone response is intimately linked to hierarchies. That's not just a social construct, that's deep biology.

 

[Ziggurat]

2) Evidence please.

He actually did present evidence. Female inmates with high testosterone were more aggressive than male inmates with low testosterone. But it doesn't mean what he think it means. As I pointed out above, these are not equivalent scenarios, since prisons are sex-segregated and men are much stronger than women (which radically changes the calculus for aggression). A low-T male in a female prison might well be more aggressive than a high-T female in a female prison, and a high-T female in a male prison might well be less aggressive than a low-T male in a male prison.

 

[Ziggurat]

First you accuse me of claiming that only testosterone accounts for the differences in behavior

Well, yes. That's the only way to explain the conclusion you draw from the data you present. Absent that assumption, your conclusion cannot follow.

now you accuse me of claiming that only socio-cultural environments account for the differences in behavior.

Yes again. Because if that's not the case, then there must be cross-cultural differences in the behaviors of men and women. If there are no cross-cultural differences, then culture determines everything.

All the while I have not held either of those positions, my position has been all this time that testosterone does affect behavior but that it doesn't do this directly,

"Directly" is poorly defined here. It doesn't matter if it's mediated by other mechanisms (as it must be if neurons don't use testosterone as a neurotransmitter), there's still a biological effect of testosterone on behavior. And biology is cross-cultural.

And whether you are surrounded by all males or all females is almost by definition a socio-cultural environmental difference.

The biological differences (such as strength) between men and women is cross-cultural. If you want to include such differences within your definition of "socio-cultural", then you have simply made those aspects of culture universal, and thus cross-cultural as well.

 

[caveman1917]

It absolutely does.

It absolutely does not.

1) Testosterone isn't the only chemical floating in your system.

Complain to Zig, he's the one who brought it up.

2) Evidence please.

Already provided for inmate populations and in the previous post for general populations.

What does that even mean? How would that even work? Why would an individual woman's system care about the statistical baseline?

It works the same way as the plenty of other substances for which the same dosage has different responses in women than in men, because their response to different dosages is different. Again, by your logic women with high testosterone levels should show less testosterone-affected behavior than men with low testosterone levels, which is false.

 

[caveman1917]

None of them are hierarchy-free societies. Their political hierarchies are pretty (but not completely) flat, but that doesn't make them hierarchy-free.

Which hierarchy do, for example, the Batek people show then?

Hierarchies are built into our DNA, from well before we were humans, or even mammals.

Argument by assertion is hardly convincing.

Your link about Japanese rugby players even supports that: testosterone response is intimately linked to hierarchies. That's not just a social construct, that's deep biology.

My link about the rugby players doesn't discriminate between the two hypotheses, it is equally consistent with either of them.

 

[caveman1917]

Well, yes. That's the only way to explain the conclusion you draw from the data you present. Absent that assumption, your conclusion cannot follow.

That makes no sense. The only way to explain the conclusion that the effects of testosterone are partially determined by culture is to assume that the effects of testosterone are not determined by culture?

Yes again. Because if that's not the case, then there must be cross-cultural differences in the behaviors of men and women. If there are no cross-cultural differences, then culture determines everything.

That also makes no sense, if there are no cross-cultural differences then culture determines nothing.

"Directly" is poorly defined here. It doesn't matter if it's mediated by other mechanisms (as it must be if neurons don't use testosterone as a neurotransmitter), there's still a biological effect of testosterone on behavior. And biology is cross-cultural.

Biology is cross-cultural but that doesn't mean that its behavioral effect is cross-cultural. Look, this is hardly contentious or anything, see for example here:

Over the past decade or so our principal research activities have investigated the extent to which levels of testosterone can be associated with certain male-typical behaviours. As you might expect, the answer is by no means straightforward. For one thing, hormones do not directly change behaviour; they influence the expression of a behaviour within appropriate environmental/ social contexts. When studying human behaviours, identifying which environmental/social contexts might be important remains a significant challenge to researchers trying to identify hormone–behaviour relationships.

The biological differences (such as strength) between men and women is cross-cultural. If you want to include such differences within your definition of "socio-cultural", then you have simply made those aspects of culture universal, and thus cross-cultural as well.

Physical strength is not a behavioral difference. Maybe you somewhere lost the plot along the way, but the contention under consideration is whether there exist universal gender differences (ie differences in behavior associated with one sex which are invariant across cultures), a contention which you supported by bringing up that testosterone affects behavior. However the mere fact that testosterone affects behavior is not sufficient to support that contention, in order to support that contention it also needs to be shown that 1) testosterone affects behavior differently in men and women and 2) that it affects behavior in the same way across cultures.

 

[theprestige]

It's nonsense to think that the effects are only socio-cultural. And whether you are surrounded by all males or all females isn't a social construct, there's an obvious biological difference there. But then, you seem to be making an art form of missing the obvious.

Anarchy won't work if humans are naturally self-hierarching.

 

[caveman1917]

Anarchy won't work if humans are naturally self-hierarching.

 

[TragicMonkey]

Social hierarchies are simply the result of organizational efficiency when instituting division of labor. If there were no labor that required division (say, technological paradise where machines do all work for us) then we'd have no need for hierarchy of any kind. At least until the machines rebel, in which case we'd need to organize a military to fight back.