No evidence that testosterone reduces cognitive empathy
penntoday.upenn.edu
penntoday.upenn.edu
> The capacity to infer others' mental states (known as ‘mind reading’ and ‘cognitive empathy’) is essential for social interactions across species, and its impairment characterizes psychopathological conditions such as autism spectrum disorder and schizophrenia. Previous studies reported that testosterone administration impaired cognitive empathy in healthy humans, and that a putative biomarker of prenatal testosterone exposure (finger digit ratios) moderated the effect. However, empirical support for the relationship has relied on small sample studies with mixed evidence. We investigate the reliability and generalizability of the relationship in two large-scale double-blind placebo-controlled experiments in young men (n = 243 and n = 400), using two different testosterone administration protocols. We find no evidence that cognitive empathy is impaired by testosterone administration or associated with digit ratios. With an unprecedented combined sample size, these results counter current theories and previous high-profile reports, and demonstrate that previous investigations of this topic have been statistically underpowered.
From: https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2019.106...
Bravo.
EDIT: glaugh's comment[0] explains why it is not. TLDR: this research debunks earlier research with a similar scope, but more long-term effects of testosterone are not accounted for.
My model for thinking about these things is genes delimit the scope of possibilities, environment (some of which is prenatal or early childhood and very hard to change) determines what possibilities turn into reality.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genome-wide_association_study
Somewhat off-topic but I find this interesting, can you elaborate on which ones we know this for?
It's widely believed that serial killers can't be rehabilitated, but as far as I can tell there really isn't data to back that up (most of them stay in jail forever, so we don't have recidivism data). So I don't think we can add serial killers to the list of non-rehabilitatable (sp?) crimes.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recidivism#Drug-related_crime
EDIT: I should clarify: I agree with your point. This is not stopping actual brain scientists from making really disturbing claims about genetic determinism, completely oblivious to their own political leanings. I'm speaking from experience of having shared departments with them.
Personally, I'm probably going to wait 5 years before I believe any psychology science claim. Especially if it confirms something I already believe in :)
In hindsight, it is kind of funny in a dark-humor way.
In saying that I think there will be a self correcting mechanism in more physically based science. If something can be replicated it can be built upon and new discoveries made. If something can't be replicated it will end up being forgotten about.
Also I do think that science needs a way of reporting failed studies and failed replication. At the moment all the glory and funding go to studies that produce positive results. Producing a failed result is still valid science and should be doccumented.
Unfortunately, this approach seems to be at odds with the incentive structure in academia
They were also pretty open in vocalizing that they didn't believe the result in paper X in journal Y. They knew the problem existed.
Psychology must be one of the hardest disciplines to design experiments for.
Personally, I see this blanket dismissal as one of the blind spots of our otherwise intelligent community.
Perhaps because so many of us are engineers, and that it strokes our egos to see the softer sciences fail?
That's called kernel development (from scratch) :P
Problem is, right now you can't tell which they are.
Not ALL, but the replication crisis has demonstrated that at least 2/3 of such studies can't be replicated.
If you had a communication channel where 2/3 of your packets failed to deliver, I'd say a statement like "this channel isn't reliable" is very justified.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replication_crisis#Psychology_...
And the blanket dismissal often posted here in a knee jerk reaction isn't very charitable to a whole body of research, that is arguably harder to operationalize than the hard sciences.
I'd prefer a more substantial discussion of the findings or paper at hand rather than to just bring up the replication crisis anytime any psychological finding is mentioned on HN.
I think many people on HN, myself included, are kind of addicted to appearing clever.
This tends to produce responses that earn us clever points with the least effort possible.
We've heard about the replication crisis a thousand times, we've heard about the Gell Mann effect. Neither of these alone constitute a substantive argument against a particular scientific paper or piece of journalism.
I'm waiting for someone to write a bot to post Gell Mann and Replication Crisis replies to every newspaper article or psychology paper. Maybe someone already has...
Credibility doesn’t depend on the relative difficulty of proving out truth claims. We don’t owe Psychology or Sociology blind faith because their claims are (arguably) more difficult to confirm than harder sciences.
You may well be bored of hearing about the replication crisis—you’re entitled to your opinion, but the low quality of the field of psychology is pretty relevant to the topic.
> I think many people on HN, myself included, are kind of addicted to appearing clever.
Apparently so are psychologists :) (kidding, I have lots of respect for psychologists and other researchers even if the fields themselves are prone to drawing bad conclusions)
Just the "lol math is hard and statistics is annoying" crowd. Honestly the thing that pisses me off most about psychology students is how only a tiny fraction of them understands and gets the actual importance of hard statistics to their field.
But instead, it's almost accepted to trash the statistics courses as just these boring hurdles to get past by. And it's still cool to suck at math.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3188848/
And much of the impact of testosterone happens in utero (Young boys and girls have similar levels; behavioral differences are driven by in utero exposure.)
This study seems to test a very narrow area where testosterone could influence empathy
I don't see how this is related, unless you think the only 'maleness' that can exist in a brain is testosterone levels. There are so many things that could be tested and analyzed here besides testosterone levels.
> Prior to this work, the strongest evidence for a link between testosterone exposure and reduced cognitive empathy came in 2011 in a study that [...] supported the idea that prenatal testosterone exposure created a more masculinized brain that less readily inferred the emotional state of others. The study was used as support for the “extreme male brain” hypothesis of autism, which contends that autism is an exaggeration of “male” tendencies toward a cognitive style characterized by systemizing over empathizing.
We've seen the growing emphasis of bad men and toxic masculinity; as if the man has a propensity for toxicity (anecdotally we've all known toxic people who were both men and women. They might generally be toxic in different ways, but that does change that no biological sex has a monopoly on being shitty human beings).
I think what's more interesting from the study is all the statements about correlation with small samples sizes. As mentioned by other comments, even this study doesn't seem remotely conclusive. It's focused on testosterone, because men generally have way more of it. I think it's more of a conversation starter on more research that should be done than anything else.
For example, traditionally the view that males should be providers for the family would have been considered a healthy aspect of masculinity. That doesn't go unchallenged any more; for example there is a real concern out there that men are too competitive and effective at securing high paid jobs.
It is an anecdote I suppose, but those involved in the gender activist communities don't seem to allow such a thing as 'healthy masculinity' because it supposes there is something positive can be exclusively/predominantly masculine and the girls don't get involved. Bit of a non-starter as ideas go.
I wonder if people in Asia and Africa feel the same. Or perhaps even in South-America. To me it seems to be mostly a "Western" issue. I live in Thailand and through the (admittedly limited) news sources I follow (Bangkok Post, South China Morning Post, ThaiVisa) there doesn't seem to be much discussion/concern here on gender, roles, what is and isn't toxic masculinity, etc...
That isn't toxic masculinity, it's a gender norm. What would be toxically masculine about it, is if a man felt forced by society to fulfill that role, regardless of his own feelings and desires.
Feminists challenge that norm and the societal pressure that drives it, but there's nothing wrong or toxically masculine with a man doing that because he genuinely wants to and isn't forcing anyone else into a role.
> those involved in the gender activist communities don't seem to allow such a thing as 'healthy masculinity' because it supposes there is something positive can be exclusively/predominantly masculine
What would you call people who would say that about femininity and feminine behavior? How do those views function together with the idea of gender equality, i.e. the state of valuing different behaviors, aspirations and needs equally, regardless of gender (definition copied from Wikipedia).
This HN comment was the first time I've ever heard of anyone talking about 'healthy masculinity' in a context of the phrase 'toxic masculinity'. The entire thrust that I've heard is that having a unique or predominantly male role in society is what toxic masculinity means in practice.
The gender theorists will have their own internal world with a lot of nuance, but the stuff that is leaking out into law and corporate diversity initiatives looks a lot more like true gender blindness. The logical flip side of that, it is quite hard to construct a positive masculine role model. The raw physical differences suggest male strength, but any actual exercise of strength apart from showing off is probably either illegal, uneconomic or low status work (sporting excellence a glaring exception). Compare that to giving birth which is incentivised, an amazing long term economic investment into old age and quite high status (mothers occupy a special place in the world). It is simply a lot easier to construct a positive feminine image than a masculine one in a world where only physical realities make a difference and everything else is expected to be gender blind.
Obviously there are positive roles for males to fill, but the idea that they are masculine in some sense isn't really acceptable. Males can fill them in their capacities as humans, but they can't be distinguished from women. What can 'healthy masculinity' mean in such a world? Adding the word masculine in doesn't add anything. 'Healthy masculinity' is basically 'Healthy femininity'.
Gender blindness in formal institutions does not prevent positive gendered role models.
Nor, even, does abandoning the social enforcement of gender stereotypes outside of formal institutions. Insofar as there are healthy expressions of classic gender images, producing examples of them does not require formal or informal social institutions to enforce classic gender roles or impose gender bias inspired by those roles.
Almost any article you read about toxic masculinity and in every discussion where it comes up, proponents take pains to point out, often in laborious detail, and to futile effect, that the term isn't meant to assign toxicity to all masculine behaviors. One shouldn't need to provide a list of "non-toxic" masculine behaviors as well as a list of "toxic feminine" behaviors in order for the concept to be understood as presented.
The people using toxic masculinity in mainstream conversation to mean "all masculinity is toxic" are, primarily, its opponents, not its proponents.
"I don't like what you're doing" can become "That's toxic male behaviour" - which immediately politicises and amplifies something that may be a trivial personal/domestic disagreement.
As for toxic femininity - it seems it cannot exist. See e.g.
https://geekfeminism.wikia.org/wiki/Toxic_femininity
...which explicitly states that toxic femininity doesn't exist as a political phenomenon, and where toxic behaviour does happen (hardly ever...) it's the fault of patriarchy.
In this view all toxic gender behaviour is caused by masculinity.
The line between that and "Masculine behaviour is inherently toxic (unless controlled and directed by women)" is a very thin one.
These definitions concentrate on tribal/political stereotyping, not on the behaviours themselves.
The idea that some behaviours are toxic - and it doesn't matter who is doing them - seems to be a conceptual leap too far in these contexts.
A men's rights advocate could say that chivalry and self sacrifice is toxic masculinity since it puts a lot of unfair pressure on men.
A female feminist could say that locker room talk and objectification of women in games is toxic masculinity since it is hostile to women.
A male feminist could say that boys rough play is toxic masculinity since it hurts or leaves out those who want to do calmer things.
A pacifist could say that action games and contact sports are toxic masculinity since they promote violence.
A body image advocate could argue that huge muscles, strength and body building is toxic masculinity since it hurts the self esteem of overweight or scrawny men.
Divorced fathers could argue that traditional fatherhood as a money provider who aren't allowed to complain is toxic masculinity.
Extroverted people could argue that the male geek culture which avoid social contact toxic masculinity since they ruin the social atmosphere.
Introverted people could argue that male initiative taking for relationships is toxic masculinity since it bothers a lot of people who aren't interested.
Politicians could argue that male intellectual stubbornness and bias for action is toxic masculinity since it leads to shootings and terrorism.
So let me ask you, what part of masculinity can't be labeled toxic? I have seen all of the examples above in the wild. What are the examples of positive masculinity? Everyone has their own version of that as well. For example, many feminists thinks that positive masculinity is men helping women. But it is not healthy for men to be pressured to help women, so that masculine image is not very positive for men. Also I am pretty sure that there you can find people who would label any one of the above as positive masculinity. In other words, the term is meaningless as it is formulated today.
Just one would do.
2. You appear to be seeking out a personal argument with me, I suggest you desist.
2. I suggest you abandon your quest to read "toxic masculinity" as some evil conspiracy to vilify masculinity.
Behaviour, not identity.
> I've made an effort to make it a part of my masculinity and so have my friends.
Behaviour, not masculinity. Masculinity is "qualities or attributes regarded as characteristic of men". I wish men would seek help when they're depressed but I'd rather that was a human trait than try and make it masculine through some Orwellian misnomer.
> 2. I suggest you abandon your quest to read "toxic masculinity" as some evil conspiracy to vilify masculinity.
I'm not on a quest, I dislike conspiracy theories, you didn't produce an example of non-toxic masculinity, and I do wish you'd learn how to stop daemonising those who disagree with you.
Wikipedia
Gender used to be a synonym for sex until the language got hijacked in the last few years to try and make it mean "gender identity" for political reasons.
To imply that those who don't wish to act the way you wish them to don't care about minorities is invidious and not supported by any evidence I've seen.
> I'm ok with calling people whatever the heck they want to be called.
As are most people until they are compelled.
> It'd be pretty silly if we thought the arguably more objective sex characteristics of a person were not binary but thought that their gender had to be binary, wouldn't it?
Would it? If, as some do, we posit that there can be an infinite number of genders or even a large number like… 42, are there 42 different categories of sex? If not, and I don't believe there are, then it's possible for multiple sexes to fit into a gender category and multiple genders into a sex category. You could probably fit all 42 into male and female and cut out a lot absurdities.
I'd go for 3, male, female and 3rd sex. Come up with a better name if you like.
It is if how I wish them to act is to care about minorities, like for instance the population that is not a part of, in your words, the population that's "overwhelmingly binary" - aka a minority, by definition.
> As are most people until they are compelled.
So you're ok with calling people what they want to be called. Nice!
> You could probably fit all 42 into male and female and cut out a lot absurdities.
Why do you, of all the people in the world, get to decide what is and isn't absurd? Is there a particular scientific method you're using to define absurdity?
> I'd go for 3, male, female and 3rd sex. Come up with a better name if you like.
I'd suggest if you need a better name for people that are neither male nor female you educate yourself. Lumping people into "other" isn't particularly useful for those people or even descriptive.
I get to decide what I think is absurd, because:
a) I'm free. b) I would still value my opinion as good enough for me even if I wasn't.
To think otherwise would be absurd, and the irony of being told this by one who wishes to impose their view upon others else they be othered is, at the very least, amusing.
> It is if how I wish them to act is to care about minorities
You're running around in circles now and thus, there is little point in continuing.
> You're running around in circles now and thus, there is little point in continuing.
By saying there existed an "overwhelmingly binary" sex spectrum, you implied the existence of a minority, so I'm simply saying to give those people the respect they deserve. That's how I "wish them to act" so it absolutely follows, based on your words, that someone who doesn't "wish to act the way you wish them to" doesn't want to respect those minorities. Easy logical reasoning to follow.
It's not contentious that you should show people you're in discussion with respect, nor that you have not shown said respect.
You guys have been going at it in other subthreads too. That's not what this site is for. In the future, please take a step back and refrain.
You guys have been going at it in other subthreads too. That's not what this site is for. In the future, please take a step back and refrain.
If you’re so keen on educating yourself then you should start with Orwell and move on to J S Mill.
> “[...] it’s important to note that the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. We found that there is no evidence to support this effect of testosterone, but that doesn’t rule out any possible effects. From what we know, though, it seems that if testosterone does have an influence, the effect is complex, not linear. Reality is typically not that simple.”
All of these groups in Western societies have been, and often still are, dominated by men. Looking at how things are changing, with women slowly gaining power in the workplace, I'm finding a lot of men are behaving differently than I remember 30 years ago. Whether or not this is due to gaining empathy, or due to fear of punitive measures, I don't know, but for me personally I feel it is the former.
But not by all men. If all of the top 1% are men, for instance, there are still 49% of men out there that are both make and not elite.
It's possible you are just observing different men now. Or observing men differently.
I feel we are long past the 'no true Scotsman' defense of woman in public office on average just exhibiting the same ruthless self-interest as the men they replaced.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs40750-014-0017-...
Not sure why it wasn't cited in this paper.
Is this a spoof article? Why would a professor of marketing at Wharton be talking on this point? "Of course", this is a nonsense thing to say.
Maybe it needed a marketing expert to get funding for this.
Because he's a co-author of the paper, people in research collaborate, and his publication list doesn't make this topic seem off in any way? Literally clicking on the first instance of the name of the person you're complaining about gives you enough information to make this comment unnecessary.
That's interesting. Adult males typically have 7-8 times the levels that females do, and females are more sensitive to it. I'd hypothesize that injecting females with extra testosterone was just plain mentally disorienting. I know a trans man who, after a few months of testosterone, claimed it was "night and day" in how they felt about and processed the world. Female biology isn't adapted to high levels of testosterone like a males biology is.
Best way I can say it is that my own understanding of emotion was rather black-and-white when on testosterone. I intellectually knew that other people had emotions beyond anger or sadness, but had no frame of reference for what that meant. I tended to see major challenges as obstacles to be overcome through force of will.
On estrogen it's like seeing the world in color -- I'm more volatile, but I actually have what I consider emotions! I understand the subtleties in my own emotions far better, which has made me a lot more empathetic to them in others. I also tend to see challenges as a sign I need to change my approach rather than just try harder.
I have had to stop hormones a few times for various reasons, and when things revert to being testosterone-dominant, I feel as if things revert to black-and-white over the course of a month or so.
I also think that just giving women a little testosterone and measuring the effect isn't likely to show much -- what seems to matter in my experience is whether the body is androgen-dominant or estrogen-dominant (the in-between areas are very not-fun, with lots of headaches, hot flashes, etc.)
There is no medically or legally significant difference between "gender" and "sex". You can get the sex/gender (different states use different terms interchangeably) on your drivers' license and birth certificate changed.
Cisgender men and women have different brain structures, and transgender people's brain structures tend to resemble that of the gender that they identify as[1]. So, for example, a trans woman like myself who was born male will have a brain structure that resembles that of a cis woman, not a man.
> I know a trans man who, after a few months of testosterone, claimed it was "night and day" in how they felt about and processed the world
This has been my experience as well (except, the opposite direction, obviously). The way I look at it, before I realized I am transgender, when testosterone was the dominant sex hormone in my body, it was like putting the wrong fuel in a car. It caused a whole slew of serious mental health problems. Estrogen has allowed me to think more clearly, and process thoughts, feelings, and emotions like I never could before. I'll never go back.
1. https://health.clevelandclinic.org/research-on-the-transgend...
Do you need to personally participate in studies to know anything about your body?
[1] J.-N. Zhou et al., “A sex difference in the human brain and its relation to transsexuality,” Nature, 378:68-70, 1995. [2] F.P. Kruijver, “Male-to-female transsexuals have female neuron numbers in a limbic nucleus,” J Clin Endocrinol Metab, 85:2034-41, 2000. [3] A. Garcia-Falgueras, D. Swaab, “A sex difference in the hypothalamic uncinate nucleus: relationship to gender identity,” Brain, 131:3132-46, 2008.
---
All of the above is from the first google result and about 30 seconds of searching. https://www.the-scientist.com/features/are-the-brains-of-tra...
So, yeah, science is beginning to try and understand this stuff.
When we reach a world where everyone has more star trek level medical care then a true survey of the population may allow for everyone to have improved lives.
When I search "brain structure test" I get IQ/personality quiz web pages. "brain structure medical procedure" gets me general information on brain anatomy and glossaries of neurosurgical terms. "{gender|trans} identity brain structure procedure" similarly returns scholarly information.
Nothing on a procedure I could schedule with my doctor, but maybe it's easier to ask my doctor than use Google. Maybe someone with better Google-fu could suggest better keywords. Has anyone done this or asked their doctor about it? I know I'd be interested in what my brain looks like in this regard!
I hear this claim a lot but I've never actually understood what "resembles" actually means. The brain structures that transgender people have don't match typical male or female brains but how do you determine which brain transgender brains resemble the most? What is the criteria? To me to determine which brain trans brains were more similar to you would have to study a LOT of dimorphic brain structures.
Some structures in transgender brains do resemble their sex or are sort of androgynous and inbetween. So I don't know how accurate trans woman = "resembles" a woman's brain actually is as a sweeping statement. In my experience trans women have rarely acted completely like either gender. I've seen trans women disperportionately engaging in masculine hobbies like computers compared to the average cis woman.
1. Dominant synapse connection direction. Males typically have more front to back connections than side to side. This may explain why females typically are better at multi-tasking, and males are typically more focused.
2. Testosterone in the womb enlarges the 3d manipulation part of the brain.
3. Testosterone in the womb has some connection to sexuality. In particular, women typically show signs of arousal towards sex without any filter (ie, animals, same gender, w/e). Typical males will show no signs of arousal to certain things (typically other males). Also, twins boys have a significantly greater likelihood of homosexuality (less testosterone to go around).
There's plenty of other differences I'm sure, and many of these may not be true. But this is what I've noted thus far.
Is the theory that male homosexual=less testosterone really more accepted than male homosexual=more testosterone? I feel like the latter has been argued extensively.
I'm pretty sure the testosterone bit had more to do with the mother than the children.
We're women because we say we are - and that's really all there is to say about it.
We are disproportionately into things like coding because, growing up, the vast majority of us are socialized the same way as boys would be. Amazingly, it turns out that in a vacuum, the activity of programming a computer isn't actually gendered.
Also mirrored by the fact that other cultures do not experience this issue so acutely.
There are still many women among those who program mathematics (statisticians etc), just that they are usually not called programmers. Also there is much less demand for people who can program math than people who can glue together libraries and create crud apps, so even if all math programmers are included in the statistics they would get dwarfed by the app programmers.
Source of the combination mathematics and statistics being a gender balanced field, above 40% women: https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2017/nsf17310/digest/fod-wome...
Engineering always being male dominated, around 15% women: https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2017/nsf17310/digest/fod-wome...
Computer science gender balance getting lowered to engineering levels: https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2017/nsf17310/digest/fod-wome...
The freer and richer women are, the more likely they are to be found in stereotypical fields.
You can really interpret the prevalence of trans women in programming as being related to nurture or nature. The data point in a vacuum doesn't obviously point to either conclusion.
It doesn't make any sense for someone else to tell you who you are. How could they know? Of course, if you were autistic or schizophrenic, that would be different...
Anyway, I remember reading an evocative description by a trans man of how testosterone made him feel like a sex crazed monster. Nobody can know for sure if they have the same experience, just like we don't know if the color blue is the same for us.
But it seemed to me that implied one of two things - either he was experiencing what cis males consider normal, and it was horrifying, in which case it was evidence against him being "really" male, or else he was not experiencing what being a cis male is like, in which case it was evidence that administering male hormones may not produce the effect of natural ones.
The goal of trans hormone therapy is to reverse the effects of the hormones of the person's biological sex, so HRT dosage of e.g. testosterone is usually more than the average cis man would produce. It's possible that that much testosterone was too much for the person you mentioned to handle, especially for his body not being used to it, or that he just got prescribed for more than he should have taken. (He could've also gotten it from the black market, in which case it would almost definitely be an incorrect dosage.)
I would have to rewatch those lectures to see if he gave any direct examples of markers, numbers, or sample size.
All the study conclusively proves is that both trans women and regular women don't react as viscerally to porn as much as the average man. The actual connectivity and structure that yields similarity in activation between trans and cis women may be completely different.
[1] https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...
Side note observation, "regular women" can be perceived as insensitive to trans women. I'm not sure what the best term to use is either though, when differentiating between trans and non-trans of the same gender. "Biological women"?
The phrase "male chauvinist" doesn't mean there's an intrinsic negative connotation in calling someone "male," nor does the phrase "nasty woman" mean it's intrinsically negative to call someone a "woman." (Of course, both terms might be used as insults in context / with tone / etc.)
> "regular women" can be perceived as insensitive to trans women
I know a few trans (mostly t-women) and insensitivity/nastiness is AFAIK not so tied to gender.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/05/180524112351.h...
Related to this is the idea of dual-gender human chimers.
(Research article) https://www.researchgate.net/publication/216874877_Dual-gend...
(Layperson-friendly blog post by the same author) https://medium.com/@brianhanley/many-transgender-and-gay-peo...
This is a great metaphor, thanks for sharing this
Should this apply to other physical/genetic characteristics as well, such as ethnicity? Should Caucausians be able to change their physical appearance (via tanning, etc...) to Native American, identify as such (cough Elizabeth Warren cough), and then be entitled to any/all social benefits legally accorded to Native American people?
What sort of implications would that have, internationally? Say someone has their body altered to appear Han Chinese, and then they go to China, expecting to be treated as a Chinese (or at least an ABC), because that's how they "identify". What are the second and third-order implications for how the world views American leadership?
Let's try...
> Should this apply to other physical/genetic characteristics...
you can change your physical characteristics, you can't (that I can think of) change your genetic ones.
> ...such as ethnicity?
Ethnicity, hmm. I don't know how to define that, so from wiki:
"An ethnic group or ethnicity is a category of people who identify with each other, usually on the basis of a presumed common genealogy or ancestry or on similarities such as common language or dialect, history, society, culture or nation.[1][2] Ethnicity is often used synonymously with the term nation, particularly in cases of ethnic nationalism, and is separate from but related to the concept of races"
Unless you pin down what you mean by ethnicity, I can't even begin answer. It's too broad. Ethnicity seems a social construction - I know a (lapsed) jew and she's ethnically one, but you couldn't tell from native english from looking at her (same as I can often tell a pole by looking, or a turk, or even some londoners), so is she because she was born one, or isn't she because she gave it up, or what?
But, maybe. After all an american indian guy decided to 'identify' as a tiger <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalking_Cat>. While that's a very odd decision to me, I'm not going to step in and physically stop him. Would you?
> cough Elizabeth Warren cough
plesse leave politics out of this, ta, it's complex enough.
> What sort of implications would that have, internationally? [...]. What are the second and third-order implications for how the world views American leadership?
What?? Seriously? This is about people who feel they don't fit their body and you try to drag in this?And why do you assume I'm from the US? To try to answer your question differenty, are you suggesting that we don't necessarily do 'the right thing' morally because people are watching?
Final question, have you ever met a trans person? Or understand what they can choose to undergo because they feel so wrong - they can go through a lot, it's not an easy thing.
Let's go with common genealogy or phenotype.
>>>Ethnicity seems a social construction
So in the absence of society you would not be able to physically distinguish between these two gentlemen [1][2] and would classify them as the same ethnicity? You cannot discern objectively-measurable distinctions between the appearances of these two faces? Facial recognition software demonstrates otherwise. [3] Every face has measurements, which cluster with other similar faces. I doubt it would be difficult to map each of those clusters with what we consider an "ethnicity".
>>>But, maybe. After all an american indian guy decided to 'identify' as a tiger <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalking_Cat>. While that's a very odd decision to me, I'm not going to step in and physically stop him. Would you?
Did he receive any LEGAL benefits normally given to large predatory felines? If no, then intervention isn't required. If yes, then absolutely I would oppose it. "Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken" - Tyler Durden.
>>plesse leave politics out of this, ta, it's complex enough.
Regardless of her politics, Elizabeth Warren is a public, high-profile figure and a perfect example of an American using their "internal" identity for legal gain. Rachel Dolezal is an alternative example. Both demonstrate that these aren't really hypothetical issues, but present-day issues crossing the spectrum of not only social issues but also medical and cosmetic technology (elective, plastic surgery, skin treatments, etc...).
>>>This is about people who feel they don't fit their body and you try to drag in this?
I try to keep a long-term, macroscopic view on social issues. But honestly, if I were to elaborate on my position it would be a long, kinda-rambling mess, so I'll table that point of the discussion.
>>>And why do you assume I'm from the US?
Oddly enough I'm usually fighting the same bias inherent in a US (and especially SFV/SFBA-heavy) website. I'm American but don't live there. So....touché on that one.
>>>Final question, have you ever met a trans person?
Of course. I live in Asia. Anyone who has spent more than a few minutes in a bar in Thailand, Philippines, or the bigger cities in Japan has been hit on by a trans person.
>>>Or understand what they can choose to undergo because they feel so wrong - they can go through a lot, it's not an easy thing.
Every human is operating within the restrictions of their physical form. My rackmate at OCS was a short dude (like 5'4") and years later he told me he considered leg extension surgery....the same kind that killed the guy in [4]). Short guys experience all sorts of emotional abuse and nobody really gives two shits about them either. Should my friend declare that he is 6'1" because he FEELS taller? Should we update all of his government documents and forms of identification as such? Of course not. Feelings are ephemeral, fleeting, and subjective. Step off a cliff and say to yourself "I FEEL like I shouldn't fall...I identify as a bird." Does gravity comply? No. Life is hard. Get harder.
[1]http://thewarriorfitness.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Warr...
[2]https://tinyurl.com/yyoamjl4
I can only imagine there's a group of short people that wish they were tall and commit suicide. I personally have never had someone tell me they were so distraught about being short that they were considering suicide. Although if it were the case "I would be alright" if medical professionals found it necessary to do a surgery for making the person taller and so the suicidal ideation goes away. I know some midgets have committed suicide and find it sad because in the future we likely will be able to prevent a person developing into a small skeleton.
Social dynamics about how a person looks matters. I think society would be better if surgery wasn't considered such a taboo by people thinking that most of the time the surgeries are pointless. Many people rebound to a greater person when they fix something visual about them and that has somehow held them back in life.
Limitations are "going away" with the outcome of science progressing in the medical community. Similar to religious bigots decreasing in numbers but they do enough damage on their way out.
> So in the absence of society you would not be able to physically distinguish between these two gentlemen [1][2] and would classify them as the same ethnicity?
They have different phenotypes, and are clearly distinguishable visually. Now, if they were brought up in the same place (say in the same town in the US), and both met a blind person, would the blind person be able to tell the difference?
Some white people choose to turn a darker colour with a tan - if they could go completely black, would it matter? (other features wouldn't change of course, but you see my point).
That's not a good answer, so let me try a different one. To me ethnicity matters because people choose to make it matter. The difference between a cis- and trans-woman does not matter to me, but it seems to matter to you. These things matter only if you choose to let them matter. And a few weeks ago I asked a trans girl out because I like her (answer: no. As bloody usual).
> Did he receive any LEGAL benefits normally given to large predatory felines? If no, then intervention isn't required. If yes, then absolutely I would oppose it.
More likely, did he lose human benefits and be eligible to be shot or put in a zoo? That's a good point, well taken!
> Elizabeth Warren [...] "internal" identity for legal gain
Legal gain? Didn't think she got anything except some vague cachet due to american indians being kewl. And because that is IMO crap because such identity is meaningless to me, she gets no cachet from me and IMO should get none from anyone else.
> Rachel Dolezal
Yep. But pretending to be black only mattered because it matters in US society.
> Both demonstrate that these aren't really hypothetical issues, but present-day issues crossing the spectrum of not only social issues but also medical and cosmetic technology (elective, plastic surgery, skin treatments, etc...).
True. And maybe I'm sidestepping the issue, but it only matters because people think it matters. Being a cis- or trans-woman only matters if people care. I don't, and I don't see why it should to anyone else (I'm not saying it shouldn't, I just don't see why it should).
> But honestly, if I were to elaborate on my position it would be a long, kinda-rambling mess, so I'll table that point of the discussion.
My position is as above - I don't care - but it would be great to sit down and talk with you.
> Every human is operating within the restrictions of their physical form [...]
Good point.
> Short guys experience all sorts of emotional abuse and nobody really gives two shits about them either
Actually I'm surprised at that. Once children grow into adults, they usually judge people more on what's inside than out. But again, it's what society thinks, and if it didn't care, it wouldn't matter.
Now for some easy ones:
> Should my friend declare that he is 6'1" because he FEELS taller?
No
> Should we update all of his government documents and forms of identification as such?
if he got surgically taller, yes, otherwise no.
I think you point is if a bloke feels like a woman, is he immediately one? I don't know. If he got surgery + hormones and transitioned, then yes.
But I can elaborate on that a bit. One person I know is becoming a guy. She prefers to be called 'he' but recognises that they don't look like one so doesn't mind when 'she' slips out. As they look like a woman but prefer to be referred to as a bloke, I will do what she prefers, but you would, or you wouldn't? I'd call it bad manners to go against their wishes and hurt their feeling.
Someone I knew referred to a very effeminate guy as 'it', as they weren't in his view male or female, so: 'it'. That pissed a few of us off.
It's about feelings. So to your next point...
> Feelings are ephemeral, fleeting, [...]
I disagree. Briefly, I had a large chunk of my life wrecked with clinical depression. That's pure 'feeling' gone wrong. YOu cannot imagine how much that hurts. Feelings are the core of our being, that distinguishes us from philosophical zombies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie Feelings are all their is that matters, because without feelings, there is nothing. We are computers.
> No. Life is hard. Get harder.
Many years ago I knew a woman who lost both twins at birth. Suppose that tragedy (she was suicidal. BTW nothing ephemeral or brief about that) could have been avoided medically, do we do that, or do we say to her "toughen up" and let them die?
Obviously we change what we can for the better. Centuries ago we lived with arthritis, gout, migraines... now far less so because we can do something about it.
So why should the feeling of being born into the wrong body type be different? See sysbin's answer for why (IMO) it isn't.
OK, I'm not going to take this much further because this whole subject is frankly going to take a day of discussion for both of us which don't have. I do not think you're wrong, I'm just trying to understand your view, and my answer above is... not good, I appreciate that, but it's my best shot. BTW, I really did find your answer measured and thoughtful.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Knowing a person is a perfectly cromulent reason to say something in a conversation. Conversations is all HN threads are. Anecdotes are great for conversation (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...).
I'm skeptical of this to begin with.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/feb/24/meet-the-neu...
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-00677-x
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/confirmed-theres-n...
When it comes to brains, there is far more variation, on pretty much anything you choose to measure, within the group of 'men' or 'women', then there is between the groups.
As far as cognitive empathy, sorry fellow men, we can't blame our lack of cognitive empathy on biology, it's probably pure socialization/education. And we can get better at it by trying/learning/practicing.
Are you claiming that there is zero biological influence on this well documented phenomenon that exists across cultures?
> can't blame our lack of cognitive empathy on biology, it's probably pure socialization/education
Any evidence?
A study linked from one of your links says: "Our study demonstrates that, although there are sex/gender differences in the brain, human brains do not belong to one of two distinct categories: male brain/female brain."
So it looks like there are, actually, differences.
Also, it is kind of assumed that we need more cognitive empathy; but why exactly, and how much is too much?
I have found it impossible to find that video anymore. I don't know why we have to rely on questionable studies when there has been much better work been done and now black-holed.
It's a defining characteristic of how we operate.
I would not read too much into that study, especially given the result of the new larger one.
Reminds me of a study done about 35 years ago by the California DOT to measure the effects of both alcohol and marijuana on driving performance. Turns out teetotalers and non pot smokers suck at driving when given booze or pot. Boozers also suck when given alcohol but not as much. And pot smokers are barely effected at all.
I'm suspicious that the body compensates eventually, so acute effects don't necessarily tell you anything particularly valid.
I'm curious to see what the measured testosterone levels in the subjects' blood ended up being. Did they push their testosterone levels to the high end of "natural", something like 700 ng/dL, or did they push them into supra-physiological bodybuilder levels?
(I'd love to see a study about the cognitive effects of harder anabolic steroids, but somehow I doubt you could get an institutional review board to sanction a double-blind experiment using trenbolone.)
I.e. their affective impairments do have significant implications on the theory-of-mind/'cognitive' side of things, but those implications are very different from the troubles of someone on the autistic spectrum. In a way, they're the very opposite!
(In fact, if you're somewhat on the spectrum and basically aware of what makes psychopaths tick, you can even have a lot of fun spotting them and interacting with them. Their attempts at superficial charm will most likely fall flat, while their lack of deep integrity and engagement will be blatantly obvious to you - but they'll probably be assuming the very opposite! So it's quite easy to figure out what they're going for and anticipate their moves.)
> One important element of social cognition is ‘cognitive empathy’, which constitutes the capacity to infer from observation the emotions, beliefs and goals of others.
Cognitive is the capacity to understand others emotional state, not necessarily react accordingly (affective empathy).
I’m not surprised by this result, perspective taking and theory of mind is like the basic building block of consciousness. It would be odd if it differed.
Testosterone known to raise competitiveness. Perhaps those with higher testosterone that are higher up in the dominance hierarchy just seem like they lack empathy because they have less males to seek approval from.
So, testosterone application doesn't instantly affect cognitive empathy in men. But might still do in women.
Is it possible that repeated exposure to elevated testosterone over a long time period is the cause? Could studies be done on steroid users?
"Science is one thing, wisdom is another. Science is an edged tool, with which men play like children, and cut their own fingers." — Sir Arthur Eddington
But I'm not sure what you're getting at. Trust me, inject 500mg of testosterone a week, you're going to notice changes.
A smaller amount is from the pituitary in both men and women.
Depending on your weight there is an enzyme created in fat cells called aromatase which converts testosterone to estrogens which can have an impact on your overall hormonal picture.
Testosterone is derived in the body from cholesterol, which is way proper fat consumption is so important for a healthy endocrine system.
Intramuscular testosterone is the most common method of HRT for trans men / trans masc folks.
The effects of which are not "androgen".
Every anabolic/androgenic steroid has some degree of androgenic effects. Researchers and pharma tried for decades to create a steroid that has no androgenic effects, to no avail. Even a 5mg dose of Anavar, one of the softest steroids that were actively prescribed for women, had androgenic effects.
Testosterone has a 100/100 anabolic/androgenic ratio. It's definitely androgenic. It will literally put hair on your chest. I don't know what point you're trying to make here.
Imagine if studies indicated that low testosterone limited or in some way hindered another desirable human capability. People have been fired for it and reputations ruined.
Suggesting men are emotionally stunted. Oh that's fine.
Do you really want to be the one that endures an unfair attack and have your intent twisted and ruin your career, just to try to prove a point? You would be a stronger person than me, I would just pass at this point and move on.
An observed fact and problem with behavior science is that they tend to align based on the culture of where the research is taking place. In Germany around 1940 you got very distinct results in behavior science compared to modern views. Behavior research made during the cold war looks very different depending which side of the Berlin wall it came from, even when accounting for sample size and scientific methods.
There are theories that tries to explain this, like for example that researchers tend to focus narrowly on questions that feel relevant in their personal culture, and then drawing larger conclusions.
On the other hand, it has been an accepted truism for many decades that the female brain is less capable of many tasks, and I haven't seen firings and ruined reputations over this. The science of this is now being seriously questioned.
"other" could mean these from the linked article:
> The growing literature on androgenic anabolic steroid (AAS) usage suggests that some users can develop bouts of aggression known as steroid rage, mood disturbance, hypomania, irritability, and depressive episodes (9–15).
Whenever I think about ourselves, I think from an evolutionary perspective. All of the mentioned effects exist in species other than humans. I can list several reasons why the behaviors could be considered desirable.
Also note, the article says the only significantly increased emotion was anger hostility. Why does anger exist?
Personally I can’t see how anger can be anything else but a manifestation of certain underlying fear as a defensive response. (That said, those emotions seem to be conventionally recognized as mostly unrelated.)
I distinguish between fear as in immediate flight response, and fear as in deeper insecurity or non-obvious harm avoidance, including things like social status preservation.
I would not bundle reflecting negatively among all that, though.
That's a very problematic and dangerous phrasing. There is also no such thing as the female brain. There are distributions of biology.
I can’t even see the title of the original paper since this one is paywalled. I was going to go try to quantify this “absence of backlash” you mentioned.
¹ It is sort of an interesting question, which majority of feminists that is. Some liberal, trans-inclusive, biological-constructivist feminists who believe in a notion of a “female brain” would potentially see no problem with the study. That is quite a minority though. The vast majority of liberal feminists would be “social constructivist” feminists who believe male/female brain differences are overblown and would view the study incredulously. Similarly, some biological-essentialist radical feminists do believe in comprehensive sex differences, and would be amenable to the finding. These would be your typical “man haters”, who are vocal online because their ideas are not welcome hardly anywhere. However, the vast majority of radical feminists believe the male/female sex differences have primarily to do with reproductive organs and, again, brain differences are overblown. And therefore would also be incredulous of the result. So all-in-all the vast majority of feminists would by default object to the study. But there is a sex-essentialist slice that cuts across the liberal/radical divide who would entertain the ideas.
On the MRA side too I believe there are sex essentialists who would be fine with the study, although many more liberal MRAs would object to it purely on the grounds of it portraying men in a negative light. I’m less familiar with the ideological divisions in that group though.
As a side note, this is part of why liberal and radical feminists are able to hate each other and talk past each other: both sides can credibly accuse the other of harboring biological essentialists.
I did hear about the president of Harvard being fired though. I read about The Bell Curve. Damore. The list goes on and on. You must know what I'm talking about.
Maybe I'm just biased so I filter bubble out evidence that sexism is sexist.
https://autistscorner.blogspot.com/2011/09/simon-baron-cohen...
What is sexist is assuming testosterone is responsible for autism and acting on that 'knowledge' without proof in some manner that impacts other people's lives.
I understand the feeling you're expressing completely. But if you just import this resentment into the thread in an unprocessed way, it acidifies discussion and makes it harder for people to be thoughtful and share information across divides. Not just the gender-ideological divide, but any divide.
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21139988.
Comment was:
This is testosterone administered to a fully formed brain. While it's still an interesting result, I would hesitate to make extrapolations to brain-developmental environments or developmental disorders.
My apologies.
I'm curious if this is worth doing (for no particular reason), as a sort of steroid use. Apparently it can have slight balding effect but is worth it.
Has anyone here tried it, just for kicks? Could you list the effects on you? I am curious how it would effect the HN demographic (which I'm part of.)
To illustrate my point, consider if this was the title: There is no evidence that being female reduces cognitive function.
Well, yeah. Kind of a "duh" from the article which quotes the scientist:
"Several earlier studies have suggested a connection between testosterone and reduced cognitive empathy..."
So no implication needed, creating supporting evidence for that hypothesis was actually already being done, and this one counters that existing narrative.
When you're trying to replicate previous studies but get a null result, it's reasonable to put that right in the title.