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Comment by 4gotunameagain | Hacker News Reader

The first problem reported with plasticizers was endocrine disruption [1]. This has been linked to the reduction of fetal anogenital distance, a key marker in determining the sex of a fetus [2]. This causes various reproductive disorders [3].

I am convinced that this contributes to the apparent feminization of human societies, a topic that apparently cannot be brought up for discussion in the US due to the ludicrous contemporary political climate.

1: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001664801...

2: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16079079/

3: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00204-018-2350-5

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Your comment about the political climate made me remember this. I cannot find the specific reference but in one of his lectures (on Youtube), Sapolsky talks about how some gay people felt offended in the 70's by research about the relation between brain structure and sexual orientation, since they felt it treated their sexual orientation as a pathology. Sapolsky contrasts it with the more recent enthusiasm about similar research, because people felt it would prove being gay was not a matter of choice or bad nurture. In political contexts, people blindly replace connotation for implication. Whereas implication is a concern of Logic (and hence, Science), connotation is a concern of intuition (or should I say, instinct) about constantly changing cultural ideals.

I have seen that lecture and it's great but please see my comment below and consider that the parent may not be that lone hero of hard science and facts against the politics of emotion which I suspect is the narrative it's trying to establish. (It's a trap ;)

>the apparent feminization of human societies

Wow, could you elaborate or backup this claim? Do you mean that it explains that there are more female born than male? Probably not since you say it can't be talked about so you're hinting at a more ideological and thus controversial claim : That masculine values are on the down or something of that kind. If that's your opinion, well it is a classic overheard reactionary argument about the pacification of social relationships and how war forge "real" men and you just disappointed me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bisphenol_A?wprov=sfla1

It was used in baby bottle mouthpieces and dummys as a plasticizer.

Parent is unintentionally supporting grandparent's point.

In any event the secular testosterone decline[1] corresponds roughly with the mass production of consumer plastic goods. No way to tease apart all the confounding variables though so it could be something else causing that.

[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17895324/ and many many many others.

Average testicle size has been shrinking for decades too. And as you say, nobody knows why.

I don’t know, but they may be referring to studies that postulate environmental (as well as other) factors contributing to the general lowering of testosterone and fertility in men over the past few decades.

https://uk.reuters.com/article/health-testosterone-levels-dc...

> apparent feminization of human societies

I have heard something similar is happening to domestic dogs too, which is very interesting, but makes sense as they will be exposed to a lot of what we are. I have no idea what to search for to bring that study up though. I did find one study about BPA levels in canned food causing marked changes just after a few weeks but that's a very small part of the whole picture.

The plastic/oil industry likely subsidizes that political stuff so the pitchforks will not come for them.

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