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Wednesday, February 1, 2023

*Tractatus Logico Geneticus

*YT


The terms woman and biological woman are linguistically identical.

The phrase people who menstruate describes women who menstruate.  Not all women menstruate.  All people who menstruate are women.

The phrase people who have uteruses describes women who have uteruses.  Not all women have uteruses.  All people who have uteruses are women.

Every mother is a woman.  Not every woman is a mother.  Nobody who is not a woman is a mother.  


Some syllogisms:

All mothers are women.  XX is a mother, therefore XX is a woman.  

All men are not mothers.  XY is a man, therefore XY is not a mother.

Almost all adult humans with XY chromosomes are men; rarely they are Swyer syndrome women; therefore no absolute conclusion can be generalized regarding XY genotype in the absence of phenotypical presentation of sex as a dyad.

Almost all adult humans with XX chromosomes are women; rarely they are de la Chapelle syndrome men; therefore no absolute conclusion can be generalized regarding XX genotype in the absence of phenotypical presentation of sex as a dyad.

All adult humans with XX (or X not-Y) chromosomes where an X is effectively absent, or sufficiently damaged to approximate a Y, are women suffering Turner syndrome.

All humans with XXX (trysomy) or XXY (Klinefelter syndrome) or XYY (Jacobs syndrome) or XYYY (XYYY syndrome - there is no identified 'YYY' or 'YY' syndrome) chromosomes are suffering atypical genetic expressions of sexual genotype (geno-atypical), some of whom may identify or be identified, currently, as intersex.

Intersex is always the product of genetic or endocrinal abnormality.

Abnormal is not a pejorative.

Hermaphrodite is a meaningful biological term, describing organisms capable of fulfilling both male and female reproductive functions.  With reference to humans it is an obsolete term, more precise but less desirable than intersex.

In cases if true hermaphroditism, the female reproductive function takes precedence.

Gender is a term specific to grammar, classifying pronouns (eg, he/she) and animals (eg, man/woman) (and in English, rarely, inanimate nouns -- eg, a ship as female). 

Gender is to grammar as genus is to taxonomy.  Genus is based on quantifiable genetic or cladistic distinguishers.  Gender in English is based on genitals.

Gender is never a descriptor in biology, only in grammar. No vertebrate has a gender; all vertebrates have a sex.  Thus, man or woman are gendered linguistic terms for biologically male or female homo sapiens (ie,  humans or people).   

Gendered nouns describing innate biological characteristics are artifacts not of grammar but of linguistics.  Thus, bull/cow, dog/bitch, cock/hen, boar/sow, ram/ewe, actor/actress -- man/woman -- all identify non-arbitrary heritable traits, independent and regardless of phonologic, syntactic and semantical abstractions.

Best practice starts with what is clear, direct and normal, then confronts what is statistically and phenomenologically abnormal.  


J

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