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I don't think that's true. Or at best it's a tautological argument. Some people have crazy genes like XXY. There's no clear gender that they are "supposed" to be.

It's very rare though.



I refer you to my comment[0] (flagged for some inexplicable reason), chromosomes are not the method of sex determination in humans (or most animals), and are not even the necessary condition in the process of fulfilling the sexual reproduction strategy in some others.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42907868


I don't know how to read that comment, but your idea that everybody is exactly male or female is clearly wrong just by thinking about it.

Sex is clearly a continuum, just like everything in the world. If you smoothly vary someone's physiology and genetics from male to female there will be a region in the middle where it's kind of woolly and you can't really say they are definitely male or female.

Let me give another example. Is a spork a spoon or a fork? It's clearly somewhere in-between. You can't say "this spork is actually a spoon with some anomalous tines".

Now it just so happens that there are very few sporks in the world (due to the huge selection pressure). But they do exist and they aren't obviously "male with errors" or "female with errors".

You can't really argue against this, any more than you can argue that green is actually very blueish red. The English language dictates that it isn't.

You're free to go off and make your own not-English where green is "blueish red" but don't expect anyone to know what the hell you are talking about.


Sex is not colour. Colour does exist on a spectrum, sex does not (in humans or other mammals). Humans are also not cutlery. Both of your analogies are misplaced.

Humans, (along with 95%+ animals) are gonochoric, which means they are either male or female and cannot change that.

There is no spectrum because there are only two types of sex cell (gametes, sperm and ova) thus, only two reproductive strategies available.

We also know that the reproductive strategy coincides with gamete size (small and large, again, sperm and ova) and this is helpfully confirmed by non-gonochoric species that are hermaphrodatic, like clownfish. We know that a clownfish has changed from male to female when their reproductive strategy has changed to the point that they can produce the other type of gamete.

> You can’t really argue against this

It seems like your assumptions have been challenged, it would’ve been better if you’d do some of that yourself, and read some biology by actual biologists, not from activists.


> sex does not (in humans or other mammals)

Yes it does. It just has an extremely bimodal distribution.

> Humans, (along with 95%+ animals) are gonochoric, which means they are either male or female and cannot change that.

Sure, when the genetics all goes to plan. But it isn't perfect. Sometimes it doesn't.

I think you have a fundamental misunderstanding about all of this but I can't quite figure out where it is. It's like you've only read a biology textbook and never really thought about it or something.


No, there cannot be a hermaphrodatic human because of the genetics, as only one reproductive strategy can be chosen even when there is a disorder.

Find me the third type of gamete and you’ll have a point.

Edit: I’ll add, traits are a bimodal distribution, sex is binary (because of all I’ve outlined here). If you believe that traits define sex then you are sorely mistaken (see 3rd gamete for why).


True hermaphroditism: Geographical distribution, clinical findings, chromosomes and gonadal histology

European Journal of Pediatrics, 1994

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF02000779


Dealt with here[1] but I'm more than willing to post the quote again:

> In the past, ovotesticular syndrome was referred to as true hermaphroditism, which is considered outdated as of 2006. The term "true hermaphroditism" was considered very misleading by many medical organizations and by many advocacy groups, as hermaphroditism refers to a species that produces both sperm and ova, something that is impossible in humans.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42929198




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