all 21 comments

[–]anfd 20 insightful - 1 fun20 insightful - 0 fun21 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

This is my current understanding, I'm not a biologist, so others can step in and correct me if I've made a mistake.

So what I understand is a female produces eggs and a male produces sperm. By that definition, why aren't pre-pubescent kids sexless?

Because already before they're born it's determined what changes their puberty will produce in them. It's not that "some" children will start growing facial hair and "some" start growing breasts, e.g. depending on how "culture encourages them" to do one or the other. What's going to happen in their puberty is clear already when they're embryos in their mother's womb. Of course there might be atypical developments during any stage of development, but biology doesn't work with 100% certainties like that. To give a few examples, there's not an agreed on definition on what's life, or what's a species. Biology is not like Newtonian physics where F=ma.

imagine a woman decides to completely remove all of her genitalia from inside and outside in surgery so that nothing of her genitalia remains, why is it that she does not stop being female

Her genome lacks the Y chromosome that's responsible for starting male development in the embryo. If there's no Y chromosome, the embryo will develop into a female. This genome was responsible for producing her female reproductive system (primary sexual characteristics). You can remove or alter some your primary sexual characteristics (e.g. womb, testicles), or your secondary sexual characteristics (facial hair, large breasts), but the genome that produced all of that will be present in your every cell.

Sex is a biological function in a sexually reproducing species. A species (such as Homo sapiens) cannot be understood on the level of an individual organism and its characteristics. The fact that some individuals in a species cannot or don't reproduce has no bearing on the definition of the species. In fact, loads of individuals in loads of species die without reproducing — they are eaten by predators, die very young, or otherwise perish in the process called natural selection.

And Why are penis, testes, etc male and why are vagina, clitoris, uterus, ovaries, etc female?

Because that's the definition of the word. Well why can't you change the definition, you might ask. Indeed. But this particular definition is based on what has been observed scientifically about sexual reproduction, so it's not that someone just made it up, and that's why it's not justified to change it to what you like. Sexual reproduction came about around a billion years ago, and in sexual reproduction it takes two different kinds of creatures of the same species (in English they're called sexes) to produce fertile offspring. There's only two kinds of gametes, sperm and egg, there's no third kind. There's no "spectrum" there.

Bacteria reproduce by division, many plants can produce by cloning themselves, or by sexual reproduction. Some insects and even some vertebrae can reproduce without sperm fertilizing the egg (it's called parthenogenesis). Just to give examples about various ways of reproduction — mammals reproduce sexually.

Generally it's a mistake to think that there's some one thing that can always decide your sex without exception. Most of the time that is indeed the case, but some people will try to argue otherwise by using very rare outliers as some kind of proof that no generalisations are legitimate. But the more sexual characteristics (and you can start by picking any number of "common sense" characteristics to tell one sex from the other) you look at, and look at them together, the more you will find that they correlate highly. Do you have XX chromosomes, do you have or have you had menstruation, do you have clearly female genitalia, what does your hormone profile look like etc. These are not independent variables, and why would they be because they were produced by the same biological system for a purpose that came to be through the process of evolution. It's irrelevant if you find that in rare cases one ouf ten or twenty of them doesn't match, because you shouldn't look at them in isolation to begin with.

The rare cases do exist, and intersex people are totally real. But they are their own discussion. It's a mistake and evidence that someone doesn't know what they talking about if they think that an exception in biology means "well then you can't say anything about anything".

[–]MezozoicGaygay male 6 insightful - 3 fun6 insightful - 2 fun7 insightful - 3 fun -  (0 children)

Technically, male body can be formed without Y chromosome, but it is only in mutated X chromosome that has SRY gene which it should not have. And it is very-very rarely happening.

[–]GaiusHelenMohiam 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

I am a biologist and this is a good explanation.

but biology doesn't work with 100% certainties like that

I had to train myself not to always give caveats. We biologists would never finish our conversations with each other if we did.

[–]MezozoicGaygay male 13 insightful - 3 fun13 insightful - 2 fun14 insightful - 3 fun -  (0 children)

Why are things like embryos and pre-pubescent kids not sexless, can you explain the reasons to me?

Why is it that he does not stop being male and does not become sexless after surgery?

Pre-pubescent boys don't produce sperm and don't have sperm so how are they boys/males?

For same reason why women after menopause and men after andropause are still considered their sex and not sexless. Or why pregnant women are not sexless. They were able before, can now or will be able in the future to produce specific specific type of gametes, and their bodies were formed accordingly starting from womb and continuing later. And female and male bodies are different in a lot more ways than just looks and reproductive organs.

Why are penis, testes, etc male and why are vagina, clitoris, uterus, ovaries, etc female? Why can't penis, testes, etc be female and why can't vagina, clitoris, uterus, ovaries, etc be male instead?

I am not sure what this question is about. Vagina is not female and penis is not male, but they are names for organs that female or male need to reproduce, and that are formed based on their chromosomes and few genes activated or not (as it is possible in very-very rare cases to have penis with XX chromosomes if SRY gene will activate for some weird reason, then this person will be grown up male in everything but chromosomes). So vagina in 99+% cases will form in female body and penis in 99+% cases in male body, and that is it.

[–]worried19 13 insightful - 1 fun13 insightful - 0 fun14 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Because they're not developed yet. Just like a baby elephant female can't get pregnant, a baby human female can't get pregnant. But the potential is there. Baby girls are born with a vagina, ovaries, uterus, and all the eggs stored inside them for later.

[–]DogeWalker 10 insightful - 4 fun10 insightful - 3 fun11 insightful - 4 fun -  (2 children)

Return question: are children born with DNA? Or do we somehow lack genetic material in every cell until puberty?

[–]DogeWalker 4 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

u/AllInOne, are children born with DNA? Or do we somehow lack genetic material in every cell until puberty?

[–]DogeWalker 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Of course they are born with DNA

Since you answered this, that should help resolve this question. Since you agree that DNA is present from conception... what is your argument that sex does not develop untl later?

[–]BenderRodriguez 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (6 children)

You do know that female people are born with all the eggs they will release in their lifetime upfront, right?

[–]AllInOne[S] 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (5 children)

Yes, which is why I asked;

I get girls are born with all the eggs they will ever have, but boys are a different story right? Pre-pubescent boys don't produce sperm and don't have sperm so how are they boys/males?

[–]BenderRodriguez 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (4 children)

Because they have male reproductive systems that are simply undeveloped? Also since our species is sexually dimorphic, if you agree that we have one class of people that are born with eggs and are therefore female from birth and constitute a given sex, then you must conclude that people with the other type of reproductive system much be of the other sex.

[–]AllInOne[S] 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

Is it possible to give an analogy for this so I can understand better? I can understand better with analogies, but only if you have the time to do that of course. Btw I remember your name from either GC guys or GCdebatesQT subreddit, I'm happy to see familiar people here!

[–]BenderRodriguez 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

Thanks I'm glad to see lots of old faces here too.

So here's an analogy:

If you're a dairy farmer and your cows have just given birth to baby calves, how do you know which calves are going to grow up to be the ones to produce milk and which ones are going to be the calves that grow up to inseminate the other calves?

[–]AllInOne[S] 4 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

Thanks for the analogy! So from what I understand given your analogy, the potential to produce eggs makes a baby calf female and the potential to produce sperm makes a baby calf male, did I get it correctly?

[–]BenderRodriguez 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

In short, yes. The fact that their potentials are opposite comes directly from the fact that they are of two different sexes. If calves were sexless until they became adults, there'd be no way of knowing at all which calves would grow up to be able to perform whichever reproductive role. The fact that you can easily tell simply by examining their physical bodies means that they're of different sexes, even as juveniles.

[–]theblackfleet 8 insightful - 2 fun8 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

They have the capacity to produce sperm. That's what makes them male, along with their XY chromosomes. An embryo has a sex, that was decided at conception. A woman who has surgery to remove her genitalia remains a woman because she was BORN female. Same with males. I could lose my breasts from surgery but I remain female. You can test any cell in my body and it will come back XX, female.

You can make up new words instead of male and female but it's the categorical difference that remains. Reality doesn't care which symbols you use to describe it. The fact that males and females have completely different genitalia remains. You could rename everything, and reality of the categorical differences remains.

[–]MatH0 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Simple. An organ that produce eggs is an uterus, which is a female sexual organ. An organ that produce sperm are testicles, which is a male sexual organ. A sex is composed by internal, external organs, chromosomes and hormones that your body naturally produces.

If a male/female quits their whole sexual organs, they are still their biological sex because they can develop diseases that are exclusive for that sex. Chromosomes, bone density and shape can't change too.

A penis can't be female because by definition is just not possible. 'Male' and 'Female' are reproductive sexes

[–]SnowAssMan 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Babies/children are neuter, not sexless.

A woman who has had her sexual organs removed is a woman who has had her sexual organs removed. She is neither: a) not a woman, or b) a man.

The uterus inside you is no more male than the money in your pocket. You can't apply the male sex where it doesn't belong.

[–]levoyageur718293 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

An old Soviet joke that I've quoted a bunch of times, here and elsewhere:

A man wants to buy some bread, but when he goes to the store, all the shelves are empty. "Do you really have no bread at all?" "No," said the shopkeeper, "we're a fishmonger and we don't have any fish. It's the bakery next door that doesn't have any bread."

Even if a one-year old, one-month old, or one-hour old baby boy can't produce sperm yet, it's completely obvious that he will be able to. If I took you to a newborn ward in a hospital and said, "pick five babies here, and I'll give you a thousand dollars for each one who gives birth but you give me a thousand for each one that doesn't," are you really going to pick a baby with a penis because you just don't know?

[–][deleted] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

This is a question about biology when I think GC are more about the abolition of gender, right? Sex isn't socially constructed, it's just a property of organisms that sexually reproduce.

But in answer to your question in a roundabout way: the bees in a hive are all female even though only the queen can reproduce. The males (drones), produce sperm but the workers don't produce eggs. They're not a third sex, they are female because their baby bee bodies had the potential to develop into a queen given the right food.

Baby male humans have the equipment to produce small gametes with the right hormones and development. Baby female humans already have produced large gametes.

It's not just about the sex cells. Every cell in the body (except for red blood cells), have a full copy of the genetic code and so every penis has cells with XY chromosomes and every vagina has cells with XX chromosomes. A penis made out of cells with XX chromosomes would be female, I suppose. A vagina made out of cells with XY chromosomes would be male, I suppose.

[–]littlerbear 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Sex doesn't just refer to the actual production of the gametes, but the potential or past production of gametes. Little girls are born with ovaries so they can potentially produce eggs; postmenopausal women did, for a large portion of their lives, produce eggs even though that egg production has stopped. Little boys are born with testes, so they have the potential to create sperm; I don't think sperm production ever stops but it decreases in volume and quality as men age. And, sex is in the chromosomes which are in every cell of the body. There are XX or XY chromosomes in the brain, in the nerve fibers, in the organs. People are sexed down to the cellular level.