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Gender
2 comments
TL;DR -- Exceptions and anomalies happen which disprove that sex differences are innately hardwired. If they were, then such exceptions/anomalies would never manifest. Additionally, we all begin as female embryos. As a result, we're more hardwired to be similar than we are to be different.
I honestly can't think of a single example of a difference between men and women that is 100% hardwired. I think that anything can be subject to exceptions, and as such, the claim that such things are "hardwired" then becomes false when an exception pops up that proves otherwise.
For example: I have a friend who was born female (he later transitioned to male, but that's irrelevant to this story). When this person was a child, he (at the time, she) instinctively always tried to pee standing up, like a male instinctively does. If it was 100% hardwired for a human born as female to always pee squatting/sitting down, then this would never have happened.
So idk. The above proves that females do not always instinctively pee squatting/sitting. What was once thought as a hardwired difference between males and females is now proven false.
We have to understand that biological sex traits don't always line up the way we expect them to. Anomalies happen. Sometimes people are born physically one sex, but mentally another. Sometimes a female has more testosterone than normal. Sometimes males develop breasts. Sometimes, things just get "mixed up," and the line between these so-called differences becomes blurred.
The reason being: We're all cast from the same mold. We all start out as female embryos, then some of us gradually mutate into males in the womb. At the most basic level, we all start out as the same sex, with no differences. We're all hardwired to be more similar to one another than we are to be different. Thus, trying to argue that some male/female differences are hardwired, is moot.
On a neurological level, male and female brains are different to some extent. But it's hard to track the origins of these differences. Likely, they are more influenced by socialisation than they are innate or 'hardwired'.
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Our brains are [pretty plastic] (https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22530090-600-brain-boosting-its-not-just-grey-matter-that-matters/) and are capable of being moulded throughout our lives. Societal binaries in terms of gender mean that the brain development of men and women will most likely differ. We can't be 'hardwired' for anything, really, in the sense that [our neurology can constantly shift] (https://www.pri.org/stories/2020-01-29/myth-gendered-brain) based on our experiences.
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Where male and female brains do differ, [it is only on a minor scale] (https://www.greatschools.org/gk/articles/gender-differences-learning/). Research [generally shows] (https://slate.com/technology/2008/07/meet-the-believers.html) that the variance within each gender is often greater than between the two. And where scientists have found neurological differences between male/female brains - they have been thought to have relevance in relation to [the propensity for & treatment of different brain disorders] (https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/319592). There is no solid evidence of these differences being innate nor of them significantly affecting or dictating behaviour.
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