ELW

Mr Eric Metaxas and Dr John Lennox discuss the 'question of science and God' in a two-part video series by Socrates in the City.

Metaxas is an American speaker, author, and talk show host, specialising in history, biographies, Christianity, and right-wing politics. Whereas, Lennox is a Northern Irish bioethicist, mathematician, and Christian apologist. It's worth listening to whether you're theist, atheist, or agnostic.

John Lennox: The Question of Science and God – Part 1 —https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDjNv-ea56E&t=2211s

John Lennox: The Question of Science and God – Part 2 — https://youtu.be/Tr3ghb6JG6A?si=f9vNI-3gmyIr8cTQ

'... [T]he testosterone level in transgender women does not differ significantly from cisgender women after a year of estrogen therapy. ... Therefore, the fairness argument bases itself more on established prejudice rather than scientific evidence.'

Oestrogen and testosterone are epigenetic, which means they influence the expression of genes. Their effects on gestation and puberty are, therefore, generally either difficult or impossible to undo. The levels of sex hormones are irrelevant if you don't take into consideration their effects.

'... The practice [of excluding trans women from women's sports] bases the female identity on a lack of physical strength ...'

Sex is systemic. There are differences between male and female eyes, male and female livers, male and female immune systems, and probably everything else. There are lots of compounding things that contribute to males having a general athletic advantage over females, not just strength.

The criteria that characterises all living things is:

Movement
Respiration
Sensitivity

Growth
Reproduction
Excretion
Nutrition

Sensitivity means sensitivity to stimuli. Sensitivity to stimuli requires and, therefore, demonstrates consciousness. It is irrelevant to the prompt how meaningful such consciousness is, only that it is demonstrated.

This may not be relevant where you are, but the most recent census for England and Wales in 2021 found that just 0.5% of people identify as non-binary or transgender. That's about 300,000 people (out of about 60 million people representing about 90% of the UK).

In comparison, women and girls make up 30 million people. Rape Crisis England & Wales says that:

• 1 in 6 children (16%) have been sexually abused
• 1 in 4 women (25%) have been sexually assaulted or raped
• 1 out of 6 rapes was perpetrated by a stranger

If strangers committing a minority of sexual abuse is true in general, there are around 1.2 million women and girls (representing 2% of the public) who have been subject to sexual abuse from a stranger. This is 15x more than all non-binary and transgender people put together. So if there is a conflict between the interests of these groups, no ethical or rational argument can be made for prioritising trans people.

Which is likely, as Rape Crisis England and Wales also says that:

• 5 out of 6 rapes (83%) are not reported to the police
• 98% of convicted sex offenders are men

Is there any reason to believe that other sex crimes are more likely to be reported to the police? Or that trans women are less likely to offend than men? If anything, isn't it likely that a hostile climate of opinion towards perceived transphobia is likely to discourage reporting? And what about the refusal by the government, many institutions and, increasingly, the public to recognise many acts of voyeurism and exhibitionism committed by non-binary and transgender people as sex crimes?

It is interesting that 82% of people voted that they disagreed with or felt ambivalent about the prompt—transcultural and transhistorical realities overwhelmingly suggest the opposite.

Cancel culture is pervasive in the modern West and has many supporters. It is one of the cornerstones of cancel culture, if not the foundation, that censorship, in general, is necessary both to promote and maintain public morality.

I think that the door was probably wide enough to accommodate two people. However, the weight of more than one person lying on the door would have, at least, pushed the door further into the water. If the door had been flooded, this would have diminished and may have negated any survival advantage to either individual.

We can extrapolate that Jack is capable of getting himself on to the door from the fact that Rose is capable of getting herself on to the door. I think that Jack and Rose knew from the time that they found the door that both or either of them getting on to it was a ‘now or never’ kind of thing due to the progressive incapacitation that hypothermia induces.

According to the English dictionary, Oxford Languages, transition emerged in late Middle English as an anglicisation of the Latin transitio from the Latin transire, meaning 'go across'.

Trans and tra are both prefixes derived from transition and are found in many words such as transatlantic, transubstantiation, transportation, trajectory, traverse and traduce.

You can't bastardise a prefix.

Furthermore, words can be accurately understood to mean multiple things and even contradictory things. For example, 'dust' is a contronym; it can mean to add dust or remove dust, depending on the context.

Rachel Dolezal, a (white) transracial woman, was able to present so convincingly as a black woman that, not only was she accepted as black by the local black community, she was accepted as an ambassador on their behalf. So, there's no reason to think that Ms Dolezal wasn’t subject to the same racial socialisation or vulnerable to the same racist abuse. Generally, nobody has any idea (including you) what your DNA indicates about you.

To enquire whether the ‘current’ level of inequality in society is unfair implies either that, as others have observed, there is a hypothetical fair level of inequality or, alternatively, that we had achieved parity at some time in the past and have since diverged from it.

‘Fair’ also has a connotation of there being somebody to blame, suggesting that there there is no such thing as organic inequality or at least organic inability to resolve it.

The intentions of the author and the sociopolitical context in which they were writing is very important to consider when assessing or responding to a quote. Thank you for sharing.

In the strictest sense, I agree that some of the contemporary taboos around sexuality are harmful, but I suspect the subtext to this question is “Would we be better off without some or all such taboos?”, which is more nuanced.

If we don’t live in a world with some taboos around promiscuity and ‘deviant’ forms of sexuality then we’ll end up living in a world with different taboos around sexual conservatism. For example, people being shamed for being prudish/frigid/vanilla or assumed to be sexually unfulfilled/repressed, etc.

Living in a world without any pressure is utopian. We can’t get rid of taboos or ideals, we can only replace them. So, the question is, would we rather live with traditional evils or modern ones?

I disagree. I think that’s an example of a logical fallacy called begging the question, in which the premise is assumed within the argument. If most people sincerely disassociate being a woman from being a female, why do you we constantly have to be coached about it? It’s not a social construct when few if any earnestly believe it.

Sorry for the late reply.

It’s not a straw man fallacy; it’s an example of supported inference. Social constructs need to be believed in by the vast majority of people to whom they’re said to apply, otherwise it’s inaccurate to describe it as a social construct.

How things should be is arguable but ultimately irrelevant to the original point of discussion. (You made an assertive statement about how things are and I disagreed.)

I am familiar with the current orthodoxy around women’s and trans issues but ultimately do not find either convincing. Furthermore, neither education nor dialectic are aided by the fact that nobody seems to agree on what the word gender means—even when we can agree that gender and sex are different.

For my part, I agree that gender is a social construct. I agree that gender is different to sex. And I agree that gender needs reform. What I don’t agree with is that gender describes womanhood rather than femininity.

Biological sex is sexually dimorphic for most people and binary for everyone.

Sex is an acknowledgment of reproductive class based on gamete production. Male biology supports the production of sperm cells; female biology supports the production of egg cells. There are no intermediate sexes because there are no intermediate gametes.

According to Oxford Languages, the dictionary cited by both Google and Siri, binary means ‘relating to, composed of or involving two things. It could also mean ‘relating to, using or denoting a system of numerical notation that uses two rather than ten as a base’ (i.e.: binary code).

So, the synonyms of binary would include couple, pair, twin, match, double and duality (but not dichotomy or polarity).

It also tells us that binary is a Late Middle English anglicisation of the late Latin word binarius; itself an evolution of the late Latin word bini, meaning two.

Binary definition

https://www.google.com/search?q=binary+definition&client=safari&channel=iphone_bm&ei=gSUgYcLsE9aM8gKvxZaYAQ&oq=binary+definition&gs_lcp=ChNtb2JpbGUtZ3dzLXdpei1zZXJwEAMyBwgAELEDEEMyBAgAEEMyBAgAEEMyBQgAEIAEMgUIABCABDIFCAAQgAQyBQgAEIAEMgUIABCABDoECAAQR1Cf5A1Yn-QNYJTnDWgAcAF4AIABmQGIAZkBkgEDMC4xmAEAoAEByAEIwAEB&sclient=mobile-gws-wiz-serp

Why sex is binary

https://youtu.be/XN2-YEgUMg0

Most people with intersex conditions are either male or female, but there are a few people who are ‘true hermaphrodites’.

‘Courage is not simply one of the virtues but the form of every virtue at the testing point.’ – C.S. Lewis

I believe in the humanity of the foetus and the right to life but I also believe in the right to bodily autonomy. And, where there is conflict, I think the right to bodily autonomy should prevail. This is consistent with our practices regarding the donation of bodies and body parts, the harvesting and analysis of DNA, our participation in clinical trials and experiments, our practices related to first aid and so forth. You can’t force a person to lend their body.

No, as previously stated, the issue is whether the right to bodily autonomy takes precedence over the right to life. Because, if so, any debate about the humanity of the foetus is academic. Many pro-choice advocates, including me, do acknowledge the humanity of the foetus and support abortion anyway.

Forced CPR is incomparable to forced pregnancy as it’s non-invasive and doesn’t compromise the interests of the person performing it.

Americans spread their culture through media. Because of their history, Americans tend to fixate on race and they are influencing other cultures for which this historically hasn’t been a problem to do the same.