With Kevin [starting here (this link may go away since the blog is being closed soon, my apologies, and good luck NonStampCollector)], there are two separate issues:
1) Are the terms “feminine” and “masculine” justifiable descriptors that increase communication when discussing “rationality and consciousness”, or are they unnecessarily charged terms whose implication is the inherent devaluation of women and serve to inject a circular argument whose conclusion is:
2) Women *currently*, and in history, are on average less rational and conscious than men.
I looked around, very briefly, at Weininger – you know, just a few quotes and a short bio.
I suspect that his ideas (however a product of his time and him probably being a bit disturbed), could easily be re-framed as feminist.
In his world, “female life is consumed with the sexual function: both with the act, as a prostitute, and the product, as a mother.”
Most women certainly didn’t do much else – at least in his experience. The average woman was constantly pregnant and taking care of children and was provided precious little, in any, help from her husband. If she didn’t want to have children, she had few resources or choices (including saying “no”) in order to end her child rearing. Similarly, you have the specter of the bored-to-tears housewife in the 50′s – doing drugs just to pass the time and being consumed with domestic affairs.
Those are not the only women in history; and certainly was not impossible for women – even given these responsibilities and treated the way they were (sometimes to the point of acquiring mental illness due to mistreatment and lack of social support against the mistreatment) – some women certainly were able to express their rational selves and develop intellectually. [Even those with several children can remain great thinkers – pregnancy does not (contrary to popular theory) make your brain die. It is the temporary lack of sleep and large hormone changes, especially for their first baby, that tend to be problematic. Of course, the experience of giving birth might just give a woman a unique philosophical insight into life, the universe, and everything – but let’s not get crazy. / sarcasm]
The lie inherent in Kevin’s framing – using the term “feminine” for this – is that the fault of a woman’s potential being suppressed is placed on her. It is her “feminine” quality that is to blame. She must become “like a man” in order to be considered as valuable as a rational being as a man is valued.
I’ve gone down that road – being a female in male-dominated spaces (physics, for example, but I seem to seek them out, so it’s not the only one). This is not new, nor is it some sort of ancient history. To be respected, it is expected to become “one of the guys” and take on male-typical socialization. For example, asserting dominance through teasing/being witty, having a male-typical gender expression (not wearing make-up, skirts, flower prints), not discussing children or family, being aggressive, etc. If you act ways associated with the feminine, you are not taken seriously, regardless of the quality of your work. You are also expected to be exceptional – and any imperfection is viewed as a negative comment on your gender; while simultaneously any minor success is considered a triumph for your gender as you are dismissed as some sort of second-rate curiosity. (It’s bizarre really.)
When a society values women – they thrive within intellectual/academic circles – as well as, if not better than, men. This is routinely *hand-waved* away as academia lowing it’s standards – a blatantly misogynistic assumption. We have evidence of the opposite, as I said, that women within academic groups tend to increase group-intelligence and quality of work within university student groups. (I wish I could send you to an article for that, but the research I’m thinking about is being done by colleagues and I don’t think they have published it yet.) By contrast, within high-school and middle-school groups, the presence of boys has been shown to decrease the academic success of girls due to girls feeling obligated to downplay their own strengths to avoid making the boys feel threatened. This is the main impetus for a resurgence in single-gender classrooms. It was NEVER about giving less rigor to the girls – but allowing them not to be bogged down by the boys – who have been socialized (within some groups) to see a smart girl as less attractive. Boys also tend to socially mature slower than girls; talk later; all of that jazz. (So I’m not accused of cherry-picking – if you are interested just Google-scholar “separate gender education” or something like that and you’ll get an ear full.)
[Just to be clear, I think that concerns surrounding pushing a gender-binary supersede the gains for single-gender education; at least for most groups. Also, I apologize for emphasizing education, but it is a field that I am knowledgeable about.]
Again, the problem is not with pointing to the sexism that threatens to relegate women to “non-rational” beings; but essentially the victim-blaming nature of the framing of this observation.
It’s like beating the shit out of someone and then calling them weak for crying. It’s repulsive really.
This whole conversation reminds me of [the poet from Saudi Arabia who appeared in a poetry competition].
If you watch this and say – that it is the fault of “femininity” that women are seldom great and *honored* poets in Saudi Arabia – I would think you are not being “rational”.
SINMANTYX 
“The lie inherent in Kevin’s framing – using the term “feminine” for this . . . ”
It’s not a “lie”. It’s just a word to convey a meaning. It’s not saying that any particular behavior is inherent in women.
“. . . is that the fault of a woman’s potential being suppressed is placed on her.”
I’m not placing the fault anywhere, and I’m not suggesting that any potential is being suppressed. All these things are additional ideas that you are constructing, and are outside the scope of what I have been saying.
“It is her ‘feminine’ quality that is to blame.”
“Feminine” is merely a label for something, like labeling the color blue, “blue”. We don’t blame the color blue for being blue. It is just blue. Something else caused it to be blue. If it changes to red then it changes to red, and if it doesn’t, it doesn’t.
“She must become “like a man” in order to be considered as valuable as a rational being as a man is valued.”
Men must also become rational if they are to be considered valuable as a rational being. This rule applies to all people, regardless of sex.
“If you act in ways associated with the feminine, you are not taken seriously, regardless of the quality of your work.”
I can’t relate to that, personally. I have known women who have very powerful, impressive minds, who still like some “girly” things, and yet the power of their mind overrides any other consideration by an order of magnitude.
People with rational minds are so rare, and such a joy to encounter, that when I meet such a person I don’t even notice what sex they are, or what they look like, or what they are wearing. I’m just glad to have met a rational person.
KEV – If you are using feminine to mean “irrational, passive, blaidhfv;liufujfdvk” and masculine to mean “rational, conscious, afdpoibh;akjernhf;aid;lk;” – you are still placing the *problem* onto inherent characteristics of the individuals – and not the lens they are being viewed through.
You say that IT is blue – and blue is blue.
I say that IT is not blue – it is being looked at through a blue filter. It is the filter’s problem – not IT’s problem.
We should then change our focus to the filter, not IT.
IT is not to blame, nor is IT the thing that needs changing.
My point in my story, is that the cultural context in which Weininger wrote his book is pervasive and enduring. I am aware that you think you can divorce “feminine” and “masculine” from that context – while simultaneously saying that using the terms increase the communicative value of them.
That’s sort of weird frankly.
PS: Why would those “girly” things need to be “overridden”?
Also, “misogyny” means “hatred of women”. It *doesn’t* mean having a low regard, in a certain context, for particular behaviors that are more common in the female of the species.”
So your use of the word “misogyny” is mistaken.
“you are still placing the *problem* onto inherent characteristics of the individuals”
Definitely not. Rationality or irrationality are not inherent in any way. There are always causes.
“I say that IT is not blue”
Ok. So you’re saying that there’s no more rationality to be found in men than there is in women. Well I think that you’re wrong and that you’re seeing things through a distorting filter. We’ll have to agree to disagree about that.
“My point in my story, is that the cultural context in which Weininger wrote his book is pervasive and enduring.”
What’s enduring is genetics and culture, and it is those factors which cause all of the differences between men and women.
I’m not interested in the cultural context of Weininger, I’m only interested in how things are right now.
“Why would those “girly” things need to be “overridden”?”
I’m not saying that should be overridden. You would only want to override them if they got in the way of rationality, and if you wanted to be more rational.
If a woman was emotionally attached to her hair or her clothes, then that would get in the way of rationality.
Can’t I just redefine it and divorce it from context and then insist that you respect the way in which I am using it? /snark
No Kev – saying that femininity (which means: “pertaining to a woman or girl”) is synonymous with passivity, irrationality, emotionality, etc is misogyny (which means: “hatred, dislike, or mistrust of women”) – in a literal sense.
Please don’t interpret my title as an accusation against you personally.
I’m aware that in philosophy they create neologisms to parse terms that sometimes have several meanings; and that jargon used within a particular context is sometimes misunderstood outside of that context.
However, you claimed:
“Women are generally regarded to be lot more emotional than men, and putting more value on feelings above reason, to be less structured in their manner of thinking, and more passive or bending to the environment. These things are not rational, but are more unconscious. Consequently, when a person has these qualities, no matter whether they are male or female, we are likely to describe them as “feminine”.
By contrast, men are generally regarded to be less emotional, less likely to put feelings above reason, more highly structured in their thinking (being the creators of science and philosophy), less passive and bending but more active and forceful. These things are more rational and more conscious. Consequently when a person has these qualities, no matter whether they are male or female, we are likely to describe them as “masculine”.
This is how the terms “masculine” and “feminine” are used, and that is how I use them.”
So you are basing the definitions on how men and women are “regarded”. I countered those associations by explaining that “masculine” is “regarded as” relating to aggression, arrogance and epic stupid; and out-of-reason internal risk-benefit analyses.
Those associations make the communicative power of your definitions counter-productive and problematic.
“So you’re saying that there’s no more rationality to be found in men than there is in women.”
As far as historically – we don’t know. As far as currently – we only have information from some sectors. The idea that women are inherently, or even culturally made to be, less rational (on average) depends on how you define “rational”.
I already provided evidence concerning rational decision-making and male-typical traits related to the stock market and you completely dismissed it.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2012/06/13/why-male-hormones-may-drive-the-stock-market-and-override-investors-ability-to-think-rationally/
If you believe that aesthetic attachments are inherently less rational – I’m not sure how you are defining the term.
“Can’t I just redefine it [“misogyny”] and divorce it from context and then insist that you respect the way in which I am using it? /snark”
To be honest, I don’t mind if you redefine the word “misogyny”, so long as you clearly define what your definition is, just as I have given clear definitions of how I’m using “masculine” and “feminine”.
If you use the word “misogyny” without clearly providing your new definition, then that is deceptive and dishonest.
“femininity (which means: “pertaining to a woman or girl”)”
My dictionary (Oxford English), says:
A. 4. a..Characteristic of, peculiar or proper to women; womanlike, womanly.
or A. 5. Womanish, effeminate
or B 1.b The feminine element in human nature. the eternal feminine
So it doesn’t pertain exclusively to women and girls. It pertains to women and girls only in that it is most common in them. It is not exclusively found in women and girls.
“means: “hatred, dislike, or mistrust of women”) – in a literal sense.”
No, it doesn’t mean these things at all. For this reason it is not misogyny.
I don’t have perfect trust in any human being, so does that mean that I am a misanthrope? No, it doesn’t logically follow. For this reason, nor am I a misogynist.
“I countered those associations by explaining that “masculine” is “regarded as” relating to aggression. arrogance and epic stupid”
I agree with you that men are also associated with those things, but these things are a direct result of consciousness and rationality, since with a limited measure of rationality and consciousness comes ego, and it is ego which produces arrogance, aggression, and stupidity.
Germaine Greer says there are no great women because they have mutilated egos. She is essentially correct, but it would be more accurate to say that women simply don’t have significantly developed egos. Ego, and the stupidity of ego, is an unavoidable stage on the path to greatness.
“I already provided evidence concerning rational decision-making and male-typical traits related to the stock market and you completely dismissed it.”
I didn’t dismiss it. I think I agreed with you insofar as I said that I regard the stock market to be largely irrational, and driven by sentiment (this can translate to hormones if you prefer).
I don’t see an awful lot of rationality in stock market trading, just as I wouldn’t see a lot of rationality in, say, drug addiction.
“If you believe that aesthetic attachments are inherently less rational – I’m not sure how you are defining the term.”
Let’s say you are so highly emotionally attached to your hair looking silky and smooth that you spend half your income on shampoos and conditioners, to the extent that your children are starving and your household is becoming a toxic waste dump. That’s an extreme example of aesthetic attachments getting in the way of reason.
I suspected that you were going the “God – philosopher” route.
The idea that egocentricism is inherently rational and selflessness is inherently irrational; I’m not going to buy.
However, I think if we began discussing that, we would be going into the realm of values and goals where “agreeing to disagree” may actually be a reasonable thing to do (however much I despise that phrase).
It does illuminate your use of the words “feminine” and “masculine” though – and I’m amused that your line of thinking encompasses the stance that “epic stupid” is a milestone on the road to rationality.
🙂
I see your point concerning attachments. I think I misinterpreted you originally as saying that attachments (categorically) get in the way of rationality.
With your example, if the person had no female-typical attachments at all – and was an egocentrist. Why would she care about her starving children or maintaining her household?
I am not buying that decision-making on the stock-market is inherently irrational. Decisions are being made – there is evidence that can be used to make those decisions. My point was that it has been shown that male-typical traits (both in terms of biology and culture) interfere with rational decision making in that case. There is no reason to think that evidence is not generalizable to other types of decision-making.
So, it seems strange to link masculinity (linked strongly to uncontrolled violent and competitive impulses) with rationality and conscious decision-making.
“The idea that egocentricism is inherently rational and selflessness is inherently irrational”
I didn’t say that egocentrism is selfless.
I said, and I quote, “Ego, and the stupidity of ego, is an unavoidable stage on the path to greatness.”
I do, however, believe that ego requires a degree of rationality or reason.
Ego arises from a limited or incomplete application of rationality. Greatness comes when a person goes further along the path of rationality, beyond ego.
“‘ I’m amused that your line of thinking encompasses the stance that “epic stupid” is a milestone on the road to rationality.”
Yes, I know it sounds strange, but in my view, most people are at too low a level to be epically stupid.
A kitten, for example, is never going to do anything epically stupid, but nor is it going to do anything great.
Don’t have a cat, huh?
🙂
“I see your point concerning attachments. I think I misinterpreted you originally as saying that attachments (categorically) get in the way of rationality.”
I do think that all emotional attachments get in the way of reason and rationality. I gave an extreme example in my previous message, but all emotional attachments, without exception, get in the way of reason to some degree.
“With your example, if the person had no female-typical attachments at all – and was an egocentrist. Why would she care about her starving children or maintaining her household?”
She may not care. She may have other priorities that are higher than her children and her household. Or, she may see her children as a logical extension of herself, and will see her future in her own children, and so will invest time and effort into nurturing them, and find immortality through them.
“I am not buying that decision-making on the stock-market is inherently irrational.”
I didn’t say it was inherently irrational. I observe that it is largely irrational and sentiment-driven.
“there is evidence that can be used to make those decisions.”
I do some trading myself, and I can tell you that there’s not a whole lot of research that goes into making those decisions. A lot of it is intuition – especially for day-traders – who don’t have much time to think about what they’re doing.
“My point was that it has been shown that male-typical traits (both in terms of biology and culture) interfere with rational decision making in that case.”
I agree with you that male biology/hormones can interfere with rational decision making, just the same as female biology/hormones can interfere with rational decision making.
But with regard to men, it tends to happen a lot less.
“So, it seems strange to link masculinity (linked strongly to uncontrolled violent and competitive impulses) with rationality and conscious decision-making.”
Competitive instincts can drive a man to want to become more rational, which can, in fact, make him more rational, provided his ego doesn’t get too overblown.
“But with regard to men, it tends to happen a lot less.”
What are you basing that assertion on?
The dictionaries we used differ. The every-day use doesn’t delineate between the traits that are culturally expected and the traits that happened to be associated with women and girls.
Perhaps the problem all along is that you are associating “feminine” with the toxic variety and “masculine” with the non-toxic variety?
Of course, it seems that you have rationalized that masculine traits (even those generally considered very negative – and even irrationality in decision-making itself) as being positive and either rational or leading to rationality.
I think that’s convoluted. I think the concepts of toxic femininity and toxic masculinity might help sort that all out.
You also seem to be jumping into the whole “Stoicism is Rationality” thing wholeheartedly. I might wade into that one at some point (but not today).
I am currently irrationally procrastinating because I have a stronger emotional attachment to discussing things on the internet than grading papers. How feminine of me! /stark
“What are you basing that assertion on?”
Just my observations.
It might have something to do with the fact that women have a marked monthly cycle, and so she’s on a hormonal roller-coaster, which men largely escape – if he’s single, at least. 😉
“Perhaps the problem all along is that you are associating “feminine” with the toxic variety and “masculine” with the non-toxic variety?”
I don’t perceive femininity to be “toxic”, as such. I believe that femininity (in both men and women) serves an evolutionary purpose in that it has provided us with a survival advantage, insofar as it makes us better at doing certain things.
It doesn’t make us better at doing philosophy or thinking rationally, however.
Males also have hormones. I’m not sure how being aware of their effects makes you *less* rational.
By “feminine” do you simply mean “subordinate”?
Since this is continuing here, I’d like to add the statistical aspect of this. Gender (masculine or feminine) is a dichotomous variable. It only takes on two values. The “variable” Kevin is trying to equate it with — emotional or rational– first of all, isn’t a dichotomy. Neither emotion nor rationality is either on or off. There’s a continuum. But, in fact, they don’t form a variable at all. A variable can only vary along one dimension. But that’s not the case for Kevin’s “variable.” People can be both highly emotional and highly rational.
For instance, imagine a kidnap victim who watches her chances and finds a clever way to escape. (I’m thinking of a real case where the victim was a woman.) The victim was highly rational–but also experiencing fairly intense fear. A person who was emotionally unaffected by being kidnapped, took the attitude “well, whatever”, might not be looking as hard for an escape route– would, in fact, be less rational than that kidnap victim who was afraid and figured out how to escape.
So Kevin is taking several continuous variables– fear, elation, sadness among emotions, and at least logic and long term planning among aspects of rationality– and collapsing all these continuous variables into one dichotomy, then equating rational-emotional with masculine-feminine. He knows, however, that women can be rational and men emotional. So the correlation between the variable “gender” and his supposed “emotional-rational” dichotomy is less than 1.
In short, Kevin has introduced three sources of inaccuracies.
1. Emotional vs. rational is not a true variable, because people can be both emotional and rational (and for that matter, totally calm and unemotional while irrational.)
2. Collapsing a continuous variable into a dichotomy always loses information. So, even if he identifies a good variable– say the ability to do logic problems as a measurement of rationality– collapsing the scores down to good or bad throws out most of the data.
3. Since the correlation is less than 1 between gender and a good measurement of rationality, using gender as a proxy for the good measurement, instead of just using the good measurement, is introducing a needless inaccuracy.
That is what I saw, pretty much immediately, in Kevin’s scheme. It fails as a useful way of describing the world– and that is true regardless of whether women score higher, on average, than men on a particular test of emotionality or rationality. There is simply too much unavoidable data loss to make it useful in any real world application. Spending time trying to make it work in a real analysis would be, in my opinion, irrational.
“By “feminine” do you simply mean “subordinate”?”
In broadest terms, I mean unconscious and passive. Reacting on auto-pilot without thinking.
“The “variable” Kevin is trying to equate it with — emotional or rational– first of all, isn’t a dichotomy”
The variable I’m using is actually consciousness itself. The less conscious the more emotional, and the more conscious the less emotional, and the more rational. There is a continuum of consciousness, and so it is a continuous variable. All people have both conscious and unconscious elements.
“People can be both highly emotional and highly rational.”
Not at the same time and with regard to the same object, they can’t. For example, a person couldn’t be highly in love with sex at the same time as being highly rational about it.
“imagine a kidnap victim who watches her chances and finds a clever way to escape”
They would need to put their fear aside temporarily to have any decent kind of structured rational thoughts.
“A person who was emotionally unaffected by being kidnapped, took the attitude “well, whatever”, might not be looking as hard for an escape route”
If they had any purpose in life then they wouldn’t think “well, whatever”. If they have a purpose in life then they will be looking hard for an escape route.
“using gender as a proxy for the good measurement, instead of just using the good measurement, is introducing a needless inaccuracy.”
The use of the term “feminine” is not a “proxy”. It’s only an indicator. If women should ever become a lot more conscious than they are now, then the term will cease to be a good indicator.
“too much unavoidable data loss”
No data is being discarded. All people are partly feminine and partly masculine, which is to say that they are partly unconscious and partly conscious.
I don’t think we have a Spock-rationalist on our hands, but instead a Muadib-rationalist.
If a person is able to keep his hand in the box; he is a man and not an animal.
The idea (correct me if I am wrong Kevin) is that animals are inherently irrational beings and have no real free will as they act on instinct and are easily cowed (you know, the reason “cow” is a sexist insult toward women) – with their only motivations being sex and survival. The feminine person, is generally more like an animal, weak-willed with very little agency; completely consumed by the trappings of being an animal – being fucked, reproducing and caring for young.
The masculine person, however, has cultivated his own ego and gained agency and seeks to impose his will on reality and become “great”. He rises above the animal to be as god. He is not a leaf in the wind, reacting thoughtlessly to his environment being tossed about like lesser beings. He is non-conformist rationalist awesome sauce. He mixes his metaphors without a care in the world.
***
Of course, an alternate explanation is that men are more likely to be arrogant narcissistic bullies with god-complexes who are more apt to socialize by establishing pecking-orders than seeking consensus; and that being such an *animal* has little or nothing to do with being a “rational agent” – but that wouldn’t be very romantic would it? (It would also be sort of gross – but I’m just using this as a flip-side example.)
The question of whether or not women are human, and not just some sort of vegetation, is a *recent* philosophical discussion.
Philosophers are not scientists. That distinction was made a long long time ago.
I was asked once who the evil-twin of physics was – the person suggested that it was the Priest. I said no – priests are the evil-twin of psychologists. Astronomers have astrologers. Chemists have alchemists. Medical doctors have homeopaths. And physicists have philosophers.
(No offense Kevin or any philosopher that might read this. I generally respect you much more than your average astrologer. No offense to astrologers. I respect you more than your average homeopath. Homeopaths – yeah, be offended – I sort of think you’re assholes.)
Philosophy and physics get along most of the time – just as long as they don’t claim that they are doing science – and occasionally we tell them to stop taking our things and they say, “Right back at you.”. A philosopher might say that a scientist is a *type* of philosopher that works under specific assumptions and are limited in scope. I’m cool with that; but they are not the same thing – perhaps science is a daughter instead of a twin?
***
A scientist is going to look at this completely different. Everything you said was exactly true. If you want to take empirical data and come at this from a systematic approach you’d parse this issue up into a thousand pieces and chew through it all.
I looked around a little bit and I found this gem (too expensive, but at least I got to read the introduction): http://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A%3A1007076813819
It’s essentially studying how the status of an individual effects the perception of their “agency” (about the closest thing to what Kevin is calling “masculinity” I suspect) and “communality” (about the closet thing to what Kevin is calling “femininity” I suspect).
I think of philosophy more as art than anything else – sort of the pinnacle of concept art – talking to Kevin is like asking a painter to lead me through his process.
Oh yeah – Spock-rationalists give you cancer: https://sinmantyx.wordpress.com/2012/07/19/i-didnt-want-to-hurt-you-but-youre-pretty-when-you-cry/#comment-159
Ick.
I don’t think having emotions necessarily clouds your judgement. It depends on how severe the stress is that causes the emotional response. You can feel and think at the same time – just because you are thinking doesn’t mean you are suppressing your emotions.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/095943889580028X
I think you are confusing being emotional with having problems with impulse control. You can also be DOING something and thinking that is it not the right course of action – which is really disconcerting. However, that doesn’t always happen in an emotionally charged situation.
Procrastination – my tongue-in-cheek example – is actually a pretty good one. You don’t have to be wrecked emotionally to act irrationally; nor do you have to be irrational to express or experience emotion.
“a Muadib-rationalist.”
Yes, that’s a fairly good analogy. I think of it as a Buddha-rationalist.
It is integrated with the whole of Nature, but consciously. That’s the terrifying thing that only “Kwisatz Haderach” could tolerate.
“He rises above the animal to be as god. He is not a leaf in the wind, reacting thoughtlessly to his environment being tossed about like lesser beings. He is non-conformist rationalist awesome sauce.”
That’s sounds about right. He is Nietzsche’s Superman. The ultimate poet/philosopher.
“an alternate explanation is that men are more likely to be arrogant narcissistic bullies with god-complexes who are more apt to socialize by establishing pecking-orders”
What you are describing here is the incomplete stage. The stage of ego, which for many men is not a mere stage but a final destination.
“The question of whether or not women are human, and not just some sort of vegetation, is a *recent* philosophical discussion. ”
I’m not sure what you mean here. The discussion has been ongoing in Buddhist and Hindu culture for thousands of years.
Buddhism teaches that a woman can only become enlightened by first being reborn as a man (mentally, rather than physically). In the Gospel of Thomas Jesus says of Mary that he would “make her a man, so that she might have a spirit”.
“Philosophers are not scientists.”
Nowadays they are not – if there are philosophers nowadays – but in the past they were often scientists in addition to being philosophers. In those days there wasn’t so much training and specialization necessary to be a scientist.
The physicists we have nowadays tend to be very bad philosophers.
” “communality” (about the closet thing to what Kevin is calling “femininity” I suspect).”
Yes, that’s a good observation. Dave Sim calls it “the merged Void”. It is the opposite of individuality and agency. Celia Green calls it “Society”, akin to the Devil.
“I don’t think having emotions necessarily clouds your judgement”
It depends what you mean by “emotions”. I don’t think of emotions as being mere feelings – like the raw feeling of being hot, cold, hungry, tired, or in pain – but as being the result of some sort of deluded processing, and resulting in things like anger, hate, and love (love of specific things in the world).
On this understanding, emotions are themselves clouded judgement.
When I had to grab the helm of a sailboat and take over in an emergency in the Panama Canal, I was so scared I was shaking. But, I’ll tell you what, I didn’t put so much as a scratch on that boat. Or the canal, for that matter.
Yes, there are reasons for emotions – and one of them is that they can prompt you to do the right thing.
I almost died because having heat exhaustion makes you feel mighty fine! – It’s sort of like being drunk.
It’s a long story – eventually I was saved by a vet in a pick-up truck who saw me on the side of the road.
I really wasn’t doing anything active to same myself though because saving myself from dying, right at that moment, was too much of a drag and was certainly too much effort given how exhausted I was.
At some point, because it was taking too long to die, I got up and stood by the side of the road some more to get someone’s attention. What a bother!
It was an incredibly bizarre experience.
“The physicists we have nowadays tend to be very bad philosophers.”
Yeah – occasionally they sort of step in it – when they are doing things that most people consider “philosophy”.
The physics, itself, though is natural philosophy. We are doing pretty well in that department – as in – that literal department 😉
Oh – and by *recent* I mean y’all are STILL talking about it. It’s as old as the hills.
M.A.Melby–
I’m sure what you’re saying is true. People have also died of carbon monoxide poisoning, feeling good the whole way.
kevinsolway–
You still aren’t getting what I said. Even if “consciousness” forms a good, continuous variable (and I’m under the impression that scientists studying the brain haven’t gotten very far in understanding consciousness, so that right there is problematic) you’re still introducing two unnecessary sources of error.
First, replacing a continuous variable with a dichotomous “indicator” variable ALWAYS means throwing away information. Here’s a simple example. If you replace the continuous variable age-in-months with the dichotomous variable young versus old, you can’t tell anything about the differences 18 and 30 year olds or 90 and 62 year olds. You’ve lost information. Can you see that?
The second problem is that, as you admit, both men and women can exhibit consciousness. So by using a masculine-feminine dichotomy as an indicator of consciousness, you’ve either got to say masculine vs feminine has a correlation of less than 1with consciousness– or that masculine vs feminine is simply a dichotomous indicator of consciousness, and has a correlation of less than 1with any other definition of masculine and feminine– including one’s stated gender. Either way, you’re throwing away readily available information in favor of, at best, a thought-experiment.
So, sure, go ahead and use masculine-feminine to mean anything you want. But I can’t see any way to use what you’re saying in a useful context.
@hoary puccoon
“You still aren’t getting what I said”
I understand exactly what you are saying, and you are wrong in what you say.
Firstly, it is completely irrelevant what scientists think about consciousness, because we are not here concerned chemicals and electrical impulses. We are only interested in a person’s ability to be rational.
“Even if “consciousness” forms a good, continuous variable, you’re still introducing two unnecessary sources of error.”
I’m not “introducing” them. Rationality is inherent in consciousness. It is already there, in consciousness – in human beings, at least. Likewise, in human beings, emotions are there when consciousness is lacking.
So we don’t need to introduce them.
“If you replace the continuous variable age-in-months with the dichotomous variable young versus old, you can’t tell anything about the differences 18 and 30 year olds or 90 and 62 year olds. You’ve lost information.”
As previously explained, we’re talking about infinite degrees of consciousness, not only two. One person might be 10% conscious, while another might be 60% conscious.
So we’re not losing any information at all.
“So by using a masculine-feminine dichotomy”
All people have a degree of masculinity (consciousness) and a degree of femininity (unconsciousness).
So no information is lost or discarded.
Using the terms this way is *extremely* useful since it does away with the problem of categorizing people into simplistic categories, such as “male”, “female”, “transgendered”, etc. If you don’t find it useful, then don’t use it.
“Firstly, it is completely irrelevant what scientists think about consciousness, because we are not here concerned chemicals and electrical impulses. We are only interested in a person’s ability to be rational.”
I’m pretty sure that a person’s ability to be rational has all sorts of dependence on “chemicals and electrical impulses”.
“I’m pretty sure that a person’s ability to be rational has all sorts of dependence on “chemicals and electrical impulses”.”
Yes, but we don’t need to know anything about chemicals and electrical impulses to be able to measure how rational a person is.
…but it helps.
It’s also one of the only ways to parse an inherent ability to be rational and the act of being rational.
kevinsolway–
If I understand your latest iteration, you only have one, continuous variable. A high score on this variable means a person is more conscious/rational/masculine. A low score means a person is more unconscious/emotional/ feminine.
So conscious=rational=masculine and unconscious=emotional=feminine.
According to what you’ve written, that’s the best guess I can make about your working hypothesis. Now, I can see ways to test to see if rational and emotional actually form two ends of a continuum. But, the hypothesis that unconscious people are emotional seems to me highly problematic. And I don’t see the reason to throw in masculine and feminine at all. Those terms have all kinds of other associations. Masculine is usually associated with broad shoulders, low-register voices, facial hair, etc. And feminine with prominent breasts, high voices, lack of facial hair, etc. So, again, you’re throwing out data.
Naturally, you’re perfectly free to say “masculine” and mean something like “more than 50% conscious.” But I can’t see why you find that at all a useful thing to do.
When he says “emotional” I think he means “reactive” or “impulsive” – which people *tend* to be when they are really emotional – for example when you lose your temper or something.
Using feminine and masculine aren’t the least bit useful. Using feminine and masculine to mean this sort of thing is not something Kevin made up – it’s an historic hold-over from a time when (as I said) the question of whether or not women were humans or vegetables was considered some sort of “learned ponderance” instead of fucking stupid.
He thinks that decoupling the feminine from the female and the masculine from the male – completely – somehow fixes this problem. However, when you do that, the justification for using those terms is non-existent other than discussing the history of how those terms were used by people like Weininger and Jesus.
M. A. Melby–
The idea that Kevin is using emotional to mean reactive or impulsive makes more sense than anything he’s actually said. Then conscious must mean something like “self aware,” as opposed to awake. That might actually make some sense. Impulsivity might very well be negatively correlated with self awareness. Whether the correlation would be a perfect -1 is questionable, but at least the negative correlation is a plausible hypothesis. Putting masculine vs. feminine into it, though, as far as I can see does nothing but cloud the water.
Oh yeah – he is not using “conscious” to mean simply awake; but being aware while you are awake.
I think – I’m sure Kevin will correct me if I’m wrong.
I don’t speak “philosopher”, but I can sometimes figure it out in context. 🙂
“It’s also one of the only ways to parse an inherent ability to be rational and the act of being rational.”
I don’t believe in the concept of “inherence”. I’m only interested in the act of being rational.
It’s of no interest to me where the rationality comes from. All we can know for certain, as philosophers, is that there are causes.
“So conscious=rational=masculine and unconscious=emotional=feminine.”
Yes, generally speaking, so far as human beings are concerned.
“the hypothesis that unconscious people are emotional seems to me highly problematic”
“Emotional”, to me, in the broadest sense, means responding automatically to stimuli, without conscious reflection.
In the narrow sense it means maladaptive automatic behavior, such as anger, hate, sadness, and love.
” I don’t see the reason to throw in masculine and feminine at all.”
There’s no absolute need to use those terms, since we can just speak of degrees of consciousness, but they provide an additional pointer as to what is being spoken of, since otherwise people may not know exactly what we mean by conscious and unconscious, in this context.
Human beings are generally so unconscious that they find it extremely difficult to comprehend what consciousness is.
“but they provide an additional pointer as to what is being spoken of, since otherwise people may not know exactly what we mean by conscious and unconscious, in this context.”
The “additional pointer” doesn’t point to what you think it does. It might in societies that still treat women as cattle and beat any original thought out of their heads the moment they disagree – but right now it’s just confusing and unnecessarily indicative of ridiculous attitudes pervasive when men were too stupid to notice that women were humans and too arrogant to reassess such nonsense.
“The “additional pointer” doesn’t point to what you think it does”
Well I think it does. I don’t expect that everyone will see what is pointed to, however.
To me, it’s obvious that women are currently, on average, at a much lower level of consciousness than men. This can be plainly seen in the behavior of modern-day feminists in the “developed” world. The average modern feminist is very close to a perfect example of the kind of unconsciousness I’m talking about. They put anger and hate on a pedestal because they don’t know of any alternative.
Some exceptional feminists, however, such as Camille Paglia, or Girlwriteswhat, show a significant amount of consciousness.
It appears that ks knows precisely as much about feminism as he knows about parametric statistics;)
Girl Writes What is “conscious” or more rational in some way … So Kevin what are your thoughts on her suggestion that a bit of corrective beating by men is fine?
http://freethoughtblogs.com/butterfliesandwheels/2012/08/whats-so-wrong-with-men-beating-up-women-really/
So, it seems that you have redefined “conscious” to mean – someone who agrees with you about stuff?
Oh gosh – I remember that he talked about “girlwriteswhat” on the original thread on NonStampCollector’s blog.
Oh gosh is she a piece of work. I watched her video on male disposability – and I was really digging the interesting perspective and assumed she was a feminist until she started inexplicably ripping into feminism (categorically) and blaming them for all sorts of shit (categorically).
It was like – what the F just happened?
I hung out on her comments for a while and talked to some of the people there. Most were somewhat reasonable, however they simply had a very dim view of feminism. However, she tolerated (practically encouraged) EXTREME misogyny and when I (believe it or not – politely) told someone that it was unhealthy and disconcerting that he fantasied about beating the crap out of random women he saw and that not all women are responsible for the hurts that he has experienced in his life; girlwriteswhat threatened to block me because her comments section was a “safe space” for men.
Her comments are full of adoring men who she has wrapped around her finger because they crave her validation.
She is absolutely the poster child for what happens when men’s experiences are not taken seriously. I think feminism could do better.
Because when those experiences are not treated seriously and men feel devalued and hurt – they need emotional support like anyone else. Our society, however, doesn’t make that emotional support available – as men are sometimes regarded as indestructible – always being the aggressor and not the victim.
It became pretty obvious to me quickly – seeing how she interacts with her fans – that her name says it all: “girlwriteswhat”. She says things that most women would not say, that validates the experiences of men (unfortunately in a pretty toxic way) and are given legitimacy simply because she is a woman.
I’ve been quote mined to be that “True Feminist” or “Rational Person” against other feminists; so I have some experience with the dynamic of, “LOOK – a woman said it – therefore your argument is invalid.”
You don’t have to quote mine her, though – it’s all there.
The type of MRA movement that she appears to be selling is very compelling to lost-souls. The big-bad “feminists” are the REAL reason you have had difficulty in relationships, that you don’t have custody of your kids, that you don’t have a job, that you were abused as a child and don’t have access to social supports, etc. That depression you feel is emasculation, if you hurt women it’s not your fault it is the fault of their weakness, etc so forth. It’s a very scary emotional manipulation.
@oolon
“her suggestion that a bit of corrective beating by men is fine?”
She said nothing of the kind, so you are straight-out lying, as usual. What she actually said was that she found parts of the article to be “seriously ethically questionable”.
” The big-bad “feminists” are the REAL reason you have had difficulty in relationships, that you don’t have custody of your kids, that you don’t have a job, that you were abused as a child and don’t have access to social supports”
Girlwriteswhat doesn’t say any other those things, so you are just making all that stuff up.
You have that backwards, Kevin. I just looked it up. GWW said she *didn’t* find much in the article that was “seriously ethically questionable.”
I’m not going to accuse you of “straight out lying.” I think you’re just confused. But you should be able to see now what people are reacting to.
After talking about male disposibility for half a video, she then went into how that idea is somehow the fault of feminism.
?!
I doubt she has said any of those things I mentioned above explicitly, however, I’m painting her as part of a “brand” of Men’s Right’s Activism which appeals strongly to men that have had difficulties in life and need to imagine a culprit – and that culprit is “feminism”.
Why are boys and men having more difficulty (on average) than girls and women as students in academia? FEMINISM!
Why do men get custody less often than women? FEMINISM!
Didn’t get a scholarship? FEMINISM!
It’s sort of a ridiculous set of crap – that I see CONSTANTLY when discussing these issues. Although this attitude doesn’t exist among all MRA (obviously); the video that I watched from GirlWritesWhat (before she seemed to be on anyone’s radar in secular circles) was DRIPPING with that mentality.
“GWW said she *didn’t* find much in the article that was “seriously ethically questionable.” ”
That’s right, and that means she did find something she found seriously ethically questionable, but that she didn’t find much.
@M. A. Melby
“she tolerated (practically encouraged) EXTREME misogyny”
That’s ridiculous. Do you think she wants to encourage people to hate herself?
She strongly encourages people to attack pseudo-feminism, which she calls “feminism”, for convenience, since nearly everyone who calls themselves a feminist is in fact a pseudo-feminist.
“girlwriteswhat threatened to block me because her comments section was a “safe space” for men.”
I’ll need to read the whole exchange before I can have an opinion on it. Can you at least provide me with the whole quote, and a link to the page?
“Why are boys and men having more difficulty (on average) than girls and women as students in academia? FEMINISM!”
If you want to argue that GWW supports that idea, then you’ll need to provide evidence. She focuses on making videos critical of pseudo-feminism, but it doesn’t follow that she thinks that feminism is the sole cause of all the problems in the world.
Feminism may indeed be one of the main reasons that boys are being alienated from the education system. Since teaching and assessment methods were changed to suit girls, going along with feminist theory, boys are increasingly feeling that they don’t belong in our educational system.
I personally blame men for all the harm that feminism has done, since they should be expected to know better.
The ent
Sorry. I was trying to say, the entire article was a justification for wife-beating, Kevin. So if GWW said she didn’t find “much” in the article that was questionable, she obviously agreed that *some* wife-beating is justified– which is exactly what M.A. Melby and oolon said. Yet again you’re turning words around to mean whatever you want them to mean. I can tell you, getting r
Can’t seem to control my iPad– to conclude. Kevin, feminists aren’t your problem. Redefining words to mean whatever you think will make your case is your problem. And you’re never going to meet a woman who will understand you, because as soon as she figures out one thing you mean and points out a problem with it, you’ll just change all your definitions again.
“Can you at least provide me with the whole quote, and a link to the page?”
Unfortunately (or fortunately) that exchange was well over a year ago. It was her male disposability video. It’s probably findable – but not easily findable. If I have a chance later I’ll try to dig it up.
And yes, this is exactly what I’m talking about:
“Feminism may indeed be one of the main reasons that boys are being alienated from the education system. Since teaching and assessment methods were changed to suit girls, going along with feminist theory, boys are increasingly feeling that they don’t belong in our educational system.”
As I said, I didn’t make myself clear. I’m not accusing GWW of saying all of those things, I’m saying that the video that I watched of hers a long time ago was a good example of an attitude among some MRA that feminism can be blamed for many things – heck even things that feminism fights actively against in many cases.
I’m also reporting my observation that she appears to gain a lot of adulation, not just because she is articulate (which she is), but because she is a woman who validates the male experience in sometimes problematic ways.
I didn’t actually weigh in on the wife-beating thing since I haven’t watched/read that much about it.
If you follow oolon’s link to butterfliesandwheels and read through that thread, there’s another link to Reddit that discusses it. Sorry I thought that was what you were referring to above.
“If I have a chance later I’ll try to dig it up.”
Thanks, I don’t like to see people slandered.
“attitude among some MRA that feminism can be blamed for many things”
In my opinion it can be blamed for many things. But it’s not just “feminism” per se, but the whole attitude which society, including men, has towards women.
” she appears to gain a lot of adulation”
It’s not a crime to gain a lot of adulation.
“sometimes problematic ways”
You’ll need to itemize those. When she has made mistakes they were only minor mistakes, in my opinion.
@hoary puccoon
“you’ll just change all your definitions again.”
I’m extremely consistent with my definitions, and my definitions are dictionary definitions, so I don’t know what you’re talking about.
No, I spent time on the GWW comments section on YouTube a while ago.
“the entire article was a justification for wife-beating”
I remember reading that article, and I remember that the article definitely wasn’t a justification for wife-beating.
You have been consistent with your definitions; but you also seem to shift the focus to those definitions instead of supporting your assertions – and your justification for making the connections you are making is lacking.
So, it appears to be redefinition even though it technically isn’t.
For example: On average women are less conscious and rational than men *currently*; therefore I’m justified in calling lack of consciousness and rationality (which I believe is synonymous with passivity and emotionality) the “feminine” aspect of a person and saying “feminine” is more descriptive than saying “conscious”, “rational”, “passive” or “instinctive” or “prone to impulse” or any other term; My justification for believing that women are more “feminine” (by this definition) than men is – well – YOUR MOM.
“your justification for making the connections you are making is lacking”
I’ve explained why I believe that women are currently, on average, less rational and less conscious than men, have I not?
It’s because I have observed that to be the case. I don’t have anything to hide.
“saying “feminine” is more descriptive than saying “conscious””
I don’t say that “feminine” is always more descriptive than “conscious”, or even that it is more descriptive most of the time. The word “feminine” is only a further indicator that is used for the benefit of those who lack an understanding of what is meant by “unconscious”, “irrational”, “passive”, etc. In an ideal world the use of the term “feminine” would be unnecessary.
I am aware that she made a statement about what she deemed mutually violent relationships – where the woman will essentially beg to be hit by nagging a man as a form of foreplay and then they’ll have good hate sex – or something.
So, yeah, even with the little I know about her stance on such things – she certainly appears to be enabling some pretty seriously toxic attitudes about violence in relationships.
I have some nuanced views about such things myself that steer slightly away from the zero-tolerance types – but yeah – that’s sort of messed up right there.
Four of the women in my old apartment complex where I was a manager had abusive partners that were abusive in different ways; and a different woman (who ended up being evicted) was violent – generally verbally but also destroyed property. When I think of domestic violence; it’s not abstract to me and I think of those situations which really opened my eyes to the reality. I’m not sure I want to read a bunch of wife-beating apologia.
I can imagine that there is a relationships somewhere that fits the bill for what she is talking about – because people are weird and complicated. The concept that this dynamic is prevalent to merit mention seems unlikely – much less be framed in the way she did.
I’d have to look into it more closely though, to make any strong judgements.
“It’s because I have observed that to be the case.” = YOUR MOM
I define “YOUR MOM” and any piece of evidence that isn’t actually in evidence and can’t be independently verified in any way.
That is what I mean by “YOUR MOM”. In this case, I find it satisfying that your “evidence” is LITERALLY “YOUR MOM” since your mom is a woman who you have probably observed. (Though I could be wrong. If you actually have not observed your mother, my apologies for my insensitivity.)
I appreciate that you’re not about to take my word for it – because I don’t have documentation of my observations.
However, calling what I said “slander” is a positive assertion of dishonesty. The conversation I was having on that comments section was very long and a long time ago. I don’t even know if it is findable.
If you know a way to search through YouTube comments – I can find it. Otherwise, I would be pressing “Show More” all day until I finally came across the conversation near the end of December 2011.
“can’t be independently verified in any way.”
It can be independently verified, and it has been by many people.
Of course, it can only be verified by those who can recognize rationality and consciousness when they see it.