John - good points and thanks for your research into this. I think greater emphasis should be placed on the relative power relations between the genders. I had wished I was born male when was young simply because I grasped that men had more power than women in the world. It was only during the women's liberation movement that I gained full appreciation of my female gender when realized that I needed to develop enough male psychological qualities in order to bring the female strengths out into the world of politics and business. Had I been born during these times I would likely have been deemed gender dysphoric and could have ended up with having a horrific sex change operation! It is telling that more often adolescents want to be born female as stated in last paragraph from recent research., that the female qualities are now being emphasized perhaps because the power elite want to further weaken beta males so they can continue in their alpha roles?
John, massive review of the literature on transgenderism and you give me courage to explore this topic as well. I have purposefully avoided it because as a Green, the topic is a third rail that can lead to recriminations of "transphobia" if one questions the legitimacy of body dysphoria as a real phenomenon that deserves correction through chemicals and or surgery. But on another level of critique, the Greens value ecological wisdom, which is a vague catch all term for things natural, that derive from nature. Is subjecting a child to gender "affirming" surgery an expression of "ecological wisdom?" Is it wise at all? The ancient people I understand, including modern ancients like the Hawaiin's but also the ancient Hebrew people, I have read about, had nuanced language that was non-binary and allowed people who felt different in their bodies to express themselves and be accepted. I think this is ecological wisdom and is how society should deal with gender dysphoria if it lasts after full puberty is passed through. In closing, I invite you to check out the critique of transgenderism from a feminist journalist who makes the argument that transgenderism is a development of the philosophy of the technocracy which is called transhumanism, a real philosophy, you can find it discussed in wikipedia. But at bottom, transhumanism is anti-ecological wisdom on account it holds that nature is a failed force and that nature gets many things wrong about the human body and even in life itself and that augmentation of the natural form is necessary to make things right. Jennifer Bilek is interviewed and has a youtube post but go to The Expose and find some info on her take; she advanced a full blown conspiracy theory (my favorite topic as you know) https://expose-news.com/2024/08/05/transgender-ideology-is-the-transhuman-agenda/
I read the linked article you provided, and I absolutely agree that transhumanism is an evil philosophy/ideology/goal. I also agree that the transgender nonsense is being promoted by Big $. While some people are making big profits from it, I think the larger motive, even by those not directly profiting from it, is to divide-and-rule the have-nots by promoting something bad and telling the public that it is bigotry to oppose it, with the result that about half the have-nots oppose it because it is bad and the other half support it because they think it is bigotry to oppose it, and the two sides view each other as the enemy. All of the 'woke' stuff is used this way (such as "anti-racism"/CRT) as I discuss at https://www.pdrboston.org/21st-century-divide-and-rule .
I recently wrote about a terrible 'woke' Massachusetts legislature bill about parentage in a Substack post at https://johnspritzler.substack.com/p/listen-liberals-if-you-support-this?r=1iggn . Yesterday that bill was signed into law by the Mass. governor. Now in Massachusetts there are, legally, no mothers and fathers, only birth-givers and "the other person."
Transhumanism posits that you can be incarnated into a machine with all of your consciousness and memories and feelings and values etc. This is false. To see why, do this thought experiment.
Imagine that such a machine that is supposedly you is seated at a table right next to you (the real you.) Imagine that there is a device on the table that is hooked up to both you and also, separately, to the machine-you. Imagine that this device can administer an excruciatingly painful shock to either you or to machine-you. Imagine that there is a toggle switch on the device that you can control, in one position the pain goes to you and in the other position it goes to the machine-you. Imagine that the device is locked in the 'on' mode so it administers the pain to either you or machine-you depending on the position of the toggle switch.
OK, now consider that the pain is now going to you and you have the ability to throw the toggle switch so the pain goes to machine-you. What will you do? If the machine-you is REALLY you, as the transhumanists claim, then you have no reason whatsoever to throw the switch. But obviously you DO have a reason--a perfectly valid reason--for throwing the switch. Namely, you throw the switch because the machine-you is not really you. The machine-you is only you in the false sense that a robot that looks and acts like you is really you.
There is good reason to believe, as I do, that consciousness occurs in biological organisms (organisms that are based on metabolism) and not otherwise. A biological clone of you could theoretically be produced. But even that would not (as per the above thought experiment) REALLY be you. We need to prevent the transhumanists from getting their way!
Regarding nature and technology, I am not opposed, in principle, to changing nature and using technology to do that. Humans would likely not have survived had they not changed the natural landscape to avoid dying of thirst or starvation or flood, etc. I discuss this in the beginning of my article about the environment at https://johnspritzler.substack.com/p/an-egalitarian-view-of-physical-reality?r=1iggn . I disagree with Ted Kazinski ("unabomber") in his total rejection of technology, and wrote about it at https://www.pdrboston.org/is-technology-the-problem .
Regarding gender dysphoria, I accept that some people suffer from this mental condition. I think they deserve to be treated with the same dignity and respect as anybody else. I wrote about how this plays out with respect to bathrooms and shower rooms and locker rooms and sports competitions at https://www.pdrboston.org/bathroom-policy-re-transgender .
John - good points and thanks for your research into this. I think greater emphasis should be placed on the relative power relations between the genders. I had wished I was born male when was young simply because I grasped that men had more power than women in the world. It was only during the women's liberation movement that I gained full appreciation of my female gender when realized that I needed to develop enough male psychological qualities in order to bring the female strengths out into the world of politics and business. Had I been born during these times I would likely have been deemed gender dysphoric and could have ended up with having a horrific sex change operation! It is telling that more often adolescents want to be born female as stated in last paragraph from recent research., that the female qualities are now being emphasized perhaps because the power elite want to further weaken beta males so they can continue in their alpha roles?
Thank you.
I'm glad you dodged the bullet and didn't get hormones or surgery!
John, massive review of the literature on transgenderism and you give me courage to explore this topic as well. I have purposefully avoided it because as a Green, the topic is a third rail that can lead to recriminations of "transphobia" if one questions the legitimacy of body dysphoria as a real phenomenon that deserves correction through chemicals and or surgery. But on another level of critique, the Greens value ecological wisdom, which is a vague catch all term for things natural, that derive from nature. Is subjecting a child to gender "affirming" surgery an expression of "ecological wisdom?" Is it wise at all? The ancient people I understand, including modern ancients like the Hawaiin's but also the ancient Hebrew people, I have read about, had nuanced language that was non-binary and allowed people who felt different in their bodies to express themselves and be accepted. I think this is ecological wisdom and is how society should deal with gender dysphoria if it lasts after full puberty is passed through. In closing, I invite you to check out the critique of transgenderism from a feminist journalist who makes the argument that transgenderism is a development of the philosophy of the technocracy which is called transhumanism, a real philosophy, you can find it discussed in wikipedia. But at bottom, transhumanism is anti-ecological wisdom on account it holds that nature is a failed force and that nature gets many things wrong about the human body and even in life itself and that augmentation of the natural form is necessary to make things right. Jennifer Bilek is interviewed and has a youtube post but go to The Expose and find some info on her take; she advanced a full blown conspiracy theory (my favorite topic as you know) https://expose-news.com/2024/08/05/transgender-ideology-is-the-transhuman-agenda/
Thank you!
I read the linked article you provided, and I absolutely agree that transhumanism is an evil philosophy/ideology/goal. I also agree that the transgender nonsense is being promoted by Big $. While some people are making big profits from it, I think the larger motive, even by those not directly profiting from it, is to divide-and-rule the have-nots by promoting something bad and telling the public that it is bigotry to oppose it, with the result that about half the have-nots oppose it because it is bad and the other half support it because they think it is bigotry to oppose it, and the two sides view each other as the enemy. All of the 'woke' stuff is used this way (such as "anti-racism"/CRT) as I discuss at https://www.pdrboston.org/21st-century-divide-and-rule .
I recently wrote about a terrible 'woke' Massachusetts legislature bill about parentage in a Substack post at https://johnspritzler.substack.com/p/listen-liberals-if-you-support-this?r=1iggn . Yesterday that bill was signed into law by the Mass. governor. Now in Massachusetts there are, legally, no mothers and fathers, only birth-givers and "the other person."
Transhumanism posits that you can be incarnated into a machine with all of your consciousness and memories and feelings and values etc. This is false. To see why, do this thought experiment.
Imagine that such a machine that is supposedly you is seated at a table right next to you (the real you.) Imagine that there is a device on the table that is hooked up to both you and also, separately, to the machine-you. Imagine that this device can administer an excruciatingly painful shock to either you or to machine-you. Imagine that there is a toggle switch on the device that you can control, in one position the pain goes to you and in the other position it goes to the machine-you. Imagine that the device is locked in the 'on' mode so it administers the pain to either you or machine-you depending on the position of the toggle switch.
OK, now consider that the pain is now going to you and you have the ability to throw the toggle switch so the pain goes to machine-you. What will you do? If the machine-you is REALLY you, as the transhumanists claim, then you have no reason whatsoever to throw the switch. But obviously you DO have a reason--a perfectly valid reason--for throwing the switch. Namely, you throw the switch because the machine-you is not really you. The machine-you is only you in the false sense that a robot that looks and acts like you is really you.
There is good reason to believe, as I do, that consciousness occurs in biological organisms (organisms that are based on metabolism) and not otherwise. A biological clone of you could theoretically be produced. But even that would not (as per the above thought experiment) REALLY be you. We need to prevent the transhumanists from getting their way!
Regarding nature and technology, I am not opposed, in principle, to changing nature and using technology to do that. Humans would likely not have survived had they not changed the natural landscape to avoid dying of thirst or starvation or flood, etc. I discuss this in the beginning of my article about the environment at https://johnspritzler.substack.com/p/an-egalitarian-view-of-physical-reality?r=1iggn . I disagree with Ted Kazinski ("unabomber") in his total rejection of technology, and wrote about it at https://www.pdrboston.org/is-technology-the-problem .
Regarding gender dysphoria, I accept that some people suffer from this mental condition. I think they deserve to be treated with the same dignity and respect as anybody else. I wrote about how this plays out with respect to bathrooms and shower rooms and locker rooms and sports competitions at https://www.pdrboston.org/bathroom-policy-re-transgender .
Massive paper,John. Whew. didn't read all of it, but well done!
Thank you!
Thank you for this. I appreciate the comprehensive research as well as the rational and compassionate/humane approach.
Thank you.