+It really is an apples-to-oranges comparison, rather than "two populations of apples with different mean weight"
+
+https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/cu7YY7WdgJBs3DpmJ/the-univariate-fallacy
+https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/vhp2sW6iBhNJwqcwP/blood-is-thicker-than-water
+
+If you just had one integrated league, females wouldn't be competitive (in almost all sports, with some exceptions [like ultra-distance swimming](https://www.swimmingworldmagazine.com/news/why-women-have-beaten-men-in-marathon-swimming/)).
+]
+
+[TODO: sentences about studies showing that HRT doesn't erase male advantage
+https://twitter.com/FondOfBeetles/status/1368176581965930501
+https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-020-01389-3
+https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/55/15/865
+]
+
+[TODO sentences about Lia Thomas and Cece Tefler https://twitter.com/FondOfBeetles/status/1466044767561830405 (Thomas and Tefler's feats occured after Yudkowsky's 2018 Tweets, but this kind of thing was easily predictable to anyone familiar with sex differences—cite South Park)
+https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10445679/Lia-Thomas-UPenn-teammate-says-trans-swimmer-doesnt-cover-genitals-locker-room.html
+https://twitter.com/sharrond62/status/1495802345380356103 Lia Thomas event coverage
+https://www.realityslaststand.com/p/weekly-recap-lia-thomas-birth-certificates Zippy inv. cluster graph!
+https://www.swimmingworldmagazine.com/news/a-look-at-the-numbers-and-times-no-denying-the-advantages-of-lia-thomas/
+]
+
+Given the empirical reality of the different multivariate trait distributions, "Who are the best athletes _among females_" is a natural question for people to be interested in, and want separate sports leagues to determine. Including male people in female sports leagues undermines the point of having a separate female league.
+
+(Similarly, when conducting [automobile races](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto_racing), you want there to be rules enforcing that all competitors have the same type of car for some common-sense-reasonable operationalization of "the same type", because a race between a sports car and a [moped](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moped) would be mostly measuring who has the sports car, rather than who's the better racer.)
+
+In light of these _empirical_ observations, Yudkowsky's suggestion that an ignorant comittment to an "Aristotelian binary" is the main reason someone might care about the integrity of women's sports, is revealed as an absurd strawman. This just isn't something any scientifically-literate person would write if they had actually thought about the issue _at all_, as contrasted to having _first_ decided (consciously or not) to bolster one's reputation among progressives by dunking on transphobes on Twitter, and wielding one's philosophy knowledge in the service of that political goal. The relevant empirical facts are _not subtle_, even if most people don't have the fancy vocabulary to talk about them in terms of "multivariate trait distributions".
+
+Yudkowsky's pretension to merely have been standing up for the distinction between facts and policy questions isn't credible: if you _just_ wanted to point out that the organization of sports leagues is a policy question rather than a fact (as if anyone had doubted this), why would you throw in the "Aristotelian binary" strawman and belittle the matter as "humorous"? There are a lot of issues that I don't _personally_ care much about, but I don't see anything funny about the fact that other people _do_ care.
+
+(And in this case, the empirical facts are _so_ lopsided, that if we must find humor in the matter, it really goes the other way. Lia Thomas trounces the entire field by _4.2 standard deviations_ (!!), and Eliezer Yudkowsky feels obligated to _pretend not to see the problem?_ You've got to admit, that's a _little_ bit funny.)
+
+Writing out this criticism now, the situation doesn't feel _confusing_, anymore. Yudkowsky was very obviously being intellectually dishonest in response to very obvious political incentives. That's a thing that public intellectuals do. And, again, I agree that the distinction between facts and policy decisions _is_ a valid one, even if I thought it was being selectively invoked here as an [isolated demand for rigor](http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/14/beware-isolated-demands-for-rigor/) because of the political context. Coming from _anyone else in the world_, I would have considered the thread fine—a solidly above-average performance, really. I wouldn't have felt confused or betrayed at all. Coming from Eliezer Yudkowsky, it was—confusing.
+
+Because of my hero worship, "he's being intellectually dishonest in response to very obvious political incentives" wasn't in my hypothesis space; I _had_ to assume the thread was an "honest mistake" in his rationality lessons, rather than (what it actually was, what it _obviously_ actually was) hostile political action.
+
+I was physically shaking. I remember going downstairs to confide in a senior engineer about the situation. I had to do _something_. But if Yudkowsky was _already_ stonewalling his Twitter followers, entering the thread myself didn't seem likely to help.
+
+[TODO: I had his email address, and I didn't think I had the right to demand his attention, so I threw in another $1000 cheerful price (and cc'd Michael and "Erin Burr") just to read it—]
+
+[TODO: Michael called me up and we talked about how the "rationalists" were over]
+
+[TODO: "not ontologically confused" concession. You might think that should be the end of the matter—but this little "not ontologically confused" at the bottom of the thread was much less visible and loud than the bold, arrogant top-level pronouncement insinuating that GCs are philosophically confused. Was I greedy to want something louder? https://twitter.com/ESYudkowsky/status/1068071036732694529 ]
+
+[TODO: email Scott 1 December (cc Anna Jonah Sarah Michael) "is there any chance of getting an explicit and loud clarification and/or partial-retraction of "The Categories Were Made for Man"?"—writing to him because marketing is a more powerful force than argument;
+
+> Rather than good arguments propagating through the population of so-called "rationalists" no matter where they arise, what actually happens is that people like Eliezer and you rise to power on the strength of good arguments and entertaining writing (but mostly the latter), and then everyone else sort-of absorbs most of their worldview (plus noise and [conformity with the local environment](https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2017/08/12/what-is-rationalist-berkleys-community-culture/)). So for people who didn't win the talent lottery but think they see a flaw in the Zeitgeist, the winning move is "persuade Scott Alexander".
+> So, what do you say, Scott? Back in 2010, the rationalist community had a shared understanding that the function of language is to describe reality. Now, we don't.
+> "No, the Emperor isn't naked—oh, well, we're not claiming that he's wearing any garments—it would be pretty weird if we were claiming that!—it's just that utilitarianism implies that the social property of clothedness should be defined this way because to do otherwise would be really mean to people who don't have anything to wear" gaslighting maneuver needs to die. You alone can kill it. My model of you assigns more than 20% probability that you will.
+
+> I don't have a simple, mistake-theoretic characterization of the language and social conventions that everyone should use such that anyone who defected from the compromise would be wrong. The best I can do is try to objectively predict the consequences of different possible conventions—and of conflicts over possible conventions.
+
+helping Norton live in the real world
+]
+
+[TODO: re Ben's involvement—I shared Scott thread with Ben and Katie; Michael said "could you share this with Ben? I think he is ready to try & help." on 17 December
+19 December
+> talk more with Ben Hoffman, he will be more helpful in solidifying your claims about IP defense etc. You are ethically or 'legally' in the right here, and the rationalist equivalent of a lawyer matters more for your claims than the equivalent of a scientist.]
+[TOOD: Sarah's involvement: I cc'd her on the 1 December Scott thread, and 16 December draft to Michael]
+
+To Anna—
+> I agree that "You have to pass my litmus test or I lose all respect for you as a rationalist" is psychologically coercive (I'm even willing to say "violent") in the sense that it's trying to apply social incentives towards an outcome rather than merely exchanging information. But sometimes you need to use violence in defense of self or property, even if violence is generally bad.
+
+> If we think of the "rationalist" label as intellectual property, maybe it's property worth defending, and if so, then "I can define a word any way I want" isn't obviously a terrible time to start shooting at the bandits.
+
+> What makes my "... or I lose all respect for you as a rationalist" moves worthy of your mild reproach, but "You're not allowed to call this obviously biologically-female person a woman, or I lose all respect for you as not-an-asshole" merely a puzzling sociological phenomenon that might be adaptive in some not-yet-understood way? Isn't the violence-structure basically the same? Is there any room in civilization for self-defense?