X-Git-Url: http://unremediatedgender.space/source?p=Ultimately_Untrue_Thought.git;a=blobdiff_plain;f=notes%2Fa-hill-of-validity-sections.md;fp=notes%2Fa-hill-of-validity-sections.md;h=b06d2815c18bb5afc23eff6e93acc33a893afb6b;hp=3d963caf33e2ddd653c067c15c53ff6ffeb1b423;hb=a8a147744e37b4f22e9e2801f364efa0a6d797b0;hpb=ddfae558ffaa71a3ab44c2ee93df4d3eaa7f4a17

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@@ -973,20 +973,16 @@ re Yudkowsky not understanding the "That's So Gender" sense, I suspect this is b
 
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-Psychology is a complicated empirical science: no matter how "obvious" I might think something is, I have to admit that I could be wrong—[not just as an obligatory profession of humility, but _actually_ wrong in the real world](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/GrDqnMjhqoxiqpQPw/the-proper-use-of-humility). If my fellow rationalists weren't sold on the autogynephilia and transgender thing, I might be a bit disappointed, but it's definitely not grounds to denounce the entire community as a failure or a fraud.
 
 
-A striking pattern from my attempts to argue with people about the two-type taxonomy was the tendency for the conversation to get derailed on some variation of "Well, the word _woman_ doesn't necessarily mean that," often with a link to ["The Categories Were Made for Man, Not Man for the Categories"](https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/11/21/the-categories-were-made-for-man-not-man-for-the-categories/), a 2014 post by Scott Alexander arguing that because categories exist in our model of the world rather than the world itself, there's nothing wrong with simply _defining_ trans people to be their preferred gender, in order to alleviate their dysphoria.
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 [TODO:
 Email to Scott at 0330 a.m.
 > In the last hour of the world before this is over, as the nanobots start consuming my flesh, I try to distract myself from the pain by reflecting on what single blog post is most responsible for the end of the world. And the answer is obvious: "The Categories Were Made for the Man, Not Man for the Categories." That thing is a fucking Absolute Denial Macro!
 ]
 
-This ... really wasn't what I was trying to talk about. _I_ thought I was trying to talk about autogynephilia as an _empirical_ theory of psychology, the truth or falsity of which obviously cannot be altered by changing the meanings of words.
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-But this "I can define the word _woman_ any way I want" mind game? _That_ part was _absolutely_ clear-cut. That part of the argument, I knew I could win.
 
 To be clear, it's _true_ that categories exist in our model of the world, rather than the world itself—the "map", not the "territory"—and it's true that trans women might be women _with respect to_ some genuinely useful definition of the word "woman." However, the Scott Alexander piece that people kept linking to me goes further, claiming that we can redefine gender categories _in order to make trans people feel better_: