
Neuroscientist Larry Cahill on the ‘neurosexism’ debate - thereare5lights
https://medium.com/s/meghan-daum/male-and-female-brains-are-different-should-it-matter-6db82ead5e20
======
dijit
I feel like it might be a cause of being a bit older but my (single) mother
always said that women and men were equal in worth not aptitude.

Her exact words were “men and women are equal but different, in many ways
they’re complimentary” she then explained that some men look down on women
because they didn’t value how women think about things. She also said the same
is true of some women viewing men.

Later she would say that men and women are equally shitty to each other (when
I was being abused at school by girls who knew I could not physically
retaliate).

I currently hold these views and neither feminism nor men’s-rights-activists
seem to ascribe to those values, at best they pay lip service to the notion
that we’re (on average, and grossly generalising) complimentary.

I remember a small blurb about “judging a fish by its ability to climb a tree”
in reference to our education system-

Maybe it’s a old way of thinking. Maybe my mum wasn’t right at all, but I
don’t understand why we can’t celebrate our differences instead of expecting
women to fit in to men sized roles. Or alternatively making a “middle-ground”
box which has to fit both sexes.

If anyone wants to alter my way of thinking; I’m completely open to it- I am
perfectly willing to accept that I’m old fashioned or incorrect here.

~~~
jstanley
I don't really have a horse in this race, but the reason women might want to
fit in to man-sized roles is because all the high-paying roles are man-sized.

~~~
mpfundstein
And because money (and power) is all that counts nowadays right? There was a
time where it was not a shame if a woman chose to stay at home. Nowadays,
people toll their eyes if my wife tells them about her (very own) choice..

~~~
UncleMeat
Yet the us does not have mandatory maternity leave. Money is choices. That
people must sacrifice it in order to do things like raise children is evidence
that our society does not value homemaking.

~~~
AvocadoPanic
Or that our society values self-sufficiency and two-parrent households where
one parent cares for the children in the home.

~~~
amanaplanacanal
I'm not sure this follows. Is the idea that lack of maternity leave will cause
two-parent households? What is the mechanism?

------
YeGoblynQueenne
>> No one seems to have a problem accepting that, on average, male and female
bodies differ in many, many ways. Why is it surprising or unacceptable that
this is true for the part of our body that we call “brain”?

Because the differences between male and female "bodies", meaning anatomical
differences like sex characteristics, are obvious and self-evident, while
differences in brain structure are not and therefore require careful study.

Further, because there are well-known and deeply entrenched cultural biases
that risk derailing this careful study and therefore any initial assumptions
that coincide with these cultural biases must be eliminated before serious
work can begin.

Finally, because any result that just so happens, completely by chance, and
despite the scientists' best effort, to agree with preconceived notions about
"how things are" should be considered extremely suspicious and scrutinised
again, and again, and again, and again, and noone who really wants to
understand the relevant subjects should feel comfortable accepting such
results as settled, much less defend them as "scientific orthodoxy".

In other words, because "bias" is as much a problem in science as it is in
society, and because in the science of sex differences it is doubly so.

~~~
tynpeddler
And just to show how complicated science in general is, your thinking is
another example of bias. Requiring a higher burden of proof for findings that
someone might be uncomfortable with is bad science. The burden of proof must
be equally high for everyone.

The real problem here isn't the science, is the pseudo-science and the
journalism. It's pretty common for people to take single studies out of
context and act as if their cherry picked study is the final word. Science
journalists are supposed to bridge the gap between experts and laymen, but
there seems to be very few good science journalists, and there seems to be
lots of hacks and conmen.

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
>> Requiring a higher burden of proof for findings that someone might be
uncomfortable with is bad science.

That is not my comment. My comment claims that cultural bias can influence the
result of scientific studies and we must be vigilant not to let this happen.

Do you disagree?

~~~
justwalt
Didn’t you say that one result as opposed to the other should be considered
extremely suspicious and looked at again multiple times? Should the opposite
result also be viewed this way?

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
I said that, yes. I didn't say anything about results that make people
uncomfortable. Can you explain why you brought up the subject?

>> Should the opposite result also be viewed this way?

Does the opposite result coincide with a commonly held preconception?

~~~
threwawasy1228
I think what they are arguing is that, YOU are feeling uncomfortable with one
of the results, and thus are biased toward exploring it more than the other
which validates your views. You here are showing that bias again by saying
that because the opposite coincides with commonly held preconceptions, it
should be taken without as much scrutiny. If this isn't what you meant I
apologize but that sure seems to be what you are saying.

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
It's very unpleasant to take part in an online conversation only for people to
try to psychoanalyse you and discern hidden motives in your comments.

My comment says what I meant to say. What it doesn't say, I didn't mean to say
on the subject. Responses to what I didn't say are none of my business and I
won't bother with them any more.

------
MrScruff
I think the point of the article is that the science supports the fact that
there are sex differences in the brain.

Ideas that the article does not propose include:

\- Men are better than Women or vice versa.

\- Men are better suited to X activity or job.

The point was that the science should be evidence lead and defended from
ideologues regardless of your view on the broader political issues. Ideologues
attempt to bend all evidence to support a pre-existing conclusion, and the
politicisation of science is bad in all cases because it undermines the entire
process. It's depressing that a publication such as Nature should be affected
in this way.

~~~
pryce
If your ideology is that any measured sex differences in the brain should be
automatically interpreted as 'innate' facts about men and women, rather than
-say- the cumulative result of a combination of gene expression (including sex
chromosomes), developmental biology and (in anything other than newborns)
socialization, then you're still imposing an ideology on the available data.

'Blank slate theory' simply isn't what feminists are arguing; they are arguing
that our society has _a woefully poor record_ of hastily ascribing traits to a
kind of biological determinism, and further claims of that type should be
heavily scrutinised.

~~~
MrScruff
I believe at least some of the studies mentioned were dealing with rats rather
than humans. I didn't read anything from the sourced article that overstepped
the bounds of what could be said from the research. It seemed like all the
interpretation was being done by the non-scientists.

------
high_derivative
Might as well directly read Cahill's piece which the above article refers to:

[https://quillette.com/2019/03/29/denying-the-neuroscience-
of...](https://quillette.com/2019/03/29/denying-the-neuroscience-of-sex-
differences/)

------
jpmoyn
"One of the things that blows students’ minds is to realize that women
disproportionately, about twice as much, suffer from all anxiety and
depression disorders relative to men, and almost all our models for studying
anxiety disorders are based on male animals."

This right here is one of the concrete reasons for why we NEED to recognize
neurological sex differences, and have studies that focus specifically on
genders. We could discover loads about treatment differences by gender, and
really help a lot of people who are suffering from depression (something that
is becoming more prevalent by the day).

~~~
Balgair
The NIH has moved the requirements in rodent research recently. Previously,
using only male rodents (bucks) was considered just fine. After some really
alarming studies out of McGill [0], much of the field has changed. Now, you
must garner a waiver to only use one sex vs. the other in rodent studies. The
effects of this change remain to be seen, but are generally thought of as
positive.

Some context is needed though. The estrous cycle of dams is fairly
complicated[1]. Controlling variables in hormones, hydration, etc. is _much_
easier in bucks. Since the experiments are easier to control for, you need
less rodents and therefore you need less funding for rodent care and housing,
and you need to sacrifice less rodents to do the experiment (generally). Hence
why they have been the 'preferred' rodent sex historically, among _many_ other
reasons.

Additionally, rodents are some of the 'first' level _in vivo_ models, but are
far from the last in the long line of research that is human applicable. It is
_very_ common that research done in rodents will not translate to other
mainstay research vertebrates like dogs and monkeys, let alone into humans.
The differences in the sexes are _vastly_ outweighed by the differences in
species.

Generally, yes, it is good that we are now defaulting to having to use both
sexes of rodents. However, costs and sacrifices per experiment have risen as a
result. All things have trade-offs in our world.

[0]
[https://www.google.com/search?q=mcgill+pain+mice+research+ma...](https://www.google.com/search?q=mcgill+pain+mice+research+males&oq=mcgill+pain+mice+research+males&aqs=chrome..69i57.11887j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8)

[1]
[https://embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/embryology/index.php/Estr...](https://embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/embryology/index.php/Estrous_Cycle)

------
Jun8
This was the takeaway for me from this interesting interview:

"Q: Is there a battle between actual scientists and science journalists who
may be in thrall to a progressive or woke ideology?

A: No, because most scientists are blissfully unaware..."

As long as scientists stay away from these discussions, the field will be left
to "ideologues" as Cahill calls them, i.e. people who either have little
knowledge of the subject they're discussing or else have such a strong agenda
that it strongly biases their views and prior probabilities.

~~~
bjourne
Calling those who disagree with you "ideologues" is not a great way of
debating. The op-ed he was railing against was written by two professors, one
in neuroscience and the other in history and the philosophy of science. The
book review he also criticized was written by a professor of neuroscience.
There is little evidence for that these people deserve to be called
"ideologues".

[https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/03/opinion/male-female-
brain...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/03/opinion/male-female-brains-
mosaic.html)
[https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-00677-x](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-00677-x)

~~~
int_19h
His review claims that the book cites numerous already-debunked studies while
ignoring large swaths of research that contradicts its thesis, which is hard
to square with a scientific approach regardless of author's credentials. Which
is to say, one can be a scientist and an ideologue at the same time.

Of course, so can Cahill. But is there similar evidence that he cherry-picks
studies to arrive at predetermined conclusions (not a rhetorical question;
genuinely curious)?

~~~
bjourne
Yes, his review is scathing. "I started to laugh in the methods section. The
authors constructed their key measure (called “internal consistency”) to make
it essentially impossible for them to not get the results they got. Or put
another way, the study was basically rigged (although not necessarily
consciously so), as subsequently shown by three other groups also published in
PNAS." So he accuses those he disagrees with of having committed science
fraud. Not only that, this fraudulent science has passed peer review and been
published in PNAS. It is odd that it has not been retracted if it was so
laughable as Cahill claims!

He also claims that these "ideologues" have such a strong grip on academia
that they will destroy your career if you oppose them: "Senior colleagues
warned me as an untenured professor around the year 2000 that studying sex
differences would be career suicide." It is smearing, which he offers no
evidence for, hoping that the readership will already "know" it is true. Maybe
he is right, maybe he is not, I can't tell. If he is right then I hope more
neuroscientists speak up about the bullying and that journals like PNAS stops
publishing junk science.

~~~
int_19h
I don't think he's claiming that the study is outright fraudulent, but rather
that the data in it cannot be summarized simply as "male and female brains
cannot be easily distinguished" without using faulty methodology to _analyse_
it. The accuracy of the data itself is not disputed, so the study is still
valuable for that reason alone.

Indeed, one of the other studies that he cites in support of his claims used
that same data to deconstruct the model. And it really does seem to be as
blatantly fudged as he claims:

"Via simulations, we systematically varied sample characteristics such as the
magnitude of sex differences and correlations among variables. Some of the
simulated scenarios were intentionally unrealistic, involving uniformly strong
sexual dimorphism and/or extremely high correlations between variables (up to
r = 0.90). Despite this, the proportion of “internally consistent” profiles
remained low in all conditions. ... To further reinforce this point, we
applied Joel et al.’s methods to facial morphology features in three species
of monkeys (crab-eating macaques, grivets, and tufted capuchins). Our goal was
to see what percent of individual monkeys would display internally consistent
species-typical profiles of features. Across comparisons, only 1.1–5.1% of the
monkeys showed consistent “species-typical” profiles ..."

[https://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1965.full](https://www.pnas.org/content/113/14/E1965.full)

------
WhompingWindows
If there is a sex-defined bi-modal distribution of neurological
characteristics, meaning for instance in IQ, then there are two separate but
overlapping curves for the sexes, then it's true that there is both overlap
and difference between the sexes. This difference is clearly evident in
physical traits like height, which is an objective measurement, whereas the
utility of IQ will be debated for decades, most likely. We can't argue that IQ
is non-overlapping though, there are low and high outliers in each sex or in
every subgroup that will overlap with every other subgroup (same goes for
race, economic status, education, any socio-dem slice you can think of). Given
large populations, this is practically a certainty.

IMO, the problem arises in the subjectivity of psycho-metrics, which can be
very lackluster tools. IQ, cognitive function, working memory, long term
memory, and on and on -much harder to establish a clear difference between
these across the two sexes, given with such imprecise and arbitrary measures.

------
legulere
If differing hormones lead to different brains why can’t different roles in
society lead to different brains? How is it possible to differentiate the two
effects?

~~~
Viliam1234
You could compare different societies, for example Saudi Arabia and Sweden. If
some gender differences remain, it is still not certainty, but it is quite
likely that they are caused by some brain chemistry.

(Unless you believe that Sweden is just as patriarchal as Saudi Arabia, in
which case I guess there is no argument that could possibly convince you.)

Another possible approach is to examine what happens to transgender people
after they start taking hormones.

~~~
wtdata
The science points towards many of the differences in the brain taking place
in utero. Hormone therapy in adults won't change those.

------
etatoby
_" there are people on this campus in the Gender Studies Department who use
books by one of these ideologues and literally have classes basically saying
that what I’m saying is wrong."_

Q1. What purpose does a Gender Studies Department serve.

Q2. Why are its teachings based not on science, but apparently on the
opposite?

~~~
threeseed
1) Gender Studies is about the discussion of gender. And the purpose is to
satisfy the needs of students who want to learn about it. No different to
studying art, computers, music.

2) It's not based on the opposite. It's based on a superset of factors of
which science is just one. We don't interact with other people according to
purely scientific algorithms and so dealing with the emotional, political and
philosophical aspects are equally as important as the scientific.

~~~
claytongulick
Are you claiming that the emotional, political and philosophical interactions
of humans can not be evaluated scientifically?

If the scientific process does not apply to Gender Studies, that's fine I
suppose, it can be considered part of the arts. However, it would be an error
to then consider forming policy based on it - similar to forming policy based
on music or painting.

In order for us to make policy decisions or recommendations, there needs to be
academic rigor, otherwise we may as well be a theocracy.

I know you didn't directly bring up anything about forming policy, so those
points aren't necessarily directed at you. I bring them up because I see a lot
of material from the field of Gender Studies being used to form policy, law
and social expectations.

~~~
throwaway2048
Science doesn't have a monopoly on truth or validity, in academic contexts, or
otherwise.

[https://www.aaas.org/programs/dialogue-science-ethics-and-
re...](https://www.aaas.org/programs/dialogue-science-ethics-and-
religion/what-scientism)

------
rdlecler1
When I was visiting Pre-schools for my son to enter at 18 months I asked them
how they handle discipline and behavior. They said that sometimes they have a
class which is mostly boys and it’s quite chaotic. If the class is mostly
girls it’s much more calm. That’s at 18-30 months.

~~~
wtdata
Yes, and they are increasingly diagnosing those children with ADHD and putting
them under drugs to control them (roughly 60% of diagnosed children with ADHD
are under medication, 84% of them are boys):

[https://adhd-institute.com/burden-of-
adhd/epidemiology/gende...](https://adhd-institute.com/burden-of-
adhd/epidemiology/gender/)

~~~
asark
I'm worried about this outcome for my 4-year-old. He needs several hours a day
to run himself tired or he acts like a crazy person. I don't think that means
he _is_ a crazy person, or has ADHD, or whatever. I think it just means he
needs to run himself tired for several hours a day. Hell, _I 'd_ probably be
saner and healthier if I did the same.

Meanwhile the kindergarten he'll attend has cut recess to once per day,
something like 20-25min, and if they do indoor "recess" due to weather they
often just watch a movie. Even if he cools off some by the time he goes, he's
gonna need like 4x that much running around outside or in a gym per day,
minimum, to not end up medicated or constantly in trouble.

------
int_19h
One thing of note. The cited review by Cahill says this:

"Rippon does not mention Udry’s work, or its essential replication by Udry’s
harshest critic, a leading sociologist who has described herself as a
“feminist” who now “wrestles” with testosterone."

But the person in question had this to say:

"This totally misrepresents my re-analysis of Udry data. (I’m the feminist who
wrestles with testosterone). Might misrepresent much else as well?"

([https://twitter.com/bjrisman/status/1112534702362165251](https://twitter.com/bjrisman/status/1112534702362165251))

------
trombonechamp
A serious problem is that in 99.9% of things that you study in the brain,
there will be no sex difference. However, every researcher records sex
information in the data they collect. So even if there isn't a scientific
reason to think there might be a sex difference in whatever you are studying,
you might as well test it because it is zero extra effort. That means that
about 1/20 studies will show an effect with $p<.05$.

~~~
zaroth
What you are stating is factually at odds with TFA, and your example of
tracking sex in research studies is interesting because the NIH tweets:

Sex can influence health & disease in many ways, which is why NIH requires
that researchers consider sex as a biological variable (SABV) in all stages of
research: [http://bit.ly/2KXGL7k](http://bit.ly/2KXGL7k)

------
User23
From the article: “To see that headline, honestly, knowing what I know about
the dramatic change in neuroscience in the past 15 to 20 years, it’s not a lot
different than seeing a headline like “The Myth That Evolution Applies to
Humans.” That would be comparable.”

That made me chuckle.

------
lukev
I think the article misrepresents the feminist position a bit. When they
protest the study of "sex differences", it's not (usually) in a flat-earth or
creationist sense of literally denying the science and claiming a-priori that
all brains are identical.

Rather, they are observing that the notion of one sex being biologically
"superior" (or at least more suitable for high-prestige roles) has a long and
oppressive history in our society, and that incautious "research" can be used
to bolster types of sexism that we had hoped were behind us. Indeed, we see
this happening on this very site all the time, whenever the topic comes up.

It's not that sex differences might not exist. It's that the instant you
publish anything on the the topic, conservatives will inevitably and
immediately latch onto it as proof that the traditional gender roles have been
correct all along. Even if that's not what the studies show (and there's
actually no reason to think they would, as the article points out.)

Basically, the point of feminists is that society is so fraught on this issue,
and there's so much latent bias, that it is extremely difficult to perform
research objectively, let alone have it be received objectively and
proportionately by an audience outside the field.

~~~
bjourne
I agree with this. In addition, Larry Cahill puts up some ridiculous strawmen:
"But also stay away from the ideologues on the other side, who unfortunately
are given a voice by editors at places like the New York Times, who know
nothing about the issue except that they’re afraid of appearing to be on the
wrong side of it.", "It’s just that I’ve been drawn into this now by having to
deal with this small but ridiculous vocal group of ideologues, and I feel an
obligation to not let them get away with utterly misrepresenting or even
vilifying my science."

He is misrepresenting the Feminist's position just as much as he is claiming
that they are misrepresenting science. Feminism has become the right's new
Bogeyman.

~~~
int_19h
Cahill does not mention feminism or feminists at any point, either in the
Medium article, or in his review that it links to. You can certainly choose to
interpret "ideologues" in this broad way, but that is a very uncharitable (for
feminism) reading.

~~~
bjourne
"You might think _they’d_ be protesting outside my door. They are not. I teach
a class here called Sex Differences in the Brain. It has a max of 60 people,
and it’s enrolled about to the max. My students come out of the class going,
“Wow, I had no idea about this stuff!” I point out to them that there are
people on this campus in the Gender Studies Department who use books by one of
these ideologues and literally have classes basically saying that what I’m
saying is wrong."

It is blatantly obvious what he means by "ideologues".

~~~
0815test
Well, it seems clear that what he has a problem with is not "feminists" but
people who actually promote junk science, either in parts of academia or on
the media. It's the difference between saying "conservatives are anti-science"
and stating the same thing about creationists or climate-change denialists.

~~~
bjourne
We all have a problem with people promoting junk science! I guess what we
differ on, is whether we believe such people are common in academia.

