You're looking at Less Wrong's discussion board. This includes all posts, including those that haven't been promoted to the front page yet. For more information, see About Less Wrong.

cousin_it comments on Transsexuals and otherkin - Less Wrong Discussion

11 Post author: lucidfox 15 July 2011 07:10AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Article Navigation

Comments (114)

Comments (114)

Sort By: Best

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: cousin_it 15 July 2011 11:12:30AM * 10 points [-]

I don't see any special mystery here. Some people are also unhappy until they "find God". Other people earnestly believe that their arm is missing. Human brains can act in all sorts of ways! You could go LW-extreme and say that delusions are always bad (i.e. a man who thinks he's a woman isn't any better than a man who believes in god, no matter the emotional implications of either belief). Or you could apply the reasoning Yvain used in his "diseased thinking" post, and ask whether society is better off accepting this or that deviation from the mean, or trying to "cure" it.

Comment author: MixedNuts 15 July 2011 11:27:44AM 16 points [-]

The neurology involved in finding god is very real and useful and happiness-inducing. It is also completely independent of the actual existence of a god to be found. (It's actually better for people who try to find or have found god to become atheists. Once you know how god works, you can have more of it.)

Believing in the existence of god, or that your arm is missing, involve wrong beliefs. The ideal (possibly forbidden by brain bugs) resolutions are learning that god isn't a dude in the sky but a perfectly ordinary oxytocin-secreting circuit, and that your arm works and you can use it. I'm not seeing the analogy to gender and species. If told "The reason you go around saying you're trans is a bug in your brain similar to believing your arm is missing.", I expect most transpeople would be able to believe it, in the sense of exhibiting verbal behavior like "Yeah, I was wrong." rather than "No, actually it's my daughter's brain. The spirits spoke to me in my heart.". Yet they wouldn't stop being miserable.

Comment author: lucidfox comment score below threshold [+] (9 children)

Comment author: cousin_it 15 July 2011 11:25:35AM 14 points [-]

I sympathize with your reaction and apologize for the choice of words (which was under a hypothetical, but still).

On the other hand, consider this: a theist could express exactly the same indignation at my comment and they'd still be wrong! And we don't have any reliable way to "cure" theism either. And it's way more prevalent and accepted by society...

What research are you proposing that I look up?

Comment author: lucidfox 15 July 2011 11:28:16AM * 0 points [-]

The Wikipedia articles "Gender" and "Gender identity", as well as their external links, would be a good start - as well as my previous post on LW, "Gender Identity and Rationality", and its discussion area.

As for religion, despite being an atheist myself, I'm not going to assume the hardline "atheism or bust" stance and instead I'll politely decline to derail the thread.

The most important difference is that religion involves people making conclusions about nonexistent (from an atheist's point of view) external entities, while gender identity involves people making conclusions about their own minds - and who can know your mind better than yourself?

Comment author: cousin_it 15 July 2011 11:58:30AM * 14 points [-]

I wonder if the is-ought distinction can help us here. Which phrase better describes your feelings in the past: "desire to be female", or "perception of being female"? If it's the former, there's nothing to argue about and I will happily strike the word "delusion" out of my mind, replacing it with "desire", and everyone's happy. If it's the latter, what gives you confidence that your perception was correct in some sense, other than the perception itself?

Comment author: lucidfox 15 July 2011 12:30:43PM 5 points [-]

It is desire, more or less - if someone believes they already have body parts they actually don't, now that's a delusion. However, calling it "desire" implicitly implies that fulfilling it is optional for their well-being, and that it's somehow okay to treat them the way they don't want to be treated until then.

Comment author: MixedNuts 15 July 2011 11:54:27AM 16 points [-]

people making conclusions about their own minds - and who can know your mind better than yourself?

Seductive, but false. Once my best friend and I disagreed about how I would react to a particular event. He was right. I would also say confidently that people online who claim to be vampires or stuff like that are, if they're sincere, making a mistake. Also, I know things about the psychology of suicidal thoughts that enable me to know important facts about the minds of a certain class of suicidal people better than they do. Also, there are people who deceive themselves about, e.g., being bisexual.

Moreover, if nobody can know my mind better than I, this is a big problem. It means psychology hasn't advanced enough. There's a doctor right now who knows my spine much better than I ever will, and this is how it should be. We need external specialized experts.

And most important - this is completely useless when you're trying to know your own mind. Some people regret transitioning and go back. When I worry about that, I can't shrug and say "Oh, but I can't be wrong!".

Comment author: lucidfox 15 July 2011 12:22:47PM 0 points [-]

Moreover, if nobody can know my mind better than I, this is a big problem. It means psychology hasn't advanced enough.

Psychology hasn't advanced enough. It's been discussed here on LW over and over again. It is ultimately based on an inherent degree of subjectivity and something more akin to a collection of best practices than actual science.

And most important - this is completely useless when you're trying to know your own mind. Some people regret transitioning and go back.

Transitioning is always a risk - the best that can be done is minimizing the likelihood of such an event by carefully evaluating the pros and cons beforehand.

And while it is a therapist making the final decision, it is ultimately based on self-diagnosis. If you don't realize you have gender identity problems, nobody else will do it for you.

Comment author: MixedNuts 15 July 2011 12:24:55PM 7 points [-]

it is ultimately based on self-diagnosis

Yes. That's why it's really fucking important to figure out how to self-diagnose rather than say "Eh, people are whatever they say they are".

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 15 July 2011 03:21:27PM 6 points [-]

I'd settle for improved heuristics.

Comment author: lucidfox 15 July 2011 12:29:18PM 0 points [-]

If you can offer a rigorous, general procedure for that, I'm willing to listen.

cousin_it comments on Transsexuals and otherkin - Less Wrong Discussion

Article Navigation

Comments (114)

Nearest Meetups

Virtual Study Room

Recent Comments

Recent Posts

Recent Open Threads

Recent Rationality Diaries

Recent Wiki Edits

Top Contributors, 30 Days

Recent Karma Awards

Comments (114)

Top Contributors, 30 Days

You'll need to login or register to do that

(Don't worry, it only takes a few seconds)

Create

Login