Well, I was using both the contexts of references to bodies in earlier discussion and the examples of both anorexia and phobias you raised. The definition of "just being wrong" doesn't fit with the terms people have been using. The use of delusion I was referring to also differs from hallucination. It doesn't necessarily pose a phenomenalogical appearance. Sometimes the delusional idea about the empirical context which will happen (e.g. some phobias).

My point about the individual had nothing against the publicity of language.

Firstly, the truth of an identity isn't defined by a feeling. Feelings just report or do not report a turth of identity. Someone doesn't belong to an identity because they feel something, they have an identity and have feelings which reflect it or not.

Secondly, the point I was making about the individual was descriptive of a state of a person feelings, not a claim about if their feelings were right. It's point about who their feeling is about about, not whether it's accurate or not.

This point is defined by the publicity of concepts. A persons feelings about their identity reference them, not other people. In any case a person's feelings about their own identity only reference them. The feeling in question is only about them.

They are feeling they are a woman , not anyone else. This remains to whether their feeling is accurate or not. Like a name, their feeling they are a woman is only about them. The point isn't being made on them being right about their identity, it's about who their feeling is about.

Delusion usually implies some sort or misread phenomenological presence in the world. Seeing something which isn't there. Supposing threats which will impact upon you which aren't there. In this case, it also specifically mentioning in the context of supposedly not recognising the present body in some way.

If we are only talking about being mistaking about meaning or a concept, it loses this force. Since there is no longer something seen at stake, a person cannot be seeing what's not there. They are just wrong about some concept. Their error is outside the context of thinking an empirical manifestation "is what it is not."

This is just bare assertion. Do you have an argument demonstrating how this is the case, or is it just a statement of what you would like to be the case? — Pseudonym

I would have thought the logical inference at play was obvious... we are speaking about an individual's feelings about their own identity. The very concept we are using is limited to a feeling about her own identity. She not feeling about other women's identity in this instance. The feeling is a sense of her own.

A personal name is not a category. People called Bill are not claiming to be similar to other people called Bill. They're not claiming, based on private feelings to be part of the set {all people called Bill}, the only criteria for membership of the set {all people called Bill} is being called Bill. — Pseudonym

Sex and gender identities aren't claiming to be part of that sort of set either. When someone sets out such an identity, they are only speaking for themselves. They are only talking about their feelings of sex and gender. If someone has feelings claiming to be a woman, said feelings don't act to report how anyone else is a women. Each woman has their own feelings which report (or do not report) the fact of their identity.

The issue is about bodies because that's where the charge of delusion is brought. That's why it's identified as "false" and a "delusion." Trans people are supposed mistaking their feelings of a certain body for how their body exists (and so defining which sex/gender) they belong to.

Without reference to the bodies in this way, there is no longer a standard for their feelings being false in the claimed sense of delusion. They could be wrong about an identity category, but it would amount to no error in recognising their biological form. A delusion it is not.

Obviously, one can claim they are are mistaken about an identity category itself (hence my earlier point of how the bigotry/rejection/discrimination is within the very conceptual terms of this position), but it is entirely unclear as to why that would be or why you would assume that in the first instance. If a mistake about the body is not at stake, we no longer have a clear reason for saying someone feelings "are false."

One can pose it directly. We don't even need to consider trans identity to do this. I could walk up to anyone who feels they are a man and claim: "You're mistaken. You're feelings don't show the truth. You actually belong to the category of woman," a claim which is true on its own terms (i.e. the fact of whether this person was a man or woman), but the arguments here were couched in the context of being mistaken about biology.

Let me pose you a little conundrum which might have you rethinking about the usefulness of the subjective/objective split: what is the status of your experiences and language use? Are these merely "subjective" such that they have no objective important? Are we prevented form saying it is true you are experiencing something else? More to the point, how does anything we might talk about, which is a "something of our experience" true if our subjectivities don't constitute something which is true and can said to report truth?

Not only would it seem the "in here" is much more related to the "out there" than the split would seem to want to imply (given all our understandings of the empirical world are something else of experience, but it would seem that the "in here" is entirely public. Just as we know about the tree in our backyard, it would seem we can know when subjective experiences exists and their character.

Else, we would have no "in here" to speak about. We couldn't talk about present experiences which did not exist and had no consequences for true statements. Really, subjectivities (that is the presence of states of experience) are objective in the way assigned to "out there" in split. They are, in fact, "out there" so to speak. If I experience happiness, that happened is an "objective" fact of the world just like the presence of a rock would be.

We already know people can fail to correctly report themselves and their identity. It even happens with sexuality and gender stuff. Some people realise what they thought were was something they were not.

My point is the delusion argument does not make sense. Trans people to not mistake their bodies for something they are not. If people are going to be wrong about their identity category, it not on the basis of misunderstanding the biological states they have. If someone is going to be wrong about being a man or woman, it has to be on the basis of a given category itself. It has nothing to do with facing to understand what body they have or being "deluded" into think they have biological states they do not.

I also never claimed whether or not someone's feelings were accurate in the context of this point. My point is outside that context: that, regardless of whether their feelings are accurate or not, to describe them as deluded about their bodies is inaccurate.

Yes. Some people are sometimes deluded. You're begging the question. If you start from a neutral position that it is possible for people to be deluded about things (to believe things which are not the case) then you cannot argue that the possibility of a group being deluded can't be discussed because to do so would be to argue that such a group are mistaken.

Anorexics are deluded. They think they're fat when they are not. They are mistaken. They're not 'really' fat such that we should put them on a diet. They're 'really' deluded so we should help then realise a position which is more 'true'. Agrophobics are deluded, they think wide open spaces are threatening when they are not. Depressives are deluded, they think that their circumstances contain more negatives than they do. — Pseudonym

All of which is manifestly untrue of trans people: were they to mistake for their body for something it was not, they wouldn't have a problem. If they were deluded about there body in the way, they would encounter it and think it of a form they sensed. This is not the case. A trans persons dysphoric about their body knows how it exists. The trans woman does not mistake her penis for a vagina like they anorexic mistakes their healthy body for fat. She knows she has a penis. In this respect, their experiences is defined in not being deluded, in recognising their body is different to the one they sense.

I'm not begging any sort of question. I'm coming form a position which recognises the trans person cannot possibly be deluded in this way because their experience is defined in recognising the bodily states they have.

Then again, some (assigned in the usual discourses) males cannot have one either. :smile:

https://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/condition/congenital-bilateral-absence-of-the-vas-deferens

The bigotry isn't a question of specific intention. It's in the very concepts Harry is using. In taking a position trans people are deluded, they's taken a position trans people are mistaken, trans identities aren't real and values they ought to be rejected in favour of "telling the truth."

It's simalir to if I were to say: "Anyone named Pseudonym was deluded in claiming to be a member of The Philosophy Forum. The person targeted is rejected, they are positioned as a danger to trust or respect, they are set-up as a target, etc.

Well, I was dealing with instances in which there were male and females.

You're right. We shouldn't assume there are males and females at all. There could be a moment, for example, where it was a fact no-one was of those categories, even if they had the same biological features as other people called "male" and "female."

In any case, we have to let the truth of an individual do the work here. To have males and females, the people and bodies who have that meaning have to exist. If we just just have a bunch of beings with penises who have "no sex," we will have no males.

(and this is why we mostly find sexed bodies, in most cases, it's a fact of us humans to belong to one. For most of us, it is true we have a sex. We are describing a fact of the people in question, just a fact given by a truth of someone's sex, rather than being a certain body ).

Having certain specifiable physical characteristics is being female. — Banno

It's also this very issue of meaning at stake in the case of trans people with concerns about there body.

Why do they identify with the opposite meaning then society has assigned them? Because of how those social practices and categories represent the body.

Their trans identity is about being recognised in a way which reflects they body sense/ought to have. They are seeking others to recognise the body they ought to have in how they are socially categorised, to be understood as someone who is properly, female/male, not just a woman/man.

Correct, there are two groups male and female (and many more). That's given by the definition of the identity terms.

We can even say that having certain identifying physical characteristics is being female. After all, every woman has specific physical characteristics which are here own.

The issue here, however, is supposing this group is only limited to a shallow set of specific characteristics. When we assume that being female only amounts to having XX chromosomes, a vagina, breasts, a womb, etc, we engage in a disgusting form of idealism.

We suppose we have these concepts which necessary set out the full range of female individual that might ever occur, without actually paying attention to who exists in front of us. We forget to the proper work of description (What biological features does someone how? What meaning of sex do those have in this instance? Do they even have a meaning of sex in this instance? ) and instead work only form ad hoc assumptions which demand it must be true. We forget other people not given concept/assumption of sex!

That doesn't really help Banno's case here.

Sex isn’t the body. There is a distinction between bodies, genitals, chromosomes and the use of sex categories. Take away sex categories, the body lose nothing. We can still each body perfectly well.

Despite the common insistence otherwise, the presence of a body doesn’t equal present of a sex category. Our bodies don’t means sex. Sex is, sometimes, a particular meaning of bodies. A categorisation of some bodies, but not defined by the presence of a body. To have certain hormones genitals, chromosomes, etc. is not how someone has a sex category. Sex identity is its own feature, sure of some bodies but not of others. One’s sex made by their sex, not their body.

We no doubt often use sex to mean certain types of bodies, but such a use of language is different the mere presence of a body being the truth condition of sex.

The language we use to mean about other things is distinct from those things. When I speak about a tree, it is not how the tree exists. If I speak about sex, it is not how a body I refer to exists. “Males” and “females” are not present be a presence of genitalia, chromosomes, hormones or any other biological feature.

They are all contingent beings, I wasn't suggesting otherwise. My reference to necessity is only in respect to their concept. In any case, the concept or meaning of a contingent state is necessary.

"The green leaves of the tree in my backyard" is a necessary meaning of that contingent state, until such time as it expresses a different meanings or ceases to be as a state. If someone comes along claiming this state doesn't mean "green leaves of a tree in my backyard yard" they will be necessarily wrong.

The concepts themselves are the ground of knowledge. Each concepts is necessarily expressed so grounding there is something for us to know.

The world has necessarily expressions of conceptual meaning, such that things, be they empirical truths (they express a concept which allows understanding of them) or logical ones. Human experience adds nothing special to them. Our experiences are just moments when we understand some of this necessary conceptual order.

Issues understanding the place of knowledge do stem from moves made by the empiricists, in the sense of philosophers, such as Kant, who equate our experience as the grounding of our knowledge. In claiming our experience is the origin of knowledge, they undercut the underlying conceptual order. We get stuck in a position of being unable to say necessary concepts define knowledge because what is known get reduced to a function of contingent experience. We mistake means of our knowing (our experiences) for the means of what is known (whatever truth we might know or not).

To unpick this equivocation, we have to return to the question of how there are things to know. What is it we need to know about something? How do our experiences of knowledge have understanding?

Once we make the move back to an account of Rationalism, where a necessary conceptual order forms the things we know, something interesting happens in the context of empirical knowledge. Since events of the world are of the necessary conceptual order, rather than just our experiences, empirical observation is not the foundation of knowledge , including of empirical states.

We can know about empirical events we never even observe.

In the context of metaphysics this very important because it reveals an incoherence to certain empiricist objections to realism. If I want to make a claim about the past world I never observe, we find I am no longer attempting the impossible.

Since the necessary conceptual order grounds the meaning of events, I just need the right concept to understand a state present before I exist and observe. I can know, for example, it was true dinosaurs roamed the Earth perfectly well. I just need the concepts expressed by those past living beings

Concepts must be more then ligatures of our reason. Animals might not have our reasoning ability, but they are significant in the conceptual order which extends beyond the human use of reason. Humans don't need to be reasoning or thinking about an animal for it to have its place in the conceptual order.

A dinosaur eats without humans being present to reason about it. This schism between the conceptual order and human reason (i.e. that the conceptual order is over and above the existence of human reason/perception) also extends to concepts outside of reporting on the empirical order. Triangles and triangularity, for example, obtain as a concept even in the absence of humans reasoning about them. In any case, the unity of the concept is defined regardless of perception. General concepts which apply to an individual are defined with unity within the conceptual order itself.

In applying a general to an individual, we are making use of this conceptual order. If I perceive a tree, for example, I do not unify that specific tree the general. On it's own, the tree already defines that unity: an existing thing which express the generality of tree. We just have think this necessarily true concept to understand this aspect of the tree.

In other words, when I understand how a general applies to a particular, I'm not moving from a "fuzzy" guess to something more specific. Rather, I understand something specific (the existing tree) and that it reflects a particular general concept ( the general concept of "tree" ). The "fuzziness" is just an illusion created if I mistake the general concept for the object I'm talking about.

When Dfpolis says we don't need anything more than for an explanation, they are saying we need is experience of the right concept itself-- e.g. the crispness of the apple, the triangularity of various triangles, etc. There is no higher or more foundational order than these necessary concepts. The existence (or non-existence) of human reason/experience has no impact upon these.

You were, the passive aggressivenes of the post is made on your reaction and treatment of others, not on whether your point was abuse doing the opposite of an intention.

Go back and look at you post. You basically said nothing about abuse having the opposite of an intended effect. It was a about how aggressive people couldn't be thinking correctly or reasonably.

After all that, we know the argument you are giving is false too. Properly placed agression is critical to understand what is right or wrong. There are countless examples of telling someone how they are utterly wrong is how they learn.

Your post was assuming those participating in aggression were doing so out of their own paranoia and without cause.

Without saying so, you are trying to suggest they are aggressive without reason and so you are better/have a better position them. You are indirectly asserting your contributions must be more valuable than their aggressive rantings.

Not that we should turn we should turn this thread to discussion of the topic, but it is deep-seated bigotry. Bigotry which goes all the way down to our concept of meaning and how people belong, to suggest trans people are some sort of combination of non-existent, a violation of all that's proper and an unreality which cannot be true, even when we are using it right infant of our eyes. Right at it's core, it's supposition is trans people aren't real and are not worth respect.

It's not simply about being polite to spare the feelings of others. The recognition, value and belonging of trans people are at stake. Discrimination against and rejection of trans people at the deepest conceptual level is the bigotry in question.

This bigotry is a huge part of the point. Two the question of supporting and respecting trans people, the bigoted impacts at this conceptual level are a huge part of the concerns.

To avoid sending this thread further into it, please responses in one of the sex and gender threads.

I wanted to offer a better answer than my last one and I finally found the words.
This is an argument concerning language and since language is a human invention declaring that a particular term means this or that doesn't bear the same weight as declaring that gravity is stronger on Jupiter than it is on Earth. This is a matter of physics. We didn't invent gravity, we merely observe and study it. I hope you see my point here as this applies to both gender and sex. — Terran Imperium

I do because my argument is coming from exactly that sort of position. No-one "invented" the meaning of belonging to a gender or sex anymore than we did any other thing, logical truth or meaning we might peak about. Sex and gender are a matter of... the significance of sex and gender themselves.

The argument was never about how we use language. It was about concepts, meanings and truth with respect to sed and gender.

Just like gravity is a matter of gravity itself (not physics, as relationships between thing physics can change).

Sex or gender involves talking about that specific truth in reference to a person. So when we consider whether someone has a sex or a gender, we are not asking a question about their body at all. Rather, we are asking what significance do they have in terms the sex and gender categories which are expressed regardless of whether someone agrees with them or not.

Simply looking at the body won't help us because that only gives us the meaning of a body. It doesn't give any definition of how the body belongs (if it does at all) to a sex or gender category. We need to know the sex or gender category expressed by the person question, if we are to now their sex or gender.

I would prefer Bannotastic.



Oh I know, I got it first hand. He's trying though. At this point, I'm happy with such baby steps. Beats doing "truth" or "concepts aren't a thing" again.

No one's feelings. These matters a lre a question of a logical turth/meaning. People aren't their gender or sex by a feeling or body. They are so by the meaning of their sex or gender itself.

Feelings, sensations, thoughts are just how people are aware of the s meaning.

The Sartrian account of choice isn't a question of vapid consumerist trend or even an authority to be whatever your whim might want.

It's an analysis of our logical definition. Sartre is addressing the idea of what makes someone who they are. How is it we come by our identity? How do we have two arms? Or belong to a philosophy forum? Choose to forgive rather than take revenge? Choose to eat porridge rather toast?

Many will try to pass of the reason they do or are anything to someone else. They will say: "I did that because God made me" or "Nature necessitated I do that." Anything and everything to deny their existence was responsible for the event.

In saying we choose everything about ourselves, Sartre is pointing out we are the difference in every case. Our own existence defines who we are and who we are not.

We can "choose anything" because our future states are always to come. Who I am now cannot be used as a rule to devine who I will be in the future. Whether I have two arms, one, none or twenty, can only be given in my present. Our existence is the only way we are one thing not another. No constraints are doing the work of making us who we are.

Debra Bergoffen. The author is listed on SEP, at the very end of the web page, at least on mobile.

The same way anything lack a particular feature: an absence of that feature.

A cars lack a wheel by the absence of a wheel. I lack the name "Bitter Crank" because it's absent from the name meanings which refer to me. For a human to have no gender, it's just a matter of the meaning "no gender" being true about them.

Much like how a doors without gender don't have a gender, actually.

Behaviours simply aren't relevant because being a gender (or not being a gender) isn't an account of behaviour. Nor does the presence of a certain behaviour define a gender (hence the absurdity and falsification of claims like "only men/women can do that" ).

It's not the same. Calling atheist religious is an error because the former excludes the latter. To be equivalent, I would have to be saying claiming someone had no gender (atheist) was claiming someone had gender (religious).

I am not doing so. To suggest someone has no gender is never the claim someone has gender.

We can draw an analogy the atheist and the religious here. A society might have a myth: "An atheist must be X." or a myth: "A religious person must be X." Despite being entirely different, both atheist and religious are categories which a myth might form around.

Gender and no gender are both categories in this way.

I'm just saying "no gender" is just as much a category as "gender." Rebecca is not escaping the use of categories which may be used by myth in social constraint. She's using the very thing she is trying to escape.

It means Rebecca's attack on gender is a performative contradiction. To have "no gender" isn't a way of escaping a category which enables such myth based social constraint. "No gender" is an identity just as capable of being misrepresented in such myth.

Eliminating gender identity (or trying to) wouldn't give us a world protected from those myth based social constraints.

My reference to "social constraint' was referring to the various constraining social practices which are supposedly done because of gender.

Trying to eliminate gender categories isn't a way to prevent such social practices. Categories of no gender can be used equally well in that respect.

A society can form a myth, for example, that person in society must wear dresses because they had no gender. The society might use it in exactly the same way as ours did "women must wear dresses."

Good my point is exact opposite then. Gender (or no gender) is not a constraint.

In terms of an identity, there is no body, behaviour, dress, etc. that it necessitates. When I say "meaningless," I mean gender offers nothing to the outcome of constraining who someone might be or their position in society. There is no "someone must be this" by gender or no gender.

Yes, I agree gender not meaningless, my point was that "no gender" is on the same level.

I meant "meaningless" in terms a constraint. Just as there is "no what is like to be a man/women," there is no "what is it like to be no gender." Gender or no gender, there is no constraint is placed.

A man may have any combination of body, dress behaviour, etc.
A woman may have any combination of body, dress behaviour, etc.
Someone with no gender may have any combination body, dress behaviour, etc.

The "meaningless" of gender doesn't give us a reason to reject it in favour of no gender. No gender is "meaningless" in exactly the same way. We have no reason to prefer it over a gender in terms of fighting social constraints.

Yes, I suspected that. A distinction between a casual discussion area and in-depth posting is fine.

My thoughts were more directed at the specific context. Yes, it's great to have an area where people can make causal comments about politics, but what happens when all the politics or major politics happens in the lounge, including discussions which would involve a context which is going in-depth? People shouldn't be able to circumvent certain standards regarding political posting just by taking a discussion to a casual area. At the point, it replaces quality engagement with politics.
The politics section ceases to have a point and the community overloaded with casual rants turning into low quality discussion.

Hiding the lounge might have an impact on this, if it stops people getting pulled into discussing politics in the lounge. I guess my point is I don't think a community can say: "Well, this is a casual area. People don't have to make an effort." The community may use leeway in casual areas and find themselves only in a forest of low quality. How and the extent to which people use casual areas impacts on the community.

Rebecca's assertion of "no gender" no less involves a gender-related category than an assertion someone is "male" or "female."

We might ask here the same question she puts to gender: why have no gender? Since gender is meaningless in terms of defining which things are "male" or "female," no gender isn't required to rid us of a gender constriction. There is nothing (e.g. a body, behaviour, etc. ) which makes one a male, female or no gender.

I suspect they meant "academic" in the sense of having knowledge, study, understanding of philosophical topics. What does it look like in terms of philosophy? Usually, it means a change in the direction of philosophical questions and answers. Aside from knowing philosophical contexts and tradition, it usually means a move away from philosophy done on a basis of questions/speculation/ "prove" (e.g. "Is the world is real or not? Where the proof he world is not an illusion?) into one focused on understanding a particular truth or topic (e.g. "This is what we know." "This philosophy was saying X and it relates to these other ideas in Y way," etc.).

In terms of philosophical discussion itself, it does make a huge difference. Having studied your topic and understood it to a higher degree than others really does matter.

I'm not sure how much policy can effect that. Unless you outright ban politics or limit it daily discussion (which users will definitely not appreciate, I suspect), I think you might be stuck with people taking responsibility for what they are discussing.

It depends how much of the political activity is being driven by the terrible quality posts I guess. I do think moderation in the political discussions has been week. People have been allowed to get away with absurdly poor quality one/few liners, insults, personal attacks etc. in the political discussions. I understand wanting to give people leeway when passions run high (or when talking about an ethical terrible person or politics), but great streams of the political discussion seem to fall into that category. I mean like half the Trump thread (at the very least it feels like it), for example, would probably have been deleted for "low post quality" at PF.

Quite a bit of it seems to be coming from the regulars too. I think the forum could demand a great deal more effort from people when discussing politics. I just don't know whether that would translate into interest and higher quality in other discussions. People might just get angry they cannot throw out few line rant or attacks about politics and otherwise carry on the same.

*edit*

I just realised I used the wrong initials for PhilosophyForums, corrected.

As someone who has greatly reduced my participation (for various reasons), I feel quality issues are coming more from the interests and behaviour from many people in the community (some old and some new). I do think things like the prominence of the shoutbox might have some effect on which discussions users are pulled into, but I feel most of it would come from an interest in arguing rather than learning philosophy.

Particularly, I feel lot of people don't have a respect someone else might be saying something knowledgable. People frequently start off in the wrong foot of trying to "debate" or prove something, instead of trying to understand.

I don't think this is necessarily an issue with an open forum. Its an inevitable aspect of being a community welcoming to everyone. PF had the same sort of issues, even at it peak. The counter is of knowledgable, generous posters interested who can from good discussions and bring other people along. This is what I think is really missing at the moment. A lot of regulars are spending a great deal chatting about politics, for example. Or they are not generous with or interested in topics which fall outside what they already know (props to Banno for breaking out of his usual patterns with that gender thread).

A certain lack of quality, I feel, is coming for either complacency, self-absorption or just a lack of interest from regular members. Distraction of shoutboxes and lounges might be a thing, but I think most issues are going to be coming form the interests and behaviour of regulars.

I'm not merely playing with words. Error is your concepts are my target. I'm pointing out logical different/facts about the meanings of sex and the body you are missing.

The property of being a vehicle (a body) does not define the property of being a SUV (female). Only the property of being an SUV (female) can define the presence of being an SUV (female).

Sex does not simply refer to genitalia. If it did, we wouldn't even have the logical distinction of sex. We would just be saying: "There is this genitalia" not "This person has some genitalia and has the sex meaning of "female." Your own usages include this distinction.

Does that mean a door is not really a door but its a concept we impose on the object? If you understand what I mean. — Terran Imperium

It means a door is a door by virtue of them meaning of door, not because it is an existing body.

Our language is also something we impose upon our object here. Neither our concept of the door nor our language acts of speaking about the door are the thing of the meaning of door.
The existence of a door is nor defined by the meaning of the language we use. Our language is not magic in that way.

The existence of the door defined by the presence of a thing, in its body being present. In terms of how it maybe be talked about or categorised, there are many different ways. Some language, for example, might even give the door a gender, despise it having no human body and no genitalia!

The deeper performative contradiction is that no gender/gender is a meaningless is an identity category. Rebecca is getting up to say people have an identity of gender. This puts their position in the same place as anyone claiming to have a gender. Both are asserting a meaning about an individual is true.

In terms of understanding gender, Rebecca's issue is treating like it is a standard which defines something else or a rule someone has to meet. Why would anyone both with gender when any reason for thinking you have to belong to one of the other (i.e. you must be X because you dress/behave/have a body part Y)? Well, for the reason that gender is its own distinction and meaning, given not be the constrictive terms of some other quality meeting a standard to "be a gender", but rather in gender being its own feature of oneself.

Categorisation isn’t an issue. People categorise things all the time. Many categorisations are true. My position isn’t against categories. I’m talking about how it is one category is true or not. When I say sex identity is independent of a body, my int is not to say bodies do not belong to categories.

I’m saying a body does not belong to a category by virtue of existence as a body. We can see this in how imagined bodies (which do not exist!) belong to categories. Belonging to a category is a particular and independent logical meaning, separate to just the presence of a body.

A body does not take on belonging to a category of “male” or “female” because it is “a body. One does not get belonging to a category from the fact of a body, from a hormone, from a penis, from a vagina, form a womb, form a certain set of chromosomes, etc. It’s always a fact of belonging to a category itself— i.e a body which is of this category because it is of this category rather than a body which is of this category because it’s a body.

The equivocation of the body with its category leads to erroneous locating of bodily difference in the meaning of a category. A man can get pregnant, provided he has a functioning womb and other associated body functions . When such a body is in the “male” category, there is a man who can get pregnant. The difference maker is the bodily state in question, not what category of identity they have. It's about having body, not a meaning of sex.

I wasn't thinking you were denying bodies are what they are (though you might do so if I was to talk about some intersex bodies).

My point the idea of sex you are using claims bodies are more than bodies. If I take a body, let's say one with XX chromosomes, a womb, breasts, a vagina, etc., your position proclaims it must belong to the sex category/sex identity of "female." It is subsuming our linguistical/conceptual/social practice of "female sex" into the body itself. You say such a body must be "female" when such a categorisation is not actually given in the existence of body.

A body with XX chromosomes, a womb, breasts, a vagina, etc. might be categorised any number of ways. We might have such a body and not refer to it be a sex at all. We might categorise such a body as "male ". The body itself doesn't pose a meaning of sex itself. It will be a Y chromosomes, a womb, breasts, a vagina, etc., not matter which category we place it in.
A body being present doesn't suppose anything "male" or "female."

This is why people using your categories have to say: Well, that body is definitely female because XZY...". If the present of a body did suppose sex, we wouldn't have to suppose an extra understanding over the body we already know. I would be able to think: "There's a body with XX chromosomes, a womb, breasts, a vagina, etc." and understand them "female" without engaging with sex as a distinction.

Yet, sex is a distinction. It means something distinct to "there is a body with...". Sex is not contained within the body. It always remains a seperate concept/meaning. The step of placing the body in the extra meaning of "sex" has to be taken.