On 1/12/2014 6:10 PM, Tim Cook wrote:
> On 2014-01-11 16:17, Patrick Elliott wrote:
>> And, yes, again, its a gibberish idea supported by
>> both men, and women, often completely unintentionally, because you just
>> tell girls one thing about their behavior, and boys another, from the
>> moment they are born. Even levels of aggressiveness, how they handle
>> situations, etc., are a result of "training", not wiring.
>
> I think that completely discounting 'wiring' as a contributing factor to
> behaviour and saying that /everything/ is social conditioning is as
> flawed as the other way around.  There really are actual physical
> differences between the sexes that go beyond just 'that's a matter of
> upbringing and presentation'.
I am not completely discounting it. Its just that, when its even 
possible to make clear determinations, of any kind, as to differences, 
the "overlap" represents like 99% of the population, with the outliers 
being on either end of the remaining 1%. Well, ok, not exactly those 
numbers, but you get the point. Worse, studies on things like spacial 
ability, which is generally assumed to be a trait men are better at, 
turn out to disappear completely, if you expose the women in a study to, 
say, video games, which require a lot of spacial recognition. Its simply 
a case that women are "less likely to need it", due to cultural factors, 
so don't develop it as extensively. Expose them to conditions where they 
do need it, and the supposed "difference" disappears. Give that sort of 
thing, how is it even possible to say that there is an area of 
"overlap", with outliers, who don't fit, and that those "edges" are, in 
fact, purely a social artifact? Answer- You can't, which throws a wrench 
in the whole assumption that any differences, at all, in terms of mental 
ability, and how we deal with the world, are hardwired, or, if any of it 
is, then, if given the same exact conditions, without cultural biases, 
likely to produce "obvious" differences.

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