Miser

Below are articles which discusses the different results of brain changes due to sexual activity in animals: (respectively) down regulation of androgen receptors, up regulation of estrogen receptors and the release of dopamine blocking opioids. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23707935 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17239879 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11844571 How well do you think these animal subjects serve in elucidating the relationship in humans between ejaculation and brain changes? In addition, do we know what these androgen receptors and estrogen receptors in these particular brain regions do?

That's not what I mean. Objectivity is in nature subjective. After all, man is the measure of all things. But don't take this too far, there are truths that are more comprehensive and precise than others. Like that of a statistically significant finding being much more reliable than the mere opinion of an individual. Yet, this doesn't mean the individual's opinions are completely useless. I don't want to get into that right now. We're straying again. Its implicit in any experiment the necessity of the double-blind condition. I didn't ignore it, if I did I must have thought it a redundant comment. But please refer to the specific post you are talking about. Better yet, lets continue from #65

Aren't you also arguing with a signpost then. Like I said, beyond the scope. And I will argue successfully, I wouldn't make claims that have no basis. You definitely seemed to have made the consideration. And that's not the point. Now you are simply arguing for the sake of arguing, and not to get at any higher truths.

I would argue that subjective is objective, but that's beyond the scope of this discussion

That's very big of you. I appreciate that. As of now, I rely on the subjective judgment of say 10 objective judges that is to be watching the experiment through a camera in another room. They are to judge the masculinity/femininity of the experimental subject on a 1-10 point scale. The subject would then proceed to conducting a series of tasks which would elicit complaining. See #47 48 The average judgment of the 10 would serve as the independent variable, As Ringer pointed out, this is not perfect, but it is my provisional attempt, and, dare I say, more congruent with the current methods of science. Judges have the advantage of bypassing overly reductionistic definitions of masculinity and femininity as it can bypass the myriads of individual factors that contribute to this judgement. In short, the sum is greater than its parts. Everything from clothing to the manner of speech could affect the opinion of the judge, and rightly so. Now, I still don't want to completely discard the fat to muscle ratio. If one wants to be strict, this parameter needs to be defined more closely to its context and considered with other factors. It is one of many factors that contribute to whether a person is masculine or feminine, though by itself it is poor. But for now, I will rely on the "Objective judges" method.

And so I did. I responded to every concern possible. I have clarified how Masculinity and Femininity could be objectively recorded in the scientific literature via objective judges and then some. What you don't find clear about, please state them. I don't rather care that I am wrong, what concerns me is how unsatisfying your counter-arguments are. Granted, some are right and I have done my best to address them. And how have I been wrong? He oversimplified my claim to say that I've perceived every statement you've made is an attack. This is not the case. The ad hominem that I see were recurring but not wholly prevalent. He made a poor caricature of what I had said and made it so ridiculous that its beyond adherence. Hence, it is a straw man. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man I have addressed the problem, but still was quickly diverted into discussing other things. So, what else needs to be addressed? We'll start anew from #47 and #48

By oversimplifying my position, you've committed the straw man fallacy. There's no question about it. And you shouldn't be stubborn. Uh huh, like you weren't the one who also diverted the topic. Your holier than thou atttude is undeserved. Leave the discussion, how much have you contributed? Good riddance

Nice try what? What am I trying? And I did try to clarify it for you. You should read the following post. I emphasized that the discussion is in nature subjective. Look to the above to find my provisional definition. If it doesn't satisfy you, as it doesn't me, provide me a better one. That's in no way a diversion from the topic nor is it essentially hostile. Good approach! That's definitely not a straw-person argument to what I have said. You've shown how definitely a classy gentleman you are.

That's true. It is thus why its important to rely on the good judgement of the individual to discern good articles from bad ones. Wikipedia provides information, but it is too broad in scope. To find specialized knowledge, it is best to use PT. Admittedly though, some make claims without reference and that can be annoying. That article in particular is probably the result of his intuitive reasoning. Maybe that means little among hard scientists but it is still quite important to acknowledge. To digress a bit, I would say we have to separate the effects of 'the phonetic improvement from phone use' from the 'anxiety for not using phones'. Both play a role in affecting attention. What was said about OCD is due to the quality of psychological illness being on spectrums. In other words, its rarely black and white. It's not whether you have it or you don't. Though a person may not satisfy the criteria of being a full flown obsessive compulsive, relevant impulses may exist. Like it or not, we all reside somewhere on the OCD spectrum, though the severity differs from person to person. The behavior of checking phones is related to "checking", and the act of checking in general dispels anxiety. Perhaps that is supposed to be implicit in the psychological repertoire. I do see your concern and, as with anything else, one must be vigilant. Are our intellectual construct a reflection of our selves? I say it does. Everything goes through the bottom-up and top-down processes of our brain. A stimuli is modified by previous schemas and previous schemas select what is encoded. A little like Plato's cave allegory where a person is used to seeing shadows all his life becoming disoriented when exposed to anything outside of the cave. No matter how rational we act, we still act upon pre-existent impulses. This seems banally true and what I've learned thus far seems to support my reasoning. Feel free to disagree. Maybe its fair to dismiss Freud on scientific grounds but lets not completely forget his important contribution to philosophy and the beginning of psychology. He worked with whatever he had in his day. Its no surprise that people in the past are usually more wrong than people in the present. Onto the claim about the relationship between scientists and their mother. This is taken out of Gender and Science, '"One of McClelland's especially interesting finding was that 90 percent of a group of eminent scientists see, in the "mother-son" picture routinely given as part of the Thematic Appreciation Test, "the mother and son going their separate ways", a relatively infrequent response to this picture in the general population. It conforms, however, with the more general observation of a distant relationship to the mother, frequently coupled with "open or covert attitudes of derogation". "' Obviously it won't apply to all scientists, but it re-emerges with enough frequency to warrant consideration. After reading this passage, I felt compelled to ask. The desire to confirm, or not, this observation simply outweighed the risk of hurt feelings. This especially seemed likely because of their complete neglect of human intuition. If I hadn't uttered it, I would be thinking about it anyways. I maintain that it was best that I articulated what I thought. Whether that's baseless is personal to you. It takes some time to get to the bottom of subterranean feelings especially when under attack from all sides. It was important to prove that the importance of the two neuraochemicals did coincide with my intuitions and that intuitions are not completely useless. Fair enough. I've learned much. 7. Because we were diverted in discussing other things. I felt it important to defend every claim I made, against every argument you made. I respond as prompted

Now here's someone who knows how to handle people. The man-flu, and the following comparisons to women were not relevant to the discussion. Whether women complain more was never part of the topic. Perhaps I shouldn't be so critical. After-all, it was an attempt to attach relevant research to the dialogue. Fair enough. Though fundamentally, I disagree to the claim that Wikipedia is better than Psychology Today as a scientific source. Both try to be a scientific as possible. Depending on the article, appropriate reference may or may not be found. But people's ideas are the people themselves. The two are inseparable . Why is it that some conversational styles are more effective than others? Why am I less reluctant to discuss the issue at hand with you than with them? It was a direct insult against one's mother. According to psychoanalytic theories, scientists share poor relationship with their mother, which is responsible for an overly objective style of conversing and a more objective approach at finding truth, at the expense of neglecting the speaker and regarding solely the idea. I reject their way of speaking on the premise that people are not machines and still need the appropriate tact if civil discussions were to accrue. Yes, but people should be free to discuss both philosophy and science. What you perceive as attacks were ways of persuading them to not be so narrow and dogmatic in scope of discussion. That's not how I read it. But even if it is, I borrowed his words to better illustrate a point, mostly because it was Aristotle who got me thinking. It was never meant to be an appeal to authority. Just as I borrowed Carl Rogers' words to emphasize the importance of subjective, experiential discussion over scientific discussion. If both types of discourse benefits the growth of scientific knowledge, then both are necessary. The citations I made to support my claims - the testosterone and estrogen effects on human cognition - was to illustrate that intuition has its place. Psychology is a broad field and requires an intuitive sifting through of existing knowledge to find emergent patterns. Simply stating that everything is confirmation bias is nonsensical.

First, I'd like to thank you for your friendlier tone. I disagree. Psychology Today tends to have good references. Ones without it I would overlook as being poorly cited. Whether Psychology Today is a good source largely depends on the discernment of the reader. The wikipedia article that he cited, notably that of the Man Flu, was reported by the 'Daily mail', 'The Daily Telegraph' and 'BBC World service'. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_flu Are these good sources? You decide. This discussion isn't in nature a scientific one. I merely wanted to survey reactions of the viewers. The conversation went along fine until the demands came for an objective standard. Which, according to the calibre of this forum, is insufficient. But why should arguments stop just because scientific literature is limited? 'The Trail of the human serpent is overall', truth doesn't have to be reached, at least not yet, by science, To ask me to construct a congruent scientific definition would be asking for the impossible right now. But we can sure as hell talk about it. Not all of their advice are good advice as I've stated above. Much of it has no meaning provided the context and much of it drove the discussion onto detours, per my response to # 19. So you wouldn't call the tone of the following to be hostile in nature? "Miser, As iNow says, you should change your attitude and learn how to debate science properly. Alternatively, you can carry on as you are, and I will keep laughing at you (at least until you get chucked out of the forum). Your decision" Why should I change my attitude when they completely misinterpreted the post. What kind of remark is: "Miser - I suspect that you're used to be the smartest member of your small local group of friends wherever you happen to live or party or whatever, but that's not the case here.“ And they say my claims are baseless. "And perhaps most importantly, the whole thread is based on an assertion by someone who is well known for getting things wrong so the whole thing is baseless." That is a flat out ad hominem. Well known for getting what wrong? Keep in mind once again, that this isn't the making of a journal article. The whole point of this discussion is to gather opinions and further reflection on the topic. Much of psychology and therapy is the discovery of truth through subjective means. As Carl Rogers says in addressing the limits of objective truths in therapy "If we project ourselves into the future, and suppose that we have had the answers to most of the questions which psychology investigates today, what then? Then we would find ourselves increasingly impelled to treat all others, and even ourselves, as objects". There is merit in discussion, be it scientific or not. Also, note #9 and my response to it #10. He prompted me to support my assertion that testosterone and estrogen is important. So I did. In post #11, he completely changes the subject and makes it into a personal attack, completely disregarding the related neuroscience paper I generously made extracts of. This kind of behavior is disappointing for any one who respects truth.

Response to post #19 First, you seem to fallaciously believe that somehow wikipedia links are superior to Psychology Today articles (which are articles written by psychologists based on the frontier of psychological research. The tangent that you went on makes no sense to me. What I said in passing, you analyzed. Not everything spoken in a sentence deserve equal weight in thought. Sure it can be operationally defined, and thanks for flexing your intellectual muscles for me - I get it -, but it was nonetheless irrelevant to the topic. So, skipping your analysis which is filled with flaws (For example, why would you go into the discussion of 'whether women make unhappy' when 'womanish' was stated as a modifier to "men". Womanish man is very differently from women. Would you like an analysis on that? Or is that a fair assumption. Transexuals excluded. And please don't cite wikipedia and be smug about it. A lot of their citations came straight out of the media oven, warm with exaggerations and biases, which I'd think you would be above. But evidently not. I do appreciate the Australian anecdote, though I have no idea what the hell it means. Would you elaborate please. I don't understand why you have to reshape everything that I said, especially considering how baseless your adjustments are. So here's one method of going about this empirical question. To definitively give answer to "do feminine men complain more", one must first set the criteria of what constitute as feminine. It's fair to demand it. In typical psychological experimentation, we can employ objective judges to give ratings of the men. Perhaps there are better ways but provisionally it will do. Second, under experimental settings, we must obviously establish the dependent variable (the average masculinity/femininity score of the experimental subject being the independent) given an exertion to stimulate complaining. So, to do this, it can range from anything from making him put his arms in cold water to doing a boring and tedious task. Meanwhile, an assistant is to become acquainted with this subject - by chatting and opening venues of discourse - and sit beside him as the subject is conducting the series of task (Which gender the assistant would best be is still up in the air, provisionally I would propose an extraverted male). As the process continues, the assistant is to record their dialogue (this occurs without the knowledge of the subject only until after the experiment is over). Then the number of incidence that satisfy as a complaint would be recorded as data and plotted as the dependent variable. This would be typical of a psychological experiment. When pressed, I had to give an answer. As with most things in life, at least for people who have a shred of humility and open-mind, every truth is provisional. It wasn't meant to be an absolute. Yet I stand by it, even though it needs modification. You on the other hand have made baseless, and sometimes smug, remarks about how science should be conducted. If I'm so common for getting things wrong, go back to the abstinence post and read the single article on Masturbation and its relatedness to an anxious parenting style plus poor prostate health. Its what I should have began with if I knew I would be encountering people with so little philosophical faculties. Not that you have successfully proven most of my statements to be definitively wrong. Otherwise, I would accept your better argument. Why don't you look at the track record. Every time I refuted your fallacious claims I did not hold them above you and say you have no understanding of science, evolution, psychology and neuroscience. I allowed you to change subjects onto other concerns you have regarding the topic. My assumption is not baseless, it is a well-documented phenomenon in the realms of science, and I see them particularly clearly in you. Whether that has any truth, only you would know. And aren't all that ad hominem? You are not above making personal attack. This is but one of many incidences. All that you've said about me can be said about yourself. Sartre said it best "Hell is other people" and by god you just saw what you see in yourself. Here's my value judgement: Pride in knowledge is secondary and even detrimental. Knowledge should be sought for the delight it brings in uncovering never-before-known mysteries. Nobody has ever called me a spoiled child because I'm always reasonable, except among unreasonable people. It's very interesting to hear you call me a child when nobody has ever done so in my life. Could what you perceive of me be a reflection of yourself? So it is quite gratifying to see Sartre being correct once again about human nature. I remind you that he sought truth not through science, but philosophy. Yet his observations are so great and permeating. The forum is meant to be a place of civil discussion. This can range from everything in philosophy to literature (especially in psychology which I remind you is a new science that needs information from all areas of life). Out of personal interest, and to enrich my understanding of human beings, I wanted people to talk subjectively about life not about silly definitions. Everything said here could potentially supplement a future research. Everything is useful. But if you get bogged down on something so trivial as personal attacks and semantics then its really everyone's loss. What kind of man accuses the other man of changing a subject when he previously prompts a discussion on another? I don't intentionally change a subject, the speaker prompted a divergent discussion so I pursued it. The most vehement of attacks come from your unfounded arrogance, not me.

So, for the last time, I'm not here to make claims. I want to get a discussion rolling. Why don't you provide me with a possible quantification of masculinity and femininity? And nothing I said have been baseless. The offense was, and has been, started by you. I merely reciprocated.

I was giving one proposition to inspire other similar propositions, meanwhile, it was never central to the topic of discussion. The standards by which one judge a person to be feminine is many - how they dress, speak, and walk. There is simply no time to go into all that, nor is this the discussion to do it in. Yet you keep on asking for the impossible, like what specific ratio would be characterized as male. Do you expect me to do that calculation by normalizing the entire population of the world and then giving you a medium. Absurd! Because I've been exposed enough to your way of arguing. Your perspective is narrow and your intuition about human life is weak. I don't need to know anything about you other than how you carry about yourself to know more than you think I know. Your intuition is not fine. There's simply no way for a discussion about human nature to get off the ground with your rigidity. If you can't discern a man to be more masculine than the next, by whatever standard, then you are blind in that sense. Nope, it is common in the sciences for the practitioner to suffer a cold and distant relationship with the mother. Your denial of human subjectivity and pathological inclination toward objectivity seems to support this You two are basically the same person to me, so look to the above

It's meant to excavate people's ideas, not get fixated on semantics. Its difficult for minds overly concerned with quantifying operant definitions for experimental subjects that bogs the conversation down. Its not meant as helping my claim but a personal attack. I'm just reciprocating the same kindness you've shown me. It is not arbitrary, categories almost always fall into a normal curve. The continuum is supposed to be on a gradient, from 1 - 10. Why don't you give me a fat to muscle ratio that would be a satisfying medium for the entire population of the world? It is a fruitless endeavor because its impossible. You simply don't have the expertise to engage in a psychological discussion. The conversation would be fine and full of good observations if it weren't for getting bogged down on impossible definitions. This is not a paper yet, this is a casual discourse. If you can't summon up your intuition, which is what I'm asking for, maybe you should avoid commenting on human matters and focus on more atomic ones Also, tell me about your relationship with your mother.

And once again, I remind you I needn't quantify it so precisely in this conversation. You are simply asking for the impossible for the amount of time I'm willing to dedicate to this topic. You obviously have no understanding of how psychology works, nor how a reasonable discourse looks like. From the sample size that you've exposed to thus far, picture a curvilinear graph . The androgynous lot belonging in the 68 percent and the masculine and feminine diverging toward the two polar ends. Thanks again for derailing the topic. =)

Roll out the red carpet, because I'm back. I've been putting off replying because I expect a cynical interlocutor. And what do we know, here you are. As we progressed through discourse, those questions were more or less answered. Whatever you are still confused about, please state your questions explicitly. Keep in mind that I've addressed your many concerns. Whenever I do, you don't acknowledge them. It seems like your whole approach is that of attack. But fine, this is the internet. We are more or less not responsible for our actions or words, and politeness means little even in urban life. However, do remember all the derogatory remarks I've thrown your direction, I will stand by them. Do I think that? That's a little presumptuous... just a little. Opinions are non-arbitrary so you can't just make them up. They need to have a source, whether it is biology or culture or from some divine inspiration. Unless you are insinuating I'm a Green peace fanatic who justifies pedophilia with climate concerns, I'd say there's no basis for your argument. Also, there's no basis for that insinuation either, I'm not a pedophile but I do care for the planet. But I digress. State your concerns explicitly so I will answer them as politely as I can

Facts are but the consensus of the current scientific community. Science is directional in its endeavor, leading to a biased representation of reality. It is in its nature subjectivity. Opinions constitute the human in us. What we hold as facts represent what we value as individuals. Metaphorical reflects the non-arbitrary nature of our language. It reflects important universalities of human beings. Saying a person is cold doesn't mean his body temperature is low, but that the person is unemotional. This is jives well with our perception of coldness when in the presence of aloof individuals. This speaks volumes of our perception. Its perceptually true and bespeaks of human nature. Flashbacks are rare if ever. The effects are actually subtler than the current 'mainstream consensus'.

I have experienced LSD 'psychosis' and much of it was the result of bad setting. One can certainly influence the environment so as to avoid these tricky situations. And even though the psychosis was altogether a very unpleasant situation, it taught me a lot about my own anxieties at the time with people. In terms of damage, define damaging the brain. Metaphorically its true: think with one's dick means to be overpowered by one's libido. That's difficult beyond my scope. But its an interesting anecdote. The greatest asset we have are our opinions. Nothing is more important to us than that.

You can check all the research articles at the bottom of each entry on Psychology today. It's one of the best sources to get information on psychology. As an aside, wikipedia isn't the best source for information either. Just about anyone can change the information on any given page. "In most cases, the psychosis-like reaction is of short duration, but in other cases it may be chronic. It is difficult to determine whether LSD itself induces these reactions or if it triggers latent conditions that would have manifested themselves otherwise" Psychosis is not a good premise to base your assertion that LSD causes brain damage. This happens in a very small fraction of cases and when it does its effects dissipate with time. The reason I choose the quote from Aristotle is because I thought it coincided with my observation too, thus using it to better illustrate my point. I didn't mean it as an appeal to authority. All the rest is fair. Thanks for the insight. I want to add that Aristotle's claim that we use our heart to think still has a wide appeal among literary circles. "My mind says I should give in but my heart says no. I always listen to my heart." It would be interesting to see what the basis of our intuition is to assert our heart as a governance for our emotional, egoistic drives. One case I heard of was a man received a heart transplant from an adrenaline junkie, the man soon became an adrenaline junkie himself, pursuing activities such as sky diving, heli-skiing etc., I wonder if anyone can find the source for this.

When you describe people, do you use only empirically quantifiable definitions such as height, weight, race and gender or do you include personality traits as well? What do people mean to you?

Then defend your claim. Acid is not known to cause brain damage according to reputable studies. Cats who are exposed to an overdose of acid and experience brain damage doesn't generalize to people who take acid once every few months with a low dose. Acid was used by scientists before it was banned to stimulate novel ways of thinking. There is now a resurgence of psychedelic research. Here's a relevant talk: When you are talking about personal matters, its the visceral response that matters not solely a systematic study of the behavior of the person. Your response would indicate, if it wasn't bogged down by an obsession with definition, how often you perceive yourself as hurting other's feelings, how much you care about other's feelings and whether you care that you hurt other's feelings among other things. I didn't expect a robotic answer:"please insert proper parameter to proceed"... I'm used to people who flexibly use their gut feeling and logic when in the right context. Meh, honest mistake. Mixed the two of you up. The two of you are some of most serious thinkers I have encountered in this lifetime. Maybe its the internet and the context but things get heavy when discussing things with you, for better or for worse. We are all after knowledge, and objective reasoning is not the only way at it. Subjective truths reveal much more about the person and the topic. But if you were to say there's problems with my assumption and approach, then you would have to completely discard human intuition which as any sober-minded person would know is foolish. I recommend you read more on the philosophy of science so as to curb your cynicism toward alternative views of science. Truth would not progress if it were defined as dogmatically as the two of you.

Socrates said "the unexamined life is not worth living". But is the examined life worth living? Is the contemplative life worth living? In short, Newton may not have resisted hormonal corruption but was simply born into a biological vessel and social environment that made him the chaste person he was. Its difficult to claim that he is more noble because of a resistance to lust that was probably not too powerful to begin with. Regardless, what are your views on abstinence?

You see what I see. A person who is completely undeterred by human emotions. Would you clarify your last question though. If I've read it correctly, I see the contrary, a dehumanization instead of being swayed by something human - a suppression of human nature. See most as people who fall into the 68 percent area of the bell curve.

Says the chemist who sees the world much differently than a psychologist. And please, do pick them apart one by one so I can rebut accordingly as I have previously. Not everything needs to be defined. If you want me to define this degree word as .5<F<.8 then the conversation has already become too impersonal. It was a personal question, to get to know you. Life isn't 100 percent science. Subjectivity is important, at least to some.