"What tangled webs we weave" when we first deceive ourselves, when we put feelings -- and economic self-aggrandizement -- ahead of facts and scientific principles. Though "codswallop" is probably being charitable -- "medical scandal" and "an egregious Big Lie" probably being more honest and accurate.
However, your “... 'Man is when short hair and rude in public' say progressives" underlines the dichotomy between sex and gender, between defining, for example, "woman" as "adult human female [AHF]" or as "anyone who has any sort of a passing family resemblance to AHFs".
More or less the dichotomy between monothetic categories and polythetic ones -- respectively. See this post of mine for some elaborations on the details in the context of defining sex as a binary or as a spectrum:
There is, in fact, some scientific, linguistic, philosophical, and logical justification for polythetic categories, for the concept of family resemblances. However, one of the major problems with them is that if one is not careful about who one lets into the family then one is likely to find oneself sitting down to Christmas dinner with the Manson family ... so to speak.
good coverage
"What tangled webs we weave" when we first deceive ourselves, when we put feelings -- and economic self-aggrandizement -- ahead of facts and scientific principles. Though "codswallop" is probably being charitable -- "medical scandal" and "an egregious Big Lie" probably being more honest and accurate.
However, your “... 'Man is when short hair and rude in public' say progressives" underlines the dichotomy between sex and gender, between defining, for example, "woman" as "adult human female [AHF]" or as "anyone who has any sort of a passing family resemblance to AHFs".
More or less the dichotomy between monothetic categories and polythetic ones -- respectively. See this post of mine for some elaborations on the details in the context of defining sex as a binary or as a spectrum:
https://humanuseofhumanbeings.substack.com/p/binarists-vs-spectrumists
There is, in fact, some scientific, linguistic, philosophical, and logical justification for polythetic categories, for the concept of family resemblances. However, one of the major problems with them is that if one is not careful about who one lets into the family then one is likely to find oneself sitting down to Christmas dinner with the Manson family ... so to speak.