Pseudoscience and the attempt to put an end to the evolution of humankind

Bailey, Vilain and the disordered model of intersex in the DSD Guidelines

Commentary by Sophie Siedlberg, Spokeswoman for OII in the United Kingdom

I have been thinking a little about this. The human (Societal) predisposition to categorize and judge on the basis of physicality as is currently happening in the United States in Bailey, Vailain and Berenbaum, advocates of the DSD model of intersex and who are using intersex subjects in their quest to discover the causes of sexual orientation and gender identity. 

I think the future of this way of thinking is deservedly under threat. Notice how loud the Bailey-ite types screech about how they were "right all along" when in truth their "Science" does not work. They talk about evolution but there is one bit (the bit that evolutionary psychologists are so blind to when it is staring them in the face, and supposedly in their field of expertise). And that is the need of all biological systems to adapt.

I think that is going to creep up on the likes of Bailey and bite them. The science of reproduction is at best a joke. It is clumsy; it has traditionally attracted a lot of "Dr Sex" types who seem to think in terms of sexual reproduction. What scares the "Dr Sex" types the most is the way evolution may be going. OK, what happens if humanity outgrows sex and it becomes nothing more than what a lot of Falwell fundies are ranting and raving about: little more than a form of entertainment rather than the sole means of reproduction? Reproductive medicine does allow for things like Parthenogenesis or so called "Virgin births" where "men become unnecessary". (Actually that is not strictly true. They still use male gametes.)

But the "Dr Sex" types are doing us all a big favour by keeping these types of biological science strictly in the realm of "ordered" and "disordered" humans, with everyone being male, female and the rest of us afflicted with a DSD (Disorder of Sex Development). They are keeping that science in the Stone Age. It is as if they will continue running on DOS while everyone else will be using Suse Linux.

Let's look at computers (I am Nano ready, very much so :) In around ten years time we will be seeing not ever faster tin box computers (Moore's law prohibits this) nor will we see tin box quantum computers (Again Moore's law still applies to some extent, as does the greater need for high temperature superconductors). It will be biological computing.

Now how will this manifest? Well reproduction (As in evolution proper, read Joan Rouhgarden) will take many forms, as the emphasis (Which is what makes humans unique) continues to follow the path of enhancing the mind. Sex and grunting in caves with Bailey will become obsolete. And guess what? What the Dr. Sex types fear the most about us intersex folks is that when we show any sign of intelligence, self awareness or ability, we come to represent that which the Dr Sex types fear the most: the path of evolution (As above) that makes them look like they are still clubbing each other with stones and bones.

You see, we look like the future when machine becomes biological and biological no longer needs sex.

In a way, we represent what may well be another step in human evolution to these people. What will humanity look like in ten thousand years time? Hyper intelligent and asexual? (The image they hate the most). OK, that may be the extreme but if the emphasis is thinking your way to continued existence rather than rutting and sex, then the Dr. Sex types (Like Bailey) look like the evolutionary dead ends.

We would not need to judge on the basis of beauty and ugly, aesthetics would be a matter of choice rather than enforced status. What makes this most interesting is that given such a series of events leading to such an outcome would not result in some utopia or brave new world. But evolution just flowing along and still making eugenicists looks stupid.

The other day I was challenged to be optimistic. Well, here is my optimism. Society always claims to be seeking to create a totally egalitarian, non prejudiced version of itself. "We don't beat up on gays anymore" and "We are not racist" but your Dr. Sex types will never bring that about because the "improvement of the species" involves the very things society claims to abhor. But the enhancing of intelligence being a primary goal, not forced by eugenics or anything like that, but driven by curiosity and the fulfillment of it by technology (Such as moving into bio computing). Look at what most religions aspire to. It is always the "higher state" the "something else" be it heaven or enlightenment. It seems that this aspiration continues quietly as machine becomes biological and biological becomes bored with sex and binaries (Base 4 will be the in thing :). Then that (Also hardwired, more profoundly than sex as it happens) aspiration will come to fruition.

I am not saying there will be some utopia or whatever. But I think that in the cold light of looking at how humanity is evolving, it will be the Baileys and Dr. Sex types with their eugenics will look stupid. And die out.

You see, they claim that people are only responding to base instincts and that it is base instincts that govern who we are. In a way they are right, but the one instinct they ignore is the instinct to evolve. In humans the awareness of it once drove eugenics, but humanity has moved on from that. Natural selection is not a question of what genes survive and what genes do not. It is a question of adaptation and striving to adapt more universally.

Remove the genetic material that is a reference library on how to do this (As eugenics tried to do) and you actually create what is disordered in an evolutionary sense. Bailey bumps off the gays and Bailey wipes out a well established population control. Bailey fails to mention that "Gender and sex variant" people in truth have higher levels of intelligence.

Which is interesting, because that is where evolution is going, and when reproduction as it is now becomes obsolete. (Binary reproduction is but one of many modes of reproduction even now). Who looks like the evolutionary next step?

Not Bailey chasing after the pretty ones that's for sure. Or his hetero-lebensborn lack-breds if he ever tries it. Nature will bite back.