Nice essay Johnathan, and I was struck by this word formulation: "From a bio-psycho-social-spiritual perspective the notion that women’s lower aptitude for chess is just biological ceases to make sense, but the claim that biology is not relevant at all looks equally foolish." It reminds me of problem solving and how women tend to be process oriented while men tend to be outcome oriented. It is one the first experiential lessons taught to people training to become telephone counselors at LifeLine here in Sydney, Australia.
While this form "making better sense of the real rather than presumed differences between men and women is not just a parlour game: it is a frontier for a revitalised civilisation," reminds me of John Verveake's "we are comprehensively prone to self-deception," and the need to question 'how' that process works within each and every one of us, to solve the puzzling nature of our self-defeating sense of reality.
May I offer some quotes I believe are worthy of consciousness contemplation:
"All this time we have been repeating the words 'know,' 'understand.' Yet we do not know what knowledge is," ― Plato.
"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one. An optical delusion of consciousness, a kind of prison for us." — Albert Einstein
"The delusion is extraordinary by which we exalt language above nature." ― Alexander B Johnson, A TREATISE ON LANGUAGE
"For people to comprehend their conditioned self-deception scheme, they must try not to impose a perceptual expectation of mind-sight on the perception capacity of eye-sight." ― Daniel Goleman, Vital Lies, Simple Truths, The Psychology of Self Deception
"The attempt to regulate affect - to minimize unpleasant feelings and to maximize pleasant ones - is the driving force in human motivation." ― Alan N Schore, Affect Regulation & the Origins of the Self
The quotation from Affect Regulation & Origins of the Self can be related to Iain McGilchrist's favorite pre-Socratic quote about a river I believe, as the non-conscious river of affective judgment that our conscious sense of reason floats upon. Because, I believe, we are the most adaptive creatures on this planet and all our behaviors are no less subconsciously orchestrated than any other creature despite our species sense of superiority and the stiff-necked sense of reason more prominent in outcome oriented men.
Your chess memoir is a favourite book of mine. It has been a wise companion through my tenuous, late-lin-life engagement with the game.
It is wonderfully refreshing to read your take on complexity of difference between women and men.
Now here's a question. It's about the art of balancing an acceptance of life as the flow that it is, as against a drive to change the flow. Is it women, is it men, or is it neither group, that shows mastery -- so-called -- in that art?
Beautifully subtle piece. Love your twist on the Blake quote. Your questioning the usefulness, or otherwise, of gender stereotypes is - to use a word you use - prismatic.
Great piece -very nuanced and a good example of how to proceed. However, I think, dare I say it, we need to be a bit 'manlier' in expressing some of the issues at stake.
The issue is around epistemology. Feminism has confused itself as being about epistemology, when really it is political. This means that the trait correlation with biological sex isn't acknowledged or even really known about in favour of ridiculously blank-slate social construction and worse, this undermining has eroded the very idea of biological sex. Judith Butler may have interesting perspectives on the meaning of sex and gender, but we shouldn't mistake that for epistemology, just as Foucault's insights into power and episteme aren't a final word on 'what is actually true in the world'.
Until feminism and postmodern academia broadly reorients and attempts to integrate other perspectives, it will bounce along an increasingly erratic path, now in the case of feminism actually undermining its very core with mistaken ideas of sex and gender.
This isn't helped by throwing out platitudes but needs people to call things out that have become embedded in our relativistic milieu.
Nice essay Johnathan, and I was struck by this word formulation: "From a bio-psycho-social-spiritual perspective the notion that women’s lower aptitude for chess is just biological ceases to make sense, but the claim that biology is not relevant at all looks equally foolish." It reminds me of problem solving and how women tend to be process oriented while men tend to be outcome oriented. It is one the first experiential lessons taught to people training to become telephone counselors at LifeLine here in Sydney, Australia.
While this form "making better sense of the real rather than presumed differences between men and women is not just a parlour game: it is a frontier for a revitalised civilisation," reminds me of John Verveake's "we are comprehensively prone to self-deception," and the need to question 'how' that process works within each and every one of us, to solve the puzzling nature of our self-defeating sense of reality.
May I offer some quotes I believe are worthy of consciousness contemplation:
"All this time we have been repeating the words 'know,' 'understand.' Yet we do not know what knowledge is," ― Plato.
"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one. An optical delusion of consciousness, a kind of prison for us." — Albert Einstein
"The delusion is extraordinary by which we exalt language above nature." ― Alexander B Johnson, A TREATISE ON LANGUAGE
"For people to comprehend their conditioned self-deception scheme, they must try not to impose a perceptual expectation of mind-sight on the perception capacity of eye-sight." ― Daniel Goleman, Vital Lies, Simple Truths, The Psychology of Self Deception
"The attempt to regulate affect - to minimize unpleasant feelings and to maximize pleasant ones - is the driving force in human motivation." ― Alan N Schore, Affect Regulation & the Origins of the Self
The quotation from Affect Regulation & Origins of the Self can be related to Iain McGilchrist's favorite pre-Socratic quote about a river I believe, as the non-conscious river of affective judgment that our conscious sense of reason floats upon. Because, I believe, we are the most adaptive creatures on this planet and all our behaviors are no less subconsciously orchestrated than any other creature despite our species sense of superiority and the stiff-necked sense of reason more prominent in outcome oriented men.
Your chess memoir is a favourite book of mine. It has been a wise companion through my tenuous, late-lin-life engagement with the game.
It is wonderfully refreshing to read your take on complexity of difference between women and men.
Now here's a question. It's about the art of balancing an acceptance of life as the flow that it is, as against a drive to change the flow. Is it women, is it men, or is it neither group, that shows mastery -- so-called -- in that art?
Looking forward to reading your chess memoir! The book actually arrived just today - I will bring it with me on my travels.
Beautifully subtle piece. Love your twist on the Blake quote. Your questioning the usefulness, or otherwise, of gender stereotypes is - to use a word you use - prismatic.
Great piece -very nuanced and a good example of how to proceed. However, I think, dare I say it, we need to be a bit 'manlier' in expressing some of the issues at stake.
The issue is around epistemology. Feminism has confused itself as being about epistemology, when really it is political. This means that the trait correlation with biological sex isn't acknowledged or even really known about in favour of ridiculously blank-slate social construction and worse, this undermining has eroded the very idea of biological sex. Judith Butler may have interesting perspectives on the meaning of sex and gender, but we shouldn't mistake that for epistemology, just as Foucault's insights into power and episteme aren't a final word on 'what is actually true in the world'.
Until feminism and postmodern academia broadly reorients and attempts to integrate other perspectives, it will bounce along an increasingly erratic path, now in the case of feminism actually undermining its very core with mistaken ideas of sex and gender.
This isn't helped by throwing out platitudes but needs people to call things out that have become embedded in our relativistic milieu.