>>It’s like you’ve made some effigy of a hypothetical trans person, then you’ve proceeded to attack it with cherry-picked information.>>
The word "trans" appears nine times, in almost every case quoting from an article. I don't see where the "effigy" is; the article specifically says "That [sex is immutable] doesn't mean that transgender people don't exist, or don't deserve to be respected just like anyone else." If pointing out basic scientific facts is "attacking with cherry-picked information", then your case isn't very robust. But I think you're seeing attacks where they haven't been made.
>>Honestly, I don’t see the point of your article.>>
It's to explain to people that no matter what they may be told, even by respectable science magazines, in fact human sex (the element required for sexual reproduction, which theoretically decides which other members of the species you can mate with) only comes in two forms: male (small motile gametes) and female (large immotile gametes). Notwithstanding that in some people the sexual development path gets diverted or held up so that we have to use unusual methods to determine their sex (as with, since you raise the case, Caster Semenya), there are still only two sexes.
>>Let’s be very clear here - the data for sex expression, presentation, etc, is classically bimodal. >>
Absolutely true (I'm taking it that by "sex expression" you essentially mean "observable sexual characteristics" and by "presentation" you mean physical appearance.) That bimodality, however, doesn't negate the underlying reality that there are only two sexes.
>>And yes, I am statistically and mathematically trained.>>
Me too. Plus biology. Smattering of other sciences too.
>>Honestly. this excessive obsession about the topic is what is really worrying.>>
What I find worrying is people trying to redefine "sex" to mean some vague handwaving mixture of hormone levels, physiognomy, and self-description. I'm untroubled by how people want to describe their gender, but once you start unmooring scientific words from their essential meaning, you are sawing off the branch of knowledge on which you're sitting. Gender is malleable. Human sex is not.
Re your links:
1) bimodal. Helpful for those who don't know.
2) That 1992 letter is somewhat out of date. The IOC's latest framework (2021) lets individual associations make their own determination on including trans women in women's events (https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/olympics/59312313).
3) The HRW account of Negesa's experience is horrific, though the IAAF disputes the account (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/athletics/2019/09/27/female-athletes-claim-careers-ruined-coerced-surgery-curb-testosterone/) and it's *very* surprising that someone - especially a successful athlete - would consent to general anaesthetic surgery without knowing what it was for. The HRW writeup does give the clue, though, that Negesa (like Semenya) is male, with a DSD. In some instances, the gonads associated with the DSD can become cancerous - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5071196/ - see the section on "pre-malignant lesions" - and it's possible, but without knowing the detail, unclear, that the doctors had made some determination like that. But there should always be patient consent.
4) The Barr body sex test is known to be a good but not perfect way to determine the sex chromosomes, which in turn are a nearly but not quite perfect way to predict sex. It's unclear if the IOC still uses it.
I'll point out, once more, that the vast majority of trans people do not have DSDs (as "intersex" used to be called). They have perfectly normal genetic and chromosomal configurations appropriate to their sex. Pointing out that sex is binary and is not a spectrum is not an attack on trans people, because it leaves the social space in which trans people can define themselves untouched. Saying that the sky's colour comes from tropospheric scattering isn't an attack on trans people. Nor is pointing out how sex works. You can't pick and choose the science you like just because you happen to want it to be true.
