The procedure to collect nasal cells took just a few minutes. After applying a numbing spray, a clinician guides a tiny brush into the upper part of the nose where smell-detecting nerve cells live. Researchers then study the collected cells to see which genes are active, a sign of what’s happening inside the brain.

The study compared samples from 22 participants, measuring the activity of thousands of genes across hundreds of thousands of individual cells, amounting to millions of data points. The nasal swab was able to pick up early shifts in nerve and immune cells. This includes people who showed lab-based signs of Alzheimer’s but had no symptoms yet.

A combined nose tissue gene score correctly separated early and clinical Alzheimer’s from healthy controls about 81% of the time.

Thank you for your reply.

I appreciate that you recognize that masculinity and femininity are concepts, and that these can co-exist and blend within many people’s experiences.

Unfortunately, the “I don’t care” position that you’ve described does still sound to me like the practice of “colorblindess.” For instance, it sounds like you are describing a similar false dichotomy; where you are saying, broadly, that either you “just don’t care” about a person’s experience of their identity features; or that, if you do care about a person’s experience of their identity features, then you would be forced to use that information to “ponder stereotypes.”

What about a third option? Could you see people as individuals rather than stereotypes; while also acknowledging that our experiences are affected by the contexts of our lives; including multiple layers of relationships with ourselves, each other, and broader societal forces?

This sounds similar to the “I just don’t see race” perspective.

Do you also just not see race?

If they’re different, what differentiates them in your thinking?

Respectfully, HubertManne, it seems like you have not really thought about this topic very deeply from a perspective other than your own yet.

I myself am old enough that I can appreciate your comment that “my whole life sex and gender terms were one and the same,” but many things change across the course of our lives, and “no one is even forcing me to study or anything now” is not a reason to stop learning and growing as a person.

If you are willing, I’d invite you to read this article on Minority Stress: pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10712335/

Or, you might also read this one: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minority_stress , especially the section “Health outcomes among sexual minorities.”

That’s a fair perspective.

I appreciate your acknowledgement that all people have the right to their own self-determination; and I appreciate your affirmation that all people deserve to be treated with kindness and respect.

I would also ask, though, when you assert your right to your own evaluation of another person, do you also practice awareness that it is fundamentally your interpretation, and that your interpretation may be factually inaccurate?

Do you say, “My experience is that I think that person is a man,” or do you say, “I declare based on my observations that I know that that person is a man” ?

Most of the time, we have no way of knowing what sex organs someone has, regardless of the expression of their outward appearance. It’s true that we may often recognize certain characteristics that lead to familiar assumptions, but in almost all scenarios we are still either making our own guesses about someone else, or we are choosing to believe that they are whoever they say they are.

Also, when considering intersex people and other variations in sexual development, even if we guess correctly about the sex organs or characteristics that someone may have been born with, we may still be wrong about the person’s underlying genetic make up or hormone balances.

I guess I wonder, when you hold your right to determine your own evaluation of another person, is your thinking flexible enough that you can hold your own assumptions lightly?

Of course. It should definitely be fine to remove the ethical guardrails because authoritarian actions are “not lawful and the government thus agreed not to do that.” They have clearly shown that they will only use their ever-expanding powers legally and responsibly. Surely, now more than ever, we can see that our government is run by conscientious public servants who value the our nation’s founding principles and work tirelessly to uphold the public’s trust.

He might

People believe in magical thinking at all income levels.