Testosterone: Check this out!
This is a super-interesting episode of This American Life. You can listen to it for free, just click.
http://www.thislife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?episode=220
The first story is about a guy who, for medical reasons, stopped producing testosterone. He says he became more god-like....
The second story is so fascinating, you MUST listen!!! It's an interview with a female-to-male transsexual, talking about the effects of the massive doses of testosterone he took during some stages of the transition.
I especially like the part where he says that, after testosterone, he became interested in science for the first time, and suddenly understood physics in a way he never had before. :O
The third story is not as interesting, but please please listen to the second story and tell me what you think!
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
A few thoughts...
Your touching on a topic that tends to come with flames. That said ---
As you know from my posts on the blue side, I've read things to this effect before, and being a fan of Steve Pinker's book, the Blank Slate, I think the observation is very important to understanding our human nature.
One of the comments made near the beginning of the show is that we want to believe our personality is somehow independent of something as simple as a hormone. Steve Pinker calls this the "Ghost In the Machine" myth, the belief that we are us independent of our bodies and brains, both of which are biological/ chemical things.
What's interesting to me is how we can believe this myth so strongly, yet we all know from first hand experience how various drugs, or just being ill (with our body's normal regulatory systems out of wack) leaves us feeling and thinking differently. And for anyone that suffers from anxiety disorder, or depression, or bi-polar, or ADHD, or a thyroid imbalance, and knows that no matter how much you think you can fight it, your bodies chemicals win over the long run, what an amazing difference it is to have the chemical imbalance treated. To feel normal, happy, relaxed, to see things in a new way, to have a normal metabolism again... unfortunately while the same is true of Testosterone, that particular hormone is more relevant to one of the differences between men and women and so carries with it additional politically correct overtones making it harder to talk about objectively.
But anyway all of this is understandable. The notion that our personalities which seem so strong are so easily disturbed by a chemical is not exactly a comforting thought (i.e., it requires us facing how weak we really are). Also the notion that are personalities are strongly shaped by our hormones doesn't jive with the currently popular belief that our personalities are primarily shaped by nurture (aka society).
Anyway, I sure hope the thread's topic can be discussed objectively, but I fear that it could easily devolve into flames. *crossing-fingers* it does not.
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
^I dunno. Maybe it's weird, but I'm totally cool with being a big ol' bag of chemicals. I don't find that thought upsetting or depressing or uncomfortable at all.
It just makes me want to know more about the chemicals in question.
Thanks for the response. :)
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
I don't either Nic, and it also totally interests me to learn more, but I've also seen (more often then not), the opposite reaction, people want to believe their personalities or souls or something along those lines are independent of their bodies/brains, which touchs on a lot of very sensitive areas.
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
***Totally non-flamey response***
I listened to everything but the results of the office pool testosterone test.
I do feel there is a biological component to most human actions. BUT to claim we are only reacting from chemical cues is to offend a whole race. I know many people, men and women, who pride themselves on handling certain life experiences with aplomb and vigor, or dignity and restraint, when the assumed responses would have been to break down or flip out (responses that would be considered "primitive.")
I can say from my own experiences with hormone therapy for ovarian cysts/endometriosis (to suppress the estrogen in my body) that the changes I perceived in myself were distressing and depressing. I considered myself a "cipher" because I lost my sex drive. I became "stoic" because the illness co-incided with the loss of many relationships (both good and bad) and a change in environment. It was a "phase" in every sense of the word.
I'm back to normal now, but "normal" for me is not "typically" female anyway.
Just my 2 non-flamey cents.
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
Quote:
Originally Posted by
madmaxine
I do feel there is a biological component to most human actions. BUT to claim we are only reacting from chemical cues is to offend a whole race. I know many people, men and women, who pride themselves on handling certain life experiences with aplomb and vigor, or dignity and restraint, when the assumed responses would have been to break down or flip out (responses that would be considered "primitive.")
I'm not sure I understand.
Let me say that I think the human brain & consciousness & biochemistry is so incredibly complicated that, even if all of our behavior is ultimately determined by our chemistry (and I'm not making that claim here), there is still plenty of room for tons of individual variation, and for extraordinarily complex mind-body-environment interactions. I also don't think that this so-called "reductionist" view necessarily takes all the mystery out of the universe, either, y'know?
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
Thanks, Nicolina!
I'm going to download the episode and share it with a group of therapist interns that I supervise weekly at a residential facility for gay, lesbian and transgendered adolescents. The exercise in Act 3 ("Contest-osterone") will be interesting because they are constantly refining their capacity to develop insights and empathize with their clients, the facility staff and their colleagues... 8)
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Nicolina
I especially like the part where he says that, after testosterone, he became interested in science for the first time, and suddenly understood physics in a way he never had before. :O
Griffin Hansbury, the transsexual interviewed in Act 2 ("Infinite Gent"), not only became interested in science but also composed a love poem that incorporated his newly discovered interest in physics...
Uncertainty Principle
Delicate swirl of sub-atomics
jitter-bugging in the dark
parts of all our depths,
you are as unknowable
as the answers to questions
such as: Does God exist?
Why is there something
instead of Nothing? and
Does she love me still?
In her absence from me
I cannot be certain simultaneously
of both her whereabouts
and her how-abouts. I know,
at this moment, she is at her desk,
in her office, way uptown.
But I cannot see how she moves,
if she is eating a sandwich
or typing a letter. Nor can I know
what she is thinking, if she is
thinking of me.
To suddenly shine a light
upon her in her chair
would be to startle her
into acting not like herself at all.
She might close up like a clam,
or nervously twirl her hair,
or begin singing, “Clang clang
clang went the trolley,”
at the top of her lungs, until,
the light switched off, she would
fade back to her usual self,
as inscrutable as the quanta.
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Budai
Thanks, Nicolina!
I'm going to download the episode and share it with a group of therapist interns that I supervise weekly at a residential facility for gay, lesbian and transgendered adolescents. The exercise in Act 3 ("Contest-osterone") will be interesting because they are constantly refining their capacity to develop insights and empathize with their clients, the facility staff and their colleagues... 8)
Cool! Glad you found it interesting & useful for your work.
I'm curious, though--are the kids in the facility there because they have mental health issues, not necessarily having anything to do with being GBLT? Or because they couldn't live at home anymore due to family conflicts--got kicked out, ran away, etc?
The other part I like about the Griffin Hansbury interview is where he's talking about how, as a woman, he was edgy and dyke-y and cool when he talked about gender issues, and now, as a guy, he can say the same exact stuff and he's ... "just a jerk."
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Nicolina
The other part I like about the Griffin Hansbury interview is where he's talking about how, as a woman, he was edgy and dyke-y and cool when he talked about gender issues, and now, as a guy, he can say the same exact stuff and he's ... "just a jerk."
That's just the old double standard. Nothing to be concerned about. ;)
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
Yeah, I'm not feeling this thread. I'm going to "puss out" of it....LOL
Naw, what I should have said is that I accept the possibility that we might just be "bags of chemicals" (or my fave, "meat puppets") but I don't believe that. I've seen too much in my life to think that.
But I was being a smart-ass dick and wanted to cockblock the thread.
(Hahaha, someone stop me.)
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
yeah, it's an interesting thing. I seem to remember there was a flurry of articles about it when the testosterone cream came out (replacing injections) a few years back.
There are all sorts of interesting things.
I believe the hormone can vary widely during the day and is also released like adrenalin/epinephrine (fight or flight response) but on average:
Housewives have less testosterone than working women.
Blue-collar guys have more testosterone than white collar guys.
Testosterone levels rise in guys after seeing their team win and decrease in those who saw their team lose.
People in dominant situations have more as in above.
Men in prison have more on average than those outside.
Higher in single men than married.
Higher in black men than white.
etc..
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpag...pagewanted=all
Columnist finds out he's in the bottom 10%
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...996735,00.html
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
Actually I don't think anyone thinks that people's personalities are only shaped by chemicals, at least no one I'd take seriously. There is no question in my mind that we do learn, and what we learn is part of the product of who we are. I think to the proper way to look at it is statistically, over large groups of people, you can look at how hormones tend to affect people's personality. Individually though you can find variations, sometimes extremes, but think of it more like this...
Lets say you did an experiment where you altered the levels of say seretonin in a large group of people, say a million or 10 million, and compare their personalities with an equal size group that has not been altered. We'd reasonable expect to find a fairly large percentage of these two groups have differences in personalities (and associated behaviors) that are, statistically evident when we compare the two groups. For example, you might find that one group is far more likely to spend more hours in bed sleeping then the other. Or you might find one group is far more likely to engage in aggressive sports then another, and so on.
Those types of statistical differences are still very telling about who/what we are, even though individually we'll find people that don't fit the statistical expectations.
Re: Testosterone: Check this out!
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Nicolina
I'm curious, though--are the kids in the facility there because they have mental health issues, not necessarily having anything to do with being GBLT? Or because they couldn't live at home anymore due to family conflicts--got kicked out, ran away, etc?
Nicolina:
The residents are placed there for a variety of reasons, including those you alluded to above. It's a diverse population, with the common denominator being GBLT issues that make placement in "traditional" group homes problematic. Check out their website...