Kenneth Cruz67 said:I feel like there might be a bit of a flaw in her reasoning here, if you ask me. She didn't really address things like reflexes or reaction speeds at all, so I guess she might be mistaken when she suggests that gender doesn't matter, even in something like e-sports. In my experience, male teams in competitive gaming tend to beat female teams quite easily, so that doesn't really level the playing field either.
During the League of Legends Championship, an all-female squad ended up with a 52-2 record before they were eventually knocked out, mostly because watching them lose over and over wasn't exactly thrilling for the audience.😁
It’s actually quite interesting to me how almost all the criticism seems to focus on men who transition and then compete against other women, whereas you almost never hear about the reverse happening. I suppose that says a whole lot on its own.😬
Facts. Biologically speaking, men have faster reflexes than women. It's definitely tied to testosterone levels somehow.
A quick Google search for "do men have faster reflexes Than Women" brings up plenty of data.
The mean fastest reaction time recorded by men was significantly faster than women (p<0.001). At the 99.9% confidence level, neither men nor women can react in 100 ms, but they can react in as little as 109 ms and 121 ms, respectivelySame goes for e-sports—it's a newer category, but there's precedent, considering "mind sports" like chess, bridge, or Go (where guys tend to dominate too).
As for her main argument, she didn't technically make an error by leaving that out; it's just a gap in the logic, since it doesn't change her final conclusion.
You could also mention that men generally have better spatial orientation (try Googling: "do men have a better spatial orientation than women?"), which matters in tons of sports. Like football, for example.
Funny enough, when I was digging through stuff about "space," I found analyses suggesting women might actually be physically and mentally better suited for astronauts! There was some NASA study from 2014...
Here’s why women may be the best suited for spaceflightIt's interesting to me how all these critiques target men who transition to women and compete against other women. You almost never see the reverse happening. That says a lot.
It doesn't really say anything we didn't already know: men are naturally stronger and hold the edge in most sports. That's exactly why we have separate women's competitions, just like we have weight classes or age brackets for youth and seniors.
Now, when a man undergoes gender reassignment surgery, he starts taking heavy doses of female hormones. Does that wipe out the biological advantage he got from testosterone? It's not a simple question. Hossenfelder breaks it down using various studies. Turns out, it might vary depending on the sport.
She also mentions that women become equal to—or even better than—men in ultramarathons, specifically those over 100 miles. I read something about this a while back. Once the body hits total exhaustion and burns through its carb stores to start burning fat, the female metabolism seems more efficient at it. I remember reading about a study from the 80s predicting women would catch up to or pass men in marathons soon. That didn't happen, 26 miles because a marathon is too short, but it seems to matter in much longer races. Same thing with open-water swimming.
NEW STUDY FINDS WOMEN ARE BETTER AT ULTRAMARATHON RUNNING THAN MEN
A massive deep dive by the International Association of Ultrarunners and RunRepeat—those guys who do the sneaker reviews—just dropped some wild stats on ultra running trends from the last 23 years. It’s the biggest data set ever, looking at over 5 million finishes across 15,451 different ultra races. Turns out, the sport has exploded, seeing a crazy 1676% jump in participation. Even better? More women are crushing it than ever before. Female participation shot up from 14% to 23% over those two decades, and honestly, their performance explains why.
The bottom line? Women start out trailing, but once you hit the extreme long-haul stuff beyond 195 miles (195 miles), they actually pull ahead. The math is simple: the longer the slog, the smaller the gender gap gets until the ladies take the lead. For instance, in 3.1 miles runs, guys clock in 17.9% faster, and even at the standard marathon distance, they hold an 11.1% edge. By the time you hit 100 mile (100 miles) races, the gap almost vanishes at just 0.25%. But once you cross that 195 (195 miles) mile threshold, women are actually 0.6% faster than the men
A joint study between the International Association of Ultrarunners and RunRepeat, an athletic shoe review company, explored the trends in ultra running over the last 23 years. In the largest study ever done on ultra running, they analysed over 5 million results from 15,451 ultra running events to plot trends in the sport. They found that not only has ultra running had phenomenal growth in the last 23 years, a 1676% participation increase to be exact, but that more women are running than ever. 23% of participants are now female, compared to just 14% 23 years ago, and that may have something to do with their success!
Overall, the study found that female ultra runners are faster than their male counterparts for distances longer than 195 miles (195 miles). The data showed that as distances get longer, the gap in pacing between genders shrinks until women come out on top. In 3.1 miles runs men run 17.9% faster than women, at marathon distance the difference is just 11.1%, 100 mile (100 miles) races see the difference shrink to just .25%, and above 195 (195 miles) miles, women are actually 0.6% faster than men
There are plenty of ultramarathons out there, they just don't grab the headlines. Like Hossenfelder says, if a sport wants eyes on it, it’s gotta be entertaining, and let's face it, watching someone jog for hours is pretty much the definition of boring 124 miles? 😛 Besides, from what I've seen, most of these races are mixed anyway—men and women competing side-by-side—so there isn't even really a debate to be had.