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Weird But Wonderful: Nature Is Not Wholly Binary
Nature is a gift, so vast and varied that none of us can fully know or appreciate it. Some aspects of the natural world — the warmth of the sun, the cooing of a dove, the pitter-patter of rain drops on our roof tops, are quite familiar. Others we may find weird but wonderful, bizarre but beautiful — or downright astonishing and sometimes terrifying. This is the second in a series. Please join me on alterate Mondays as I share some observations about aspects of nature that may be less familiar to many.
Men are from Mars, women are from Venus … but what about the rest of the planets?
I currently serve as the coordinator of the Honolulu Philosophy Meetup, an informal group that convenes once a month at a local coffeehouse to explore some issue of current concern. One issue that we focused on over a three-month period, just prior to the pandemic, was how government and society ought to respond to individuals who identify as transgender, or transexual. This has become an increasingly controversial topic over the past several years, as trans men and trans women have demanded that society simply accept them as the men and the women that they understand themselves to be.
But conservative commentators and politicians have pushed back. Allowing trans women to participate in women’s sports, they argue, would put…
