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你可能在想，好希望这些关于睾酮的论断都是错的，但我想强调的其实是，这些论断正确与否都无所谓。如果你觉得一个科学假设让你不爽，请你在脑子里绷紧这根弦：你很可能会低估支持这个假设的证据。这句话听起来好像和没说一样，但我花了很长时间，下了很大功夫才真正理解。
现在的大众和过去一样，热衷于相信人类身体、行为、制度的性别结构几乎完全不受生物学（尤其是睾酮的作用）影响。这类意见的一位领袖名叫科迪莉亚·法恩，她是一名心理学家，在2017年出版了著作《荷尔蒙战争》。法恩认为，睾酮决定男性行为这种论调早就被证据压垮了，用她的话说，“复活这只恐龙”既没用又危险，还会“粉碎男女平等的希望” [40] 。如果你相信“生理性别是推动人类走上不同道路的基本力量”，那你就陷入了“老生常谈”，即“两性之间的差异由过去的进化压力塑造，女性更加谨慎，注重生儿育女，而男性则永远在寻求更高的地位，以吸引更多伴侣” [41] 。
《荷尔蒙战争》获得了英国皇家学会科学图书奖，该奖项很有影响力。一名评委为这本书写了这么一句评语：“这本书出色地说明了每个人，无论是男性还是女性，生来就有能力拥有任何一种生活。” [42] 《荷尔蒙战争》指出，如果相信关于进化、激素的“性别歧视”论调，那我们就是在对自己能取得的成就横加限制。法恩等人表示，若要消除这些限制，就得驳斥两性之间有生物学差异这种“根深蒂固的迷思”，尤其是睾酮的迷思。 [43]
人们普遍相信，性别差异的生物学解释必然会让人对进步悲观，并接受性别社会规范的宿命论。神经科学家吉娜·里彭在2019年出版的《大脑的性别》一书中就这么说过：“对生物学的信仰让我们形成了一种特定思维倾向，认为人类能进行的活动是固定的、不可改变的，从而忽视许多新的可能。我们灵活的大脑与其可调节的世界，在很大程度上密不可分地联系着。” [44]
《睾酮外传》《荷尔蒙战争》，还有无数流行杂志、报纸上的文章……没有这方面知识储备的读者如果读完了这份精心遴选的清单，一定会疑惑，我们在这儿大惊小怪地讨论，到底是为了什么。如果科学上真有这么大的缺陷，那“男性性激素”睾酮的迷思一开始是如何产生的？科学记者安杰拉·萨伊尼在她的畅销书《低人一等：科学如何误导女性，以及改写故事的新研究》中回答了这个问题。在她看来，是科学史上明显又真实的性别歧视把我们引入了歧途，只有揭露科学中的偏见和性别歧视，我们才能看到真正的证据。在这本书的开头，萨伊尼问道：“性激素平衡的影响能否超越性器官并深入我们的思想和行为，让男人和女人产生明显差异呢？” [45] 她的答案很明确：“两性在心理上差异很小，我们看到的差异也不源于生物学，很大程度上是文化塑造的。” [46]
带有性别歧视意味的假设能够影响科研，在这一点上我认同萨伊尼，但我不能认同她对上述问题的回答。科学研究已经明确证实性别差异确实有生物学来源了，在许多重要的方面，睾酮能让男性和女性的心理、行为产生差异。
在接下来的章节里，你将看到睾酮为了促进繁衍，是如何影响我们的身体、大脑和行为的。了解这种影响不是什么坏事，而是对我们的一种赋能。我们了解睾酮或性别差异，绝不意味着我们接受目前程度的性侵犯、性骚扰、性胁迫或性别歧视。恰恰相反，社会的进步有赖于科学的进步 [47] ，了解驱动我们的优先事项和行为的力量，以及基因、激素和环境如何相互作用，有助于我们与本性中阴暗的一面对抗。没有必要低估睾酮在我们体内发挥的作用。了解世界运作的方式、直面真相的确有可能令人不适或不安，但我希望这个过程总体上能让你满意，给你力量，要是你能觉得有趣就更好了，因为这些就是我有过的感受。
[1] R. J. Nelson and L. J. Kriegsfeld, An Introduction to Behavioral Endocrinology ,5th ed. (Sunderland, MA: Sinauer Associates, 2017), 73-74, 554, 703.
[2] 1英尺=0.3048米。——编者注
[3] Martin N. Muller and Richard W. Wrangham,“Dominance, Aggression and Testosterone in Wild Chimpanzees: A Test of the ‘Challenge Hypothesis, ’” Animal Behaviour 67, no.1 (2004): 113-23;参考了第116页关于黑猩猩尿液收集、保存和激素分析的方法。
[4] 基巴莱黑猩猩项目是一个针对灵长目动物的长期野外研究项目，开始于1987年，以乌干达境内的野生黑猩猩种群为主要的研究对象，研究方向包括行为、生理、生态等，旨在保护濒危的灵长目物种及其生境。——译者注
[5] 1英里约为1.61千米。——编者注
[6] Eugene Linden,“The Wife Beaters of Kibale,” Time , August 19, 2002, 56;另参见：Eugene Linden, The Octopus and the Orangutan: More True Tales of Animal Intrigue, Intelligence, and Ingenuity (New York: E. P. Dutton, 2002), 112。
[7] Richard W. Wrangham and Dale Peterson, Demonic Males: Apes and the Origins of Human Violence (Boston: Houghton Miflin Harcourt, 1996).
[8] Martin N. Muller, Sonya M. Kahlenberg, Melissa Emery Thompson, and Richard W. Wrangham,“Male Coercion and the Costs of Promiscuous Mating for Female Chimpanzees,” Proceedings of the Royal Society B:Biological Sciences 274, no.1612 (2007): 1009-14, and Joseph T. Feldblum,Emily E. Wroblewski, Rebecca S. Rudicell, Beatrice H. Hahn, Thais Paiva,Mine Cetinkaya-Rundel, Anne E. Pusey, and Ian C. Gilby,“Sexually Coercive Male Chimpanzees Sire More Offspring,” Current Biology 24, no. 23(2014): 2855-60.
[9] Human Rights Watch,“Human Rights Watch World Report 2000—Uganda,”December 1, 1999, https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6a8c924.html.
[10] Neil MacFarquhar,“8 Tourists Slain in Uganda, Including U.S. Couple,” New York Times , March 3, 1999.
[11] 奥兹医生是美国心脏手术领域的知名专家，后放弃从医，主持全国性的电视节目《奥兹医生秀》，帮助无数人获得了健康的生活方式。——译者注
[12] Danielle Kurtzleben,“Trump and the Testosterone Takeover of 2016,”National Public Radio, October 1, 2016, https://www.npr.org/2016/10/01/494249104/trump-and-the-testosterone-takeover-of-2016.
[13] Andrew Sullivan,“#MeToo and the Taboo Topic of Nature,” New York Magazine, January 19, 2018.
[14] Gad Saad,“Is Toxic Masculinity a Valid Concept?,” Psychology Today blog, March 8, 2018, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/homo consumericus/201803/is-toxic-masculinity-valid-concept.
[15] Neal Gabler,“The Testosterone Fueled Presidency,” Huffington Post ,August 16, 2017, https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-testosterone-fueled presidency_b_59949cd3e4b056a2b0ef029c.
[16] 三者均为美国知名的保守派专栏作家、政论撰稿人。——译者注
[17] Emerald Robinson,“The Collapse of the Never-Trump Conservatives,” Ameri can Spectator , June 29, 2018.
[18] Leon Seltzer,“M ale Sexu al Misconduc t a nd the Testosterone Curse,” Psychology Today blog, November 29, 2017, https://www.psycholo gytoday.com/us/blog/evolution-the-self/201711/male-sexual-misconduct and-the-testosterone-curse.
[19] Rachel E. Morgan and Barbara A. Oudekerk,“Criminal Victimiza tion, 2018,”BCJ 253043, Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, September 2019, https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/cv18.pdf; David C. Geary, Male, Female: The Evolution of Human Sex Differences , 3rd ed. (Washington, DC: American Psychological Associa tion, 2021), 433-37; National Highway Trafic Safety Administration,“Com parison of Crash Fatalities by Sex and Age Group”(Washington, DC: Na tional Center for Statistics and Analysis, 2008); Monica Hesse,“We Need to Talk About Why Mass Shooters Are Almost Always Men,” Washington Post , August 5, 2019.
[20] 1英寸=2.54厘米。——编者注
[21] 几乎每一种性别差异，男性的变异程度都要大于女性，但小学时期的阅读能力的变异程度常常较低，没有统计学意义上的性别差异。参见：Ariane Baye and Christian Monseur,“Gender Differences in Variability and Extreme Scores in an International Context,” Large-Scale Assessments in Education 4, no.1(2016): 1-16。关于智商等认知能力测试的变异程度的性别差异，参见：Alan Feingold,“Sex Diferences in Variability in Intellectual Abilities: A New Look at an Old Controversy,” Review of Educational Research 62, no.1 (1992): 61-84。
[22] Rebecca M. Jordan-Young and Katrina Karkazis, Testosterone: An Unauthorized Biography (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2019), 54; and Rebecca M.Jordan-Young,“How to Kill the ‘Zombie Fact’ That Testosterone Drives Human Aggression,”paper presented at the Women in the World: Time for a New Paradigm for Peace conference, University of Maryland, September 2019, 22.
[23] American Psychological Association,“Harmful Masculinity and Violence,” In the Public Interest Newsletter, September 2018, https://www.apa.org/pi/about/newsletter/2018/09/harmful-masculinity.
[24] 《嘿，小瘦子！你瘦得肋骨都凸出来了！》，电子漫画，引自查尔斯·阿特拉斯有限公司的官方网站，访问于2020年1月15日。查尔斯·阿特拉斯的力量训练法广告常见于学者的文章，文章分析了这个广告反映的“理想男性”的特征。例如，参见：Jacqueline Reich,“‘The World’s Most Perfectly Developed Man’: Charles Atlas, Physical Culture, and the Inscription of American Masculinity,” Men and Masculinities 12, no. 4 (2010): 444-6。
[25] Randy Thornhill,“Rape in Panorpa Scorpionflies and a General Rape Hypothesis,” Animal Behaviour 28, no.1 (1980): 52-59.用桑希尔的话说，男性比女性身材魁梧，是因为“体形较大的男性受青睐”，而这又是由于如果未能成功抢到交配所需的资源，体形较大的男性强奸的成功率更高。桑希尔和帕尔默的强奸假说全文，参见：Randy Thornhill and Craig T. Palmer, A Natural History of Rape: Biological Bases of Sexual Coercion (Cambridge,MA: MIT Press, 2001)。批判这一观点的言论，参见：Jerry A. Coyne and Andrew Berry,“Rape as an Adaptation,” Nature 404, no. 6774 (2000):121-22。
[26] Justin Storbeck and Gerald L. Clore,“Afective Arousal as Information: How Afective Arousal Influences Judgments, Learning, and Memory,” Social and Personality Psychology Compass 2, no. 5 (2008): 1824-43.
[27] Lawrence Summers,“Full Transcript: President Summers’ Remarks at the National Bureau of Economic Research, Jan.14, 2005,” Harvard Crimson ,February 18, 2005, https://www.thecrimson.com/article/ 2005/2/18/full transcript-president-summers-remarks-at/.
[28] Alan Finder,“President of Harvard Resigns, Ending Stormy 5-Year Tenure,” New York Times , February 22, 2006.
[29] Sara Rimer and Patrick D. Healy,“Furor Lingers as Harvard Chief Gives Details of Talk on Women,” New York Times , February 18, 2005.
[30] James Damore,“Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber,”July 2017, https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/3914586/Googles-Ideological-Echo Chamber.pdf.
[31] 支持他的文章，参见：Lee Jussim, Geofrey Miller, and Debra W. Soh in“The Google Memo: Four Scientists Respond,” Quillette , August 17, 2017,https://quillette.com/2017/08/07/google-memo-four-scientists-respond/;Debra Soh,“No, the Google Manifesto Isn’t Sexist or Anti-Diversity. It’s Science,” Globe and Mail (Toronto), August 8, 2017; Glenn Stanton,“The Science Says the Google Guy Was Right About Sex Differences,” Federalist ,August 11, 2017, https://thefederalist.com/2017/08/11/science-says-google guy-right-sex-diferences/。更多的批判性观点，参见：Megan Molteni and Adam Rogers,“The Actual Science of James Damore’s Google Memo,” Wired , August 15, 2017, https://www.wired.com/story/the-pernicious-science-of james-damores-google-memo/; and Brian Feldman,“Here Are Some Scientific Arguments James Damore Has Yet to Respond To,” New York Magazine ,August 11, 2017。
[32] Gina Rippon,“What Neuroscience Can Tell Us About the Google Diversity Memo,” The Conversation , August 14, 2017, https://theconversation.com/what-neuroscience-can-tell-us-about-the-google-diversity-memo-82455.里彭认为，达莫尔在备忘录中宣称“女性在科技领域人数过少，是由于生物学差异”，但达莫尔从未说过生物学是全部解释。里彭还指出，兴趣和能力方面的性别差异并不是“落入两个极端”，而是“分布在一个连续区间内”，并以此来反对达莫尔。但我仍要强调，达莫尔并未否认过这一点。
[33] Daisuke Wakabayashi,“Contentious Memo Strikes Nerve Inside Google and Out,” New York Times , August 8, 2017.
[34] Daisuke Wakabayashi and Nellie Bowles,“Google Memo Author Sues, Claim ing Bias Against White Conservative Men,” New York Times , January 8, 2018.
[35] Angela Saini, Inferior: How Science Got Women Wrong and the New Research That ’ s Rewriting the Story (Boston: Beacon Press, 2017).
[36] Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex , 2 vols.(London: John Murray, 1871), vol.1, 564.
[37] David F. Feldon, James Peugh, Michelle A. Maher, Josipa Roksa, and Colby Tofel-Grehl,“Time-to-Credit Gender Inequities of First-Year PhD Students in the Biological Sciences,” CBE—Life Sciences Education 16, no.1 (2017), article 4.截至2017年，女性获得生物科学领域52.5%的博士学位，但在相关领域只拿到30%～35%的终身教职。
[38] Gertrud Pfister,“The Medical Discourse on Female Physical Culture in Germany in the 19th and Early 20th Centuries,” Journal of Sport History 17, no. 2(1990): 191.
[39] Adam S. Cohen,“Harvard’s Eugenics Era,” Harvard Magazine , March-April 2016, https://harvardmagazine.com/2016/03/harvards-eugenics-era.
[40] 引自出版商的封底描述：Cordelia Fine, Testosterone Rex: Myths of Sex, Science,and Society (London: Icon Books, 2017)。
[41] 引自出版商的描述：W. W. Norton, Fine, Testosterone Rex , https://www.wwnorton.co.uk/books/9780393082081-testosterone-rex。
[42] “Cordelia Fine’s Explosive Study of Gender Politics Wins 30th Anniversary Royal Society Insight Investment Science Book Prize,”Royal Society, news,September 19, 2017, https://royalsociety.org/news/2017/09/cordelia-fine wins-30th-anniversary-royal-society-insight-investment-science-bookprize/.
[43] 引自出版商的描述：Fine, Testosterone Rex 。
[44] Gina Rippon, The Gendered Brain: The New Neuroscience That Shatters the Myth of the Female Brain (New York: Random House, 2019), 353.
[45] Saini, Inferior , 28.
[46] Saini, Inferior , 10.
[47] 关于科学和理性如何推动社会进步，有一本书做了充分的分析，参见：Steven Pinker, Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress (New York: Viking, 2018)。