Sex as a process

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• Paul E. Griffiths (University of Sydney & Macquarie University)
• Thursday 12 March 2026, 15:30-17:00
• Hopkinson Lecture Theatre, New Museums Site.

If you have a question about this talk, please contact Ahmad Elabbar.

Biological sex is not determined at conception. This fact has been obscured by concentrating on humans and ignoring the many species in which individuals change sex during their life cycle, as well as the many species with non-genetic or facultatively genetic sex determination systems. In these species it is self-evident that sex is the outcome of a developmental process, a process that can take different paths in different circumstances. But the general point applies equally to humans. Human sex chromosomes cause sexual development to proceed down a particular pathway (other things being equal), but they do not constitute sex any more than nest temperature constitutes sex in crocodiles. In humans, just as in species with non-genetic sex determination, assigning sex to pre-reproductive life-history stages involves ‘prospective narration’ – classifying the present in terms of its predicted future. Sex is a process.

As a corollary to this view, the idea that an individual organism is male, female, hermaphrodite or neuter should be replaced by the more accurate idea that organisms have state-dependent sexual life-history strategies under which individuals manifest one or more sexes during specific life-history stages and depending on circumstances. This is the only view that can be consistently applied across the whole diversity of sexual species.

The paper concludes by comparing and contrasting this processual view of biological sex with other recent ‘sex realist’ theories in philosophy of biology.

This talk is part of the Departmental Seminars in History and Philosophy of Science series.

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