I think you’re correct in a very narrow sense where it shouldn’t matter that some traits are more prevalent and that can be described as normal.

It just flies in the face of what we know about human behaviour across recorded history.

> It just flies in the face of what we know about human behaviour across recorded history.

You're right, human behavior is often abhorrent and focused on differences.

But trying to solve that problem by pretending that scientific taxonomy is the cause, is counterproductive. People want an easy answer, and it's easier to warp science than change the hearts of men. But it's an insidious "solution" that has untold corrosive effects and impairs our ability to inspect reality with integrity and honesty.

As scientific taxonomy has often been a historic justification and taxonomy really is just a social construct itself (and often terribly inaccurate, see the problem of defining species for example) it's pretty easy to see why it seems like a good place to tackle the issue. I don't think we can pretend that science is some pure place that exists in a vacuum apart from society.

> If there is an overwhelming physical characteristic, that the vast majority of humans exhibit, it's not hurtful to acknowledge it as normal, and deviation from that norm, by definition, as abnormal.

In the exact sense and in the exact same proportions as we may say the following:

    As the vast majority of atoms in the universe are either Hydrogen or Helium, it's not hurtful to acknowledge these as normal, and deviation from that norm, by definition, as abnormal.

Combining the actual science and your take on the nomenclature, it now follows that carbon, lead, gold, aluminium, lithium, the bulk of Tom Lehrer's The Elements in fact are all abnormal.

Of course that does sound pretty silly.

Yes, if your (statistical) population is all the elements in the universe that would be the case. If your target population is all the metal deposits or all humans in the world you would come to different conclusions.

That's exactly right - I'm directly comparing the known universal population of humans with the known universal population of elements.

Humans are 98% Male or Female with a long tail of variations in chromoosones.

Elements are 98% Hydrogen of Helium with a long tail of variations in the nucleus and electron shells.

The elements have atypical clusterings on planets, humans have atypical clusterings in various cities.

It appears to be a sound comparison.

Yes, but this entire discussion skips over the obvious fact that the words "abnormal" and "normal" in typical human conversational contexts have very little to do with statistical ideas and more typically carry moral weight.

If the your whole point is that you want to say intersex people are abnormal in the sense that they are drawn from a portion of the distribution with small support, I guess that is fine, but if you use that language in an ordinary context, prepare to be misunderstood.

My whole point?

You may want to scroll up parent to parent - ta8645 is the user that I initially responded to and the person who first stated that humans were only either M or F and then moved to suggest that those who didn't fit the M or the F definitions (physically, at birth) were abnormal and outsiders.

My point, such as it is, is that when representing the world as we understand it through science we are faced with a flood of important long tail outliers - eg: collectively every element in the universe that is not Hydrogen and not Helium is proportional to the collection of every human that is neither not perfectly male (by physical birth reproductive biology definitions) nor perfectly female.

I regard the non H and non He elements as significant despite their rarity and it always strikes me as odd that some people make such a song and dance about humans that are born every year with the same frequency.

Regarding the English language, it's a normal common occurrence that { not perfect male, not perfect female } are born every year - a bookie can number their occurrance within a tight window as an example of how regular, precise, and predictable these numbers are.