@geoffc well, i do care a little, in the sense that i do think it makes a difference when terms include both sexes. But, it isn't something that it is right to expect others to do, i don't think. I just do it myself. I don't want to assume some sort of guilt.
I do too, though I'm trying to break myself of the habit. I believe that very few people are actively intending to be sexist, but also that intentions don't matter all that much, and the effects, while perhaps small, are real.
A bit late to you discussion on manned/man-rated vs crewed/human-rated, but from a pedants point of view, it can mean both the gender or the race of humans, and in that case I say it depends on it's usage, while evidently crewed and human-rated are better, terms such as man-made reference the species and there's no reason manned or man-rated shouldn't.
@Edlothiad Referring to humanity as 'man' also sends a message that it is the men who count. If you have something composed of two things, and you refer to all of it with the name of one of those things, you are discounting the other. It doesn't matter that it has been done this way for a thousand years.
@kimholder I don’t think it does. Just like when you used the term “humanity” which has the substring of “man” in it, I don’t think you meant to convey that it’s only the men of our species count either. :)
what people mean to convey, especially today, is the reason i'm not inclined edit things. but there is really no doubt that this is exactly the historical context. The way it is said conveys the historical reality that men counted more.
a substring which occurs in both woman and man and human is really not a clear-cut case. the word man as meaning all of humanity is.
@ReactingToAngularVues geoff's answer is unreferenced, but it is much more analytical. he defends his stance with concrete points. and there is nothing in it that has no basis, unlike the other answer, which makes statements about saving face.
this is a case where the voting acts as the validation of the answer. not a desirable situation, but something which tends to happen.
it works alright as long as a large majority of the voters have a sound knowledge of the issues, something which so far has been true on this site.
I disagree that it's more analytical. It's just longer and attempts to sound more authoritative.
I could break it down line by line, but that'd be tiring. If you actually question each sentence in that answer it's not analytical at all. It's just personal opinion masquerading as authority.
i agree it has a lot of speculation, which isn't a good thing in an answer. arguably the question itself was borderline too speculative.
you might be able to engage goeff on how speculative the numbers and performance analysis is. typically he is quite able to back that up.
still, that question is pretty much impossible to answer without speculation. the thing about the deleted answer is that it was entirely about image, something which inherently can't be proven.
