IMHO I am not convinced that gender identity is actually measurable or a knowable thing. I can physically demonstrate whether I am male or female. I can only assume that I think or feel like other males or females based on how other males or females behave or what they tell me they think and feel. Given the fluidity of language I have no guarantee that my interpretation of that is accurate. I have no real way to do an experiment because I cannot choose to be the other gender for a day and compare. Maybe there are more objective measures but they seem somewhat inadequate to me. My real life experience informs me that there are no real defined boundaries and all of us are some mixture of all of the above.
Paul is more talking about pride and identity. He's not talking about full embodiment or awareness of what identity is.
I'm going to say an example that's not true but it's just to demonstrate a point.
For example if I say "All women are stupid." If you identify as a woman you get offended and emotionally compromised. You assume the person who said it is wrong and you leave.
If you don't identify as a woman and you aren't offended by the statement at all.... perhaps you can do an objective and open minded study to get to the bottom of the question.
An objective person can look at the data and realize that on the bell curve of IQ... men and woman have the same average but men have a thicker tail on the far ends of both sides of the curve. This says that the small population of extremely intelligent people and extremely stupid people are mostly men. By not having pride you can be more objective and see this nuance.
Graham is talking about pride and identity and how it effects your objectivity and bias and intelligent analysis. He is not referring to the actual meaning and definition of identity.
The dark side of lacking identity and being objective is that while I illustrate a rosy conclusion (that is also true) here, not all conclusions are rosy. It is very possible that for certain scenarios the data shows results that are not politically correct. What if the data shows that women are truly stupider? What then?
I went to the gender thing primarily because much of the discussion seemed centered on that. But in general I would say my identity is comprised of many more things other than my gender.
By trying to simplify a definition of identity into something specific or plucking out a single identity trait (any trait) which cannot be defined precisely (emacs vs vim, declarative vs functional, race, intelligence, flavor, color etc) we lose information and end up in never ending ratholes of discussion. People start relying on personal experiences and feelings (subjective info) which makes the discussion personal and more often than not useless.
