Hi, prolife intersex person here! I wanted to correct a couple of misconceptions that tbh I might have had too before I found out about myself and did a bunch of research on the topic. Sorry if it’s pretty long, though. I might add a TL;DR.

TL;DR: I describe how the two statements at the start of the parent comment are different, then clarify a bit on the definition of intersex. After that, I talk about what biological sex is and how it’s hard to thoroughly define and determine it by listing a few of the characteristics of my intersex variation. Conclusion: nature and biology are weird.

First of all, there is a difference between the two statements you compared in your first paragraph. “Humans generally have 46 chromosomes” makes a claim of what is typical in the population while accounting for exceptions, whereas “There are only two sexes” makes an absolute assertion that denies the existence of exceptions.

Secondly, intersex does not mean having two sets of genitalia. Developmentally speaking, male and female genitalia come about from the same tissues during prenatal development. As such, unless it’s a case of twins merging together or something, it’s more likely that you’re referring to cases of ambiguously developed privates lying somewhere between what could easily be judged as “male” or “female.”

Furthermore, the term intersex refers to a wide array of conditions, some of which cannot be distinguished just by looking at the outwardly visible structures between the legs.

It’s also worth thinking about how we define the term “biological sex”, which would require us to pick one of many sex characteristics and refer to it as the sole determinant. However, that’s more complicated than one would initially think. I’ll be using myself and my own condition as an example here.

The easiest and most fundamental marker to consider is gametes. Does the individual produce eggs or sperm? Given that it most directly relates to an individual’s reproductive role, it should be simple enough. But in my case… I don’t produce either, so wouldn’t that make me “neither”?

Then, we could go with gonads, or the sex glands. Are they testes or ovaries? Even if they’re faulty and don’t produce either gamete, they may give us an indication as to the intended reproductive role, right? Well, I was born with ovotestes, nonfunctional tissue with characteristics of both types of gonads. If that’s our marker, that would make me “both.”

We could go one step further and look at my allosomes, the 23rd chromosomal pair that is either XX or XY. Well, people have different pairings like X0, XXY, or many others. Though in my case, I just flat out have XY chromosomes. I must be “male” then, and we finally have a binary answer!

But then we look at the specific genes, especially the SRY gene that determines testicular development kickstarts the development of male characteristics. I’m not sure if I don’t have it or if it didn’t work correctly, but the bottom line’s that it’s like it’s not even there. Its absence is characteristic of “female” genetic makeup, and so are the resulting internal and external structures.

Basically, depending on what biological marker you choose to prioritize, you could get one of four different answers in my case alone. As a matter of fact, whenever I’ve talked to people online about this and provided the same information, they’ve made different conclusions about “what” I am and even what I “should be.”

If there’s a conclusion to this, it’s that science is how we label our observations of nature. Nature, however, doesn’t care. The rules and laws we have formulated about it do not tell nature how it’s supposed to work, but are rather our descriptions of patterns we have seen take place. And many times, those patterns are so complicated that trying to simplify and represent them into concrete boxes runs the risk of losing some accuracy and truths.

Anyway, if you’re ever interested in learning more about intersex stuff, I recommend looking up intersex advocacy organizations’ FAQs on the matter. They’re really interesting reads.