Once, there lived a man. Or woman.

In the 13th hour of the confirmation hearing of Ketanji Brown Jackson the first black woman to be appointed to the United States Supreme Court someone asked the nominee to define a woman It was a trick question of course to see whether Jackson had a soft spot for gay lesbian transgender people and others who questioned the gender they were assigned at birthJudge Jackson correctly punted the answer out of her court saying she was not a biologist and therefore not qualified to define a woman Scientists and philosophers applauded her answer but seriously doubted that even a competent biologist would be able to define a woman Apparently there is no sufficient way to clearly spell out what makes someone a womanBy now you are scratching your head and might be showing early signs of brain fog Why is this even a question yoursquore wondering Surely everyone knows the difference between a man and a woman Men are born with a penis and identify as males women are born with a vagina and identify as females Isnrsquot it just that simpleNot in todayrsquos world where you if a penisowner might need to walk a fine line and describe a woman as nonpregnant cervixhaving vaginaowning person with mammary tissue Walk with me and wersquoll try to figure this outmdashbecause it turns out we may have had it wrong all alongOne problem is that menmdashthat sexobsessed powerhungry blundering speciesmdashhave been doing all the defining over the centuries Womenrsquos bodies according to men were dangerous immoral and needed to be tightly regulated by men of course Never mind that even as of this century most men are utterly baffled by womenrsquos bodies especially their lady bitsThe names reveal a lot about the men who came up with themFor instance vagina originally meant sheathmdashand carried the implication that it was created mainly to cover a manrsquos erm sword Sometime during the middle ages they came up with a potatolike word pudendum to describe external female sexual organs The word is derived from the Latin word for lsquoto be ashamedrsquo or pudereThe word uterus comes to us from the Greek word for hysteria and the uterus itself was believed to be unnervingly like the two horns of a devil Hippocrates father of the Hippocratic oath that all doctors must take believed that the uterus wandered around a womanrsquos body like a lost puppy causing insanity and that the cure was marital bliss or lsquoparoxysmsrsquomdashotherwise known as orgasmsThe clitoris ladies and gentlemen was supposedly never found in a woman of virtue Suspected witches used to be stripsearched If found to possess a clitoris they would be tried for witchcraftEven today few menmdashand many womenmdashknow that the correct name for the part they routinely call the vagina is vulva Google it and learn something newLetrsquos go deeper Some answers to the mysteries of how the body decides if a foetus will be a boy or a girl began to emerge when geneticists discovered X and Y chromosomesmdashthreads made up of 200 or so genes For a long time it was believed that foetuses with two X chromosomes came out as girls while having an X and a Y chromosome made you a boyBut then they found athletic allmale persons with XX chromosomes as well as certified females with XY chromosomesThings got weirder MIT biologists found that just a single gene in the chromosomemdashcalled the DMRT1 genemdashdid something odd When this gene was removed from cells in a male testicle those cells began producing oestrogen a hormone that womenrsquos ovaries produce A similar gene removed from a femalersquos ovarian cells made them switch to producing testosterone a male hormoneIt was as though our reproductive systemrsquos cells can go from male to female at the flick of a switchmdashand the switch is a gene You may be born male but you stay male because the DMRT1 gene is constantly at work suppressing cells that start getting girlylike Yoursquod be female if that gene wasnrsquot keeping you maleWhere did we get this ability Marine biologists in California believe itrsquos an evolutionary legacy They found a remarkable genderfluid fish called the bluehead which hangs out near reefs in schools consisting of one male and a harem of females who spend their lives having sex If a predator eats up the male presto one of the females in the school evolves into a male And the sex goes onThe gene that helped them switch gender wasmdashno surprisemdashDMRT1Perhaps the correct answer to lsquowhat is a womanrsquo should bemdashldquoDamned if I know Irsquom just a manrdquoHere viewed from there C Y Gopinath in Bangkok throws unique light and shadows on Mumbai the city that raised him You can reach him at cygopigmailcomSend your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper