The last word on circumcision In yesterday's post, I pointed out that circumcision is the kind of bottomless hot topic that people just cannot stop themselves from arguing about. I claimed that two of the major issues in circumcision cannot be discussed reasonably. This, I think, is why so few of us can avoid trying, and also why the discussions never end. Yesterday, I tried to show that it is senseless to argue about the pain the infant feels. Today, I'd like to end discussion about whether or not circumcision lessens the pleasure of orgasm.

The idea here is that snipping off the foreskin, which is rich in nerve endings, dulls the intensity of sensation. To judge this claim requires that we compare the way an orgasm feels to a circumcised man to the way it feels to an uncircumcised man. This poses a special problem.

By point of contrast, consider a related objection to circumcision, which is that the foreskin serves as a handy lubricated sleeve for the glans. This claim is perfectly amenable to reasoned inquiry, because the evidence needed to judge it is publicly available to both the snipped and the unsnipped. An uncircumcised man can experience the benefits of his foreskin, and imagine what it would be like to forego these benefits. The circumcised man can sample the benefit of other forms of lubrication, and picture the convenience of having this feature built in. Both can weigh this benefit against the cost of routine hygienic maintenance. This is an argument that at least makes sense, and I encourage people to argue about it as much as they like.

No such comparison is possible, however with the claim that an uncircumcised orgasm feels better. It is not enough to merely compare two alternate physical arrangements: we also must consider the brain’s interpretation of sensation. We cannot assume that having fewer nerve endings necessarily means experiencing less pleasure. It may be, for example, that the brain calibrates itself to register sensations based upon the number of nerve endings extant, so that altering the number of endings from days after birth would do nothing to alter the experience of the intensity of pleasure.

As an example of this possibility, consider the eye’s interpretation of color. Take a roll of daylight color slide film, and shoot three photographs without using the flash. Take the first outdoors, the second indoors under incandescent light, and the third indoors under fluorescent light. The first photograph will have what we consider normal color, the second will be yellowish, and the third will be green. This is because each light source has a different color temperature, and the daylight film is balanced for daylight and electronic flash, which share nearly the same color temperature. Our retinas physically register the same differences, but we do not usually see these differences because our brains calibrate for the discrepancies without our even being aware of it.

In the movie "This Is Spinal Tap," Nigel proudly exhibits an amplifier that he has had custom made. He shows the character of the filmmaker the volume knob, and it is marked not up to the usual 10, but to 11. In the dialog that follows, the filmmaker tries to gently question whether the amp is any louder than other amps just because the knob is numbered up to 11. His point is that the volume knob does not measure a specific quantity of volume at each numbered level, but merely represents a proportion of the total volume available on that amp. It may be that there is a baseline minimum of the appropriate type of nerve ending to afford any orgasm at all, and if we physically meet this threshold, the brain affords us a ration of pleasure proportionate to the percentage of our endings that are stimulated. If so, then the uncircumcised who claim they are having a more pleasurable orgasm than their circumcised brethren are making the same mistake as Nigel.

This speculation may be completely untrue, but it is impossible to know, because verifying this would require comparing the private sensation experienced in one person’s brain with the private sensation in another person’s brain.

Suppose I claim to have a higher tolerance of pain than you do. I offer as proof that I went to work with a headache, while you stayed home with one. You suggest that your headache was more painful than mine. I disagree, claiming that mine was more painful than yours. You say that you could not stand up without unendurable pain. I say I couldn’t either, but I was able to endure it because I have higher tolerance for pain. How is this argument to be adjudicated?

Or, try this one, borrowed from the philosopher Wittgenstein: Imagine that we each have a box, and in this box is something we all call a 'beetle.' We all say we know what a beetle is only from looking in our boxes, and we cannot look in each others' boxes. We could each have anything in our boxes. There is no way I could ever know how the contents of my box compares to the contents of your box.

The intensity of pleasure provided by an orgasm is like this 'beetle.' We know it only from looking in our own box, and we cannot look in anyone else's box.

Not even the stories of men circumcised as adults can resolve this problem, even if these men were to be unanimous in their reports. These reports only reveal what it is like to experience sex first as an uncircumcised man, and then as a man circumcised as an adult. This might be a different experience than that of only ever having been the one or the other. It is possible, for example, that the brain trains itself with one experience, and then must re-train itself for the other experience. A re-trained brain might interpret signals differently than a once-trained brain.

Arguing about whether or not circumcised orgasms are less pleasurable than uncircumcised orgasms is pointless. No amount of rational inquiry could resolve the question.  ¶ 8:56 AM