Hormones, Ideology, and the Cost of Dissent with Carole Hooven

Conversations With Coleman

The Free Press

Philosophy, Society & Culture

4.8 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 3 November 2025

⏱️ 97 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

My guest today is evolutionary biologist Carole Hooven. If you’ve followed her story, you know she was effectively pushed out of Harvard for articulating a basic biological fact—and doing it politely. We talk through her research on hormones, rough-and-tumble play, aggression, and libido; what puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones actually do; why sports can’t be reorganized around “hormone levels”; and how elite institutions reacted to her saying things they all once taught. This is a conversation about evidence, not slogans—and about the cost of speaking plainly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to another episode of Conversations with Coleman.
0:04.6	My guest today is Carol Hoeven.
0:07.5	Carol is an evolutionary biologist and author who holds a PhD in biological anthropology
0:12.9	and taught in the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University for many years.
0:19.3	In 2021, she published the book, T, the story of testosterone,
0:24.7	the hormone that dominates and divides us. Because she is an expert on the effects of testosterone,
0:31.5	her work put her at odds with trans activists and others who believe that gender has no biological basis.
0:39.0	In this episode, Carol recounts the disturbing story of how she was hounded out of Harvard
0:44.4	University for her beliefs, and after that, we move on to the substantive areas of her expertise.
0:50.6	We talk about, for instance, the effect that testosterone has on the brain, how testosterone
0:55.9	drives biological and psychological differences between men and women, whether women and men should
1:02.3	be segregated in sports, and much more. So without further ado, Carol Hoeven.
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1:57.8	Carol Hooven, thanks so much for coming on my show. Thanks for having me, Coleman.
2:02.1	So I've met you before in real life. I've followed your work. I've followed some of the way that you've been treated by the institutions that you've worked for.
2:13.5	And I imagine people in my audience, some will be familiar with the story, but for those who
2:18.8	aren't, can you tell me a little bit about, first of all, your academic background? How did you
2:24.3	get into studying the topics that you study? And then what has been your treatment from academic
	...

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