Homosexuality and the T0E
david ford
Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
1a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
presence of homosexuality among humans.
1b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
homosexuality among humans.
1c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
homosexuality among humans.
2a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
practice of pedophilia among humans.
2b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
pedophilia among humans.
2c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
pedophilia among humans.
3a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
practice of bestiality among humans.
3b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
bestiality among humans.
3c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
bestiality among humans.
Eric Gill
@posting.google.com:
> While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
> Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
>
> What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
You aren't interested in discussing them.
<snip>
Rick Russell
david ford <dfo...@gl.umbc.edu> wrote:
> presence of homosexuality among humans.
...
> practice of pedophilia among humans.
...
> practice of bestiality among humans.
The link between biological evolution and advanced social behavior
isn't very clear. I don't think you're going to find any strong
arguments "for" or "against" biological evolution in that realm.
Rick R.
Dissident
> While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
> Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
>
> What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
>
> 1a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
> presence of homosexuality among humans.
> 1b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
> homosexuality among humans.
> 1c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> homosexuality among humans.
>
You first need to clarify what you are asking. First, do
you mean to ask whether evolutionary theory provides a
framework that includes a scientific explanation of the
existence and prevalence of homosexuality in humans? Or
are you asking if it is the human acceptance of the theory
of evolution *causes* homosexuality? Second, is it your
intent to impugn the theory of evolution based on either of
these effects?
Because, if the alternative to evolution is "goddidit", and
that explains everything, and any putatively negative aspects
of the world that a theory successfully explains are, in fact,
the "fault" of that theory, then creationism would be just as
much to blame for pedophilia, etc. as you imply evolution is.
And frankly, if I believed in a god, he'd be the first one
I'd blame for anything I didn't like in the world. So yeah,
let's throw out evolution, accept creationism and fundamentalist
theology, and put the blame for everything wrong in the
world right back where it belongs: on the Christian God.
Jos Flachs
ford) wrote:
>While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
>Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
>
>What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
You.
For you relate three entirely different subjects, completely unrelated
to one other. Perhaps homosexuality can be explained by some kind of
evolution theory. The other two are cultural and have nothing to do
with evolution.
Huck Turner
It is probably safe to say that none of these behaviours is a
reproductive advantage, but they would only be a reproductive
disadvantage if they occurred to the exclusion of reproductive sexual
behaviour.
Being attracted to members of the opposite sex is an advantage on a
purely reproductive level, but given that men and women have virtually
the same set of genes, realising this mutual attraction may not be
trivial because it involves making men attracted to women while women
are attracted to men. In this light, we might expect that development
occasionally results in men who like men and women who like women.
This is not to say that such people are 'defective' because there is
no objective reason to associate reproductive fitness with value
judgements of what is 'good'.
Things like vulnerability to disease, a tendency to behave recklessly,
low intelligence, living on earthquake fault lines, bad diet, and so
on are all things that might reduce a person's chances of passing on
his or her genes relative to someone else. Selection is constantly
acting to reduce the risks associated with these things (complicated
by the fact that this has to be done without introducing new
risks/costs), but there will always be someone who is vulnerable to
disease _relative_ to someone else, someone who is _relatively_
reckless, and so on. Likewise, there will always be some people whose
sexual behaviour is more conducive to passing on genes than the sexual
behaviour of others. There is not necessarily any difficulty here
unless you assume (incorrectly) that biological systems are always
perfect, presenting globally optimal solutions to design constraints
rather than just imperfect, locally optimal solutions.
Note furthermore that design 'imperfections' present more of a problem
for creationism than they do for evolutionary theory.
H.
Danny Kodicek
"Jos Flachs" <'wcruise'@ksc15.th.com> wrote in message
news:9ptv5091sbr7qq7qt...@4ax.com...
Well, we can't say that for sure. Evolution has left human males (along with
the males of plenty of other species) with a rather powerful and not
terribly discriminatory sex drive (females too, but they're more
discriminating as a rule). Culture's role seems more to limit the
consequences of this drive than to create it. Certainly all three of David's
poorly-linked phenomena (are they equally repellant and evil in his eyes?)
can be found in most cultures across the world, which certainly suggests a
genetic rather than cultural origin. That isn't to say that evolution has
selected 'for' any of them, any or all of them may simply be by-products of
other selected traits (eg, paedophilia could easily be seen as an aberrant
result of the combination of high sex drive with love for children, both of
which have a clear survival value)
Danny
"Rev Dr" Lenny Flank
david ford wrote:
> While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
> Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
>
> What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
What, if anything, is the scientific theory of creation? How, if any
way, can we test it using the scientific method? Why, if any reason,
won't Ford answer these questions?
===============================================
Lenny Flank
"There are no loose threads in the web of life"
Creation "Science" Debunked:
http://www.geocities.com/lflank
DebunkCreation Email list:
http://www.groups.yahoo.com/group/DebunkCreation
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Matt Silberstein
(david ford):
>While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
>Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
>
>What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
>
>1a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
>presence of homosexuality among humans.
>1b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
>homosexuality among humans.
>1c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
>homosexuality among humans.
Absent evidence any of those could be true. When we have some
evidence regarding, among other things, the "cause" of
homosexuality (among humans as well as all other mammals) we can
look at these claims. What evolution theory does tell us, which
you ignore, is that it is meaningful to look at other animals in
order to learn things about humans.
>2a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
>practice of pedophilia among humans.
>2b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
>pedophilia among humans.
>2c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
>pedophilia among humans.
>3a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
>practice of bestiality among humans.
>3b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
>bestiality among humans.
>3c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
>bestiality among humans.
I will give the obvious next step:
4a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
practice of creationism among humans.
4b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount
of creationism among humans.
4c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
creationism among humans.
5a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
practice of theism among humans.
5b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount
of theism among humans.
5c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
theism among humans.
--
Matt Silberstein
Donate to the C.A.N.D.L.E.S. Museum, burnt down by arsonists who wrote
"Remember Timothy McVeigh" on the wall.
C.A.N.D.L.E.S. stands for Children of Auschwitz Nazi Deadly Lab Experiments
Survivors.
www.candles-museum.com
lanny budd
ford = fool: only reposts drivel
Stanley Friesen
>While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
>Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
>
>What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
>
>1a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
>presence of homosexuality among humans.
Nothing. It is correct as stated.
>1b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
>homosexuality among humans.
Nothing. It is correct as stated.
>1c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
>homosexuality among humans.
Nothing, it is correct as stated.
Note, there is NO contradiction in the above. The value of all
behavioral traits is *situation* *dependent*, so which will be favored
by evolution is *also* situation dependent.
>
>2a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
>practice of pedophilia among humans.
>2b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
>pedophilia among humans.
>2c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
>pedophilia among humans.
>
>3a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
>practice of bestiality among humans.
>3b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
>bestiality among humans.
>3c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
>bestiality among humans.
Same point.
The peace of God be with you.
Stanley Friesen
Lieutenant Kizhe Katson
> david ford wrote:
> > While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
> > Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
> >
> > What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
> >
> > 1a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
> > presence of homosexuality among humans.
> > 1b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
> > homosexuality among humans.
> > 1c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> > homosexuality among humans.
> >
> > [snip repetition of similar claims for pedophilia and bestiality]
>
> You first need to clarify what you are asking. First, do
> you mean to ask whether evolutionary theory provides a
> framework that includes a scientific explanation of the
> existence and prevalence of homosexuality in humans? Or
> are you asking if it is the human acceptance of the theory
> of evolution *causes* homosexuality? Second, is it your
> intent to impugn the theory of evolution based on either of
> these effects?
I think the answer he's looking for is that, within each triplet,
evolution could easily account for any or all of the alternatives (ie.
for those that are counter-factual as well as those that aren't).
Ergo, evolutionary theory is unfalsifiable. But as usual, it's hard
to tell just what david's getting at. For all I can tell, he may be
looking for an honest discussion (but his posting history argues
against it).
-- Kizhé
R. Dunno
> While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
> Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
>
Ha. Hedonism predates evolutionary theory, and originates in
the Bible. Read about Sodom and Gomorrah. What if anything
have you studied.
david ford
david ford:
> > While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
> > Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
> >
> > What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
> >
> > 1a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
> > presence of homosexuality among humans.
> > 1b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
> > homosexuality among humans.
> > 1c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> > homosexuality among humans.
> >
> > [snip repetition of similar claims for pedophilia and bestiality]
>
> You first need to clarify what you are asking. First, do
> you mean to ask whether evolutionary theory provides a
> framework that includes a scientific explanation of the
> existence and prevalence of homosexuality in humans?
Instead of [D]"includes," I would say "could include," but
then again I don't know what exactly is meant by
[D]"scientific."
> Or
> are you asking if it is the human acceptance of the theory
> of evolution *causes* homosexuality?
No.
> Second, is it your
> intent to impugn the theory of evolution based on either of
> these effects?
I mock evolutionary theory on the grounds that it can do
what's described in 1a, 1b, 1c, 2a, 2b, 2c, and 3a, 3b, 3c.
It may as well be called Explain Everything Evolutionary
Theory (EEET).
> Because, if the alternative to evolution is "goddidit", and
> that explains everything, and any putatively negative aspects
> of the world that a theory successfully explains are, in fact,
> the "fault" of that theory, then creationism would be just as
> much to blame for pedophilia, etc. as you imply evolution is.
>
> And frankly, if I believed in a god, he'd be the first one
> I'd blame for anything I didn't like in the world. So yeah,
> let's throw out evolution, accept creationism and fundamentalist
> theology, and put the blame for everything wrong in the
> world right back where it belongs: on the Christian God.
Shaw, George Bernard. 1921. _Back to Methuselah. A
Metabiological Pentateuch_ (New York: Brentano's), 300pp.
Shaw was a playwright. From the preface and on lxii-lxiv,
the entire section "The Humanitarians and the Problem of
Evil":
Yet the humanitarians were as delighted as anybody
with Darwinism at first. They had been perplexed by
the Problem of Evil and the Cruelty of Nature. They
were Shelleyans, but not atheists. Those who believed
in God were at a terrible disadvantage with the atheist.
They could not deny the existence of natural facts so
cruel that to attribute them to the will of God is to make
God a demon. Belief in God was impossible to any
thoughtful person without belief in the Devil as well.
The painted Devil, with his horns, his barbed tail, and
his abode of burning brimstone, was an incredible
bogey; but the evil attributed to him was real enough;
and the atheists argued that the author of evil, if he
exists, must be strong enough to overcome God, else
God is morally responsible for everything he permits the
Devil to do. Neither conclusion delivered us from the
horror of attributing the cruelty of nature to the
workings of an evil will, or could reconcile it with our
impulses towards justice, mercy, and a higher life.
A complete deliverance was offered by the discovery of
Circumstantial Selection: that is to say, of a method by
which horrors having every appearance of being
elaborately planned by some intelligent contriver are
only accidents without any moral significance at all.
Suppose a watcher from the stars saw a frightful
accident produced by two crowded trains at full speed
crashing into one another! How could he conceive that
a catastrophe brought about by such elaborate
machinery, such ingenious preparation, such skilled
direction, such vigilant industry, was quite
unintentional? Would he not conclude that the
signal-men were devils?
Well, Circumstantial Selection is largely a theory of
collisions: that is, a theory of the innocence of much
apparently designed devilry. In this way Darwin
brought intense relief as well as an enlarged knowledge
of facts to the humanitarians. He destroyed the
omnipotence of God for them; but he also exonerated
God from a hideous charge of cruelty. Granted that the
comfort was shallow, and that deeper reflection was
bound to shew that worse than all conceivable
devil-deities is a blind, deaf, dumb, heartless, senseless
mob of forces that strike as a tree does when it is blown
down by the wind, or as the tree itself is struck by
lightning. That did not occur to the humanitarians at the
moment: people do not reflect deeply when they are in
the first happiness of escape from an intolerably
oppressive situation. Like Bunyan's pilgrim they could
not see the wicket gate, nor the Slough of Despond, nor
the castle of Giant Despair; but they saw the shining
light at the end of the path, and so started gaily towards
it as Evolutionists.
And they were right; for the problem of evil yields very
easily to Creative Evolution. If the driving power
behind Evolution is omnipotent only in the sense that
there seems no limit to its final achievement; and if it
must meanwhile struggle with matter and circumstance
by the method of trial and error, then the world must be
full of its unsuccessful experiments. Christ may meet a
tiger, or a High Priest arm-in-arm with a Roman
Governor, and be the unfittest to survive under the
circumstances. Mozart may have a genius that prevails
against Emperors and Archbishops, and a lung that
succumbs to some obscure and noxious property of foul
air. If all our calamities are either accidents or sincerely
repented mistakes, there is no malice in the Cruelty of
Nature and no Problem of Evil in the Victorian sense at
all. The theology of the women who told us that they
became atheists when they sat by the cradles of their
children and saw them strangled by the hand of God is
succeeded by the theology of Blanco Posnet, with his "It
was early days when He made the croup, I guess. It was
the best He could think of then; but when it turned out
wrong on His hands He made you and me to fight the
Croup for Him."
Johnson, Phillip E. 1997. _Defeating Darwinism by Opening
Minds_ (Illinois: InterVarsity Press), 131pp. Johnson
is a creationist. On 64-66, paragraphs from the section
"Critical Thinking Is Good for Religion Too":
Every scientific materialist who reads this will
understandably want to ask: "Are you willing to apply
baloney detecting to religion, as well as science?" The
answer is (emphatically) _yes!_ I can't think of a better
way to introduce students to Christianity than to invite
them to read the Gospels with care and to ask all the
tough questions. I'm also not particularly worried about
how they answer those questions the first time through.
Dealing with the tough questions is a lifelong business,
and the most important educational point is not to try to
spoonfeed students with oversimplified answers that
won't stand the tests of time and experience. Here are
two examples of the kinds of issues I'd like young
people to begin to think about.
6. _The problem of suffering._ One of the seeming
advantages of Darwinism is that it makes it unnecessary
to ask why God permits the innocent to suffer and
(sometimes) the wicked to prosper. In a materialistic
universe, moral arbitrariness is only to be expected. As
Richard Dawkins puts it, "Nature is not interested one
way or the other in suffering, unless it affects the
survival of DNA." Some religious people actually like
Darwinism because they think it gets God off the hook.
If (for some reason) the divine plan involved creating by
means of scientific laws, then God couldn't intervene to
prevent suffering without spoiling his own grand
scheme. I don't find that convincing, but it's clear that
some Darwinists believe in their theory less because of
the scientific evidence than because they have
theological or philosophical objections to supernatural
creation.
Of all the errors of scientific materialism, the silliest is
that resolution of the National Academy of Sciences that
religion and science are separate realms that should
never be considered in the same context. On the
contrary, evolutionary scientists are obsessed with the
"God question," and the problem of suffering is one
important aspect of that question.
I would tell students that none of the usual answers to
the problem of suffering is entirely satisfactory. I'd
want my students to have some familiarity with the
classic treatments of the problem, especially the book of
Job and the Grand Inquisitor section of Feodor
Dostoyevsky's _The Brothers Karamazov_, as well as a
good Christian apologetic like C. S. Lewis's _The
Problem of Pain_. I'd want them to read the Psalms and
the Gospels with the problem fully in mind, and think
about whether and how the suffering and resurrection of
Jesus help with it. I'd want them to understand that
some of the appeal of Darwinism stems from classic
philosophical objections to the doctrine that the world is
governed by a Creator who loves us and cares about
what we do. Above all, I'd want them to face the fact
that if science has its unsolved problems, so does
religion. We all see through a glass darkly-- but what
glass should we try to see through?
1967 Dobzhansky on the problem of evil
http://www.google.com/groups?selm=b1c67abe.0401260957.1a5b69fc%40posting.google.com
howard hershey
The theory of evolution, as understood by biologists, cannot and does
not explain "everything". The only obvious prediction about
homosexuality that one could make based on an understanding of evolution
is that a species which *requires* two sexes of that species to mate for
reproduction will not be *exclusively* homosexual. That follows simply
from the fact that in order to evolve, a population must reproduce.
Reproduction is one of the requirements of evolution. I notice that
this was not one of your options and that, unlike evolution, one could
say that religion can explain exclusive homosexuality (or chastity, as
the Shakers practiced it) in such a species with a straight face because
a supernatural agent could always create the next generation out of
clay. Reproduction is not necessary when you have supernatural creation.
Other than that obvious prediction, various degrees and amounts of
homosexuality can have little to no impact on reproductive success of a
population *within particular reproductive strategies*. For example, a
harem species where most females are controlled by a single male and
there are many males left 'single' can clearly tolerate substantial
homosexual behavior and even homosexual orientation without
significantly affecting reproductive success.
That might lead to a prediction that human societies where harem
behavior exists or where there are substantial numbers of all male
groups isolated from female contact (certain Islamic and fundamentalist
societies that rigidly separate the sexes, all-boy or all-girl schools,
prisons, certain armies) might exhibit higher frequency of homosexual
*behavior*, but not necessarily homosexual *orientation*. Societies
where there is tolerance of homosexuals might exhibit higher
*self-reported* homosexual *orientation*. These are hypotheses that can
be tested.
One can obviously propose an evolutionary (usually meaning, among the
simpler minds that ignore neutral events, that one can propose a natural
selection "purpose" or "just-so story" for why a certain feature exists
in a certain organism) explanation for many things that exist in
biology. That does not mean that that hypothesis is correct in any
particular case. To provide *evidence*, to *test* that a particular
hypothesis is what science requires.
First, you would have to show that the specific behavior had a genetic
basis (at least in part) and that the differences in behavior within the
species was linked to alternative genotypes (or showed heritability).
Second, you would have demonstrate that there was differential
reproductive success of those different genotypes, keeping in mind the
possibility of frequency-dependent selection, heterozygote advantage,
and, for quantitative traits, the fact that, in most cases, each
generation produces a broader variance at birth with a culling from the
two tail ends to narrow the variance at reproduction, but usually
without changing the position of the mode/median/mean.
Let's take homosexuality as an open question and ask how or if evolution
impacts upon it. The first thing I would want to know is whether
homosexual orientation is 1) common, 2) infrequent, or 3) extremely rare
or absent in human cultures and whether the frequency varies in
different types of cultures. That is, I would want to start with
empirical knowledge of the frequency of homosexual orientation rather
than idlely and arm-chair "predict" it from theory. After all, I have
already pointed out why, other than the simple extreme I mentioned, it
is quite possible for there to be a significant range in the frequency
of homosexual behavior and orientation without affecting reproductive
success of the population.
One might then ask if there are any special attributes of societies with
higher than average rates of homosexual orientation. [At this point,
one would have to be very careful in one's methodology because people's
actual sexual behavior and desires and their reported behavior and
desires are not usually the same thing, even among members of
fundamentalist churches -- as evidenced by things like divorce and teen
pregnancy rates.]
Then one would ask if the frequencies match, roughly, the frequencies
seen in animals with similar mating systems (carefully distinguishing
*behavior* and *orientation*).
But remember that evolution only deals with that fraction of phenotypic
variance that is genetic (transmissible to future generations). If,
say, it were found that pedophilia were due to brain damage or childhood
trauma, then pedophilia would be of no evolutionarily consequence (other
than that it obviously means that the wiring of the human brain or mind
*can* become damaged so as to produce a pedophile).
That is, one must not geneticize all of biology (I speak as a
geneticist). And one must understand that genes set up a norm of
reaction. That is, the same genes can produce different phenotypes
depending upon its interaction with the environment. Behavior in
humans, in particular, is highly flexible and has a broad range of
phenotypes for the same genotypes. A person one generation removed from
a tribal, hunter-gathering existence may be a medical doctor or auto
mechanic.
It may well be that there is no specific gene for homosexuality.
Homosexual orientation may simply be one tail of a bell-shaped curve
(which is ascribed as a qualitative difference), where most people are
capable of loving and bonding to both sexes to some extent but are
generally sexually attracted to the opposite sex. Homosexuality, then,
may be the evolutionarily harmless 'cost' required for our species to
have males capable of bonding with other males in co-operative behavior
(like hunting). [There are, of course, species where male-male
co-operation is rarely seen. And they would have, I would hazard to
guess, a significantly lower frequency of homosexual behavior than herd
or tribe species.]
The other extreme tail end of such curve, which is not discussed and is
perhaps best described a narcissistic 'loner' sociopath, is a decidedly
less pleasant addition to most human societies (and also less likely to
be reproductively successful -- extreme heterosexuals may not be
individuals that get along well in society). Evolution by natural
selection, of course, is very good at finding the 'sufficing' mini-max
solution to such problems (to the extent that the differences are
genetic) as can be seen in the simplified case of sickle-cell anemia,
where the optimal frequency of sickle cell allele can be quickly reached.
So if you want, I would predict that evolution, *IF* it is involved in
producing homosexuals at all (that is, if homosexuality has a
significant genetic basis), probably produces the optimal level of
homosexuals given our local mating systems and societal requirements.
*IF* homosexual orientation is a quantitative trait there is also likely
a less reproductively fit individual at the other extreme of the curve
ranging from extreme heterosexual orientation to extreme homosexual
orientation. That is because natural selection usually works as a
conservative agent reducing the extremes in the variance produced each
generation.
That optimal level will differ from species to species (and perhaps from
culture to culture) based on local features such as mating system, group
dynamics (tribe or herd as opposed to solitary hunter), environment,
age, social status, degree of pair bonding, etc. I would expect some of
these to consistently favor or disfavor homosexual behavior/orientation.
Evolution by natural selection says that (to the extent that the feature
in question is genetically based), that feature will succeed relative to
a genetic variant to the extent that it furthers the *mean* or *average*
reproductive success of organisms in the population with that variation
in a local environment.
AC
howard hershey <hers...@indiana.edu> wrote:
<snip>
I hope someone nominates this for PotM. I've used up my seconding, but this
excellent post deserves the nomination.
--
Aaron Clausen
mightym...@hotmail.com
Richard Forrest
What, if anything, is wrong with the following claim:
There is a scientifically supportable creationist theory for the
diversity of life in the natural world.
Frank Pericope
David,
While reading your post, some questions come to mind.
1. Assuming a genetic component to complex behavior like
homosexuality, what, if anything, is wrong with the observation that
the frequency of alleles in a population changes over time, such that
a given allele may sometimes be widespread in the population, may
sometimes be present in a small part of the population, and may at
other times be absent from the population?
2. What, if anything, is the scriptural or doctrinal basis for your
aversion to homosexuals and/or homosexual behavior?
- F.
Lieutenant Kizhe Katson
IOW, I was right about ford's intentions. There should be Home Game
points for correctly divining the intent of one of the t.o resident
obscurantists (ford, Goodrich, a few others in the past).
-- Kizhé
Andy Groves
You do admit, don't you, that there are potential observations that
evolutionary theory could not explain? For example, excavation of
rabbit fossils from the Burgess Shale, or parakeets using a completely
different genetic code than every other eukaryote.....
Andy
syvanen
If someone says, as many have, that homosexuality in human populations
violate evolutionary theory, then I can respond that that is not true.
Complex social traits can be under pressure of natural selection and
can result in counter intuitive results. This is not the same thing
as saying that homosexuality, in itself, is an argument in favor of
evolutionary theory. It just says that it is not an argument against
it.
Mike Syvanen
Tim M
"howard hershey" <hers...@indiana.edu> wrote in message
news:c3saqd$m0b$1...@hood.uits.indiana.edu...
Matt Silberstein
(david ford):
[snip]
>I mock evolutionary theory on the grounds that it can do
>what's described in 1a, 1b, 1c, 2a, 2b, 2c, and 3a, 3b, 3c.
>It may as well be called Explain Everything Evolutionary
>Theory (EEET).
The theory of gravity can explain why something goes up, goes
down, or stay where it is. We might as well call it the Explains
Everything Gravity Theory. To put it another way, models can lead
to a variety of solutions depending on the input.
[snip]
SortingItOut
As far as I know, there is nothing wrong with the above statements.
It's not easy to see what you're getting at, but from your other
posts, I think I've got it.
You seem to be confusing explanatory power with predictive power. (By
predictive power, I'm referring to predicting future events, not
future dicoveries about the past.) I'm guessing that you think we
should be able to analyze the initial conditions from millions of
years ago and use the ToE to predict the exact level of homosexuality
that can be measured in the year 2004 (or even this millenium). But
that's like predicting today when and where the next tornado will
appear in the U.S., what size it will be, and how long it will last.
We can't use the ToE to predict what lifeforms will be present on
Earth 10 million years from now, and it would be even harder to
predict what their behavior will be. There are far too many
variables. But that seems to be what you're asking for, in effect.
There are many hypothetical ways to disprove the ToE (or major
components of it). The ToE predicts a certain range, or "domain", of
possible lifeforms that can be found in the fossil record. As someone
else posted, finding rabbit fossils in the Burgess Shale would be a
problem for the ToE. Likewise, certain animal behaviors are within
the range of possible behaviors, while others are outside that range.
None of the behaviors you posted above "violate" the ToE.
June
> Nominated
Seconded
>
> "howard hershey" <hers...@indiana.edu> wrote in message
> news:c3saqd$m0b$1...@hood.uits.indiana.edu...
> >
[snip]
--
My 2¢ ß-}
June
(BigDiscusser)
I am an 82 year old Christian lady. I am interested in a wide variety of
topics and am a retired RN.
http://community.webtv.net/JOJOYD/BigDiscusser
Jesus loves you.
John Chap 1 v 3
Colossians Chap 1 v 16, 17--defeats evolution with ADAPTATION by Jesus
who is IN His creation (not evolution) plus scientifically untouchable
classic morality, equals the DIVINE SYNTHESIS.
MUSLIMS NEED JESUS CHRIST AS THE SON OF GOD ALMIGHTY, and follow His Way
of Love with us, worshipping in their own Mosques.
Therion Ware
On Thu, 25 Mar 2004 08:34:02 +0000 (UTC) in talk.origins,
(BigDiscusser) (JOJ...@webtv.net (\(BigDiscusser\))) said, directing
the reply to talk.origins
>the deterioration of moral society--any connection?
Has society deteriorated? Are for example, New York or London safer
today than they were 1 to 200 years ago? Is there more or less
prostitution, more or less child abuse, more or less crime, more or
less racial discrimination?
Which is to say that before you try to explain the "deterioration of
moral society" you have to show that there actually has been a
deterioration of moral society and define what you mean by "moral
deterioration".
Personally, I think you'll have your work cut out for you.
>God bless, Jo Jean
>
>I am an 82 year old Christian lady. I am interested in a wide variety of
>topics and am a retired RN.
[snip]
--
"Do Unto Others As You Would Have Them Do Unto You."
- Attrib: Pauline Reage.
Inexpensive VHS & other video to CD/DVD conversion?
See: <http://www.Video2CD.com>. 35.00 gets your video on DVD.
all posts to this email address are automatically deleted without being read.
** atheist poster child #1 ** #442.
Filip van den Bergh
>
>
> On Thu, 25 Mar 2004 08:34:02 +0000 (UTC) in talk.origins,
> (BigDiscusser) (JOJ...@webtv.net (\(BigDiscusser\))) said, directing
> the reply to talk.origins
>
>
>
>>the deterioration of moral society--any connection?
>
> Has society deteriorated? Are for example, New York or London safer
> today than they were 1 to 200 years ago? Is there more or less
> prostitution, more or less child abuse, more or less crime, more or
> less racial discrimination?
>
> Which is to say that before you try to explain the "deterioration of
> moral society" you have to show that there actually has been a
> deterioration of moral society and define what you mean by "moral
> deterioration".
>
> Personally, I think you'll have your work cut out for you.
>
The Earth is degenerating these days. Bribery and corruption abound.
Children no longer mind their parents, every man wants to write a book,
and it is evident that the end of the world is fast approaching.
--Assyrian stone tablet, circa 2800 BCE
TomS
<2u7lw6xi3ire.1xbx039ggw591$.d...@40tude.net>, Filip van den Bergh stated..."
"Do not ask why the old days were better than the present; for
that is a foolish question" Ecclesiastes 7:10
---Tom S.
"According to some modern authorities the human mind cannot 'conceive how a
self-determining system can increase its own initial complexity.' If this be
admitted preformation must be a law of Nature, and epigenesis fundamentally
impossible." FJ Cole, Early Theories of Sexual Generation (1930), page 209
Richard Forrest
> the deterioration of moral society--any connection? God bless, Jo Jean
>
> I am an 82 year old Christian lady. I am interested in a wide variety of
> topics and am a retired RN.
>
And Jane Austin was a great, bluff Yorkshireman with a beard like a Rhododendron...
RF
Ferrous Patella
(\(BigDiscusser\)):
> the deterioration of moral society--any connection?
No.
--
Ferrous Patella
"Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war."
--John Adams, letter to Abigail, 1797
Dick C
> the deterioration of moral society--any connection? God bless, Jo
Jean
Actually, it is the far right that is the most immoral in our society.
Seeking to persecute those whose sexuality is different from theirs,
wishing to hide problems in their churches, lying about their goals,
lying about their beliefs, seeking to discriminate against anyone
different from them.
--
Dick #1349
Damn it . . . Don't you dare ask God to help me.
To her housekeeper, who had begun to pray aloud.
~~ Joan Crawford, actress, d. May 10, 1977
Home Page: dickcr.iwarp.com
email: dic...@comcast.net
Lieutenant Kizhe Katson
No. Why do you ask?
>....God bless, Jo Jean
-- Kizhé
syvanen
Still trying to convert Moslems; you must realize that there are very
Moslems here at TO. I understand there are four positions open in
Iraq for Christian missionaries, you could apply now and do some real
conversion work.
Mike Syvanen
Rick
Is it arrogance or ignorance that is responsible for the assumption
that religion holds the patent on morality?
Richard S. Crawford
Both, of course.
Frank J
No:
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA001.html
Oh, wait, you said "evolutionISM."
And God bless you too.
Eros
>
> I am an 82 year old Christian lady. I am interested in a wide variety of
> topics and am a retired RN.
Are you seriously suggesting that today's civilization, as a whole, is
less moral than that portrayed in the Bible and throughout recorded
history? I think you need to increase your medication old girl!
EROS.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Will you speak falsely for God, and speak deceitfully for him?"
Job 13:7
"Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not
see."
Hebrews 11:1
"Believers are justified in all things."
Acts 13:39
Pithecanthropus Erectus
> JOJ...@webtv.net (\(BigDiscusser\)) wrote in message news:<2583-406...@storefull-3257.bay.webtv.net>...
>
>>the deterioration of moral society--any connection? God bless, Jo Jean
>>
>>I am an 82 year old Christian lady. I am interested in a wide variety of
>>topics and am a retired RN.
>>
>
Apparently you are ageless, Joyjoyd, Jo Jean.
>
> And Jane Austin was a great, bluff Yorkshireman with a beard like a Rhododendron...
>
Jane Austin.... Austen?
>
> RF
>
--
I am against religion because it teaches us to be satisfied with not
understanding the world.
Richard Dawkins
Bennett Standeven
Yes. When one came into being, the other stopped.
Joe Cummings
Jo Jean,
I wonder if Jimmy Swaggart, a creationist who was
caught with his trousers down in the company of a lady of easy virtue,
blamed evolution for his lapse?
I am a seventy three year old bad Catholic, who wonders why Jo
Jean has so few birthdays.
Have fun,
Joe Cummings
Hank
Both. Especially ignorance, since *I* hold the patent.
Philistines ... humpf!
--
Assimilate a pitiful little species like you? I think not! - Q of Borg
Hank
> the deterioration of moral society--any connection? God bless, Jo Jean
When I was a kid, I lived in a 100% caucasian community. Contracts on homes
prohibited selling them to other races. At the time, that was legal. Now,
it's illegal.
You've got quite a ways to go in convincing me that society is
deteriorating. Maybe you've been watching too much TV news (Making
Mountains Out Of Molehills, Inc.)
David Jensen
Ferrous Patella <mail1...@pop.net> wrote in
<Xns94B75E5E6FB60...@199.45.49.11>:
>news:2583-406...@storefull-3257.bay.webtv.net by JOJ...@webtv.net
>(\(BigDiscusser\)):
>
>> the deterioration of moral society--any connection?
>
>No.
Are you sure? I see a strong positive correlation between increasing
public religiosity and declining public (and private) morality.
enantiodromiac
>
biblethumpers have led to our moral decay because when we look
ostensibly at examples such as Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart to begin
with there are obvious problems afoot. Let us then look ostensibly at
the priests molesting kids. That is obviously not moral upswing in
connection to the beacon of light people assume priests are carrying
God's so-called cloth into the pit of oblivion. We can also ostensibly
look at the fact that biblethumpers will regretably help Barney Fife
get back into the White House this November. If that happens the moral
decline will accelerate. Our future generations will be victims of
economic catastrophe as the generation voting for Barney Fife runs out
on the bill. That is faith based economics with God as copilot.
And let us ostensibly look at what our biblethumping citizenry has
wrought post Janet's boob flash shall we. We are on a moral decline
back into the bubbling cauldron of the middle ages. They might start
burning witches and heretics soon. That is what the biblethumpers in
the corn states have forced upon Civilization. Children of the corn
that is. All them there states voting for Barney Fife.
Witch hunts are immoral and that is where things are heading. Soon
abortionists, homosexuals, evilutionists and other immoral evildoers
will be symbolically assuming the role of the Salem witch if the
moralists gain the upper hand. We will be under the banner of a
fundamentalist fever similar to that we fought to destroy in
Afghanistan. How ironic is that.
>
> I am an 82 year old Christian lady. I am interested in a wide variety of
> topics and am a retired RN.
>
> http://community.webtv.net/JOJOYD/BigDiscusser
> Jesus loves you.
> John Chap 1 v 3
> Colossians Chap 1 v 16, 17--defeats evolution with ADAPTATION by Jesus
> who is IN His creation (not evolution) plus scientifically untouchable
> classic morality, equals the DIVINE SYNTHESIS.
> MUSLIMS NEED JESUS CHRIST AS THE SON OF GOD ALMIGHTY, and follow His Way
> of Love with us, worshipping in their own Mosques.
>
I had thought that Muslims were well aware of Isa ibn Mariam. How many
Muslims are named Isa out there in Mecca land? That should be a
barometre of respect afforded to the original Isa.
Richard Forrest
> Richard Forrest wrote:
> > JOJ...@webtv.net (\(BigDiscusser\)) wrote in message news:<2583-406...@storefull-3257.bay.webtv.net>...
> >
> >>the deterioration of moral society--any connection? God bless, Jo Jean
> >>
> >>I am an 82 year old Christian lady. I am interested in a wide variety of
> >>topics and am a retired RN.
> >>
> >
>
> Apparently you are ageless, Joyjoyd, Jo Jean.
>
> >
> > And Jane Austin was a great, bluff Yorkshireman with a beard like a Rhododendron...
> >
>
> Jane Austin.... Austen?
>
>
> >
> > RF
> >
Sorry. Austen. Being a 23 year old blonde sex bomb, I find it hard to
type correctly because of the long nails.
RF
Richard S. Crawford
> the deterioration of moral society--any connection?
No connection that can be proven, demonstrated, or even seen by any
reasonable person.
How about:
* The rise of fundamentalist Christianity since the 60s...
* and the rise of sexuality in society since the 60s.
Any connection?
Mitch Alsup
> the deterioration of moral society--any connection?
Yes, there is a correleation, however, unlike what you imply, society is
getting better rather than worse.
>
> I am an 82 year old
nitwit
> Christian lady.
Mitch
AC
> the deterioration of moral society--any connection? God bless, Jo Jean
I look at two thousand years of history in Christendom, and you know, I
can't say that it has too many moral highpoints until the Enlightenment, and
by that point, Christendom's tarnish had become very obvious. Quite
frankly, I don't find Christianity to be any moral beacon at all. Even some
of its moral pronouncements are, in my opinion, deeply immoral.
--
Aaron Clausen
mightym...@hotmail.com
Noelie S. Alito
Seconded.
"Tim M" <scot...@cox.spammerssuck.net> wrote:
> Nominated
>
Stanley Friesen
>"(BigDiscusser)" wrote:
>
>> the deterioration of moral society--any connection? God bless, Jo Jean
>
>When I was a kid, I lived in a 100% caucasian community. Contracts on homes
>prohibited selling them to other races. At the time, that was legal. Now,
>it's illegal.
>
>You've got quite a ways to go in convincing me that society is
>deteriorating. Maybe you've been watching too much TV news (Making
>Mountains Out Of Molehills, Inc.)
Making Money out of Making Mountains out of Molehills, Inc.
Dirty Laundry, Give us Dirty Laundry.
The peace of God be with you.
Stanley Friesen
Walter Bushell
syv...@ucdavis.edu (syvanen) wrote:
> dford3@ (david ford) wrote in message
> news:<b1c67abe.0403...@posting.google.com>...
> > Dissident <qq...@7600.net> on 23 Mar 2004:
> > david ford:
> >
> > > > While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
> > > > Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
> > > >
> > > > What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
> > > >
> > > > 1a. Evolutionary theor could easily account for a widespread
> > > > presence of homosexuality among humans.
> > > > 1b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
> > > > homosexuality among humans.
> > > > 1c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> > > > homosexuality among humans.
> > > >
> > > > [snip repetition of similar claims for pedophilia and bestiality]
> > >
> > > You first need to clarify what you are asking. First, do
> > > you mean to ask whether evolutionary theory provides a
> > > framework that includes a scientific explanation of the
> > > existence and prevalence of homosexuality in humans?
> >
> > Instead of [D]"includes," I would say "could include," but
> > then again I don't know what exactly is meant by
> > [D]"scientific."
> >
> > > Or
> > > are you asking if it is the human acceptance of the theory
> > > of evolution *causes* homosexuality?
> >
> > No.
> >
> > > Second, is it your
> > > intent to impugn the theory of evolution based on either of
> > > these effects?
> >
> > I mock evolutionary theory on the grounds that it can do
> > what's described in 1a, 1b, 1c, 2a, 2b, 2c, and 3a, 3b, 3c.
> > It may as well be called Explain Everything Evolutionary
> > Theory (EEET).
> >
>
> If someone says, as many have, that homosexuality in human populations
> violate evolutionary theory, then I can respond that that is not true.
> Complex social traits can be under pressure of natural selection and
> can result in counter intuitive results. This is not the same thing
> as saying that homosexuality, in itself, is an argument in favor of
> evolutionary theory. It just says that it is not an argument against
> it.
>
> Mike Syvanen
Remember until very recently gays made good husbands, they were as
insistent on having sex unless it was desirable to have children, so
were less likely to kill their wives through excessive pregnancies and
strain the family budget with supporting too many children. Also they
were less likely to run off with another woman.
Andy Groves
JoJean,
You have not answered my question about the Bible's position on homosexuality:
> > The Bible speaks against homosexuality in 1 Cor. Chap 6, v 9, and Lev
> > Chap 18, v 22. God bless, Jo Jean
> >
> Let's look at these, shall we?
>
> 1 Cor. Chap 6, v 9 (and 10)
>
> Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God?
> Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers,
> nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,
> Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor
> extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.
>
> I'm a little confused here about the reference to homosexuality. Does
> this mean that gay men are OK if they're butch rather than effeminate?
> And what does "abusers of themselves with mankind" mean? Is this a
> reference to solitary or group masturbation? And if it's an obscure
> reference to gay sex, then presumably lesbians are OK (provided
> they're butch too, and not lipstick lesbians) since they're abusing
> themselves with womankind?
>
>
> Lev Chap 18, v 22
> Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.
>
> This could be seen as a condemnation of male gay sex, but it could
> also apply to threesomes. Comments?
>
> And what do you make of:
>
> Leviticus 11 vv10-12:
> "And all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers,
> of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in
> the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you:
> They shall be even an abomination unto you; ye shall not eat of their
> flesh, but ye shall have their carcases in abomination.
> Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an
> abomination unto you."
>
> Have you ever eaten at Red Lobster, JoJean? Ever gone to a clambake?
> Why is gay sex an abomination, but eating crawfish OK?
Andy
Cirbryn
> > Dissident <qq...@7600.net> on 23 Mar 2004:
> > david ford:
> >
> >
> >>>While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
> >>>Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
> >>>
> >>>What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
> >>>
> >>>presence of homosexuality among humans.
> >>>1b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
> >>>homosexuality among humans.
> >>>1c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> >>>homosexuality among humans.
> >>>
> >>>[snip repetition of similar claims for pedophilia and bestiality]
<snip>
> > I mock evolutionary theory on the grounds that it can do
> > what's described in 1a, 1b, 1c, 2a, 2b, 2c, and 3a, 3b, 3c.
> > It may as well be called Explain Everything Evolutionary
> > Theory (EEET).
>
> The theory of evolution, as understood by biologists, cannot and does
> not explain "everything". The only obvious prediction about
> homosexuality that one could make based on an understanding of evolution
> is that a species which *requires* two sexes of that species to mate for
> reproduction will not be *exclusively* homosexual. That follows simply
> from the fact that in order to evolve, a population must reproduce.
> Reproduction is one of the requirements of evolution. I notice that
> this was not one of your options and that, unlike evolution, one could
> say that religion can explain exclusive homosexuality (or chastity, as
> the Shakers practiced it) in such a species with a straight face because
> a supernatural agent could always create the next generation out of
> clay. Reproduction is not necessary when you have supernatural creation.
>
> Other than that obvious prediction, various degrees and amounts of
> homosexuality can have little to no impact on reproductive success of a
> population *within particular reproductive strategies*. For example, a
> harem species where most females are controlled by a single male and
> there are many males left 'single' can clearly tolerate substantial
> homosexual behavior and even homosexual orientation without
> significantly affecting reproductive success.
>
> That might lead to a prediction that human societies where harem
> behavior exists or where there are substantial numbers of all male
> groups isolated from female contact (certain Islamic and fundamentalist
> societies that rigidly separate the sexes, all-boy or all-girl schools,
> prisons, certain armies) might exhibit higher frequency of homosexual
> *behavior*, but not necessarily homosexual *orientation*. Societies
> where there is tolerance of homosexuals might exhibit higher
> *self-reported* homosexual *orientation*. These are hypotheses that can
> be tested.
>
> One can obviously propose an evolutionary (usually meaning, among the
> simpler minds that ignore neutral events, that one can propose a natural
> selection "purpose" or "just-so story" for why a certain feature exists
> in a certain organism) explanation for many things that exist in
> biology. That does not mean that that hypothesis is correct in any
> particular case. To provide *evidence*, to *test* that a particular
> hypothesis is what science requires.
>
> First, you would have to show that the specific behavior had a genetic
> basis (at least in part) and that the differences in behavior within the
> species was linked to alternative genotypes (or showed heritability).
> Second, you would have demonstrate that there was differential
> reproductive success of those different genotypes, keeping in mind the
> possibility of frequency-dependent selection, heterozygote advantage,
> and, for quantitative traits, the fact that, in most cases, each
> generation produces a broader variance at birth with a culling from the
> two tail ends to narrow the variance at reproduction, but usually
> without changing the position of the mode/median/mean.
>
> Let's take homosexuality as an open question and ask how or if evolution
> impacts upon it. The first thing I would want to know is whether
> homosexual orientation is 1) common, 2) infrequent, or 3) extremely rare
> or absent in human cultures and whether the frequency varies in
> different types of cultures. That is, I would want to start with
> empirical knowledge of the frequency of homosexual orientation rather
> than idlely and arm-chair "predict" it from theory. After all, I have
> already pointed out why, other than the simple extreme I mentioned, it
> is quite possible for there to be a significant range in the frequency
> of homosexual behavior and orientation without affecting reproductive
> success of the population.
>
> One might then ask if there are any special attributes of societies with
> higher than average rates of homosexual orientation. [At this point,
> one would have to be very careful in one's methodology because people's
> actual sexual behavior and desires and their reported behavior and
> desires are not usually the same thing, even among members of
> fundamentalist churches -- as evidenced by things like divorce and teen
> pregnancy rates.]
>
> Then one would ask if the frequencies match, roughly, the frequencies
> seen in animals with similar mating systems (carefully distinguishing
> *behavior* and *orientation*).
>
> But remember that evolution only deals with that fraction of phenotypic
> variance that is genetic (transmissible to future generations). If,
> say, it were found that pedophilia were due to brain damage or childhood
> trauma, then pedophilia would be of no evolutionarily consequence (other
> than that it obviously means that the wiring of the human brain or mind
> *can* become damaged so as to produce a pedophile).
>
> That is, one must not geneticize all of biology (I speak as a
> geneticist). And one must understand that genes set up a norm of
> reaction. That is, the same genes can produce different phenotypes
> depending upon its interaction with the environment. Behavior in
> humans, in particular, is highly flexible and has a broad range of
> phenotypes for the same genotypes. A person one generation removed from
> a tribal, hunter-gathering existence may be a medical doctor or auto
> mechanic.
>
> It may well be that there is no specific gene for homosexuality.
> Homosexual orientation may simply be one tail of a bell-shaped curve
> (which is ascribed as a qualitative difference), where most people are
> capable of loving and bonding to both sexes to some extent but are
> generally sexually attracted to the opposite sex. Homosexuality, then,
> may be the evolutionarily harmless 'cost' required for our species to
> have males capable of bonding with other males in co-operative behavior
> (like hunting). [There are, of course, species where male-male
> co-operation is rarely seen. And they would have, I would hazard to
> guess, a significantly lower frequency of homosexual behavior than herd
> or tribe species.]
>
> The other extreme tail end of such curve, which is not discussed and is
> perhaps best described a narcissistic 'loner' sociopath, is a decidedly
> less pleasant addition to most human societies (and also less likely to
> be reproductively successful -- extreme heterosexuals may not be
> individuals that get along well in society). Evolution by natural
> selection, of course, is very good at finding the 'sufficing' mini-max
> solution to such problems (to the extent that the differences are
> genetic) as can be seen in the simplified case of sickle-cell anemia,
> where the optimal frequency of sickle cell allele can be quickly reached.
>
> So if you want, I would predict that evolution, *IF* it is involved in
> producing homosexuals at all (that is, if homosexuality has a
> significant genetic basis), probably produces the optimal level of
> homosexuals given our local mating systems and societal requirements.
> *IF* homosexual orientation is a quantitative trait there is also likely
> a less reproductively fit individual at the other extreme of the curve
> ranging from extreme heterosexual orientation to extreme homosexual
> orientation. That is because natural selection usually works as a
> conservative agent reducing the extremes in the variance produced each
> generation.
>
> That optimal level will differ from species to species (and perhaps from
> culture to culture) based on local features such as mating system, group
> dynamics (tribe or herd as opposed to solitary hunter), environment,
> age, social status, degree of pair bonding, etc. I would expect some of
> these to consistently favor or disfavor homosexual behavior/orientation.
>
> Evolution by natural selection says that (to the extent that the feature
> in question is genetically based), that feature will succeed relative to
> a genetic variant to the extent that it furthers the *mean* or *average*
> reproductive success of organisms in the population with that variation
> in a local environment.
<snip>
I'm going to leave the above post intact for clarity, but respond to
the following quotes:
Hershey: "The only obvious prediction about homosexuality that one
could make based on an understanding of evolution is that a species
which *requires* two sexes of that species to mate for reproduction
will not be *exclusively* homosexual."
Cirbryn: I think an obvious prediction is that if homosexuality has a
genetic component, and if it interferes with lifetime reproductive
success, then it it will be selected out of the population. The fact
that it isn't requires some explaining in a testable manner. I think
the most likely potential explanation is that the genes involved in
homosexuality exhibit beneficial pliotropic effects in some
individuals that counterbalance the negative effects of homosexuality
on the fitness of homosexual individuals. For example, unless a gene
for attraction to women were on the Y chromosome we'd expect every
male to be a carrier of genes that, in a female daughter, would
promote attraction to men. The genetic benefits of passing along such
genes to daughters could easily outweigh numerous occasions in which,
for whatever reason, they were activated in an individual of the
"wrong" gender. Unfortunately, to test this we would have to identify
the genes involved (if any), which no one has yet done.
Hershey: "For example, a harem species where most females are
controlled by a single male and there are many males left 'single' can
clearly tolerate substantial homosexual behavior and even homosexual
orientation without significantly affecting reproductive success."
Cirbryn: The problem with this explanation is that wheras the species
would do just fine, the individuals possessing the hypothetical
homosexual genes would still have a more difficult time passing those
genes into succeeding generations. That's why harem species still
produce a roughly 1 to 1 sex ratio, despite the fact that most of the
males never reproduce and are unnecessary to the continuation of the
species.
Hershey: "After all, I have already pointed out why, other than the
simple extreme I mentioned, it is quite possible for there to be a
significant range in the frequency of homosexual behavior and
orientation without affecting reproductive success of the population."
Cirbryn: Again, it's the inclusive reproductive success of the gene in
question that matters, as averaged across all the individuals in the
population that have that gene. The rest of the population are just
competitors.
Hershey: "So if you want, I would predict that evolution, *IF* it is
involved in
producing homosexuals at all (that is, if homosexuality has a
significant genetic basis), probably produces the optimal level of
homosexuals given our local mating systems and societal requirements."
Cirbryn: I would like to see a mechanism by which evolution could do
this, or an a priori prediction of what an "optimum" level might be
under particular circumstances. Even if we supposed that a particular
group might survive better than other groups if it had some "optimum"
level of homosexuality, the group would still be composed of numerous
genetic lineages, all of which would be competing against each other.
If one of those lineages developed a homosexuality gene, all the
lineages in the group would benefit, but only the lineage with the
gene would suffer reduced fitness as compared to the others. The
homosexuality gene would therefore be likely to be weeded out despite
any group benefits it might provide.
lensman1955
> While reading portions of Benjamin Wiker's _Moral Darwinism: How We
> Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
>
> What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
>
> 1a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
> presence of homosexuality among humans.
> 1b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
> homosexuality among humans.
> 1c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> homosexuality among humans.
>
> practice of pedophilia among humans.
> 2b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
> pedophilia among humans.
> 2c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> pedophilia among humans.
>
> 3a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
> practice of bestiality among humans.
> 3b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
> bestiality among humans.
> 3c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> bestiality among humans.
How does this sound for an answer;
There are fringes to every group. Especially when you're dealing with
humanity where not being at the top of the evolutionary ladder does
not automatically mean you die out.
Tim M
"Cirbryn" <Glen...@planet-save.com> wrote in message
news:cd0d4ca3.04032...@posting.google.com...
> howard hershey <hers...@indiana.edu> wrote in message
news:<c3saqd$m0b$1...@hood.uits.indiana.edu>...
>
>
> I'm going to leave the above post intact for clarity, but respond to
> the following quotes:
>
> Hershey: "The only obvious prediction about homosexuality that one
> could make based on an understanding of evolution is that a species
> which *requires* two sexes of that species to mate for reproduction
> will not be *exclusively* homosexual."
>
> Cirbryn: I think an obvious prediction is that if homosexuality has a
> genetic component, and if it interferes with lifetime reproductive
> success, then it it will be selected out of the population. The fact
> that it isn't requires some explaining in a testable manner. I think
> the most likely potential explanation is that the genes involved in
> homosexuality exhibit beneficial pliotropic effects in some
> individuals that counterbalance the negative effects of homosexuality
> on the fitness of homosexual individuals. For example, unless a gene
> for attraction to women were on the Y chromosome we'd expect every
> male to be a carrier of genes that, in a female daughter, would
> promote attraction to men. The genetic benefits of passing along such
> genes to daughters could easily outweigh numerous occasions in which,
> for whatever reason, they were activated in an individual of the
> "wrong" gender. Unfortunately, to test this we would have to identify
> the genes involved (if any), which no one has yet done.
In fact it remains to be shown that the reproductive rates for heterosexual
individuals are significantly greater than for homosexual individuals in
acestral populations.
I know it seems at the outset that, of course, their reproduction rates
*must* be less. But I challenge that assumption. From a historical
perspective, many, many, many individuals that are considered to have been
gay have also had children. (In fact this assumption is so strong, that an
individual's children is cited as evidence to counter the claim of his/her
homosexuality)
Even in ancient Athens where homosexuality (in men) was accepted more than
in any other ancient culture, it was more common that the men have wives and
children than not.
Furthermore, eventhough there is virtually nothing known about the sex lives
of women, it would be naive to think that there were no lesbian mothers or
that a common woman would have been allowed to remain unmarried. Her
personal desire for men or women would have remained irrelevant.
If this hypothesis is correct, then a person's genes would be blind to their
orientation; their predisposition toward a sexual orientation would be
(semi)free to drift much as blood type is free to drift.
Lilith
<snip all preceding>
> Cirbryn: I would like to see a mechanism by which evolution could do
> this, or an a priori prediction of what an "optimum" level might be
> under particular circumstances. Even if we supposed that a particular
> group might survive better than other groups if it had some "optimum"
> level of homosexuality, the group would still be composed of numerous
> genetic lineages, all of which would be competing against each other.
> If one of those lineages developed a homosexuality gene, all the
> lineages in the group would benefit, but only the lineage with the
> gene would suffer reduced fitness as compared to the others. The
> homosexuality gene would therefore be likely to be weeded out despite
> any group benefits it might provide.
Then why don't we see a decrease in sickle-cell anemia in malarial
regions? Why hasn't IT been weeded out? Certainly there are a
percentage of people born with the gene who develop the devastating
disease that should have been selected from the original family line.
The answer is that heterozygotes have increased fitness. Homozygotes
(a smaller segment of the population) manifest the disease.
Now, tossing aside the anemia example, let's talk development,
hormones, sex, and male homosexuality (since it seems to be the only
type under discussion all this time). Female homosexuality has its own
set of studies, by the way.
Warning to creationists: You are invited to read all the way down.
In the first post in this thread, david ford was again going about it
all wrong. The TOE does not make the kinds of predictions he was
stating. In fact, david was endulging himself in a bit of fantasy. :)
If a population has a fixed trait, it may or may not be *directly*
related to reproductive fitness, but it can at some level be connected
to reproductive fitness or consequences of that fitness.
For now, let me assume that traits associated with emergence of
homosexuality confer a reproductive advantage to those heterosexuals
who reproduce. This assumption will be borne out by evidence, so bear
with me for a few minutes while you read further.
Now, it's known that men require estrogens for reproduction in their
own right. Males without estrogens are infertile and have bone density
problems. How is estrogen manufactured in males? There is an enzyme,
an aromatase, that transforms androgens into estrogens in the brain.
The aromatase in mammalian brains (transforms androgen to estrogen) is
necessary for male brain development and without it, male rodents are
aggressive, more prone to infanticide, more harmful to the females
during copulation -- a bunch of negative effects (see paper links
below for more). Clearly in male rats, aromatase activity and likely
more estrogen is necessary for greater reproductive success, both
before and after copulation.
It also has been shown that male sheep (rams) with male partner
preference had less aromatase activity and different brain structure
than rams with female partner preference.
It's obvious that aromatase function has quite a lot to do with brain
structure, behavior, and partner preference in mammals thus far
studied.
Natural and individual variations in estrogens, aromatase activity,
androgens, and also importantly, their receptors, renders a greater
variation in estrogens and a lower dose of testosterone to developing
fetuses. There are many other players, such as serotonin and its
receptors, and other brain microenvironments that may play a key role
in development of sexual preference.
It's been established that there is a molecular basis in fetal brain
development as well as adult behavior and sexual preference and sexual
behavior and patterning.
Now, back to the TOE. I'd like to add to Howard Hershey's point, that:
"The only obvious prediction about
homosexuality that one could make based on an understanding of
evolution
is that a species which *requires* two sexes of that species to mate
for
reproduction will not be *exclusively* homosexual. That follows
simply
from the fact that in order to evolve, a population must reproduce."
Now, there are other predictions that are less obvious that stem from
Howard's statement, when coupled with a molecular model of sexual
behavior and development.
One of the more direct predictions would be that if there exists in a
species strict (non-bisexual) male homosexuality fixed into a minor
percentage of the males in a two-sex reproductive population, then
there must exist a set of developmental and behavioral conditions, in
male heterosexuals, which confer a reproductive advantage. These
traits that confer reproductive advantage should, in some combination,
manifests part-time as homosexuality. I will for the moment not
consider a major social or situational advantage by having homosexuals
present in the population.
Note that there is no direct prediction (yet) how many homosexuals
would arise from this model. That depends entirely on all the
developmental and biological players in sexual preference and the
amount of reproductive advantage. If one knows all the genetics of
these traits, and how they manifest, one should be able to predict an
estimate (given nature + nurture) of how many homosexuals will arise
as a consequence of heterosexual advantage.
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
Note that I am making predictions in the form of questions based on
homosexuality as an extreme distribution in a heterosexual population.
This model suggests some behavioral advantage in combinations of these
multiple traits. The following lines of research are suggested from
consideration of the TOE and the fact that homosexuals exist in a
largely heterosexual population. I include only one or two papers I
pulled up that would arise from each of these proposals. I'm sure
others can add to these.
The model I will propose here is that homosexuality may be the extreme
distribution's manifestation of a complex trait that gives rise to
reproductive success in heterosexuals, and part-time emerges as
homosexual behavior. Homosexuality would be the natural "cost" of
reproductive success because of sexual selection.
Let's begin making some predictions and then going to the literature
to examine them.
QUESTION 1. Is estrogen important to male reproductive health as well
as female reproducitve health? It should be, if it's to be present and
obviously important.
Proposed: the presence of female hormones in males confers a
physiological reproductive advantage.
Found: Estrogen is critical for male reproductive success in
sperm production.
QUESTION 2. Can we be sure that male behavior and brain structure is
patterned by brain chemistry? It should be, if it confers
homosexuality as a set behavior in mammals.
Proposed: Microchemistry and (female hormones, neurotransmitters)
has a consequence on male fetal brain development so that some
sub-population has a natural variation towards homosexuality.
Found: Homosexual rams have differing brain structures and
chemistry:
Also, another earlier paper:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=10097016
QUESTION 3: Would sexual (and social) selection operate to select out
those human males with more feminine (and less masculine) appearences
overall?
Proposed: Reproductive and social advantage due to sexual
selection, appearence, and men with more feminine/childlike traits are
selected for as social/sexual partners.
Found: that humans are more attracted to "younger", less
masculinized traits, suggesting the origins of neoteny in human sexual
preference and the cultural obsession with youth. See the paper by
Perrett:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=9732869
QUESTION 4: does behavior due to more feminine characteristics confer
reproductive advantage beyond sexual selection, say in male behavior
and reproductive success in its own right?
Proposed: Reproductive advantage in feminized male behavior can
be conferred due to more feminine behavior in child-rearing, social
and genetic investment.
Found: Male rodents with less estrogens because of aromatase
deficiency, indulge in infanticide and negative sexual behavior:
howard hershey
I agree. In fact I proposed the idea that homosexuality may be a
consequence of having traits that allow the male-male bonding required
for life in a troop or tribe. In organisms where there is no such
male-male bonding (as in lion prides or in solitary hunters like tigers,
where male-male contact is more likely to result in combat, I would
expect a lower frequency of homosexuality. Homosexuality, then, may be
one of the biological 'prices' (being one tail of the bell-shaped curve)
we pay for civilization (which has some small selective benefit to
humans;-)).
>
> Hershey: "For example, a harem species where most females are
> controlled by a single male and there are many males left 'single' can
> clearly tolerate substantial homosexual behavior and even homosexual
> orientation without significantly affecting reproductive success."
>
> Cirbryn: The problem with this explanation is that wheras the species
> would do just fine, the individuals possessing the hypothetical
> homosexual genes would still have a more difficult time passing those
> genes into succeeding generations. That's why harem species still
> produce a roughly 1 to 1 sex ratio, despite the fact that most of the
> males never reproduce and are unnecessary to the continuation of the
> species.
Not a problem. Selection for sexual behavior (pleasure in the mating
act, especially) is just as strong in the males in these all-male
groups. And much of this type homosexuality is situational (like what
happens in human prisons), and only occassionally is it due to
homosexual orientation. It is just that in these harem species, many
males lack the opportunity for male-female sex, but still have that
innate sex drive. There is no loss of capacity to mate heterosexually
due to having engaged in homosexual activity and, given the opportunity,
many of these isolated males will engage in heterosexual activity.
Selection for strong sex drive, of course, is favored in both cases.
And that drive will be passed down to the progeny of the successful herd
alpha male.
>
> Hershey: "After all, I have already pointed out why, other than the
> simple extreme I mentioned, it is quite possible for there to be a
> significant range in the frequency of homosexual behavior and
> orientation without affecting reproductive success of the population."
>
> Cirbryn: Again, it's the inclusive reproductive success of the gene in
> question that matters, as averaged across all the individuals in the
> population that have that gene. The rest of the population are just
> competitors.
Yes. Which is why I mentioned the possibility that the other extreme of
the bell-shaped curve might also be less reproductively fit in certain
mating systems. Having the problem "Does not get along well with
others" can lead to expulsion from the tribe (or to prison time) which
can reduce one's reproductive success.
>
> Hershey: "So if you want, I would predict that evolution, *IF* it is
> involved in
> producing homosexuals at all (that is, if homosexuality has a
> significant genetic basis), probably produces the optimal level of
> homosexuals given our local mating systems and societal requirements."
>
> Cirbryn: I would like to see a mechanism by which evolution could do
> this, or an a priori prediction of what an "optimum" level might be
> under particular circumstances.
*If* homosexuality has a genetic component (and there is *some* evidence
for at least a small component from twin studies), then whatever
correlates there are with homosexual orientation will be under selective
constraints from the environment. Again, I think homosexuality is not
the behavior that is actually being selected for, but is a relatively
rare consequence of a selection process for some more general behavioral
capacities.
Environmental selection *is* a process (a blind process) that optimizes
the population level frequency of alleles to that which optimizes
population reproductive success. It does so even if some of the
consequences of this optimization is lethal to a fraction of the
population. Sickle cell allele in malarial areas (or thalassemia or a
number of other traits) are classic examples of this. Despite the
necessary production of homozygous lethals, the environment optimizes
the frequency of sickle cell allele in the population to the level that
results in optimal survival (specifically, that is when the differential
gain in survival of heterozygotes due to malarial resistance is balanced
by the loss of alleles in the lethal homozygotes). Selection always
optimizes adaptation to local environments.
> Even if we supposed that a particular
> group might survive better than other groups if it had some "optimum"
> level of homosexuality, the group would still be composed of numerous
> genetic lineages, all of which would be competing against each other.
> If one of those lineages developed a homosexuality gene, all the
> lineages in the group would benefit, but only the lineage with the
> gene would suffer reduced fitness as compared to the others. The
> homosexuality gene would therefore be likely to be weeded out despite
> any group benefits it might provide.
Again, if homosexuality is an occasional consequence of genes (probably
this is a quantitative trait) that allow or favor male-male bonding and
collective activity (that is, favors life in tribe, troop, or
civilization), the benefits of male-male bonding and collective activity
may simply greatly outweigh the loss of reproductive success of the
occasional homosexually-oriented individual. One might, indeed, be able
to breed out homosexuality, but only at the cost of creating a
dog-eat-dog (dogs, of course, really live in packs, so better might be
spider-eat-spider) society.
I personally doubt that there are genes that specifically lead to
selection *for* homosexuality pure and simple. There are genes that
lead to increased sex drive (that can lead to homosexual behavior in the
absence of heterosexual partners). There are genes that lead to
behaviors that favor survival as a tribe or group (such as genes that
favor male-male co-operation) that can sometimes lead to homosexual
orientation. That is, there may well be (and probably are) genes that
*can* lead to homosexuality, but they probably were not selected for on
that basis alone.
>
TomS
<c4butn$us1$1...@hood.uits.indiana.edu>, howard hershey stated..."
As the thread is supposed to be about "Homosexuality and the TOE",
and as this is being posted to talk.origins, it is appropriate to ask
about what relevance this has for *evolution*.
About *evolution*, as distinct from *intelligent design* or
*creation*.
And about *evolution*, rather than *genetics*.
As to the first point, if there is some material basis for
homosexuality, then "intelligent design" is going to tell us that
that material basis is "intelligently designed". "Creation" is
going to tell us that it is "created".
Using the criteria of "intelligent design" and "irreducible
complexity" or whatever, it is easy to show that homosexuality
meets those criteria. (At least as much as anything else meets
those criteria.) Therefore, this "alternative" tells us that
homosexuality is part of the design of (some) humans.
As to the second point, much of the discussion in the previous
posts is about whether or not homosexuality could be genetically
determined. It is rather difficult to understand how homosexuality
could be a consequence of *macro*evolution. *Micro*evolution may
be relevant, but then (as the "creationists" and other advocates
repeatedly tell us), micro-evolution is acceptable on the basis of
the evidence.
Therefore, it seems inappropriate to mention macro-evolution as
being somehow especially relevant to an explanation of the existence
of homosexuality. It seems less relevant than are such relatively
uncontroversial sciences such as genetics and micro-evolution. And i
t seems less relevant than the (supposed) alternatives of "intelligent
design" or whatever.
---Tom S.
"According to some modern authorities the human mind cannot 'conceive how a
self-determining system can increase its own initial complexity.' If this be
admitted preformation must be a law of Nature, and epigenesis fundamentally
impossible." FJ Cole, Early Theories of Sexual Generation (1930), page 209
fencingsax
> Became Hedonists_ (2002), some questions came to mind.
>
> What, if anything, is wrong with the following claims?:
>
> 1a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
> presence of homosexuality among humans.
> 1b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
> homosexuality among humans.
> 1c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> homosexuality among humans.
>
> practice of pedophilia among humans.
> 2b. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a small amount of
> pedophilia among humans.
> 2c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> pedophilia among humans.
>
> 3a. Evolutionary theory could easily account for a widespread
> practice of bestiality among humans.
> bestiality among humans.
> 3c. Evolutionary theory could easily account for an absence of
> bestiality among humans.
They are all the biggest pile of pachyderm crap since the wolly
mammoth? Really, I could ask you the exact same questions about
creationism, except I have morals, and like to think I only ask my OWN
questions that are relevant, and can actually CONTRIBUTE to a debate
or conversation.
Cirbryn
> Cirbryn wrote:
> > howard hershey <hers...@indiana.edu> wrote in message news:<c3saqd$m0b$1...@hood.uits.indiana.edu>...
<snip>
Alright, thanks for the clarifications. I was concerned that you were
making a Wynn-Edwards type of group selection argument, to the effect
that a certain level of homosexuality in the population might optimize
the population's reproductive success and thereby be maintained
despite any fitness reducing impacts it might have to the homosexual
individuals. Apparently we can both agree that's not likely. If you
don't mind I'm going to take a crack at re-wording one of the
statements you make above to make that distinction more clear (at
least to me). Let me know if this sounds right:
You said "Environmental selection *is* a process (a blind process)
that optimizes the population level frequency of alleles to that which
optimizes population reproductive success." To me this implies that
selection works to set allele frequencies according to the optimal
reproductive success of the population. But what you meant was that
"selection will favor an allele that reduces the reproductive success
of certain carrying individuals so long as the average reproductive
success of all individuals carrying the allele in the population is
greater than that of the individuals carrying other alleles."
So for instance, in areas where malaria is common the sickle cell
allele tends on average to produce a net benefit to individuals that
carry it when the frequency of the allele in the population is low,
because at low frequencies almost every carrier of the allele will
have only one copy and so obtain increased resistence to malaria. At
such frequencies selection favors the sickle cell allele, which causes
its frequency in the population to increase. But at higher frequencies
there will be more individuals born with two copies of the allele,
whose reproductive success will be lowered by sickle cell anemia. This
will tend to drive the frequency down as selection favors competing
alleles. Eventually the frequency of the sickle cell allele will
stabilize as it reaches the point where the opposing tendencies cancel
out to zero (or if this never happens, then at 100% or 0%). This need
not be the point that optimizes the reproductive success of the
population at large.
Cirbryn
> On Wed, 24 Mar 2004 15:42:52 +0000 (UTC),
> howard hershey <hers...@indiana.edu> wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> I hope someone nominates this for PotM. I've used up my seconding, but this
> excellent post deserves the nomination.
With appologies to Mr. Hershey, I think the post relies too heavily on
group selection arguments, without adequately addressing or even
acknowledging the known difficulties of such arguments, to warrant a
PotM.
Walter Bushell
"Tim M" <scot...@cox.spammerssuck.net> wrote:
<Snip>
> I know it seems at the outset that, of course, their reproduction rates
> *must* be less. But I challenge that assumption. From a historical
> perspective, many, many, many individuals that are considered to have been
> gay have also had children. (In fact this assumption is so strong, that an
> individual's children is cited as evidence to counter the claim of his/her
> homosexuality)
>
> Even in ancient Athens where homosexuality (in men) was accepted more than
> in any other ancient culture, it was more common that the men have wives and
> children than not.
<Snip>
Indeed. Homosexual men may even have been more efficient in raising
children, as I was getting at in a related thread.
I'm sure many got married in the 40, 50s and 60s and earlier, just
because everybody got married when the graduated. They would get
married, because everyone does.
In ancient Athens it was apparently _expected_ for a citizen to marry
and have children. For slaves the argument that gays would reproduce less
is a little harder to refute. OTOH slavery has been with us for a
genetically short time and even " a blind squirrel will catch the
occasional acorn."
Cirbryn
My recollection is that I'd posted this through Google on the 29th,
about the same time I posted my comments directly to Mr. Hershey's
post. I think Mr. Hershey has since answered those concerns, (although
I might still quibble with the wording). I don't know why the above
post didn't show up (on Google) until the 31st, but having read Mr.
Hershey's response of the 30th, I'll withdraw my objections.
Walter Bushell
lil...@umich.edu (Lilith) wrote:
> "The only obvious prediction about
> homosexuality that one could make based on an understanding of
> evolution
> is that a species which *requires* two sexes of that species to mate
> for
> reproduction will not be *exclusively* homosexual. That follows
> simply
> from the fact that in order to evolve, a population must reproduce."
>
> Now, there are other predictions that are less obvious that stem from
> Howard's statement, when coupled with a molecular model of sexual
> behavior and development.
>
> One of the more direct predictions would be that if there exists in a
> species strict (non-bisexual) male homosexuality fixed into a minor
> percentage of the males in a two-sex reproductive population, then
> there must exist a set of developmental and behavioral conditions, in
> male heterose xuals, which confer a reproductive advantage. These
> traits that confer reproductive advantage should, in some combination,
> manifests part-time as homosexuality. I will for the moment not
> consider a major social or situational advantage by having homosexuals
> present in the population.
No, the genes could give advantage to a man's sisters.
Lilith
Note I said up above, "One of the more direct predictions". I wasn't
saying it was the only one. Obviously the female could also benefit.
You know, I knew someone was going to point that out, so that's why I
put "One of the more direct..." in hope that it was obvious that I was
just picking one prediction to focus on.
Cirbryn
Yes you said "one of the more direct". You also said "there must exist
a set of ... conditions, in male heterosexuals," etc etc. That use of
the word "must" isn't supported by the ToE. While we'd expect the
(hypothetical) genetic component of male homosexuality to produce
advantageous characteristics in some individuals, there's nothing to
say those individuals must be male. Additionally, I'd pointed out the
possibility of such genes being advantageous in females farther up in
the post to which you were responding. So by ignoring that possibility
and claiming the genetic component must express advantageously in
males, you gave the impression of having considered and rejected the
idea that it could express advantageously in females. I appreciate Mr.
Bushell's bringing that point out so it could be cleared up.
And while I'm clearing things up, you also asked in your response to
my post why we don't see a decrease in sickle cell anemia in malarial
regions. I hope my March 30 response to Mr. Hershey answered that.
(http://tinyurl.com/2st8e). The gist is that I was never arguing
against the possibility that a gene producing detrimental effects in
some individuals could be maintained by virtue of producing beneficial
effects in other individuals. I was arguing against the notion that it
could be maintained by virtue of "optimizing the reproduction" of the
population as a whole.
Lilith
That's why I was only picking one scenario. The point of the post was
to look at molecular biology and behavior in MALES. I had then gone
on to examine how a mutation in MALES affects behavior as well as
reproductive success. My reply has nothing to do with not discussing
females. It had everything to do with discussing the affects of
aromatase in male populations, which you never addressed in this
reply. Instead of talking about what I didn't address, why are you
ignoring what I did address?
The point isn't that there are other hypotheses to test, other
predictions as a result of this observation to examine. The point was
that I made one and gave you the evidence.
You're focusing your attention on my preamble and nothing on what I
presented afterwards.
> Additionally, I'd pointed out the
> possibility of such genes being advantageous in females farther up in
> the post to which you were responding. So by ignoring that possibility
> and claiming the genetic component must express advantageously in
> males, you gave the impression of having considered and rejected the
> idea that it could express advantageously in females. I appreciate Mr.
> Bushell's bringing that point out so it could be cleared up.
That's great, but that wasn't my point, and had nothing to do with
rejecting the females-also point. My point was that you can use
molecular biology to discuss homosexual behavior and why it might
arise in a population.
I hope you noticed that my hypothesis above was focused on sperm
production, so I had to of necessity pick out a prediction based on
male anatomy. :)
>
> And while I'm clearing things up, you also asked in your response to
> my post why we don't see a decrease in sickle cell anemia in malarial
> regions. I hope my March 30 response to Mr. Hershey answered that.
> (http://tinyurl.com/2st8e).
Your response is inherently flawed, because you equate the 25%
homozygous sickle-cell presenting population with homosexuality, which
does not emerge at that frequency. You say:
>At such frequencies selection favors the sickle cell allele, which
causes
>its frequency in the population to increase. But at higher
frequencies
>there will be more individuals born with two copies of the allele,
>whose reproductive success will be lowered by sickle cell anemia.
Homosexuality does not have to be single-allele based, and as that's
not our observation by its prevalence, the point that the reproductive
success of the population will take a hit for homosexuality is not
supported.
> This
>will tend to drive the frequency down as selection favors competing
>alleles. Eventually the frequency of the sickle cell allele will
stabilize as it reaches the point where the opposing tendencies cancel
out to zero (or if this never happens, then at 100% or 0%). This need
not be the point that optimizes the reproductive success of the
population at large.
If the population is surviving and reproducing, the the population is
successful in that environment. If the sickle cell allele has moved
into the population, then it has clearly been selected for.
If it has been selected for, it has increased the reproductive success
of the population in that environment.
Now, homosexuality is clearly not a single-allele characteristic.
Aromatases can be selected for, for reproductive success. However,
individual variations can make the consequence of aromatase function
different from individual to individual, and one of those consequences
can be homosexual behavior. All that matters is that sperm motility
and birth rates surpass death rates -- that one's children are
successful in breeding a set of survivors into the next generation.
> The gist is that I was never arguing
> against the possibility that a gene producing detrimental effects in
> some individuals could be maintained by virtue of producing beneficial
> effects in other individuals. I was arguing against the notion that it
> could be maintained by virtue of "optimizing the reproduction" of the
> population as a whole.
If the gene is pleiotropic (operating with different functions in
different compartments and during different times), I see no reason a
gene can't optimize reproduction while simultaneously affecting
behavior.
For instance, hormones are wildly pleiotropic. If efficient aromatase
functions are necessary for reproductive success but also in some
combinatorial situations give rise to homosexual behavior on the
extreme distribution, then you have a trade-off. On the big-picture
level, here are the two choices (again, I'm focusing on the males for
this example):
Choice 1: You can lose the occasional homosexual through a change in
allele frequency by mutating aromatase and yielding less homosexuals
while SIMULTANEOUSLY losing reproductive viability (sperm production
for example) across all heterosexuals, causing the birth rate to be
inadequate against environmental challenge. The population as a whole
suffers because the birth rate does not adequately balance the death
rate. Note that sperm production is only one advantage of estrogens in
males. Here, you have no homosexual children but you're only able to
successfully impregnate a female with three children in your lifetime,
two of which die as a matter of course. Your last remaining child has
children who, as adults, are also reproductively compromised and it's
a crap shoot whether or not your line survives at all.
Choice 2: You can alternatively keep the occasional homosexual and
optimize sperm production for that allele, increasing population rates
against environmental challenge and increasing the species survival,
as the number of births allows for greater odds of the population's
survival. If one of your children is homosexual, and nine others are
heterosexual with five surviving into adulthood, the population
benefits. It benefits even more because those children are also
successfully breeding for more children (and the females are
exhausted).
Maybe you can explain why, in this picture, an allele yielding optimal
sperm production (for example)but also homosexuality, cannot help a
population survive (and thrive) as an entity while simultaneously
allowing an occasional homosexual as a behavioral consequence of
increased sperm production (for example). Again, I'm choosing just one
consequence of aromatase function.
Walter Bushell
lil...@umich.edu (Lilith) wrote:
But it is not a prediction, since its falsity does not go to negate the
hypothesis. If the genes were sufficiently detrimental to both males and
females then it would die out.
Walter Bushell
> Homosexuality does not have to be single-allele based, and as that's
> not our observation by its prevalence, the point that the reproductive
> success of the population will take a hit for homosexuality is not
> supported.
<Snip>
Homosexuality is I am almost certain a multiply caused condition. For
example, Alan Turing was gay apparently because he was terrified of
women. (Probably the worst reason to be gay.)
If it has genetic causes, they are probably many genes that would push
one in that direction if you have a lot of them, or certain subsets,
particuarly without other genes that would block the aforesaid.
John Wilkins
Chicken and egg - many gays were unable to relate to women in times when
the male and female roles were rigidly dictated by social norms.
Turing's biographer, Alan Hodges, notes that Turing was drawn to men
even at his primary school. He was a born gay.
--
John Wilkins
john...@wilkins.id.au http://www.wilkins.id.au
"Men mark it when they hit, but do not mark it when they miss"
- Francis Bacon
Cirbryn
I thought your post made a good argument as to how homosexuality might
persist in a population despite the otherwise expected tendency of
natural selection to weed it out. I also thought your focus on
specific biochemical factors raised some interesting points that I
personally hadn't seen before, and provided some good starting places
for further research. I didn't comment further on those points
because, as speculations, I neither disagreed with them nor thought I
had anything worthwhile to add. (I might enjoy giving it a shot later
though once we get this little disagreement ironed out. Might help me
learn something anyway). My one quibble has been with your statement
to the effect that the ToE would predict that genes conferring male
homosexuality in some individuals must also confer male heterosexual
advantage in other individuals. That's not a preamble so much as it is
a conclusion or summary, and I think it's both incorrect and likely to
mislead other readers on an important point. Consider a situation in
which genes expressing (occasionally) in male homosexuality were
maintained because of the compensating advantages they conferred in
heterosexual females. Now re-read your statement from your 3-30 post
(quoted above) starting "One of the more direct predictions would be …
." In such a situation would your statement be true or false? And
before you point out that yes, technically I'm right but it's a
quibbly point and you never actually intended to choose wording that
would eliminate heterosexual female advantage as a possible
explanation, let me just say that yes I realize that, but being
quibbly about wording is important here, and I wasn't the only person
who noticed the problem.
> > Additionally, I'd pointed out the
> > possibility of such genes being advantageous in females farther up in
> > the post to which you were responding. So by ignoring that possibility
> > and claiming the genetic component must express advantageously in
> > males, you gave the impression of having considered and rejected the
> > idea that it could express advantageously in females. I appreciate Mr.
> > Bushell's bringing that point out so it could be cleared up.
>
> That's great, but that wasn't my point, and had nothing to do with
> rejecting the females-also point. My point was that you can use
> molecular biology to discuss homosexual behavior and why it might
> arise in a population.
>
> I hope you noticed that my hypothesis above was focused on sperm
> production, so I had to of necessity pick out a prediction based on
> male anatomy. :)
>
Right, and a seminal prediction it was. But rather than saying the ToE
predicts there must be a compensating advantage in males, I think it
would be more correct to say that genes producing homosexuality in
some individuals could be maintained by a compensating advantage in
other individuals without violating the ToE, and that increased sperm
production in males with higher aromatase levels is one such
possibility.
> > And while I'm clearing things up, you also asked in your response to
> > my post why we don't see a decrease in sickle cell anemia in malarial
> > regions. I hope my March 30 response to Mr. Hershey answered that.
> > (http://tinyurl.com/2st8e).
>
> Your response is inherently flawed, because you equate the 25%
> homozygous sickle-cell presenting population with homosexuality, which
> does not emerge at that frequency. You say:
>
> >At such frequencies selection favors the sickle cell allele, which
> causes
> >its frequency in the population to increase. But at higher
> frequencies
> >there will be more individuals born with two copies of the allele,
> >whose reproductive success will be lowered by sickle cell anemia.
>
> Homosexuality does not have to be single-allele based, and as that's
> not our observation by its prevalence, the point that the reproductive
> success of the population will take a hit for homosexuality is not
> supported.
I was using the sickle cell allele as an example of an allele that
produces a reduction in fitness in some individuals but is
nevertheless maintained in the population due to a compensating
pleiotropic effect on other individuals. This is the same explanation
that you, I and Mr. Hershey have all proposed for homosexuality. I
don't see: 1) why you think the sickle cell allele would necessarily
be maintained at 50% when you don't know the benefit of malaria
resistence confered to the heterozygote or the detriment of anemia
conferred to the homozygote; 2) why the frequency would particularly
matter to the example; 3) why it matters that I used a single-allele
example; or 4) why you're arguing against your own explanation.
Additionally, I never argued that the population would necessarily
"take a hit for homosexuality". I'm saying that the state of the
population's reproductive success does not explain homosexuality's
persistence. I'll talk about why not farther down.
>
> > This
> >will tend to drive the frequency down as selection favors competing
> >alleles. Eventually the frequency of the sickle cell allele will
> stabilize as it reaches the point where the opposing tendencies cancel
> out to zero (or if this never happens, then at 100% or 0%). This need
> not be the point that optimizes the reproductive success of the
> population at large.
>
> If the population is surviving and reproducing, the the population is
> successful in that environment. If the sickle cell allele has moved
> into the population, then it has clearly been selected for.
Assuming its frequency is too high to be explained by mutation
pressure, and that it's not selectively neutral and just drifting into
the population I'd agree.
> If it has been selected for, it has increased the reproductive success
> of the population in that environment.
I'd probably agree with regard to the sickle cell gene, but it isn't
always true. Consider for example a polygynous population in which
each reproducing male collects a harem with an average of nine
females. Assume that as luck would have it the birth ratio is about 9
females to 1 male. Now introduce a mutant allele that causes
individuals to produce male and female children at a 50/50 ratio. This
allele would be selected for despite the fact that its rise in the
population would greatly decrease the population's reproductive
capacity. It would be selected for because the high benefit of getting
a male child that ended up reproducing would compensate for all the
other male children that didn't reproduce, thereby making male and
female childred equally reproductively valuable (from the point of
view of a parent hoping for grandchildren) in a population of 50%
each, and making the rarer gender more reproductively valuable in a
population that wasn't 50/50.
Furthermore, even if we assumed that the genetic component of
homosexuality did increase the reproductive success of the population
at large, it wouldn't follow that the allele in question could be
maintained because of that benefit to the population. Assuming
homosexual individuals are less likely to procreate, the genetic
component for homosexuality would be outcompeted by other alleles
regardless of the benefits or detriments each of those alleles might
have for the population. It would probably help the lemming population
to be able to track carrying capacity better rather than shooting on
past it to the point where there are starvig lemmings everywhere. But
any alleles that induced their carriers to slow their reproduction as
the carrying capacity approached would be outcompeted and weeded out
of the population. As with any tragedy of the commons, what's good for
the individual gene line may be bad for the population. And with
natural selection, what's good for the individual gene line rules.
> Now, homosexuality is clearly not a single-allele characteristic.
> Aromatases can be selected for, for reproductive success. However,
> individual variations can make the consequence of aromatase function
> different from individual to individual, and one of those consequences
> can be homosexual behavior. All that matters is that sperm motility
> and birth rates surpass death rates -- that one's children are
> successful in breeding a set of survivors into the next generation.
All that matters (and I think we're once again on the same page here)
is the the average benefit conferred by a particular allele across all
the individuals in the population that carry it. If that average is
greater than the average for competing alleles then that allele will
be selected for even if some carrying individuals actually suffer
deleterious effects. What doesn't matter to natural selection is the
effect of the allele on the reproductive capacity of the population.
I'm not saying such an allele couldn't help a population survive. I'm
saying it wouldn't necessarily do so. Any effects it may have on the
population, whether good or bad, will be transparent to natural
selection. Consequently, population effects can't explain why an
apparently detrimental allele is maintained. The scenario you offer
above does provide such an explanation, but only because it posits
compensating pleiotropic effects in other individuals rather than to
the population as a whole. This is the same reason I gave for why the
sickle cell allele is maintained.
xtmprs...@erols.com
Therion Ware wrote:
>
> On Thu, 25 Mar 2004 08:34:02 +0000 (UTC) in talk.origins,
> (BigDiscusser) (JOJ...@webtv.net (\(BigDiscusser\))) said, directing
> the reply to talk.origins
>
> >the deterioration of moral society--any connection?
>
> Has society deteriorated? Are for example, New York or London safer
> today than they were 1 to 200 years ago? Is there more or less
> prostitution, more or less child abuse, more or less crime, more or
> less racial discrimination?
>
> Which is to say that before you try to explain the "deterioration of
> moral society" you have to show that there actually has been a
> deterioration of moral society and define what you mean by "moral
> deterioration".
>
> Personally, I think you'll have your work cut out for you.
>
> >God bless, Jo Jean
> >
> >I am an 82 year old Christian lady. I am interested in a wide variety of
> >topics and am a retired RN.
>
> [snip]
> --
> "Do Unto Others As You Would Have Them Do Unto You."
> - Attrib: Pauline Reage.
> Inexpensive VHS & other video to CD/DVD conversion?
> See: <http://www.Video2CD.com>. 35.00 gets your video on DVD.
> all posts to this email address are automatically deleted without being read.
> ** atheist poster child #1 ** #442.
You have to define deterioration.
If you define it as Jo Jean's religion, then the safety of cities
and the amount of child abuse don't tell you anything.
The only thing that matters is, are the endangered city dwellers
and child abusers christian?
If not, we are deteriorated.
xtmprs...@erols.com
Dick C wrote:
>
> (BigDiscusser) wrote in talk.origins
>
> > the deterioration of moral society--any connection? God bless, Jo
> Jean
>
> Actually, it is the far right that is the most immoral in our society.
> Seeking to persecute those whose sexuality is different from theirs,
> wishing to hide problems in their churches, lying about their goals,
> lying about their beliefs, seeking to discriminate against anyone
> different from them.
>
> --
> Dick #1349
> Damn it . . . Don't you dare ask God to help me.
> To her housekeeper, who had begun to pray aloud.
> ~~ Joan Crawford, actress, d. May 10, 1977
> Home Page: dickcr.iwarp.com
> email: dic...@comcast.net
Those things are actually moral behavior.
Dick C
>
>
> Dick C wrote:
>>
>> (BigDiscusser) wrote in talk.origins
>>
>> > the deterioration of moral society--any connection? God bless, Jo
>> Jean
>>
>> Actually, it is the far right that is the most immoral in our society.
>> Seeking to persecute those whose sexuality is different from theirs,
>> wishing to hide problems in their churches, lying about their goals,
>> lying about their beliefs, seeking to discriminate against anyone
>> different from them.
> Those things are actually moral behavior.
Sadly, the people on the far right do think it is moral. Along with
killing thousands of people because a right wing leader says it is
the thing to do.
Daniel Harper
> Walter Bushell <pr...@panix.com> wrote:
>
>> In article <75200cbc.04040...@posting.google.com>,
>> lil...@umich.edu (Lilith) wrote:
>> <Snip>
>> > Homosexuality does not have to be single-allele based, and as that's
>> > not our observation by its prevalence, the point that the reproductive
>> > success of the population will take a hit for homosexuality is not
>> > supported.
>>
>> <Snip>
>>
>> Homosexuality is I am almost certain a multiply caused condition. For
>> example, Alan Turing was gay apparently because he was terrified of
>> women. (Probably the worst reason to be gay.)
>>
>> If it has genetic causes, they are probably many genes that would push
>> one in that direction if you have a lot of them, or certain subsets,
>> particuarly without other genes that would block the aforesaid.
>
> Chicken and egg - many gays were unable to relate to women in times when
> the male and female roles were rigidly dictated by social norms.
>
> Turing's biographer, Alan Hodges, notes that Turing was drawn to men even
> at his primary school. He was a born gay.
An MIS major I know was once talking about a homosexual person we both
knew in a negative light. Knowing his major, I asked him what he thought
of Alan Turing. "Who?" was his response, and I realized that yes,
education had fallen so far that someone majoring in Information Systems
could have no clue who Alan Turing was.
(Of course, I realize that MIS is not CS, and that even in the CS classes
we've come a long way since the Universal Turing Machine, but to not have
even heard the name is pretty close to a cardinal sin in my book. Even
those who major in American Literature should know who Virgil was.)
--
In the Beginning, was the Command Line...
--Daniel Harper
(change terra to earth for email)