[lbo-talk] Re: lbo-talk Digest, Vol 18, Issue 17

[Jim Devine]

On 6/2/05, Luke Weiger <lweiger at umich.edu> wrote:
> This does nothing to explain why it is that humans came to have orgasms in
> the first place.  Couple slight tweaks to our genetic blueprint and, voila,
> no orgasms.  I think even Gould and Lewontin would fess up and admit that
> sex is pleasurable because (over many eons in the past) folks who found sex
> pleasurable were more likely to leave offspring behind.  Every evolutionary
> account of a purported adaptation is a "just so" story, but that doesn't
> mean they're all mere fantasies.  

I'm no expert on the subject, but Gould and Lewontin would never deny
the role of biological explanation -- as opposed to _ex post_
rationalization. Your explanation sounds pretty good.


>Do you think hands are evolutionary accidents?

no. But the number of fingers is. 

It's ridiculous to oppose "sociobiological explanation" (i.e.,
reductionist Darwinism) with "random explanation," assuming that just
because one rejects the first, one must embrace the latter.

-- 
Jim Devine
"Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way
and let people talk.) -- Karl M., paraphrasing Dante A.