[lbo-talk] Re: Instinct

ravi listmail at kreise.org
Tue Nov 29 12:01:43 PST 2005


At around 29/11/05 2:32 pm, Miles Jackson wrote:
> On Tue, 29 Nov 2005, Arash wrote:
>
>> My point here isn't about the stability of categories, it's about the
>> evolutionary puzzle of near-exclusive homosexuality, which you denied
>> existed.
>
> If near-exclusive homosexuality didn't exist in human prehistory,
> there's no puzzle to be solved. --Assuming that near-exclusive
> homosexuality/heterosexuality existed hundreds of
> thousands of years ago is wild conjecture that is not even
> supported by primate analogies. Based on our nearest primate
> cousins, it's much more realistic of assume that early humans
> engaged in various kinds of opportunistic heterosexual and
> homosexual sex. (Ah, the good old days--)
>

What is the fascination on LBO with evolution of traits, in particular homosexuality? ;-) Perhaps LBO could use a FAQ, in the grand old Usenet tradition? I volunteer to compile one: Send me your questions, preferably with answers.

Regarding the above: Miles, is it true that there is no exclusive homosexuality in primates? Given that: (a) there is evidence of homosexuality in primates, such as bonobos, (b) a strong male hierarchy with an alpha male who dominates, we could hypothesize that of necessity, some males (despite behind-the-alpha's-back sexual escapades) experience nothing but homosexual sex. If true, perhaps you do not count this as an instance of exclusive homosexuality, since its not voluntary?

Also, I wrote on an earlier thread about the issue of homosexuality as encoded in the genes (if at all) and what I consider to be the misunderstanding (of evolutionary theory) that by its very nature homosexuality cannot survive [through reproduction]. The misunderstanding (again, as I see it) rests on the confusion of visible traits with genic coding (phenotype vs genotype). An entirely invisible trait could nonetheless be present within the population and express itself in future ones: in this case, if one were to posit homosexuality as recessive in the genotype, all that is required is for two individuals with heterosexual phenotype carrying the specific recessive alleles to say mate successfully (as in begetting progeny, not achieving the big-O) four times, to generate the probability of a homosexual phenotype child. Voila! ;-)

<disclaimers>

I am not a biologist, so I would appreciate any corrections. Also, I do not necessarily believe either that (a) sexual orientation is genetically coded, (b) such encoding is trivially mapped to the trait, or most importantly, that (c) a gene's view explanation is anywhere near complete.

</disclaimers>

--ravi

-- If you wish to contact me, you will get my attention faster by substituting "r" for "listmail" in my email address. Thank you!



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