bitch at pulpculture. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----
http://www.3dvulva.com/ (may NSFW, but it largely clinical pics, but you never know how people are about these things)
helpful, also, to understand that the clitoris isn't only about the button. i took those pics, btw, and turned them into star wars spaceships. http://blog.pulpculture.org/2006/09/22/3d-vulva/
^^^^^^^ CB: I should have put "button" in quotes. "Message location" ?
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andie nachgeborenen ________________________________________ My theory is not monogamy, but that the placement of the clitoris, inconvenient for bringing the woman to orgasm through intercourse, and promoting intercourse would seem to be a major adaptive value of orgasm, because it gives women an opportunity to assess whether whatever partner she's engaging in sex with -- and this may be one or many -- would go the extra mile, as it were, to satisfy her sexual needs rather than merely selfishly indulging his own. This would give her information about whether he might be a good mate, considerate of her needs, likely to support her and their offspring, and therefore worthwhile to engage in further sexual relations with.
^^^^^^ CB: But our evidence of "ancient society" is that the males who support her and her offspring are _not_ the males she has intercourse with. They are her brothers for whom she has an incest taboo. Mother's brother, not mother's sex partners, help raise the children. So, since the male you have intercourse with is not going to be your help mate in childrearing, the male's sensitivity in intercourse has nothing to do with future childrearing assistance sensitivity.
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The communality of childcare in prehistorical social groups only affects this hypothesis weakly, because it is still more probable that a male who did in fact care more for his own offspring and his partner (polygamous, monogamous, higamous, hogamous)is likely to reproduce; he will be a more attractive partner.
^^^^^ CB: This is projecting modern "partners" back into a kinship structure in which they don't exist. See above. Your childrearing "partner(s)" are your brothers, not your lovers.
The idea is the woman has intercourse with more than one male, and so the biological father is not known. Of course, the mother is known. This is the basis for matrilineality (tracing the family through the mother) prevailing, because the biological father is not known, but the mother is. Then the mother's brothers (plural), none of whom she has sex with because of the incest taboo, act in the role that is modernly termed "father". It's an avunculate ( uncle system)
The origin of monogamy is the "worldhistoric defeat of the female gender" because men start enforcing that women have sex only with a single male _so the male can know who his children are and pass his private property to his offspring_. Thus, the monogamous family, private property and the state arise as a complex together. Engels doesn't always get it right , but when it counts ,he does, to paraphrase Levins and Lowentin. This is one of those cases when it counts and Engels gets it right.
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If women with a "conventionally" placed clitoris is better placed to evaluate which partners are more attractive, that will enhance their own adaptive fitness and make it more likely that they will differentially reproduce with that feature at a greater rate.
^^^^^^ CB: See above. Your brother, who helps you in childrearing, does not have sex with you, doesn't touch your c., because of the incest taboo.
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(As well as to some degree increasing the adaptive fitness of caring males -- I guess the incidence of caring males, which I would guess is moderate at best, may cut against the hypothesis. Or maybe men care but are ignorant and our society makes people too prudish to talk about, and educate men in, bringing women to organism through clitoral stimulation. I read a survey somewhere that some ridiculously small proportion of men even know here the clitoris is, much less what it does, and as for the g-spot, forget it.)
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CB; When I was young, there was an expression: "Don't believe everything you read." (smile)
Another point, it is very easy for a woman to stimulate her own c. during v. intercourse, increasing the pleasure of v intercourse. Any trait that encourages, enhances, tends to increase v. intercourse is not likely to be a Gouldian spandrel, but directly selected for in the natural selection sense.
Given that stimulation of the c. tends to lubricate the v., ( I haven't heard anybody denying that yet) plus a few other phenomena which connect the c. and v. seemingly ignored by all the theorists who want to make out such a big separation between the two physiological "locations"/"events", I really got to wonder what's going on with the academic sex theorists.
With respect to those surveys, for various reasons related to strategies in the "battle of the sexes" , many women might not want to reveal all their secrets in surveys where men would find out those secrets.
Another point, somewhat complicated, is that if the stimulation of the c. does not encourage or "dovetail" with v. intercourse, then it might become a distraction from v. intercourse. Why have sex with men, if you feel so good just stimulating your c. ? If thereby women with c.'s have _less_ v. intercourse than women without c.'s, c's would be selected against and lack of c. would be selected for. The upshot implication is that c. stimulation probably enhances and encourages v. intercourse, as in causing lubrication, arousal even, of the v.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orgasm
Vaginal versus clitoral orgasms A distinction is sometimes made between clitoral and vaginal orgasms in women. An orgasm that results from combined clitoral and vaginal stimulation is called a blended orgasm. Many doctors have claimed that vaginal orgasms do not exist and that female orgasms are obtained only from clitoral arousal. Recent discoveries about the size of the clitoris - it extends inside the body, around the vagina[20] - complicate or may invalidate attempts to distinguish clitoral vs. vaginal orgasms.
The concept of the purely vaginal orgasm was first promulgated by Sigmund Freud. In 1905, Freud argued that clitoral orgasm was an adolescent phenomenon, and upon reaching puberty the proper response of mature women changes to vaginal orgasms. While Freud provided no evidence to support this basic assumption, the consequences of the theory were greatly elaborated thereafter, not least because many women felt inadequate when they could not achieve orgasm via vaginal intercourse that involved little or no clitoral stimulation. Freud's theories on this, and indeed many other biological subjects, were later largely proven false or based on supposition.
In 1966, Masters and Johnson published pivotal research into the phases of sexual stimulation. Their work included women as well as men, and unlike Kinsey previously (in 1948 and 1953), set out to determine the physiological stages leading up to and following orgasm.[21] One of the results was the promotion of the idea that vaginal and clitoral orgasms follow the same stages of physical response. Additionally, Masters and Johnson argued that clitoral stimulation is the primary source of orgasms.
A new understanding of the "vaginal" orgasm has been emerging since the 1980s. Many women report that some form of vaginal stimulation in concert with clitoral stimulation is essential to experiencing a fully satisfactory orgasm[citation needed]. Recent anatomical research has pointed towards a connection between intravaginal tissues and the clitoris -- it has been shown that these tissues have connecting nerves. This information, combined with the anatomical evidence that the internal part of the clitoris is a much larger organ than previously thought, could explain credible reports of orgasms in women who have undergone clitorectomy as part of so-called female circumcision (also called female genital mutilation). The discovery of the biological link between the clitoris and the vagina lends further credence to the belief that the clitoris is the 'seat' of the female orgasm and indicates that the clitoris is simply far wider-spread than the visible part most people commonly associate with it. It is possible, however, that some women have more extensive clitoral tissues and nerves than others, meaning that some women can achieve orgasm solely via direct stimulation of the external portions of the clitoris.