--- Matt <lbo4 at beyondzero.net> wrote:
> On Fri, Jan 26, 2007 at 08:41:33AM -0800, andie
> nachgeborenen wrote:
> > This is annoying, stupid, and insulting and I am
> not
> > talking to you about it any more.
>
> You display great patience and take a lot of time to
> explain many
> things Legal to those of us not as knowledgeable and
> that is one of
> the main reasons I read just about everything you
> write here. Thank
> you!
>
> But whenever science comes up your tone gets a
> little nasty. Just
> because people disagree with you doesn't mean they
> are morons.
>
> The sociobiological explanation you presented does
> not seem to be
> supported much in the published research.
> Admittedly I am not a
> Biologist or an Anthropologist, but I did a quick
> search:
>
>
>
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=female+clitoris+evolution&hl=en&lr=&btnG=Search
>
> This was an interesting letter from SB Hrdy, quite
> relevant to this
> discussion:
>
>
>
http://frigor.hit.bg/lib/The%20evolution%20of%20female%20orgasm%20-%20logic%20please%20but%20no%20atavism.pdf
>
> Something similar to your theory mentioned there is
> the "pair bond
> hypothesis" and she (an Anthropologist at UC Davis)
> calls it absurd,
> based upon research indicating that:
>
> Based on both clinical observations and
> interviews with
> women, there is a disconcerting mismatch
> between a female capable of multiple sequential
> orgasms and a male partner typically capable of
> one climax per copulatory bout. Furthermore,
> only a minority of women (on the order of 30%)
> typically experience orgasms from intercourse
> alone. Even for natural selection rarely an
> agent of perfection this level of response
> seems . . . substandard to warrant the claim that
> the orgasm is an adaptation for fostering pair
> bonds though this is not to say that the
> orgasm, once it became part of the primate
> repertoire, might not subsequently be enlisted
> as an agent to promote pair bonding
> when social or environmental conditions are
> conducive to monogamy . . .
>
> Important, as I see it, is that orgasms are
> certainly not only found
> in Homo Sapiens Sapiens. I apologize for not
> remembering, but someone
> pointed out that developmentally there appears to be
> little difference
> in an early fetus between a penis and a clitoris.
>
> This article
>
>
>
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/ap/ar/1998/00000056/00000005/art00898
>
> states in the abstract:
>
> Female orgasmic responses were observed in 80 of
> 240 copulations
> (33%). The frequency of orgasms was not
> correlated with female age
> or dominance rank, but it was higher for
> copulations lasting longer
> and involving a higher number of mounts and
> pelvic thrusts.
>
> Wow, thats a similar number as Hrdy cites, but that
> could just be
> coincidence.
>
> [And if only I had learned more about Macaques when
> I was younger...]
>
> The sexual reproduction humans engage in has a long
> history. And the
> shared anscestor between Humans and Macaques is from
> about 25MYA. So
> if female orgasms are at least 25 MY old, I don't
> know if the
> sociobiological explanation you posit seems likely.
>
> I'm assuming that a lady Macaque's clitoris is no
> less displaced than
> the male Macaque's penis. [I was going to go to the
> zoo to check, but
> a Friday evening watching movies seemed somehow
> less....creepy.]
>
> It just may be that the female orgasm is a wonderful
> thing evolution
> has given us, just like the male orgasm. From an
> adaptive point of
> view, incredible pain that could only be relieved
> (please no blue ball
> jokes) by ejaculating into a vagina would serve the
> same function as
> a male orgasm.
>
> But I like the way things turned out.
>
> > After the following
> > brief explanation. The question you ridicule was
> > raised as part of a larger theory. The theory
> began
> > from the presumption that the human capacity for
> > sexual pleasure evolved because it enhanced
> adaptive
> > fitness. This, I understand, is dreadfully
> > pro-capitalist and male supremacist. That theory
> then
> > raises a natural question. The question is based
> on
> > the facts (1) that most women require clitoral
> > stimulation to orgasm, and (2) the human clitoris
> is
> > not optimally placed to to be stimulated to orgasm
> > during intercourse. Why, then, is it located where
> it
> > is?
>
> Hmmmm, where would you like the clitoris to be? I
> did a survey of
> women I know and when I told them their clitorises
> were in the wrong
> places, they thought I was daft.
>
> So the assumptions being made here: that the
> clitoris provided an
> evolutionary advantage because it is important for
> female orgasms;
> that female orgasms are biologically important for
> reproduction, may
> not be true.
>
> How far back to a common anscestor must one go to
> find clitorises in
> other places?
>
> [snip]
>
> I think Hrdy nailed it nicely - if one tries to use
> natural selection
> to explain female orgasms as a driver for
> pair-bonding, the hypothesis
> is inconsistent with observation. But where
> societies encourage
> monogamy, female orgasms can be used to promote pair
> bonding. But
> that isn't evolutionary biology.
>
> [Here is where I had started, but deleted, some
> cheesey comments to
> prove I wasn't sexist, things about sexual
> etiquette. If anything I
> wrote is sexist, I welcome the critique because I am
> curious how that
> might be the case. Certainly proud proclamations
> regarding
> cunnilingus wouldnt absolve me of something sexist,
> and might actually
> be an indicator of sexism. But I digress.]
>
>
> Matt
>
> --
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>
> Theoretically, people see money on the counter, and
> no
> one around, they think they're being watched.
> -Dante Hicks
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> -Veronica
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