Thinking Homosexuality

a reply to: continuousThunder

why should it MATTER if homosexuality provides an edge in reproductive blah blah blah

It matters because there are people who wish to paint homosexuals as evil. It is important to them that homosexuality be seen as a behavioural choice rather than an inborn trait. Pointing out that homosexual behaviour can promote survival and reproduction in some animal species shows that it is a natural form of behaviour, genetically programmed in some individuals the same way blue eyes are genetically programmed in some individuals.

surely we're above every single thing about us having to contribute to the survival of the species?

All human behaviour is ultimately derived from instincts that maximize survival and reproductive success. This is the case even with people who have no children and are not interested in having any. It’s called human nature.

a reply to: Astyanax

yeah that was... kind of my point, in a sense. the "born like this" narrative backs us into a corner where everything is dictated on the terms of people who think the gays are evil. Either we prove that we have some sort of abstract legitimacy in terms of reproduction or they win and we're evil.
i reject the whole game as it's based in spurious notions to begin with.
It doesn't matter what value i bring to heteronormative society and it doesn't matter how i came to it, it's totally irrelevant.
i am what i am, i'm proud of myself and my lifestyle, and i don't need to justify that to people who hate me anyway

a reply to: continuousThunder

That's a hard position to defend. I am all for free sexual expression, but not everyone has a choice and not many are capable of dealing with the opprobrium from those who think they do have one. Might be worthwhile putting yourself in some of your friends' shoes.

Your defiance is admirable, though. It captures the original spirit of liberalism, regardless of the issue under discussion.

originally posted by: Teikiatsu
Of course it was deliberate. You opened that door by using the tired meme 'animals do it.' If your argument is that Behavior A is okay because animals display it in the wild, the natural extension is that Behaviors B, C and D are also okay because animals display it in the wild. Stop denying that you made your argument vulnerable to that rebuttal. I could go one step beyond that and inquire why you are insinuating that homosexuals are no better than amoral animals.

This is pretty much a signed confession that you are trolling.

Anyway, it will not surprise anyone (except you) to learn that your logic is as feeble as your morality. You're deploying a fallacy called "The Undistributed Middle".

It's not a question of accepting one form of animal behaviour as being OK and therefore all other aspects of animal behaviour as OK. It is completely possible for some behaviour from the animal kindgom to be OK but not other types of behaviour, and only a simpleton or a troll would argue otherwise. Or possibly both.

I could as well say that being straight is meh because it's going well with nature. Nature that is cruel and gave birth to all caniballs, poop eaters you name it. Soon sperm and eggs will be made from skin cells and fetuses will be placed in the artifical wombs and I'm happy thinking about it because the further from the cruel nature the better.

originally posted by: Astyanax
a reply to: Teikiatsu

I'll just copy/paste my last response for another person

I think that person adequately dealt with some of the, ahem, moral issues in what you wrote. Kicked your ass, in fact.

You are welcome to your opinion.

I’m more interested in the biology. You admitted that homosexual behaviour is reproductively beneficial to some organisms in some circumstances. You pointed to some examples where the benefits are evident, even if, as in the case of the fish, it can often be difficult to work out what the benefit is.

There are plenty of species in which homosexual behaviour has been recorded, yet biology has no hypothesis to explain why it occurs. Would you bet for or against there being a genuine survival or reproductive benefit in those cases?

As a biologist, I am interested in the function behind the behavior as well. That's one of the reasons I have those examples at the ready.

I would bet *for* the behavior as some type of survival/reproductive strategy if it is observed across the entire species.

I would bet *against* the behavior as survival if it observed in a single animal or small group.

An example of the latter would be one of my cats. At an early age she figured out that when she was cleaning herself that if she massaged her vagina with her paws it felt good. She got into the habit and we can't break her of it. This has led to multiple trips to the vet to treat her for urinary and vaginal infections. If she lived in the wild and displayed this behavior she would have been dead years ago. But the positive feedback she gets for the activity is very strong, and we can't monitor her 24/7 to stop doing it. The other cats in our household have not copied her masturbation activity, so it is not hard-wired into their instincts.

If there is a behavior displayed by animals in the wild that uses excessive amounts of energy and could lead to death/infection/injury there must be a survival mechanism attached to it. Heck, heterosexual copulation is a massive drain on resources. Pregnancy is a massive drain on resources. Raising young is a massive drain on resources. There are either strong sensory positive feedbacks attached to the activity or strong hormonal pathways that reinforce the activity that generates survival advantages. It's not very romantic sounding, but it's the truth.

By all means, feel free to reference one of these species where the behavior is observed but no hypothesis has been created. Be prepared for some follow-up questions. Notably if the behavior is species-wide and if promotion of the dominance hierarchy has been discounted.

If you answer ‘against’, then you are a fool who is deaf to his own logic. Since I do not think you are that, I am guessing your would argue for there being such a benefit.

For now, yes.

Yet you are not willing to admit a survival or reproductive benefit to homosexual behaviour in one animal species: your own.

Don't go there. You haven't read my previous theories on why it appears in the human population. The ones I still bandy about are reactions to population size in an area, excessive male/female disproportion in a small population, or as familial support to care for the younger heterosexual members that would pass on closely related DNA.

However, since the population of homosexuals in the human species has been estimated as less than 2% (as per CDC data), that places them outside any incidence that has significant impact on the overall population.

Special pleading much?

You have neither an ethical nor a scientific foot to stand on here. I suggest calling a taxi. See you on another thread.

I kept these for completeness, but otherwise they are no value for this discussion.

originally posted by: audubon

originally posted by: Teikiatsu
Of course it was deliberate. You opened that door by using the tired meme 'animals do it.' If your argument is that Behavior A is okay because animals display it in the wild, the natural extension is that Behaviors B, C and D are also okay because animals display it in the wild. Stop denying that you made your argument vulnerable to that rebuttal. I could go one step beyond that and inquire why you are insinuating that homosexuals are no better than amoral animals.

This is pretty much a signed confession that you are trolling.

Anyway, it will not surprise anyone (except you) to learn that your logic is as feeble as your morality. You're deploying a fallacy called "The Undistributed Middle".

It's not a question of accepting one form of animal behaviour as being OK and therefore all other aspects of animal behaviour as OK. It is completely possible for some behaviour from the animal kindgom to be OK but not other types of behaviour, and only a simpleton or a troll would argue otherwise. Or possibly both.

Actually, you are the one employing logical phallacies. From where I'm sitting you have been appealing to nature, appealing to emotion, with a little tu quoque on the side.

Not entirely sure what that deletion was for. Anyway, TL;DR - "tu quoque" doesn't mean what you obviously think it means, it's spelled "fallacy" not "phallacy" (freudian slip alert!), and I'm not responding to any more of this nonsense. Good day.

a reply to: Astrocyte

So out of curiosity, is it wrong, only for humans? Because it exists elsewhere in nature.

a reply to: Astrocyte

What evidence do you have of humanity being above animals? We

are

animals. It is pure ego to think we are above them.

originally posted by: Noinden
It is pure ego to think we are above them.

I disagree. We see plenty of evidence that we are more special than animals. Animals serve humans. We are the only upright creative beings with opposable thumbs and huge brains which allow us to do much more than any animal could do.

a reply to: Noinden

Oh animals serve humans? Yes we've domesticated some animals, we've also failed to do so with others neighbour. There is evidence that ants have domesticated aphids, so does this make them above other insects?

Our brains are huge only with regards to extant primates, Neanderthals had larger brain capacity in many cases. So size does not matter either.

Again. I don't see us "above" other animals, except perhaps in destructive ability. I'm not proud of that.

double post sorry

a reply to: Astrocyte

according the psychologists, many gays are gay because they were abused as children…

there was a 50% success rate at helping gays who wanted to turn straight, do so…

the basics about homosexuality appear to be suppressed by those who like being gay…

youtube: HOMOSEXUALITY_101
youtu.be...
2011 NARTH Conference Dr. Nicholas Cummings
youtu.be...

a reply to: Noinden

we are above other animals because we are the only sentient beings who can interface fully with both spiritual and physical realms… this is the "vitruvian man" message: the circle is the spiritual and square is the physical…

this can also be seen in how we use intellect and then create… animals can be influenced by the supernatural, but they are not seeking out the supernatural in an organized sense, like a seance or church…

reading history, you can easily see that the supernatural has influenced nearly every major historical figure and scientific advance...

a reply to: mouthfullofkefirgrains

Are you 100% sure about that, or is this just a human bias? The more we study animals, the more we find out that they are not that different from us, or more correctly we are not that much better than them.

a reply to: Noinden

homosexuality does not exist in the animal kingdom… aberrant or convenient homosexual activity maybe, but the idea that the animal is a female trapped in a male body or that there is even a lifestyle of strictly being gay does not exist for animals…

and anyway, there are a lot of things animals do that we mightn't want to emulate, like eating feces, eating decaying animals, incest, killing of young, etc...

a reply to: Noinden

study shamanism, for example… look at how much effort and design goes into the practice of accessing the supernatural…

they are seeking power and knowledge… and it can be very dangerous…

often they are raised from a young age to enhance abilities…

animals are just not capable of the heights of comprehension and intellect we are… most of that is our projection on them…

not saying we are better than animals morally, just designed to be the apex of the creation...

a reply to: mouthfullofkefirgrains

Oh it does not exist in the animal kingdomw eh? "o species has been found in which homosexual behaviour has not been shown to exist, with the exception of species that never have sex at all, such as sea urchins and aphis"

You are wrong.

Next

EDIT

You don't understand homosexuality by your comments. You are confusing transgenderism with homosexulaity. Guess what that also happens in the animal kingdom.