tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post113901912790905024..comments2024-03-28T21:56:51.675-04:00Comments on Face to Face: Politically incorrect fashion III: Gaynessagnostichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12967177967469961883noreply@blogger.comBlogger13125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1140114185131815452006-02-16T13:23:00.000-05:002006-02-16T13:23:00.000-05:00(1) I believe that there are many genes which lead...(1) I believe that there are many genes which lead to a PREDISPOSITION to homosexuality. Having some of these genes confers benefits such as higher IQ and higher creativity, but having too many leads to homosexuality, which is why gays remain a small "evolutionary stable" percent of the population but don't disappear.<BR/><BR/>(2) My theory is that sex hormones in general stunt the mathematcial and spacial development of the brain. Boys and girls do equally well in math until puberty which girls reach first.<BR/><BR/>As you pointed out, the guys who do well in math and art are not the masculine guys but the nerdy ones who have less testosterone or are late in maturing.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139607636677164452006-02-10T16:40:00.000-05:002006-02-10T16:40:00.000-05:00If you look at the big picture, considering old s...If you look at the big picture, considering old syndromes that are common and materially reduce fitness, damn few are side effects of a variant behavioral strategy - like none. <BR/>No such thing has ever been found -so naturally, it's the default explanation for homosexuality. <BR/>Go figure. <BR/><BR/> Over time, if you had a gene variant that increased female fitness while decreasing male fitness, you would expect sex-limited expression to evolve. Admittedly this takes time. You'd also see a pattern of inheritance that does not actually exist. <BR/><BR/> Whathisname, Levay, found that a little nucleus in the hypothalamus was smaller in gay men: a different nucleus in the hypothalamus is zapped in narcolepsy. It's a possible way of changing some behaviors and leaving almost everything else intact.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139573345871736612006-02-10T07:09:00.000-05:002006-02-10T07:09:00.000-05:00Agnostic,Thanks for your reply.I'm probably out of...Agnostic,<BR/><BR/>Thanks for your reply.<BR/><BR/>I'm probably out of my depth, but if my understanding of the theoretical framework underlying the investigation of female fecundity is accurate, the idea is that we are really dealing with a specific and elevated type of female heterosexual orientation - a genetic predisposition toward "overloving men," as Hamer puts it - which is adaptive in its female lineage but occasionally and incidentally expressed as homosexuality when it is inherited in males. I'm not arguing in favor of such a mechanism, but if that's the working theory, wouldn't the problematic math with male dead ends be minimized? My sense is that it would be like a discretely sensitive genotype for mother-love that harmlessly, if infrequently, passes to boys who end up being more nurturing fathers.<BR/><BR/>Also, it may be worth emphasizing that "homosexually enabled straight men," in McKnight's speculation, are not themselves gay, but carriers of the gay polygene who exhibit a suite of sexually-selected temperamental traits that are valuable within a niche of the market. Homosexuality arises at the edges, with counter-selective social forces keeping its prevalence in check.<BR/><BR/>Again, I'm not disposed to dismiss Cochran's hypothesis; I just wish he took more care in addressing the theories that aren't centered on kin-selection. And I suppose I would find the germ noodlings more compelling if gayness was expressed as more of a specific or narrowly-fixated neurological quirk - like narcolepsy - without so much temperamentally distinctive baggage associated, but as my thoughts turn to schizophrenia I realize that's probably an irrational expectation.Chiphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03411363107558366631noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139516398825916592006-02-09T15:19:00.000-05:002006-02-09T15:19:00.000-05:00Do lesbians emphasize social status or income? I'v...Do lesbians emphasize social status or income? I've heard otherwise, but I don't know. From what I've seen, they like status in the lesbian social scene.<BR/><BR/>Anyway, think about how to spend your time agnostic. Gays or Spanish girls.<BR/><BR/>I vote Spanish girlsAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139507131140362852006-02-09T12:45:00.000-05:002006-02-09T12:45:00.000-05:00John: There is an effect of urban birth, but the s...John: There is an effect of urban birth, but the source the gay kid got it from probably was contacted by many other kids, yet only that one kid turned gay. Genetic susceptability; perhaps homosexuality requires a "coctail" of several microbes to be expressed; etc.<BR/><BR/>Chip: The Italian study you quote did show somewhat elevated fecundity for the sisters of gay men, but not nearly enough to make up for their gay brothers' genetic dead-ends. About gay men being more charming -- they're only so around people they don't want to have sex with. With men they want, they're way too masculine (forward, objectifying, etc.) for women's tastes (visit a gay club and see). They're better dancers & flirts b/c once a person's search image is set as a male, another program says: "IF search image = male, and GOAL = partnering up, THEN execute programs 1, 2, 3..." The programs a person runs when trying to get a male are flirting, dancing, etc. b/c guys are visual and want someone who suggests easy interest. Being a good flirt & dancer doesn't turn women on if you're not also well-to-do and tall, which is why straight men & lesbians run different programs when trying to court females (emphasize status, etc.).<BR/><BR/>Lindsey: See Cochran's PDF I linked in paragraph 4. It talks about how the bug probably affects the brain, & how homosexual sheep show a similar pattern. Identical twins (MZ) are exposed to pretty much the same hormones, so those could only account for a rarity of homosexual cases. Interestingly, MZ don't have to both show symptoms for a disease even if both are infected (Cochran mentions polio, where MZ show concordance only 36% of the time). There's a messy causal chain from contracting a bug up through showing symptoms; presumably there are many other factors involved.<BR/><BR/>TC: Male athletes who juice likely do lose some VS skills, though to what extent that affects their stats I couldn't say. Female juicers likely gain VS skills up until they reach the "feminine male" level, but if they go further (like body-builders) they likely lose much of their gains. Don't know about math, but VS helps visualize difficult word problems, so perhaps.agnostichttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12967177967469961883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139429861794159902006-02-08T15:17:00.000-05:002006-02-08T15:17:00.000-05:00Also, are gay men better at math?Also, are gay men better at math?tchttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10540495343231722385noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139429621149558022006-02-08T15:13:00.000-05:002006-02-08T15:13:00.000-05:00But that's not all, as VS skills peak at a testost...<I>But that's not all, as VS skills peak at a testosterone level somewhat below the male median (yet significantly above the female median).</I><BR/><BR/>So would we expect juicing male athletes to lose some VS (hitting a baseball?) while juicing female athletes would get better?tchttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10540495343231722385noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139353871087629472006-02-07T18:11:00.000-05:002006-02-07T18:11:00.000-05:00Lindsey,For a good overview of the science, check ...Lindsey,<BR/><BR/>For a good overview of the science, check out Michael Bailey's book, The Man Who Would Be Queen, the complete text of which is available free online at:<BR/><BR/>http://www.psych.northwestern.edu/psych/people/faculty/bailey/book.html<BR/><BR/>Bailey is a fun writer, and he's good at pointing out the special interpretive problems that arise where the study of homosexuality is concerned. For example, while there is indeed research showing a relationship between adult homosexuality and childhood abuse, assigning a causal role to the incidence of abuse is trickier than you might think; the possibility has to be taken into account that homosexually pre-disposed children are more easily identified and targeted by adult abusers.Chiphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03411363107558366631noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139290733980098572006-02-07T00:38:00.000-05:002006-02-07T00:38:00.000-05:00Well, I'm smart enough not to bet against Gregory ...Well, I'm smart enough not to bet against Gregory Cochran. And your off-the-cuff summary isn't bad. But the big flaw you point out might not sink McKnight's theory, which is framed, if I recall correctly, so that the charm factor emerges as a kind of counter strategy to the optimal mate-type, i.e., the ones boasting superior height, athletic ability, etc. By exhibiting peripherally female-valued traits such as social status, charm, and verbal intelligence, the "homosexually enabled heterosexual" gains enough of a niche in the mate market to maintain a marginal dynasty in the genetic stakes. Once such traits reach an equilibrium, and homozygously gay men become more conspicuous in the population, the marginal advantage becomes devalued so that the classically favored pure heterosexual types regain favor, and the social-genetic mechanisms maintaining a fluctuating balance play out anew. I am in no position to evaluate the plausibility of this theory, but McKnight -- who is highly critical of Wilson's ideas about kin selection -- is emphatic that the genetic math adds up.<BR/><BR/>Also, there is the whole business about Hamer's "overloving gene," which might favor higher rates of fecundity in women and be passed from mothers to sons where its homosexual expression is but a noisy genetic dead-end. Some evidence in support of this idea may be found in a recent study claiming to show that women with more maternally-linked homosexual relatives tend to have siginificantly more children than women in the maternal line of heterosexuals (see Camperio-Ciani A, Corna F, Capiluppi C. Evidence for maternally inherited factors favouring male homosexuality and promoting female fecundity. Proc R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2004 271:2217-21).<BR/><BR/>I don't mean -- and am not qualified -- to argue that either of these ideas is more likely to prevail than germ theory. Rather, I would suggest that they are more worthy of consideration than Wilson's nostrum about gay uncles, which was an interesting first shot, but empirically doomed. (My difference-splitting hunch, for what its worth, is that when and if the etiological mysteries are solved, it will turn out that different types of homosexuality yield to different causes.)<BR/><BR/>On a related note, isn't it interesting that while PC orthodoxy on this subject reflexively favors the view that homosexuality is innate, very few intellectuals seem interested in exploring how such a genetically puzzling predisposition might have come to be? It's fun to contrast with the perennial "controversies" over sex differences, where the evidence is robust and the PC default position is reversed.Chiphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03411363107558366631noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139249061714371582006-02-06T13:04:00.000-05:002006-02-06T13:04:00.000-05:00Chip, here is how I'd make the argument. Some as...Chip, here is how I'd make the argument.<BR/><BR/> Some aspects of gay male personality are different from straight men in ways that women like: gay men are emotionally expressive, like to dance, are concerned with their appearance, and if we believe some studies have larger penises than straight men. You can probably think of others.<BR/><BR/> I think it isn't that gay men are a side effect of an adaptation to being better cads, but a side effect of an adaptation to being better cads. It might go a way to explain why people used to think that boys became homosexuals because dad left mom. Dad left mom because he and his big weiner were out womanizing.<BR/><BR/> I'll put my probably dumb bet that 25% chance of being genetic, 75% of being very specific brain damage. I won't discount my just so story without studies showing that the straight brothers of gay men don't have more premarital sex partners and more affairs after marriage.<BR/><BR/> The big flaw is that the traits women most like in short term relationships, height and athletic ability, seem lower in gay men.<BR/><BR/>Is this pretty much what McKnight said?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139231424433564152006-02-06T08:10:00.000-05:002006-02-06T08:10:00.000-05:00I'm really enjoying this series.Any thoughts on th...I'm really enjoying this series.<BR/><BR/>Any thoughts on the theory outlined in Jim McKnight's "Straight Science" that homosexuality might have evolved as a frequency-dependent balance polymorphism, with "homosexually enabled straight men" (charmers) enjoying a marginal fitness advantage so that exclusively gay men get a genetic free ride? If you're interested, a good summary of McKnight's thinking can be found on page 103 of the Routledge paperback.Chiphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03411363107558366631noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139220098791657352006-02-06T05:01:00.000-05:002006-02-06T05:01:00.000-05:00If a gay pathogen could exist most easily among a ...If a gay pathogen could exist most easily among a population with the highest percentage of explorers, who were gaining new ground; then perhaps cartographic art would be expected to be one of the more gay-influenced genres. Actually, though, this genre seems to be one of the most masculine and heterosexual of arts and their genres, along with architecture. Gay influence appears to be associated with the largest cities, which fits with transmission efficiency.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-1139219257889364992006-02-06T04:47:00.000-05:002006-02-06T04:47:00.000-05:00That is fascinating; especially the aspect in whic...That is fascinating; especially the aspect in which high-VS is said to be optimized with somewhat feminized males. Possibly maximal VS is a gatherer ability. Hunters and scouts in strange terrain are sometimes most superior who can remember their way back. This may involve the imaginative rotation that is called central to VS ability. If I'm in such a situation, I would remember to keep looking back, so as to know what the place looks like from the opposite approach.<BR/> In terms of gay pathogen parasite manipulation, very high fitness costs to hosts imply very high efficiency of horizontal transmission. One host would have to infect others, who were then pushed towards maximizing transmission. <BR/>Wouldn't this generate epidemics, and variable prevalences locally? Why should it stabilize, at a level that would prevent a culturally or genetically less susceptible group from invading the area of another?<BR/> Tolerance of homosexuality appears to be higher in groups which have been expanding their land occupation most rapidly long term. Populations associated with mining and seafaring, may have more tolerance of homosexuality, as if they could've better afforded<BR/> the fitness cost.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com