The Gay Animal Kingdom: a challenge to Darwinian theory of sexual selection

[Huckleman2000]

Came across this article in Seed Magazine about the work of a Stanford professor who wrote a book (Evolution's Rainbow) cataloging sexual behaviors in vertebrates. This includes documentation of homosexual activities in over 450 species. This abundance of non-reproductive sexual behavior led her to question the theory of sexual selection - that traits that weren't explained by natural selection were explained as part of sexual attraction. for example, the peacock's extravagant tail attracts females, and so is selected as an evolutionary trait even though it isn't an environmental adaptation. Within this theoretical framework, homosexuality is an anomaly, since it doesn't lead to reproduction.

What she postulates from her work is that homosexual behaviors are actually selected for in species that have higher degrees of social behavior. Shared homosexual experiences in many species reinforce social bonds and maintain social stability.

One implication is that individuals would have to select for group traits, not the individual "best genes I can find" idea that predominates Western cultural stereotypes.

That's a REALLY brief summation of a far more interesting article.

 

[Safe_Bet]

So what are you saying... that you'd still be dragging your knuckles on the ground if I wasn't queer? How cool is that!!!

 

[Dragonlipz]

So what are you saying... that you'd still be dragging your knuckles on the ground if I wasn't queer? How cool is that!!!

I LIKE draggin' my knuckles on the ground, thank you very much!

 

[amicus]

Thanks Huck, I was looking for something interesting and amusing to read and that filled the bill admirably.

Written by a person who lived as a man for the first 52 years and then a woman in later life...talk about compensation, oh, my!

You will almost (?)never find animals or primates that are exclusively gay.

No shit, Dick Tracy, reproduction, continuation of species becomes a bit problematical, eh? (insert laughter here)

Other biologists think Roughgarden is exaggerating the importance of homosexuality. Invertebrate zoologist Stephen Shuster told Nature that Roughgarden “throws out a very healthy baby with some slightly soiled bathwater.” And biologist Alison Jolly, in an otherwise positive review of Evolution’s Rainbow for Science, conceded that Roughgarden ultimately fails in her ambition to “revolutionize current biological theories of sexual selection.” As far as these mainstream biologists are concerned, Roughgarden’s gay primates and transgendered fish are simply interesting sexual deviants, statistical outliers in a world that contains plenty of peacocks. As Paul Z. Myers, a biologist at the University of Minnesota, put it, “I think much of what Roughgarden says is very interesting. But I think she discounts many of the modifications that have been made to sexual selection since Darwin originally proposed it. So in that sense, her Darwin is a straw man. You don’t have to dismiss the modern version of sexual selection in order to explain social bonding or homosexuality.”

This style of psuedo or 'pop' science, as practiced also by the Global Warming Junk Scientists, also to justify an agenda, is really giving all of science a bad name.

But, as I said, amusing and worth a chuckle or two...

Amicus

 

[Epmd607]

Came across this article in Seed Magazine about the work of a Stanford professor who wrote a book (Evolution's Rainbow) cataloging sexual behaviors in vertebrates. This includes documentation of homosexual activities in over 450 species. This abundance of non-reproductive sexual behavior led her to question the theory of sexual selection - that traits that weren't explained by natural selection were explained as part of sexual attraction. for example, the peacock's extravagant tail attracts females, and so is selected as an evolutionary trait even though it isn't an environmental adaptation. Within this theoretical framework, homosexuality is an anomaly, since it doesn't lead to reproduction.

What she postulates from her work is that homosexual behaviors are actually selected for in species that have higher degrees of social behavior. Shared homosexual experiences in many species reinforce social bonds and maintain social stability.

One implication is that individuals would have to select for group traits, not the individual "best genes I can find" idea that predominates Western cultural stereotypes.

That's a REALLY brief summation of a far more interesting article.

The Bonobo(pygmy chimpanzee) uses their sexuality to soothe others of the same sex, their offspring, pretty much anyone in the community that's getting too excited they'll calm them down with a hand job. The homosexual pair bond is much rarer than shared homosexual experiences in the animal kingdom. You'd still group homosexual pair bonds as anomalous. There's really no reason yet to say that homosexuality is a trait selected for in any species, even humans.

When you read Greek literature it seems like every man has a lover. So with the weak logic most people use, you might say homosexuality is being selected against, is more infrequent now than it was 2000+ years ago.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Whatever you do to decrease your reproductive fitness increases the odds for your extinction. Homosexuality removes you from the game if THE GAME is getting your genes into the next generation.

E.O.Wilson and Richard Dawkins pretty much said this 40 years ago when they created sociobiology, but the idea is so hateful to gays and Usual Suspects that Wilson and Dawkins didnt get invited to many parties. And theyve spent the last 20 years trying to disguise their original assertions. They even changed the name to EVOLUTIONARY PSYCHOLOGY to fool the noobs.

Gays are Nature's SHMOOs, Al Capps fictional critters who made for great lumber, leather, dining, and axle grease. They worked well for filling pot-holes or pretty nearly anything.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Whatever you do to decrease your reproductive fitness increases the odds for your extinction. Homosexuality removes you from the game if THE GAME is getting your genes into the next generation.

E.O.Wilson and Richard Dawkins pretty much said this 40 years ago when they created sociobiology, but the idea is so hateful to gays and Usual Suspects that Wilson and Dawkins didnt get invited to many parties. And theyve spent the last 20 years trying to disguise their original assertions. They even changed the name to EVOLUTIONARY PSYCHOLOGY to fool the noobs.

Gays are Nature's SHMOOs, Al Capps fictional critters who made for great lumber, leather, dining, and axle grease. They worked well for filling pot-holes or pretty nearly anything.

It's not quite as simple as Wilson thought when it comes to social animals, animals who must live as a family &/or group or go extinct. There, survival of the group trumps survival of the individual, because if the group goes down, all the genes are lost, but if an individual has an "altruistic" gene, he might go down for the sake of the group, but he's saving the genes of his relatives.

In such a way, social animal colonies select for more socialized individuals and against selfishness.

In humans, cultural evolution is much more important than physical evolution when it comes to determining survival, so humans tend to value their group's cultural norms even above their own lives. That's why humans are willing to go to war, putting the survival of their group's values above the survival of their own genes.

If homosexuality contributes to social cohesion, then it should be selected for. Whether it does or not can be someone else's discussion

One place where homosexuality did influence cultural survival was in ancient Sparta, where men were encouraged to fight next to their lovers to make them more fierce and dedicated. It seems to have worked for the Spartans.

 

[Epmd607]

...

If homosexuality contributes to social cohesion, then it should be selected for. Whether it does or not can be someone else's discussion

One place where homosexuality did influence cultural survival was in ancient Sparta, where men were encouraged to fight next to their lovers to make them more fierce and dedicated. It seems to have worked for the Spartans.

Most mammals live in social groups, there aren't enough homosexual pair bonds to do the math on whether it's selected for. At face value there's no reason why homosexuality would be selected for in terms of social cohesion. Even where homosexual interaction is part of day to day life it still doesn't necessarily affect the majority of the population. The females of the group could just as easily perform the functions of the homosexual actors in the places we see a pattern of homosexual interaction. There's nothing wrong with being a biological anomaly, if it turns out homosexuality performs no function in terms of natural selection.

In the world of animals most social groups are made up of females. Collecting data on what constitutes female homosexual interaction would be even tougher. Most human females I've known are borderline homosexual if we go with the standard used for male animals in the animal world... It's not worth dealing with, whether homosexuality is part of evolution or not. Someone who's gay shouldn't need evolutionary proof to justify their sexual pref.

We have to get this straight, the Sacred Band was either a Theban or Macedonian fighting force. If anyone has a link to where Spartans or any other Greeks are organizing a unit according to who's screwing who, please post it. As far as I know the Spartans were anti-homosexual and made fun of the Athenians for sleeping with boys.

 

[penandpaper]

As has been pointed out to me many times, it is hard to infer about human behavior from that of others in the animal kingdom.

But, I think to deduce patterns is acceptable. (It is, after all, what our brains do. ) The problem with those patterns is animals are more apt to instinct. I've never seen a group of animals only fuck the same partner for 50 years. Sex is often violent. And they don't even use push-up bras to lure in a mate. Monsters, I tell you.

Then again, I've never wanted to fuck the same person for very long, had animalistic sex, and I do hate the falseness of push-up bras. Damn, I'm a monster.

 

[Huckleman2000]

[...]If homosexuality contributes to social cohesion, then it should be selected for. Whether it does or not can be someone else's discussion
[...]

Yes, and according to Roughgarden, “a ‘common genetic disease’ is a contradiction in terms, and homosexuality is three to four orders of magnitude more common than true genetic diseases such as Huntington’s disease.” Also, there is the well-documented correlation between bi- and homosexuality and birth-order. If females are living long enough to have many offspring, by implication they are in a stable social setting.

The article gives the example of Japanese macaques (bold added):

Japanese macaques, an old world primate, illustrate this principle perfectly. Macaque society revolves around females, who form intricate dominance hierarchies within a given group. Males are transient. To help maintain the necessary social networks, female macaques engage in rampant lesbianism. These friendly copulations, which can last up to four days, form the bedrock of macaque society, preventing unnecessary violence and aggression. Females that sleep together will even defend each other from the unwanted advances of male macaques. In fact, behavioral scientist Paul Vasey has found that females will choose to mate with another female, as opposed to a horny male, 92.5% of the time. While this lesbianism probably decreases reproductive success for macaques in the short term, in the long run it is clearly beneficial for the species, since it fosters social stability. “Same-sex sexuality is just another way of maintaining physical intimacy,” Roughgarden says. “It’s like grooming, except we have lots of pleasure neurons in our genitals. When animals exhibit homosexual behavior, they are just using their genitals for a socially significant purpose.”

 

[Stella_Omega]

It's very obvious that homosexual behavior does not contribute to a specie's extinction; we would be extinct by now if that were true.

Wilson wrote his theories of evobio based on his studies of ants and bees, for crissakes. Insect behaviors have nothing to do with mammal behaviors.

And Dawkins has spent the last twenty years backpeddling for his "selfish gene" theory, and apologising and claiming that people misread what he was trying to say-- which I do not believe for a moment, i think his phrasing was deliberately sensational.

A little learning is a dangerous thing.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

DOC

Bushido is ambivalent about homosexuality, encouraging samurai to service their comrades but not enjoy it.

Nobel Laureate Herbert A. Simon said altruists are stupid and docile. But I dont buy the claim that there are such things as altruists. I think there are simply lotsa stupid and docile people.

 

[Epmd607]

Yes, and according to Roughgarden, “a ‘common genetic disease’ is a contradiction in terms, and homosexuality is three to four orders of magnitude more common than true genetic diseases such as Huntington’s disease.” Also, there is the well-documented correlation between bi- and homosexuality and birth-order. If females are living long enough to have many offspring, by implication they are in a stable social setting.

The article gives the example of Japanese macaques (bold added):

Except Huntington's is a specific mutation on chromosome 4. There is no Gay Gene to point to.

I don't know how you can describe homosexual interaction in an animal population without being able to point to genetic material. Human beings label themselves homosexual, what's going on in macaque society isn't as easy to deal with. Most grooming in apes is an intimate, sensual exchange. It's a slippery slope trying to pin homosexuality in other animal groups. There are birds that pair bond for many seasons male to male and female to female. How do you define bird sex, bird intimacy...

 

[Stella_Omega]

jimmy, you may be pugnacious instead of docile, but you certainly exhibit all the stupidity any Nobel laureate could ever wish to see.

 

[Epmd607]

It's very obvious that homosexual behavior does not contribute to a specie's extinction; we would be extinct by now if that were true.

Wilson wrote his theories of evobio based on his studies of ants and bees, for crissakes. Insect behaviors have nothing to do with mammal behaviors.

And Dawkins has spent the last twenty years backpeddling for his "selfish gene" theory, and apologising and claiming that people misread what he was trying to say-- which I do not believe for a moment, i think his phrasing was deliberately sensational.

A little learning is a dangerous thing.

I think it's more of a question of "Does homosexuality have any part in Natural Selection?" The OP cites an article that seems to say it does. I don't see the evidence myself. I'd just go with homosexuality being a biological anomaly, not resembling a genetic disease even. I can't explain what it is, I don't think there are any good arguments describing the endemic group of homosexuals in any human population.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that insect behaviours have nothing to do with mammal behaviours. We do share genetics and common ancestors with insects. The ordering of an ant community isn't so far from any other community of creatures. It's just a matter of ants and bees are ordered in said communities by genetics and you get a continuum of proto culture with reptiles and birds until you get to mammals and the true culture of apes.

 

[Stella_Omega]

I think it's more of a question of "Does homosexuality have any part in Natural Selection?" The OP cites an article that seems to say it does. I don't see the evidence myself. I'd just go with homosexuality being a biological anomaly, not resembling a genetic disease even. I can't explain what it is, I don't think there are any good arguments describing the endemic group of homosexuals in any human population.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that insect behaviours have nothing to do with mammal behaviours. We do share genetics and common ancestors with insects. The ordering of an ant community isn't so far from any other community of creatures. It's just a matter of ants and bees are ordered in said communities by genetics and you get a continuum of proto culture with reptiles and birds until you get to mammals and the true culture of apes.

That was Wilson's argument, yes. The lay public loves bullshit like this. it makes everything seem so simple. And simple is in short supply these days.

DNA does not regulate behaviors. DNA regulates on and off switches in tiny bits of protein, making them be shaped in particular ways, or contract and expand in particular ways, under the influence of other bits of proteins, also controlled my the on and off switches of DNA. The aggregate of those proteins create physical bodies. Those bodies develop behaviors that let them survive long enough to make another copy of their body.

To say that the behaviors and needs of ants, who live in an environment that would be lethal to primates, has anything in common with the "culture of primates" is ludicrous. Culture is a process of innovation and disemination of new behaviors.

Ants don't have "culture." They have the most basic of reactive systems, that never changes except under strong environmental stimulus-- the kind that decimates a population, leaving only the tiny percentage behind that can survive.

 

[Handley_Page]

One place where homosexuality did influence cultural survival was in ancient Sparta, where men were encouraged to fight next to their lovers to make them more fierce and dedicated. It seems to have worked for the Spartans.

[ QUOTE: Epmd607]
We have to get this straight, the Sacred Band was either a Theban or Macedonian fighting force. If anyone has a link to where Spartans or any other Greeks are organizing a unit according to who's screwing who, please post it. As far as I know the Spartans were anti-homosexual and made fun of the Athenians for sleeping with boys.
[\QUOTE]

In the Sparta of King Leonidas (Thermopylae?), men were not permitted to marry until they reached a certain standard. Homosexuality was permitted in that it got a skilled warrior to train a younger one and being that close passed vital information all the time.
(I don't think I've expressed that right).

 

[Epmd607]

That was Wilson's argument, yes. The lay public loves bullshit like this. it makes everything seem so simple. And simple is in short supply these days.

DNA does not regulate behaviors. DNA regulates on and off switches in tiny bits of protein, making them be shaped in particular ways, or contract and expand in particular ways, under the influence of other bits of proteins, also controlled my the on and off switches of DNA. The aggregate of those proteins create physical bodies. Those bodies develop behaviors that let them survive long enough to make another copy of their body.

To say that the behaviors and needs of ants, who live in an environment that would be lethal to primates, has anything in common with the "culture of primates" is ludicrous. Culture is a process of innovation and disemination of new behaviors.

Ants don't have "culture." They have the most basic of reactive systems, that never changes except under strong environmental stimulus-- the kind that decimates a population, leaving only the tiny percentage behind that can survive.

Yet, your response was simplistic. Culture is the dissemination of old, useful sets of behaviors. There is very little innovation in culture, just like there is very little change in human genetics from generation to generation. Primate culture was selected for in our evolutionary history against the more reactive system of the monkeys we share a common ancestor with. Doesn't mean we've wiped instinct from our system. Genetics does regulate the behavior of ants and to lesser degrees, lizards, birds, and people.

Ant genetics and their 'reactive system' changes with environmental stimuli, same as the culture and genetics of people. Ice Age Culture is different than Bronze Age Culture, do to environmental difference. Saying ant behavior has nothing to do with primate behavior is the same as saying "Human beings have no innate responses to environmental stimuli(no instinctual response, no chemical change in our bodies such as adrenaline, no suckling infant out of the womb...)" Human generative grammar is actually mapped similarly to the chemical mapping of Ant society.

 

[Epmd607]

[ QUOTE: Epmd607]
We have to get this straight, the Sacred Band was either a Theban or Macedonian fighting force. If anyone has a link to where Spartans or any other Greeks are organizing a unit according to who's screwing who, please post it. As far as I know the Spartans were anti-homosexual and made fun of the Athenians for sleeping with boys.
[\QUOTE]

In the Sparta of King Leonidas (Thermopylae?), men were not permitted to marry until they reached a certain standard. Homosexuality was permitted in that it got a skilled warrior to train a younger one and being that close passed vital information all the time.
(I don't think I've expressed that right).

Spartan men were required to marry at age 30 as part of their civic duty. I guess pederasty was popular everywhere. Everyone needs a boy to love in the Ancient World. Mildly disturbing.

 

[TE999]

Ancient warriors such as Hoplites, Spartans, Leigonnaires, etc. in homosexual relationships had to be tightly disciplined so if their lovers were wounded or struck down they didn't break battle formation to rescue them. Sometimes discipline wasn't enough.

Animal behavior has only superficial bearing on human behavior. Animals have no concept of love or passion, only group socialization instincts and mating urges.

 

[Epmd607]

Ancient warriors such as Hoplites, Spartans, Leigonnaires, etc. in homosexual relationships had to be tightly disciplined so if their lovers were wounded or struck down they didn't break battle formation to rescue them. Sometimes discipline wasn't enough.

Animal behavior has only superficial bearing on human behavior. Animals have no concept of love or passion, only group socialization instincts and mating urges.

Human beings are animals, therefore there's no reason to make a special distinction between man the animal and chimp the animal, as opposed to chimp the animal and tree shrew the animal. It has been conceded that other primates most likely have culture, and primates do in fact have a concept of love, hate, sadness. Jane Goodall, anyone who works with gorillas or apes will tell you they have feelings very similar to people.

People have group socialization instincts and mating urges, I can't imagine someone saying we don't. It's just a matter of how does genetics meet culture and how in turn does our high level of culture affect selection for our species. I don't think homosexuality is selected for or against in our species.

 

[Huckleman2000]

Yet, your response was simplistic. Culture is the dissemination of old, useful sets of behaviors. There is very little innovation in culture, just like there is very little change in human genetics from generation to generation. Primate culture was selected for in our evolutionary history against the more reactive system of the monkeys we share a common ancestor with. Doesn't mean we've wiped instinct from our system. Genetics does regulate the behavior of ants and to lesser degrees, lizards, birds, and people.[...]

But that's the idea: Culture becomes a driver of natural selection. I think Stella has made that point in other threads. Primates (and other vertebrates) select mates for cultural values that enhance their species' survivability. So, cooperation becomes valued over aggression as societal structure becomes more complex. Insofar as same-sex sexual behavior reinforces social bonds, same-sex sexual behavior can be a trait (combination of traits) that becomes selected and passed down.

 

[Stella_Omega]

Human beings are animals, therefore there's no reason to make a special distinction between man the animal and chimp the animal, as opposed to chimp the animal and tree shrew the animal. It has been conceded that other primates most likely have culture, and primates do in fact have a concept of love, hate, sadness. Jane Goodall, anyone who works with gorillas or apes will tell you they have feelings very similar to people.

People have group socialization instincts and mating urges, I can't imagine someone saying we don't. It's just a matter of how does genetics meet culture and how in turn does our high level of culture affect selection for our species. I don't think homosexuality is selected for or against in our species.

Well, we, somehow or another, managed to develop sentience-- via the random mutations of little folded bits of proteins that influence each other in so many myraids of ways that nothing can be traced back to any particular gene.

Along with sentience, we developed this new way of responding to our environment(S); instead of genetically changing those protiens to make ourselves more tolerant to cold-- we took other animals' skins and wrapped them around ourselves. And, to get cool, we took those skins off. At that point, we stopped evolving in response to environment.

And dude, that was more than fifty thousand years ago.

This is a very long time. Species have evolved and died off in less time than that. IF humans have evolved further, in response to our non-nature-based, man-made cultural environment-- it would be towards better responses to culture, and less and less instinctive. Instincts don't work well for us. Male humans, for instance, cannot go into territorial rages just because they've scented each other's pheremones. Female humans don't advertise estrus. We have other things to do besides get knocked up by you assholes.

Humans are not governed by the biological imperative to produce offspring. really, not. We are governed by what Goldschmidt et all have called the "career imperative;" the desire to do well by whatever cultural norms show a human to have done well.

If you are a subsect of the LDS, that might mean being part of a polygamous marriage with tons of kids. if you are living in urban cities, it might mean having one, perfect child. If you are Yves Saint Laurent (for an example), progeny would have less than nothing to do with what drives you forward, or how you would rate your satisfaction with your life.

 

[Epmd607]

...
IF humans have evolved further, in response to our non-nature-based, man-made cultural environment-- it would be towards better responses to culture, and less and less instinctive. Instincts don't work well for us...

Humans are not governed by the biological imperative to produce offspring. really, not. We are governed by what Goldschmidt et all have called the "career imperative;" the desire to do well by whatever cultural norms show a human to have done well...

Humans won't and haven't ceased to evolve do to high level culture. Just the difference in lung and body structure of an Andean Indian compared to a Masai warrior tells us people haven't ceased to evolve in the last 10,000 years. Complex culture existed before Sapiens-Sapiens, before we evolved into modern humans, Erectus through Cro-Magnon Man had most of the same cultural characteristics we have today.

Culture is just another adaption to the biological imperative to produce offspring. If your society is ordered by chemicals/instinct or by the ownership of land and suburban block parties -- it's just a different way of ordering reproduction. Human beings have become less and less instinctive, but so have other apes. It's still important in recognizing the selective pressures do to the relationship of genetics, environment and culture.

The asexual feels no urge to reproduce the species. Around the time of spermarche, boys feel the chemical change and urge to reproduce. How culture deals with those boys and redirects their energies isn't much different than how an adolescent male elephant is dealt with in Africa. They're usually marginalized, not only by a stronger Bull, but by the ordering of elephant society. Just because you feel the urge to mount something doesn't mean you will be able to. Aggression isn't the only reaction in the animal kingdom in terms of ordering reproduction in a population. Penguins aren't exactly aggressive toward each other when they're looking for partners.

 

[Epmd607]

But that's the idea: Culture becomes a driver of natural selection. I think Stella has made that point in other threads. Primates (and other vertebrates) select mates for cultural values that enhance their species' survivability. So, cooperation becomes valued over aggression as societal structure becomes more complex. Insofar as same-sex sexual behavior reinforces social bonds, same-sex sexual behavior can be a trait (combination of traits) that becomes selected and passed down.

Culture doesn't become the primary driver of Selection in humans. Environment will always be the primary driver of any change in group genetics. Cooperation is selected for, I agree. I just don't see any good data that says homosexual relations in a group makes for a better group dynamic. I think it's fanciful. Alliance and Friendship in humans would have to have its root in homosexual proto-human alliances to be something that was selected for. You have to remember our primate cousins evolved along side us, not before us.