Homosexuality and Natural Selection.

You know damn all about biology don't you NJ?Worker bees are not male. That is the whole point. Workers are diploid females the male drones are only haploid. Drones develop from unfertilised eggs and because they are haploid there is no variability in their genetic contribution to offspring. Consequently worker bees are likely to be much more genetically related than offspring of two diploid parents.You haven't just failed to understand the argument RAZD presented about bees you have fundamentally misunderstood one of the most basic elements of bee biology.TTFN,WK

(*blink!*)
You did not just say that, did you?TTFN,WK

That this is what happens is an assumption. There is no reason to believe that the two are inextricably linked. Many lesbian couples choose to have baby's using donated sperm. They obviously still want to have and raise children despite not wishing to copulate with a man. Surely if a gay woman wanted a child enough she could force herself to actually have sex with a man, the desire for procreation may overide the lack of sexual desire or indeed distaste for that act.You would really need to show that the lack of desire was sufficient to render the individual essentially sterile, which would be pretty tricky. To counter this there are vast numbers of people who are gay that have at one time had heterosexual relationships and had children through those relationships. Which is strange given the many ways of getting around it that have been provided to you in detail. Again with the assumption that not wanting to have sex with the opposite sex means you don't want to pass, or are incapable of passing, on your genes. And again!! The desire to have heterosexual sex is not neccessarily the same as the desire to procreate/pass on your genes. Because there are two conflicting desires, and in such a case we frequently balance the strength of conflicting desires and one will win out. In some cases the dislike for heterosexual procreation may win out, although this is much less of an issue nowadays due to advances in reproductive technologies, but in a number the desire for procreation will win out. Only in the sense that there are some artificial technologies used in some cases not in that it is someway going against nature. You have already been given a number of varyingly plausible explanations. I would tend to favour the one supported by some recent italian work suggesting that male homosexuality may be linked to genes which increase female fecundity. Its good that you can speak for 'most evo's' like that, its a shame it is such complete horseshit however. That is the only measure of evolutionary fitness it has nothing to do with 'the measure of life' whatever the hell that is. No it isn't, but you just keep slinging those ad homs in there.TTFN,WK

Eh? You just totally mixed up completely different suggestions. The idea that homosexuality is some sort of Malthusian safety valve came from a position espoused by some people the author of the OP knew, not from any scientific source, it has nothing to do with the fecundity hypothesis for which there is a growing body of research.you can't argue against a theory with some scientific evidence just on the basis of the ideas of some random people, or rather you can but it is a rubbish argument as is describing as ad hoc a hypothesis which has solid research to back it up, just look up some papers on pubmed. The recent Camperio-ciani paper was previously mentioned and the work of Blanchard is also particularly relevant. Together or individually? all sexual animals copulate, in one way or another, for purposes of procreation. A number of animals also appear to copulate for pleasure heterosexually, homosexually, with arms, etc... A very good question, at the moment there has been very little research on women. I don't know why that is the case but it is. I certainly see no reason why we should expect to find the same genetic basis, to the extent that there is one, for both male and female homosexuality. Well nature certainly can produce changes in alleles. The fact that a specific locus or loci has not been identified is since this research is at an early stage. Also if it is a maternal effect of female fecundity, i.e. an acculmulation of some sort of anti adrogenic antibody, then the homosexual themselves may not actually be a carrier of the relevant allele/s. What is the meaning of life may or may not be too broad but it isn't a question I can answer. Is the universe meaningless? I don't know. Can any real meaning be found in life? Yes certainly but it takes an effort of will to find it and it is likely to be very different for different people. So while it is possible to find meaning in life I don't think there is only one true meaning in life which applies to everyone. This is totally different form what you previously said. Not being concerned with spirituality is not the same as saying people are nothing but sperm receptacles. And if it isn't all we get is teh addition of good fairies, tyrant gods and invisible pink unicorns, big whoop.TTFN,WK

Well it does in terms of population genetics. An allele which increases female fecundity is likely to produce a more productive lineage and therefore propagate more than one producing less fecund females. If that allele happens to produce, either directly or indirectly, homosexuality in a proportion of the male offspring of that lineage then that will impact the fitness benefit of that allele, but not neccessarily to a degree which overides the benefit accrued in the female line.While you may argue that an individual homosexual male who chooses not to procreate because of his sexual preferences is individually weaker in terms of fitness, in genetic terms the allele can still confer a net fitness advantage to its carriers in general which should be seen in its maintenance or spread through a population. Unfortunately without actually having a specific gene or locus this is still very speculative, but it is an explanation. The fitness benefit does not need to accrue to every individual carrying it in order for the gene to be positively selected. Tha doesn't make the people who write it stale and clinical in their approach to humanity any more than writing in french would make me french. I would but I have to attend the cremation of a friend's pookah.TTFN,WKEdited by Wounded King, : Correctd some typos

There have been a number of Twin studies consistent with a biological, if not a genetic, basis for male Homosexuality. Only one seems to explicity look at twins raised in different environments. One important point to bear in mind with the Camperio-Ciani et al. study previously cited (2004) is that in many ways the female fecundity hypothesis in concert with the observation that more older male siblings increases the likelihood of a child being homosexual suggests that homesexuality is partly an epiphenomenon of the increased female fecundity rather than the result of any gene causing homosexuality in the actual bearer.TTFN,WKEdited by Wounded King, : No reason given.

Maybe you should read some of this thread Martin, it directly addresses this very issue.In summary the crux of the issue is Dawkins statement "If a homosexuality gene lowers its own probability of being reproduced today".This could only be a problem for evolution is it was actually shown that whatever gene/genes influence homosexuality do in fact lower its probability of being reproduced, and not just in homosexuals.TTFN,WK

I'm not sure that you mean generation. I am not a different generation from my older brother. Perhaps with each subsequent offspring or each subsequent pregnancy with a male child. This need not be the case if the selective forces are acting on traits which increase the number of offspring a female has, that would seem to naturally lend itself to such a trait being propagated. If the maternal effect is a factor in determining sexuality then there is good reason to think that the genes involved will be passed on in line with normal genetic principles. It wouldn't mean that a male carrier, gay or straight, would have a gay son, but it might lead to him having gay grandsons if the trait presents itself in his female children.TTFN,WK

Before they show up with the particular effect of increasing the likelihood of gay male offspring, but not perhaps of producing the effect of increased female fecundity.TTFN,WK

Do you just not know what 'sexual selection' means or just not know what the hell you're talking about?I know there are a lot of people on this board who are keen to emphasise the role of sexual selection in evolution but I very much doubt you would find even the most hardcore of them saying that it is what the 'entire theory of evolution' is based on.Its this sort of plainly wrong attempts at 'science' that make people think that you don't realy care a whit for arguing from science Nem. You've been making the same stupid assertions about what gya people can and can't do or want and don't want this entire thread and they have been rebutted ad nauseum.TTFN,WK

Sex doesn't fix a mutation. Sex isn't any type of selection. You have quite clearly demonstrated that you have no idea what 'Sexual Selection' actually means. Your ability to write in coherent English appears to have collapsed. I agree that the weakness you claim to find in the arguments is specious. You have not made one single effort to actually rebut them however you just keep restating your narrow minded initial assumptions over and over again. Because there is no evidence, only your hollow assertions.TTFN,WK

Your posts don't seem to suggest you want to actually discuss the topic at all. You seem to want to limit discussion of the topic on the grounds that you think discussing it at all is somehow demeaning to homosexuals.If your only contribution to a discussion is saying we shouldn't discuss it at all then can you see why Admin doesn't consider that a productive contribution. If you want to object to the topic ever having been promoted then that is a topic suitable to a thread about topic promotions or moderation, but not to this thread itself.When you say "There is no need for a scientific analysis of normal." You seem to be saying we should all be happy to settle for ignorance and no one should do science at all. We can't understand disease or dysfunctions of a system if we don't understand how it operates normally. So should we not have any medical science because it relies on a scientific analysis of 'normal'? And if we consider homosexuality to be encompassed in 'normal', as I do, then don't we need to understand that as well so that we don't label it as some sort of disorder or abberance, as has unfortunately been the case so often historically and still is in too many places. Your mistaking of mutation as some sort of perjorative term seems to be leading you to ascribe a whole lot of motives to people here that they just don't have.TTFN,WK

It makes as much sense as it ever did, which means it is simplistic and facile.You give the impression that you simply haven't read, or at least not understood, any of the responding arguments. All you are doing is restating the same empty argument you have been making right from the start of this thread.TTFN,WK

I don't think that would be hard to argue at all. We now have a much more controlled environment in the western world today than at any time in previous history. Modern medical advances have made our infant mortality rates dramatically lower than those of the previous century.The trade off between R, high fecundity, and K, lower fecundity higher parental investment, strategies can be seen all the way through the organismal spectrum even in a highly K species such as humans. In situations were environmental factors have a large detrimental effect on infant mortality rates an R type strategy can be more advantageous, especially in an agrarian setting where from early adolescence, or possibly before, a child can be a productive member of a family aiding the communal effort for survival rather than being the drain on parental resources that children are so often viewed as in our urban oriented modern world.These sorts of changes have progressed radically in the western world in the last couple of centuries. It is certainly reasonable to frame evolutionary explanations of a phenomenon in terms of the conditions which have prevailed more extensively.Humans are a K type species, but there are certainly a number of environmental conditions where a more R like high fecundity strategy could be advantageous.TTFN,WK Edited by Wounded King, : Because I don't bother to proof read any of my posts and consequently write stupid things.

I got the types mixed up in the last paragraph. I'll just go back and correct that using the wonders of time travel.TTFN,WK