Knowing several nurses who work in maternity I can tell you that they rarely if ever see these births. If you have the source study I'd love to see their conclusions and testing methods.
Oh and do you have a link where you saw this from? I've only found this article on www.ntac.org. And I would consider this a slightly biased source on this topic.
Just to let you know I didn't forget about you, but I'm looking for a better primary resource on the statistics. I did find that initial figure on the ntac site and your right that it might be suspected of being biased. Trying to track down the original WNT-4 article.
Also, Any idea on how many babies pass through a maternity ward a year?
As your brother will likely tell you, equating homosexuality with beastiality is a lame argument. Their is good evidence (and reason) to suggest that sexual attraction for one's own species is hardwired into our brains, but there is no evidence, AFAIK, that attraction to another species is. A common red herring argument for theists is to equate homosexuality with beastiality, pedophilia, and other demonstrably unhealthy practices. [/B]
Well, I certainly did not mean it this way. Maybe the misunderstanding comes from the fact that over here, beastiality is perfectly legal, so it does not server as a derogeratory argument that well.
But you are possibly right, I retract the argument. Let's stick to humans
This is slippery terrain. To argue based on evolution is always dangerous, since the effects of evolution cannot be predicted. It is easy to see in hindsight, that a larger brain allows you to create a civilization which in turn allows you to happily overpopulate the planet. It would have taken a genius to predict this outcome some 200.000 years back.
Perhaps if evolution were a true theory instead of just some observations this would be less troublesome.
As you have mentioned you don't really know who is going to produce more until well, it has happened. However what we have now are societal laws attempting to control what should happen naturally. The unfit child of a very rich man might live with an undesirable trait while the fit child of the poor man does not. Likewise the poor often have many more children than the rich and are still increasing in population quickly. Meanwhile Europe, Japan and other countries are literally letting themselves vanish due to lack of reproduction.
Perhaps when you have only 150 million very wealthy people in Europe attempting to hold off a few billion less wealthy people a little genetic determinism will once again come into play.
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I'd very strongly disagree with the assumption in the first place. Building computers and space ships is not genetically determined, the same goes for democracy. So, fundamental aspects of our life like civilization, speech, human rights are not encoded in our genes, but are human achievements.
I would say it is indeed genetically determined. Just as speech is a genetic attribute so are the societal inventions that come about as a result of it.
Please understand that I am taking a very different view, intentionally, as to what is "right" here. Societal inventions, and human rights are seen as achievements in our Western view. However nature does not subscribe to a particular view. If by sheer population Western culture, and it's accomplishments were overthrown, tossed away, discarded etc, in genetic terms it would not have been an accomplishment.
Please understand that while I do not sympathize with terrorists this is some of the thinking behind how western culture is seeking to "destroy" Islamic culture. You give women rights, they stop having so many children. Then your culture and people die. It is simplistic but it doesn't subscribe to the same values or concepts of "winning" to which we subscribe. In their view if our women are wearing g-strings, having sex and getting abortions they are indeed liberated. They have their 1.3 children and have as many rights as possible. In Islamic culture that woman might be imprisoned (in Western views), uneducated, allowed only to have children and determine her worth via giving birth to as many children as possible. She will have her 9 or so children.
In our view we are right. However in evolution's view who might be right? We believe modern trapping allow us to escape genetic determinism. We could be absolutely wrong on this. Our freedoms, liberties and rights could be plunged into oblivion with the bets we are placing today. It would be nice if our rights allowed us to give freedom and wealth to two hundred million people while billions live in poverty. However even with technology that genetic determinism might come home to roost via sheer numbers in say a war, strength of an economy, etc.
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Moralists of all time have tried to find an axiomatic basis for human rights, laws, ethics and morals, and have either turned to religion (the word of god needs no reasons) or to nature (nature just is as it is, it is justified by existance). I am not sure why it should be necessary or relevant to base decisions of a modern society on biological traits that have evolved hundreds of thousands of years ago.
It is not hard to see that someone who cheats and kills whenever he believes to get away with it is more true to our nature (since cheating can give you a genetic advantage over your victim) than someone who believes in values and has some self-restraint. However, I can hardly see why we would be better off in a dog eats dog world.
You might be correct that we have indeed escaped the trappings of evolution and nature. However the penalties if we are wrong are pretty several. The nonfittest do not survive. Perhaps we don't believe it is any longer a dog eat dog world. I just hope the other dog agrees as well.
But with respect to those born with ambiguous gender and corrected surgically to one sex are you prepared to say definatively that their sexual engagment with the "same" sex is, itself, a sinful act?
I'm not quite sure what you mean. It strikes me more as a "do you lie to the killer about the guy in the closet" type of question.
If humans incorrectly determined the gender of a patient whacked something off. How is that loving the same gender? It would be like saying I am homosexual if I screwed my wife while wearing a dress. If their true gender is something other than what the doctors determined, and they love the opposite gender of what they are. I would still call that heterosexuality and non-sinful.
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I do not suggest that it necessarily denotes ambiguous sexualtiy (although in some cases it might). For those that believe the physical sexual characteristics dictate the "proper" (biblically speaking- always heterosexual) orientation they must accept that they cannot make such judgements with respect to those born with ambiguous gender.
It would seem to me that you are not comparing representative samples. You seem to be using basically medical malpractice to attempt to justify homosexual rights. I think it would be much easier to just discuss homosexual rights rather than argue that a small sample of misattributed resolutions of ambigious gender should justify a societal outcome.
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Certainly people can make choices that go against their "nature." And even after a theist begrudgingly accepts the idea that homosexuality may be inborn, many will suggest that it is no different from any other affliction which God wishes us to struggle against. But, if you inerpret gender with emphasis on the mental rather than the physical then this argument melts away. Homosexuals become morally equivalent (with respect to a biblical interpretation) to the infertile, the disabled, or those with ambiguous gender.
Actually I think most homosexuals would find being associated with a disability or a misdiagnosed medical case to be insulting. They don't want the question of what is gender twisted until it has an unreliable outcome. They wish to be accepted for who they are and what they do.
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I don't know if this qualifies as an "evolutionary" argument, but the existence of love and compassion and the self-evident realities of society (killing is bad, golden rule, etc) necessitate the same priorities. Whether the source of love and compassion and social concern as mental qualities arose by divine plan or through the simple evolutionary pressure to ensure the survival of our young, our tribe, and ourselves makes no difference.
Actually infanticide, polygamy and other values that we consider not so self evident have existed quite easily throughout the ages. Our social concerns and values are fixtures of our times. If our wealth left us who knows how quickly the rights would follow. As they say, desperate times call for desperate measures. We are not desperate so we do not know. However I have no doubt about the true nature of most people when given limited resources. Their self preservation would likely trample over the rights of just about anyone and everyone.
Thanks for addressing my questions a bit though. Likewise thanks for reading my conclusions as a whole and not quickly mischaraterizing them into something you wish to argue against. It is a refreshing change for this forum.
I'm also limited in the number of gay people I know, but I'd have to wonder about the theory that most homosexuals have/want children. Rosie O'Donnell and Melissa Etheridge excepted, but those are the only two examples I can think of.
Homosexuality has to be genetic. Humans wouldn't have lasted this long on earth without a biological urge to keep reproducing offspring. Gay people (specifically the ones who don't want to have sex with someone of the opposite sex even for the sake of conceiving a child) either don't get that urge because of some genetic difference, or they suppress it.
I'm not saying it's not possible for someone who has no interest in heterosexual sex to want to raise children, but it can't be that common.
I'm also limited in the number of gay people I know, but I'd have to wonder about the theory that most homosexuals have/want children. Rosie O'Donnell and Melissa Etheridge excepted, but those are the only two examples I can think of.
Homosexuality has to be genetic. Humans wouldn't have lasted this long on earth without a biological urge to keep reproducing offspring. Gay people (specifically the ones who don't want to have sex with someone of the opposite sex even for the sake of conceiving a child) either don't get that urge because of some genetic difference, or they suppress it.
I'm not saying it's not possible for someone who has no interest in heterosexual sex to want to raise children, but it can't be that common.
I'm gay. About half my friends are gay. All of us are, through no choice of our own, solely sexually attracted to members of our own sex. All of us, with maybe one or two exceptions, want to have children. Just because one is homosexual doesn't mean one doesn't have the most basic human impulse, the desire to reproduce.
Actually I think most homosexuals would find being associated with a disability or a misdiagnosed medical case to be insulting.
I'll pipe up and say I find the entire line of thought horribly offensive. I am not impaired, disabled or deformed in anyway. Homosexuality is not a disease, physical, mental or otherwise.
And gay men are not women, or female in any way, shape or form.
Perhaps if evolution were a true theory instead of just some observations this would be less troublesome.
Creationist :-P
Seriously, though, there have been quite a few experiments on procaryota and other lower life forms which proved the basic assumptions the evolutions theory is based on.
The same is not true for humans, since you just cannot do evolutionary experiments.
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Please understand that I am taking a very different view, intentionally, as to what is "right" here. Societal inventions, and human rights are seen as achievements in our Western view. However nature does not subscribe to a particular view. If by sheer population Western culture, and it's accomplishments were overthrown, tossed away, discarded etc, in genetic terms it would not have been an accomplishment.
Yeah, but only if
- social welfare and medical insurance is encoded in Euro genes, while US genes only carry a rather crippled welfare gene and asian genes do not carry this trait at all. Sounds ridiculous to me, but if you really insist, I cannot disprove this.
If on the other hand, the genetic foundation of compassion (and in extrapolation welfare) is encoded in any human genome, nothing will fundamentally change once western culture is overthrown. There might be some dark centuries, but eventually a similar culture will evolve again.
- Compassion and welfare do not have a selective value. If it has, chances are that western culture stays richer and can get along with less children/woman whereas african women must produce much more offspring just to offset the much higher death rate.
I'd urge you so look into history how often western civilization has been destroyed (hint: never) before engaging in a "what if" discussion to deeply.
Don't take this personally, but I think your social darwinism is sickening, not so much because it questions basic human rights but because it is based on a totally lopsided (and imho uninformed) understanding of evolution. You seem to confuse strength and offspring rate with evolutionary fitnes. It is, however not survival of the strongest but the fittest. Human evolution - as far as we can say - has always favoured the brainy, not the brawny.
I further doubt that trying to base cultural achievements on a genetic foundation has any merit (please, prove me wrong, I am longing for a link or quote). Different to any other animal species, H. Sapiens has entered in a cultural evolution that in many aspects has canceled genetic evolution (e.g. someone with weak eyes has a much higher fitnes today than before glasses were invented). If you want to discuss evolutionary trends in our civilization, you should not forget to look at cultural evolution. Capitalism, science and democracy have shown a much superior fitnes than any competing system.
Seriously, though, there have been quite a few experiments on procaryota and other lower life forms which proved the basic assumptions the evolutions theory is based on.
The same is not true for humans, since you just cannot do evolutionary experiments.
I was just being cute because most scientific theories have predictive results. Evolution doesn't. Let's not make it an evolution debate because I'm arguing for selection in the second half of the replies. Give me my cute quip and leave it at that.
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Yeah, but only if
- social welfare and medical insurance is encoded in Euro genes, while US genes only carry a rather crippled welfare gene and asian genes do not carry this trait at all. Sounds ridiculous to me, but if you really insist, I cannot disprove this.
If on the other hand, the genetic foundation of compassion (and in extrapolation welfare) is encoded in any human genome, nothing will fundamentally change once western culture is overthrown. There might be some dark centuries, but eventually a similar culture will evolve again.
- Compassion and welfare do not have a selective value. If it has, chances are that western culture stays richer and can get along with less children/woman whereas african women must produce much more offspring just to offset the much higher death rate.
I'd urge you so look into history how often western civilization has been destroyed (hint: never) before engaging in a "what if" discussion to deeply.
Don't take this personally, but I think your social darwinism is sickening, not so much because it questions basic human rights but because it is based on a totally lopsided (and imho uninformed) understanding of evolution. You seem to confuse strength and offspring rate with evolutionary fitnes. It is, however not survival of the strongest but the fittest. Human evolution - as far as we can say - has always favoured the brainy, not the brawny.
I further doubt that trying to base cultural achievements on a genetic foundation has any merit (please, prove me wrong, I am longing for a link or quote). Different to any other animal species, H. Sapiens has entered in a cultural evolution that in many aspects has canceled genetic evolution (e.g. someone with weak eyes has a much higher fitnes today than before glasses were invented). If you want to discuss evolutionary trends in our civilization, you should not forget to look at cultural evolution. Capitalism, science and democracy have shown a much superior fitnes than any competing system.
I was not attempting to argue that social policy has a evolutionary selective value or is determined in part by genes. Rather the contention was that modern society has allowed us to discard evolution and move beyond nature via the shear power of our modern trappings. We believe that since we can control our environmental factors that no selection occurs via nature. However if we via our culture and technology basically choose not to reproduce, that doesn't mean everyone else is going to subscribe to that view.
Western culture will not get by with fewer children, they are getting by with pretty much NO children. Children don't happen to vote and as a result our social policies have made having children undesirable. The United States has managed to keep reproduction at replacement levels largely because Hispanics still have larger numbers of children. However that might not be true of them in a generation when they have become acculturated as well. Meanwhile Europe and Japan are heading toward populations up to 33% smaller than they currently have while the world population is estimated to be at least 9 billion by 2050.
You contend that capitalism, science and democracy have given us a better fitness than other competing ideas. Please understand up front that I would never forgo any of the three. I'm just saying that the evolutionary measure of fitness is how many offspring carry on the genes. That is why evolution isn't predictive. It is impossible to know what traits will have an advantage until the offspring are already born and either live or die before they have the chance to reproduce.
By evolutionary standards, we are not the fittest society. Population trends in Europe, Japan, and even the U.S. could enfeeble and bankrupt their society while a world teeming with poverty waits to get in.
Now you say how many times has Western culture ever lost this sort of battle and answer with never. I'll simply answer with this. How many times in the past has the reproductive rate of Western countries been below replacement levels?
I'll pipe up and say I find the entire line of thought horribly offensive. I am not impaired, disabled or deformed in anyway. Homosexuality is not a disease, physical, mental or otherwise.
And gay men are not women, or female in any way, shape or form.
Well, I was prepared to disagree with you until I looked up the definition of disease:
1. A pathological condition of a part, organ, or system of an organism resulting from various causes, such as infection, genetic defect, or environmental stress, and characterized by an identifiable group of signs or symptoms.
2. A condition or tendency, as of society, regarded as abnormal and harmful.
I don't think either of those are a fair classification. There is impared in the sense that 98% of the world can reproduce with their chosen mate, but yet gay people don't have that freedom. I guess why does it have to be classified at all. It doesn't need to be. It is what it is.
I don't believe it's a disease, but to me it's abnormal. Heterosexual sex allows a biological process?conception?to take place, while homosexual sex does not. Unless there are lots of test-tube babies among the AI members, I'd venture to say most of us wouldn't be here if not for some heterosexual sex. Either there's something different about gay people that prevents that biological urge to reproduce from taking place, or the gays who have no interest in finding someone of the opposite sex to help them conceive children are actively suppressing that urge.
I don't believe it's a disease, but to me it's abnormal. Heterosexual sex allows a biological process?conception?to take place, while homosexual sex does not. Unless there are lots of test-tube babies among the AI members, I'd venture to say most of us wouldn't be here if not for some heterosexual sex. Either there's something different about gay people that prevents that biological urge to reproduce from taking place, or the gays who have no interest in finding someone of the opposite sex to help them conceive children are actively suppressing that urge.
It's not as easy to concieve a child when the opposite sex does not attract you in a sexual way. Well... not without modern science anyway, at least for lesbians.
I actually heard one theory that makes a sort of sense about homosexuality. There are breeds of animals (penguins were cited, but there are others) that when the population grew to large would pair off into same sex pairings and thus, not reproduce. This they saw as a means of population control.
Interesting theory, if you buy it. Certainly opens up quite a few questions.
I don't believe it's a disease, but to me it's abnormal.
Awwww, c'm on...
by that line of reasoning, any non-reproductive het sex is abnormal, be it because of the pill, condoms, a vasectiomy, oral sex, sex with an infertile partner...
Surely, we have sex for more reasons than to produce children?
I eagerly await a sexually liberated future where our innate curiosity is embraced instead of labeled. I await a time where a frank open minded conversation doesn?t have to make strangers squirm and conservatives shudder. I await a time when freedom of expression extends to every bedroom, a time when consenting adults can undertake any fetishism they desire without fear of shame. I await a time when ?adult stores? are not seen as the bottom of the barrel of human society, but instead a manifestation of our liberation. I look forward to a time when my sexual desires don?t have to be iron clad and stamped on my sleeve for my neighbors to judge. I look forward to a time when everyone can enjoy a free culture which embraces diversity and encourages unity. Perhaps bohemian, or over simplistic but I think our future will be bright indeed. I don?t it as a downward spiral into immorality. Instead I see it as embracing a basic human need which can be just as spiritually gratifying as it can be physically gratifying.
I eagerly await a sexually liberated future where our innate curiosity is embraced instead of labeled.
*sigh* amen to that. I don't see this future arriving anytime soon, though. The idea that sex can be playful, weird and funny if you just let your curiosity run wild and at the same time reassuring is not very widespread. Yes, sex can be a great way to express yourself, but a lot of anxieties are usually tied to it and society seems to have adopted a very sex-negative stance.
You can find a sex-positive attitude, but usually only among members of sexual minorities like gays, swingers and SM folk.
I was just being cute because most scientific theories have predictive results. Evolution doesn't. Let's not make it an evolution debate because I'm arguing for selection in the second half of the replies. Give me my cute quip and leave it at that.
I would let it slip if it weren't incorrect. Evolutionary theory does make predictions. In my field some of the most interesting predictions are about what you expect to find when you start comparing the DNA from different species. And surprise, the predictions are confirmed. You're right that evolutionary theory can't predict what things are going to evolve into in the future, but it never claimed to make such predictions.
But you're right, I didn't want to turn this into a evo debate thread.
I'll pipe up and say I find the entire line of thought horribly offensive. I am not impaired, disabled or deformed in anyway. Homosexuality is not a disease, physical, mental or otherwise.
And gay men are not women, or female in any way, shape or form.
Uggh, I knew I would have difficulty communicating this part. Let me state once again, out of my own defense, that I don't think gay men are women.
Let me agree that you should be offended at this line of thought, but is it really any more offensive than someone believing you are a pervert who is going to hell and shouldn't be allowed to marry or adopt kids or lead boy scouts?
I'm not quite sure what you mean. It strikes me more as a "do you lie to the killer about the guy in the closet" type of question.
You totally lost me here, but I'm not familiar with this question.
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If humans incorrectly determined the gender of a patient whacked something off. How is that loving the same gender? It would be like saying I am homosexual if I screwed my wife while wearing a dress. If their true gender is something other than what the doctors determined, and they love the opposite gender of what they are. I would still call that heterosexuality and non-sinful.
This is exactly the point. If the physical gender is unclear you judge the persons "real" gender by their preference and assume it is heterosexual. Even if the gender has been "made" clear, you still recognize the person's mental state, foremost.
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It would seem to me that you are not comparing representative samples. You seem to be using basically medical malpractice to attempt to justify homosexual rights. I think it would be much easier to just discuss homosexual rights rather than argue that a small sample of misattributed resolutions of ambigious gender should justify a societal outcome.
The examples of "wrong" sex-corrected ambiguous gender children only dramatizes the point, but it stands just as well with unaltered ambiguous gender examples. There are examples of children who no-one, even the doctors, recognize as anything but normal boys until they reach puberty and start developing breasts, then upon examination they are found to have ovaries.
Beyond these enigmas, the ambiguous gender examples demonstrate definatively that mental sexual orientation and physical sexual orientation are not 100% linked. This conclusion is what is relevant in how our society judges homosexuals.
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Actually I think most homosexuals would find being associated with a disability or a misdiagnosed medical case to be insulting. They don't want the question of what is gender twisted until it has an unreliable outcome. They wish to be accepted for who they are and what they do.
They do find it insulting and they should, although perhaps no more insulting than being judged abberant, satanic, sinful, unfit, or perverted. I personally do not advocate classifying gay men as women or lesbians as men, but for those who try to accomodate religious dogma which demands black and white distinctions between sex, they must address the dilema ambiguous gender raises.
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Thanks for addressing my questions a bit though. Likewise thanks for reading my conclusions as a whole and not quickly mischaraterizing them into something you wish to argue against. It is a refreshing change for this forum.
Nick
Likewise, I have found your posts to be considerate and I think your points about the societal impacts of genetic determinism deserve their own thread to allow for a more thorough discussion. BTW, have you ever seen Gattaca?
Just thought this was relevant. Haven't had a chance to look at the primary paper yet.
Still a little dissapointed that no firebrand, anti-homosexual conservatives responded to my questions.
Maybe they are all high on oxycontin.
Seriously though, I've yet to find one conservative that will maintain there black and white moral evaluations of "homosexuals" when faced with the reality of ambiguous gender. IMO, it's a powerful argument that those who call themselves liberal shouldn't shy away from simply because it may be offensive to some homosexuals upon cursory examination.
On this note, I do admit that my own descriptive powers must fall short, as I was unable, upon repeated attempts, to communicate the distinction between the equivocation of homosexuals to woman (a position I do not support), and the implications of such a POSSIBILITY as to how it pertains to scriptural interpretation (i.e. nullifying any definitive determination of "homosexuality").
Comments
Originally posted by EMGeneratr
Knowing several nurses who work in maternity I can tell you that they rarely if ever see these births. If you have the source study I'd love to see their conclusions and testing methods.
Oh and do you have a link where you saw this from? I've only found this article on www.ntac.org. And I would consider this a slightly biased source on this topic.
Just to let you know I didn't forget about you, but I'm looking for a better primary resource on the statistics. I did find that initial figure on the ntac site and your right that it might be suspected of being biased. Trying to track down the original WNT-4 article.
Also, Any idea on how many babies pass through a maternity ward a year?
[i]
As your brother will likely tell you, equating homosexuality with beastiality is a lame argument. Their is good evidence (and reason) to suggest that sexual attraction for one's own species is hardwired into our brains, but there is no evidence, AFAIK, that attraction to another species is. A common red herring argument for theists is to equate homosexuality with beastiality, pedophilia, and other demonstrably unhealthy practices. [/B]
Well, I certainly did not mean it this way. Maybe the misunderstanding comes from the fact that over here, beastiality is perfectly legal, so it does not server as a derogeratory argument that well.
But you are possibly right, I retract the argument. Let's stick to humans
Originally posted by Smircle
This is slippery terrain. To argue based on evolution is always dangerous, since the effects of evolution cannot be predicted. It is easy to see in hindsight, that a larger brain allows you to create a civilization which in turn allows you to happily overpopulate the planet. It would have taken a genius to predict this outcome some 200.000 years back.
Perhaps if evolution were a true theory instead of just some observations this would be less troublesome.
As you have mentioned you don't really know who is going to produce more until well, it has happened. However what we have now are societal laws attempting to control what should happen naturally. The unfit child of a very rich man might live with an undesirable trait while the fit child of the poor man does not. Likewise the poor often have many more children than the rich and are still increasing in population quickly. Meanwhile Europe, Japan and other countries are literally letting themselves vanish due to lack of reproduction.
Perhaps when you have only 150 million very wealthy people in Europe attempting to hold off a few billion less wealthy people a little genetic determinism will once again come into play.
I'd very strongly disagree with the assumption in the first place. Building computers and space ships is not genetically determined, the same goes for democracy. So, fundamental aspects of our life like civilization, speech, human rights are not encoded in our genes, but are human achievements.
I would say it is indeed genetically determined. Just as speech is a genetic attribute so are the societal inventions that come about as a result of it.
Please understand that I am taking a very different view, intentionally, as to what is "right" here. Societal inventions, and human rights are seen as achievements in our Western view. However nature does not subscribe to a particular view. If by sheer population Western culture, and it's accomplishments were overthrown, tossed away, discarded etc, in genetic terms it would not have been an accomplishment.
Please understand that while I do not sympathize with terrorists this is some of the thinking behind how western culture is seeking to "destroy" Islamic culture. You give women rights, they stop having so many children. Then your culture and people die. It is simplistic but it doesn't subscribe to the same values or concepts of "winning" to which we subscribe. In their view if our women are wearing g-strings, having sex and getting abortions they are indeed liberated. They have their 1.3 children and have as many rights as possible. In Islamic culture that woman might be imprisoned (in Western views), uneducated, allowed only to have children and determine her worth via giving birth to as many children as possible. She will have her 9 or so children.
In our view we are right. However in evolution's view who might be right? We believe modern trapping allow us to escape genetic determinism. We could be absolutely wrong on this. Our freedoms, liberties and rights could be plunged into oblivion with the bets we are placing today. It would be nice if our rights allowed us to give freedom and wealth to two hundred million people while billions live in poverty. However even with technology that genetic determinism might come home to roost via sheer numbers in say a war, strength of an economy, etc.
Moralists of all time have tried to find an axiomatic basis for human rights, laws, ethics and morals, and have either turned to religion (the word of god needs no reasons) or to nature (nature just is as it is, it is justified by existance). I am not sure why it should be necessary or relevant to base decisions of a modern society on biological traits that have evolved hundreds of thousands of years ago.
It is not hard to see that someone who cheats and kills whenever he believes to get away with it is more true to our nature (since cheating can give you a genetic advantage over your victim) than someone who believes in values and has some self-restraint. However, I can hardly see why we would be better off in a dog eats dog world.
You might be correct that we have indeed escaped the trappings of evolution and nature. However the penalties if we are wrong are pretty several. The nonfittest do not survive. Perhaps we don't believe it is any longer a dog eat dog world. I just hope the other dog agrees as well.
Nick
Originally posted by Nordstrodamus
But with respect to those born with ambiguous gender and corrected surgically to one sex are you prepared to say definatively that their sexual engagment with the "same" sex is, itself, a sinful act?
I'm not quite sure what you mean. It strikes me more as a "do you lie to the killer about the guy in the closet" type of question.
If humans incorrectly determined the gender of a patient whacked something off. How is that loving the same gender? It would be like saying I am homosexual if I screwed my wife while wearing a dress. If their true gender is something other than what the doctors determined, and they love the opposite gender of what they are. I would still call that heterosexuality and non-sinful.
I do not suggest that it necessarily denotes ambiguous sexualtiy (although in some cases it might). For those that believe the physical sexual characteristics dictate the "proper" (biblically speaking- always heterosexual) orientation they must accept that they cannot make such judgements with respect to those born with ambiguous gender.
It would seem to me that you are not comparing representative samples. You seem to be using basically medical malpractice to attempt to justify homosexual rights. I think it would be much easier to just discuss homosexual rights rather than argue that a small sample of misattributed resolutions of ambigious gender should justify a societal outcome.
Certainly people can make choices that go against their "nature." And even after a theist begrudgingly accepts the idea that homosexuality may be inborn, many will suggest that it is no different from any other affliction which God wishes us to struggle against. But, if you inerpret gender with emphasis on the mental rather than the physical then this argument melts away. Homosexuals become morally equivalent (with respect to a biblical interpretation) to the infertile, the disabled, or those with ambiguous gender.
Actually I think most homosexuals would find being associated with a disability or a misdiagnosed medical case to be insulting. They don't want the question of what is gender twisted until it has an unreliable outcome. They wish to be accepted for who they are and what they do.
I don't know if this qualifies as an "evolutionary" argument, but the existence of love and compassion and the self-evident realities of society (killing is bad, golden rule, etc) necessitate the same priorities. Whether the source of love and compassion and social concern as mental qualities arose by divine plan or through the simple evolutionary pressure to ensure the survival of our young, our tribe, and ourselves makes no difference.
Actually infanticide, polygamy and other values that we consider not so self evident have existed quite easily throughout the ages. Our social concerns and values are fixtures of our times. If our wealth left us who knows how quickly the rights would follow. As they say, desperate times call for desperate measures. We are not desperate so we do not know. However I have no doubt about the true nature of most people when given limited resources. Their self preservation would likely trample over the rights of just about anyone and everyone.
Thanks for addressing my questions a bit though. Likewise thanks for reading my conclusions as a whole and not quickly mischaraterizing them into something you wish to argue against. It is a refreshing change for this forum.
Nick
Homosexuality has to be genetic. Humans wouldn't have lasted this long on earth without a biological urge to keep reproducing offspring. Gay people (specifically the ones who don't want to have sex with someone of the opposite sex even for the sake of conceiving a child) either don't get that urge because of some genetic difference, or they suppress it.
I'm not saying it's not possible for someone who has no interest in heterosexual sex to want to raise children, but it can't be that common.
Originally posted by mlnjr
I'm also limited in the number of gay people I know, but I'd have to wonder about the theory that most homosexuals have/want children. Rosie O'Donnell and Melissa Etheridge excepted, but those are the only two examples I can think of.
Homosexuality has to be genetic. Humans wouldn't have lasted this long on earth without a biological urge to keep reproducing offspring. Gay people (specifically the ones who don't want to have sex with someone of the opposite sex even for the sake of conceiving a child) either don't get that urge because of some genetic difference, or they suppress it.
I'm not saying it's not possible for someone who has no interest in heterosexual sex to want to raise children, but it can't be that common.
I'm gay. About half my friends are gay. All of us are, through no choice of our own, solely sexually attracted to members of our own sex. All of us, with maybe one or two exceptions, want to have children. Just because one is homosexual doesn't mean one doesn't have the most basic human impulse, the desire to reproduce.
Originally posted by trumptman
Actually I think most homosexuals would find being associated with a disability or a misdiagnosed medical case to be insulting.
I'll pipe up and say I find the entire line of thought horribly offensive. I am not impaired, disabled or deformed in anyway. Homosexuality is not a disease, physical, mental or otherwise.
And gay men are not women, or female in any way, shape or form.
Originally posted by trumptman
Perhaps if evolution were a true theory instead of just some observations this would be less troublesome.
Creationist :-P
Seriously, though, there have been quite a few experiments on procaryota and other lower life forms which proved the basic assumptions the evolutions theory is based on.
The same is not true for humans, since you just cannot do evolutionary experiments.
Please understand that I am taking a very different view, intentionally, as to what is "right" here. Societal inventions, and human rights are seen as achievements in our Western view. However nature does not subscribe to a particular view. If by sheer population Western culture, and it's accomplishments were overthrown, tossed away, discarded etc, in genetic terms it would not have been an accomplishment.
Yeah, but only if
- social welfare and medical insurance is encoded in Euro genes, while US genes only carry a rather crippled welfare gene and asian genes do not carry this trait at all. Sounds ridiculous to me, but if you really insist, I cannot disprove this.
If on the other hand, the genetic foundation of compassion (and in extrapolation welfare) is encoded in any human genome, nothing will fundamentally change once western culture is overthrown. There might be some dark centuries, but eventually a similar culture will evolve again.
- Compassion and welfare do not have a selective value. If it has, chances are that western culture stays richer and can get along with less children/woman whereas african women must produce much more offspring just to offset the much higher death rate.
I'd urge you so look into history how often western civilization has been destroyed (hint: never) before engaging in a "what if" discussion to deeply.
Don't take this personally, but I think your social darwinism is sickening, not so much because it questions basic human rights but because it is based on a totally lopsided (and imho uninformed) understanding of evolution. You seem to confuse strength and offspring rate with evolutionary fitnes. It is, however not survival of the strongest but the fittest. Human evolution - as far as we can say - has always favoured the brainy, not the brawny.
I further doubt that trying to base cultural achievements on a genetic foundation has any merit (please, prove me wrong, I am longing for a link or quote). Different to any other animal species, H. Sapiens has entered in a cultural evolution that in many aspects has canceled genetic evolution (e.g. someone with weak eyes has a much higher fitnes today than before glasses were invented). If you want to discuss evolutionary trends in our civilization, you should not forget to look at cultural evolution. Capitalism, science and democracy have shown a much superior fitnes than any competing system.
Originally posted by Smircle
Creationist :-P
Seriously, though, there have been quite a few experiments on procaryota and other lower life forms which proved the basic assumptions the evolutions theory is based on.
The same is not true for humans, since you just cannot do evolutionary experiments.
I was just being cute because most scientific theories have predictive results. Evolution doesn't. Let's not make it an evolution debate because I'm arguing for selection in the second half of the replies. Give me my cute quip and leave it at that.
Yeah, but only if
- social welfare and medical insurance is encoded in Euro genes, while US genes only carry a rather crippled welfare gene and asian genes do not carry this trait at all. Sounds ridiculous to me, but if you really insist, I cannot disprove this.
If on the other hand, the genetic foundation of compassion (and in extrapolation welfare) is encoded in any human genome, nothing will fundamentally change once western culture is overthrown. There might be some dark centuries, but eventually a similar culture will evolve again.
- Compassion and welfare do not have a selective value. If it has, chances are that western culture stays richer and can get along with less children/woman whereas african women must produce much more offspring just to offset the much higher death rate.
I'd urge you so look into history how often western civilization has been destroyed (hint: never) before engaging in a "what if" discussion to deeply.
Don't take this personally, but I think your social darwinism is sickening, not so much because it questions basic human rights but because it is based on a totally lopsided (and imho uninformed) understanding of evolution. You seem to confuse strength and offspring rate with evolutionary fitnes. It is, however not survival of the strongest but the fittest. Human evolution - as far as we can say - has always favoured the brainy, not the brawny.
I further doubt that trying to base cultural achievements on a genetic foundation has any merit (please, prove me wrong, I am longing for a link or quote). Different to any other animal species, H. Sapiens has entered in a cultural evolution that in many aspects has canceled genetic evolution (e.g. someone with weak eyes has a much higher fitnes today than before glasses were invented). If you want to discuss evolutionary trends in our civilization, you should not forget to look at cultural evolution. Capitalism, science and democracy have shown a much superior fitnes than any competing system.
I was not attempting to argue that social policy has a evolutionary selective value or is determined in part by genes. Rather the contention was that modern society has allowed us to discard evolution and move beyond nature via the shear power of our modern trappings. We believe that since we can control our environmental factors that no selection occurs via nature. However if we via our culture and technology basically choose not to reproduce, that doesn't mean everyone else is going to subscribe to that view.
Western culture will not get by with fewer children, they are getting by with pretty much NO children. Children don't happen to vote and as a result our social policies have made having children undesirable. The United States has managed to keep reproduction at replacement levels largely because Hispanics still have larger numbers of children. However that might not be true of them in a generation when they have become acculturated as well. Meanwhile Europe and Japan are heading toward populations up to 33% smaller than they currently have while the world population is estimated to be at least 9 billion by 2050.
You contend that capitalism, science and democracy have given us a better fitness than other competing ideas. Please understand up front that I would never forgo any of the three. I'm just saying that the evolutionary measure of fitness is how many offspring carry on the genes. That is why evolution isn't predictive. It is impossible to know what traits will have an advantage until the offspring are already born and either live or die before they have the chance to reproduce.
By evolutionary standards, we are not the fittest society. Population trends in Europe, Japan, and even the U.S. could enfeeble and bankrupt their society while a world teeming with poverty waits to get in.
Now you say how many times has Western culture ever lost this sort of battle and answer with never. I'll simply answer with this. How many times in the past has the reproductive rate of Western countries been below replacement levels?
Nick
Originally posted by Kirkland
I'll pipe up and say I find the entire line of thought horribly offensive. I am not impaired, disabled or deformed in anyway. Homosexuality is not a disease, physical, mental or otherwise.
And gay men are not women, or female in any way, shape or form.
Well, I was prepared to disagree with you until I looked up the definition of disease:
1. A pathological condition of a part, organ, or system of an organism resulting from various causes, such as infection, genetic defect, or environmental stress, and characterized by an identifiable group of signs or symptoms.
2. A condition or tendency, as of society, regarded as abnormal and harmful.
I don't think either of those are a fair classification. There is impared in the sense that 98% of the world can reproduce with their chosen mate, but yet gay people don't have that freedom. I guess why does it have to be classified at all. It doesn't need to be. It is what it is.
Originally posted by mlnjr
I don't believe it's a disease, but to me it's abnormal. Heterosexual sex allows a biological process?conception?to take place, while homosexual sex does not. Unless there are lots of test-tube babies among the AI members, I'd venture to say most of us wouldn't be here if not for some heterosexual sex. Either there's something different about gay people that prevents that biological urge to reproduce from taking place, or the gays who have no interest in finding someone of the opposite sex to help them conceive children are actively suppressing that urge.
It's not as easy to concieve a child when the opposite sex does not attract you in a sexual way. Well... not without modern science anyway, at least for lesbians.
I actually heard one theory that makes a sort of sense about homosexuality. There are breeds of animals (penguins were cited, but there are others) that when the population grew to large would pair off into same sex pairings and thus, not reproduce. This they saw as a means of population control.
Interesting theory, if you buy it. Certainly opens up quite a few questions.
Originally posted by mlnjr
I don't believe it's a disease, but to me it's abnormal.
Awwww, c'm on...
by that line of reasoning, any non-reproductive het sex is abnormal, be it because of the pill, condoms, a vasectiomy, oral sex, sex with an infertile partner...
Surely, we have sex for more reasons than to produce children?
Originally posted by alcimedes
retard.
Holy shit that was funny. I snotted coffee all over my damn Dell. I'm mailing you the bill you funny man you!
That's how I feel.
Originally posted by Not Unlike Myself
I eagerly await a sexually liberated future where our innate curiosity is embraced instead of labeled.
*sigh* amen to that. I don't see this future arriving anytime soon, though. The idea that sex can be playful, weird and funny if you just let your curiosity run wild and at the same time reassuring is not very widespread. Yes, sex can be a great way to express yourself, but a lot of anxieties are usually tied to it and society seems to have adopted a very sex-negative stance.
You can find a sex-positive attitude, but usually only among members of sexual minorities like gays, swingers and SM folk.
Originally posted by trumptman
I was just being cute because most scientific theories have predictive results. Evolution doesn't. Let's not make it an evolution debate because I'm arguing for selection in the second half of the replies. Give me my cute quip and leave it at that.
I would let it slip if it weren't incorrect. Evolutionary theory does make predictions. In my field some of the most interesting predictions are about what you expect to find when you start comparing the DNA from different species. And surprise, the predictions are confirmed. You're right that evolutionary theory can't predict what things are going to evolve into in the future, but it never claimed to make such predictions.
But you're right, I didn't want to turn this into a evo debate thread.
Originally posted by Kirkland
I'll pipe up and say I find the entire line of thought horribly offensive. I am not impaired, disabled or deformed in anyway. Homosexuality is not a disease, physical, mental or otherwise.
And gay men are not women, or female in any way, shape or form.
Uggh, I knew I would have difficulty communicating this part. Let me state once again, out of my own defense, that I don't think gay men are women.
Let me agree that you should be offended at this line of thought, but is it really any more offensive than someone believing you are a pervert who is going to hell and shouldn't be allowed to marry or adopt kids or lead boy scouts?
Originally posted by trumptman
I'm not quite sure what you mean. It strikes me more as a "do you lie to the killer about the guy in the closet" type of question.
You totally lost me here, but I'm not familiar with this question.
If humans incorrectly determined the gender of a patient whacked something off. How is that loving the same gender? It would be like saying I am homosexual if I screwed my wife while wearing a dress. If their true gender is something other than what the doctors determined, and they love the opposite gender of what they are. I would still call that heterosexuality and non-sinful.
This is exactly the point. If the physical gender is unclear you judge the persons "real" gender by their preference and assume it is heterosexual. Even if the gender has been "made" clear, you still recognize the person's mental state, foremost.
It would seem to me that you are not comparing representative samples. You seem to be using basically medical malpractice to attempt to justify homosexual rights. I think it would be much easier to just discuss homosexual rights rather than argue that a small sample of misattributed resolutions of ambigious gender should justify a societal outcome.
The examples of "wrong" sex-corrected ambiguous gender children only dramatizes the point, but it stands just as well with unaltered ambiguous gender examples. There are examples of children who no-one, even the doctors, recognize as anything but normal boys until they reach puberty and start developing breasts, then upon examination they are found to have ovaries.
Beyond these enigmas, the ambiguous gender examples demonstrate definatively that mental sexual orientation and physical sexual orientation are not 100% linked. This conclusion is what is relevant in how our society judges homosexuals.
Actually I think most homosexuals would find being associated with a disability or a misdiagnosed medical case to be insulting. They don't want the question of what is gender twisted until it has an unreliable outcome. They wish to be accepted for who they are and what they do.
They do find it insulting and they should, although perhaps no more insulting than being judged abberant, satanic, sinful, unfit, or perverted. I personally do not advocate classifying gay men as women or lesbians as men, but for those who try to accomodate religious dogma which demands black and white distinctions between sex, they must address the dilema ambiguous gender raises.
Thanks for addressing my questions a bit though. Likewise thanks for reading my conclusions as a whole and not quickly mischaraterizing them into something you wish to argue against. It is a refreshing change for this forum.
Nick
Likewise, I have found your posts to be considerate and I think your points about the societal impacts of genetic determinism deserve their own thread to allow for a more thorough discussion. BTW, have you ever seen Gattaca?
Just thought this was relevant. Haven't had a chance to look at the primary paper yet.
Still a little dissapointed that no firebrand, anti-homosexual conservatives responded to my questions.
Maybe they are all high on oxycontin.
Seriously though, I've yet to find one conservative that will maintain there black and white moral evaluations of "homosexuals" when faced with the reality of ambiguous gender. IMO, it's a powerful argument that those who call themselves liberal shouldn't shy away from simply because it may be offensive to some homosexuals upon cursory examination.
On this note, I do admit that my own descriptive powers must fall short, as I was unable, upon repeated attempts, to communicate the distinction between the equivocation of homosexuals to woman (a position I do not support), and the implications of such a POSSIBILITY as to how it pertains to scriptural interpretation (i.e. nullifying any definitive determination of "homosexuality").