"The Evolutionary Mystery of Homosexuality"

The article is interesting, and brings up a lot of information. I did have a couple of things to expand on though.
It'd be nice if they cited their studies. I can name a couple at least that I remember touching upon in undergrad - there's more than one study that shows that female relatives of gay men have more offspring,and this has been demonstrated cross culturally.

Also it is evident that gay men and women do lavish attention on their nieces and nephews - this is not a new phenomenon and has been noted throughout history. If one does not produce offspring themselves, they are free to allocate some resources to offspring of their siblings. There are several species in which there are 'helpers' who do not breed for years or at all, and help their parents or siblings raise offspring.

 

Weirdly enough (referring to the above post), my uncle who is gay and I were very close and he always took me on days out and bought me things, so maybe we do have a purpose. I would love a 100% accurate answer to why I am gay though and hope one day, just like gender that sexual orientation can be identified. It would make that child's life so much easier if parents knew from word go, but then again you'd probably get some parents trying to manipulate/brainwash their kids into thinking their not.

I also wonder why we were born with the capability and organs to reproduce, why didn't we evolve without? The same the male and female genitals are different. Why didn't evolution decide to remove our capability to have children of our own?

 

Lewis: removing them would be more work than leaving them. Male and female genitalia aren't as different as they seem at first. Both start out the same way, it's just a matter of if hormones trigger certain parts to grow and fuse or not.

 

Nice article, but the lack of citations is sad :/

Do you still know which studies they were? I'd love to read them!

 

Interesting, as BOTH my younger sisters have many children. One has 10 kids, and another has 5. Very interesting. When I was younger I used to babysit a lot of my cousins too. hmmmm... My aunt has 15 kids.

 

I'm always skeptical of lots of theories about why homosexuality is adaptive. Kin selection theory seems kind of ridiculous to me in this case. I just don't see how it could possibly be a strong evolutionary force.

Of the theories of why these genes might be adaptive, group selection makes the most sense, along with sexually antagonistic selection, but they don't have much empirical evidence. And frankly, as an amateur scientist I just don't buy the arguments that he poses.

It seems obvious to me, however, that bisexuality is very adaptive in numerous scenarios. Bisexual males can form bonds that decreases mate competition, increases societal harmony, and at the same time neither are less likely to mate at all. Alternatively, it's a good "sneaky" strategy, a less dominant male might get access to a more dominant male's mate if he's sleeping with both of them.

It makes even more sense for females, ancient men probably had shorter life spans than women. (Foraging and war are dangerous occupations) if there are more men than women and it always takes at least two parents to raise a child then what can the "extra" women do? If they form pair bonds with each other and still can pick out high quality males then any children they have get a much higher chance at surviving.

Basically, I don't really understand why scientists are trying to understand the evolution of homosexuality. It's not adaptive, and coming up with arguments for why it might be just ends up with shakey theories without any evidence. It'd be much easier to explain the adaptive nature of a range of sexuality within a species.

Even more, I don't necessarily buy the argument that historically homosexuality decreased fitness. Yes, in modern society many gays don't reproduce, but we can't apply modern sexuality to ancient Africa.

 

would you prefer religion explaining against/for homo?

 

Of course not. I'm an evolutionary biologist; I'm just being skeptical of many of the theories presented in the article.

 

What does everyone think of this comment? I don't agree

The author way over-concludes his data. There is no such thing as absolute genetic determinism of behavioral traits in humans, we are not lower animals operating by instinct. First, comparison to animal behavior is anthropomorphism at its worst. You can no more determine the purpose of animal behavior that may look like homosexual behavior, than you can fly to the moon without a spaceship. Are there genetic factors in homosexuality? Yes, but they are most certainly not absolutely determinative. Is homosexuality deeply ingrained? Yes, to the extent that it can be change only with great difficulty (there are a few cases), if at all. However, all sexual behavior -- heterosexual, homosexual, you name it -- includes LEARNED behavior. That makes any assessment of genetic components and evolution very complicated. "Scientists" and others who have concluded that homosexuality is all genetic simply are engaging in a political agenda. And it is unnecessary. Homosexuality is so deeply ingrained that little, if anything, can be done about it. Does that make it wrong or make homosexuals bad people? Of course, not! All of us have learned behaviors, that are an integral part of who we are. There should be no value judgments because a behavior is learned. That's wherein the problem lies. There are some who think that homosexuality is so wrong that they somehow need to stop it. But that is wrong-headed thinking. The fact that something is learned does not imply that it can be changed. Again we all have traits that are learned that are nevertheless integral to who we are. They can no more changed than we can just flap our arms and fly! But genes are just plain NOT everything!

 

Childbirth in prehistory was just as deadly as hunting.