(Continued)
Right, let's fast forward a bit to early humans as hunter-gatherers. The biggest threats were starvation or attacks by wild animals or rival tribes. Life expectancy is short and death comes pretty much at random. Human children are of course the weakest members of the tribe, so they can only survive if there's somebody to look after them.
On the one hand, the homosexual members of the tribe didn't have many children, you'd expect whatever 'gay gene' there is to die out. But think about it - your parents were probably heterosexual - but if one of them cops it and you are lucky enough to have a gay uncle or aunt, you've not only got your surviving parent to look after you, but probably a spare uncle or aunt (and his or her partner) who look on you as their next of kin.
So the gay gene was not passed down directly, but diagonally.
More anon.
No wonder he's never around
1 hour ago
4 comments:
Any gay gene theory has to explain gay females as well as gay males.
We have been looking for over 20 years to no avail.
we Carry plenty of genes that dont serve much purpose, such as male nipples, its very easy for genes to hang around without the need for a special theory as to why they persist.
Gay genes are passed on vertically in ordinary heterosexual relationships as one would expect.
The gay gene itself makes women more fecund and therefore it confers an advantage in natural selection - hence, it doesn't die out.
Here's just one study - there are quite a few more out there. The evidence for this is really starting to pile on now.
Sexually Antagonistic Selection in Human Male Homosexuality
The other side of the debate is not everyone who carries it, expresses it phenotypically - environmental factors come into play. Me? I knew when I was about 10; there's something about a man's body that just gets me hawt!
Anecdotally, I am one of 6 siblings. Seems to work, huh?
Sorry totally underwhelmed, ill give you 50 quid "no gay gene or genes identified in the next 10 years" and 35 quid "none in the next 50 years" or in other words never.
Did you see the John Barrowman - the Making Of Me for the BBC, broadcast on 24 July 2008, if you did not look out repeat.
You said in your earlier post that you thought Humans are pleasure seekers, I think the evidence says otherwise. The Experience Machine thought experiment in, of Anarchy, State, and Utopia by Harvard University philosopher Robert Nozick. says what we are looking for is reality.
If you think about human sexuality what you are really thinking about is the human persona, which is created in your mind, and the brain is developed in the mothers womb.
If its true that 3rd and 4th siblings are much more likely to be gay, then mummy natures strategy might be simply to keep the numbers equal which in nature is 50% female and 51% male (i think) thus knocking out the larger families equals things up.
Daniel "The gay gene itself makes women more fecund" that, if true, is another neat explanation.
PB, I thought they had found a gay gene? Perhaps there isn't one, or it is impossible to track down as it is the result of zillions of different genes interacting.
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