NSFW Best Thread Ever [No SJW-related posts allowed]

[MINIGUNWIELDER]

I need a way to acess the threads you have made reference to, so I can make a troll account.

 

[John Yossarian]

Well it seems the gay argument has died down so:
http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/inde ... pic=577714

How do you deal with bullies, kids trying to act tough, and other forms of posturing?

If they were codexers they would know the proper course of action is to obtain the bullie's address and give it to Blackhart. I have a feeling he likes it when they're bad boys.

 

[galsiah]

Well it seems the gay argument has died down so...

Almost .

Enjoying the act of sex is different from being attracted to the opposite sex. Supposedly only humans and dolphins are characterized by the former, while every species that engages in sexual reproduction is characterized by the latter.

Fair enough, but so what? I can eat lettuce without being attracted to lettuce eating too.

Even in ancient greece it was...

Again, how is this relevant? How does it in any way make it unlikely for such people to have reproduced (without making assumptions that they acted just like people in the USA today)?

Have you seen any evidence of homosexuality being significantly more prevalent

The point isn't that homosexuality would become more/less common. It's that having a family while being homosexual is likely (I guess) to have become much rarer now that it's legal and accepted (more widely at least).
Do I have stats for this? No - but then I'm not proposing any theory. The burden of proof is on dear old Greg to demonstrate (or strongly indicate) that this is not the case.

Initially? Is that supposed to mean before society existed?

Yes. Where's the problem with that?

Dig them as friends, not mates.

This was by way of a joke .

It's a second best adaptation that's a far cry from homosexuality.

It's not a "second best adaptation" - it's just something some people do. Why dress this up in scientific terminology when there's just no evidence to back it up as anything more than anicdotal?
I can eat a sandwich while hopping in order to impress potential mates with my coordination. That's not a "second best adaptation" - it's simply something some odd people might do.

Still, I guess you were replying to my "chicks dig gay dudes" comment, so fair enough. That wasn't a serious argument.

In a competition (and mating has ALWAYS been a fierce competition), the one who wants it more (is a heterosexual) has a big advantage over one who doesn't.

Evidence please. Preferably non-anecdotal.
[NB "it's just obvious" is not a good argument]

In any case, what is "it"? Homosexuals might not want to mate, but who's to say they don't want children?

Furthermore, not only is evolution not at the level of the group

Evolution happens at every level. The main reason humans have evolved to be so cooperative (within what they perceive as their group) is precisely because there's competition between groups.

Gathering food, guarding territory, defending against predators etc. are all cooperative endeavors. The more cooperative groups will do well at these things. Those who compete internally (too much of the time) will do worse.

The ones who do better will survive as groups more often. Lone primates don't tend to do well, so if the group doesn't survive, every member has a much reduced chance.

This is the whole basis through which humans have become so cooperative (because cooperation within groups makes groups fitter, and by extension their members fitter), and society as we know it has formed.

Evolution as a concept can be applied to any collection of objects in an environment. There's absolutely no reason to restrict it to individuals with their own DNA. Of course you can't use genetic reasoning in the same way for groups / tribes / varieties of lemonade, as you can for individual creatures, but evolution is about more than genetics.

Genes are selfish.

Evolution isn't just about genes. It's about the continued existence of anything.
You can absolutely reasonably talk about the evolution of e.g. cars, in the same sense as evolution of humans. The concept of "fitness" just applies very differently - cars are fitter if they're popular, cheap to produce, efficient to run etc.. Such cars will tend to get copied and expanded upon. Unpopular models will "die out".

A gene that causes you to have less children and your competitors (which even your relatives are to a certain extent) to have more is going to get weeded out.

First, there's no proof beyond "it's obvious", that homosexuals have had fewer children over the last few thousand years.

Second, you're treating it as one (non-recessive) gene, which is overly simplistic. Such attributes will tend to get weeded out - whether they actually are is a very complex issue. It will depend on any other effects of the genes involved.

Third, you're still assuming (without justification) that homosexuality can't help the group of which the individual is a member. So long as some gene that contributes is recessive, it can be carried in the population without causing homosexuality in all the individuals who carry it. If the individuals who do display homosexuality help their group significantly, the carriers in the group will do better (since the group does).

This could make the homosexuality beneficial over the population, even though it (probably) reduced the fitness of individuals who exibited the phenotype (i.e. were themselves homosexual).

I've no evidence to suggest that this is the case, but it could be [e.g. if the presence of homosexuality reduced internal competition in a group, happening to make it more successful]. Again - I'm not proposing a theory.

There's even an equation that shows how it works. Homosexuality isn't even close to measuring up to it.

It rather depends on how you apply it.

Say you've got a population including genes X and Y.
Assume that the probability of having gene X is p(X), and the probability of having Y is p(Y).
Assuming those are independent probabilities (which they might be in a certain population), the chance of having both is: p(XY) = p(X)*p(Y).

Now assume that XY = homosexuality.
Assume that the cost of XY is 1 (i.e. not reproducing at all - certainly an over-estimate).

What do homosexuals have to do for the X or Y only members of the population in order to make the genes favourable? Let's see:

With respect to these genes only, for any X or Y person, relatedness (R) = 0.5. [i.e. 1 out of 2]

The ratio of Xs to XYs will be: 1/p(Y) [i.e. p(X) / p(XY)]
similarly, the ratio of Ys to XYs will be: 1/p(X) [i.e. p(Y) / p(XY)]

This means for each XY, you have 1/p(Y) Xs, and 1/p(X) Ys

Then, with benefit per person B, the total benefit from the gene is:
(1/p(Y))*B + (1/p(X))*B

The cost is at most 1 (probably somewhat less).
To get the necessary benefit, we need to solve the following for B:

(1/p(Y))*B + (1/p(X))*B > 1

=> B > 1/[1/p(Y) + 1/p(X)]

What this means is that the lower the chance of getting X or Y in the population, the lower the benefit required for each of them from an XY.

Assuming p(XY) were say 5% = 0.05, and that p(X) = p(Y) = 0.05^0.5 = 0.22, for the sake of argument, this would mean:
B > 1/[1/0.22 + 1/0.22]

=> B > 0.11

That's not an enormous benefit. Importantly, however, it'd need to apply to each X and Y in the population - or at least give an average benefit of 0.11 to each X or Y. That's quite a lot (probably reasonable for siblings, but unlikely for the whole population.

[[[EDIT: thinking about it, p(X) = p(Y) is the worst case for my argument.
Suppose p(X) = 0.95 and p(Y) = 0.053
then
B > 1/[1/0.95 + 1/0.053]
=> B > 1/[1.05+19]
=> B > 0.05 (ish)
]]]

However, all those calculations were assuming independence of X and Y. Given their genetic relationship, they'd be very unlikely to remain independent for long. Selection against XYs would almost certainly create a negative correlation between these genes, so that p(XY) < p(X) * p(Y).
The greater the strength of this relationship, the lower the benefit to the group required from each XY. [also, the true cost of homosexuality must be less than 1, so B is an overestimate]


Of course the above is just a load of unsubstantiated theory. It's reasonable and coherent (I think), but there's nothing to suggest it's true.

Dear old Greg ought to demonstrate that it isn't true (and that any theory like it couldn't work - e.g. involving many more genes than two).
To this end, studying evidence from e.g. identical twins is probably a good idea (though it's hardly easy to get a large amount of data from that source). [though low concordance is only a strong argument against a wholly genetic cause - not against a genetic factor]

Do you know of any other trait that fits the model you've described?

No - I've never studied data on the subject. However, it's entirely possible in theory (there are certainly many properties which rely on combinations of many genes).

Someone who's suggesting that homosexuality couldn't be genetic ought to show that such a situation couldn't work - either through demonstrating that the reasoning is in error (which I don't think is the case), or more probably by providing (relevant) data.

How long have chocolate and lemonade existed? How much of an impact have they had on evolution compared to, I don't know, SEXUAL REPRODUCTION? It's not even close.

And this is related to a continuous vs. discrete distinction how exactly?
Liking lemonade or chocolate may or may not have a genetic component, just as liking people of the same sex may or may not. There's no reason to suppose that liking people of the same isn't as much of a grey area as liking chocolate [i.e. definitely one way or the other for some individuals, but a grey area for others].

If you've evidence to the contrary, I'd be interested to hear it. (perhaps there is some, but none that I know of)

It's nice that we have one solid datapoint to discuss, but I'm not sure what you mean by "misused".

Indeed.
By misused, I mean like this:

Well, from this biological perspective, it's surely a disease. Disinterest in the opposite sex reduces reproduction quite a bit - around 80% in American conditions.

I'm not getting at him for using "disease" (though it's perhaps not a helpful word), since he defines it above.

I am getting at using a statistic as if it's justified, simply because it's the best we have. It might be the best we have, but that means we have no useful data. Using inappropriate data to draw conclusions when you have no good data is "misuse".

If a glass of orange juice is the closest approximation I have to a crate of beer, it doesn't mean that I stand any chance of getting drunk on it. The answer is not to put more effort into using the orange juice - it's to get beer, or find an alternative solution.

Evolution makes a genetic explanation extremely unlikely

How exactly? There are holes all over his theory. Personally I'd consider it "unlikely" that homosexuality were to exist at all, if I were looking at the situation from the outside. The fact is that it does exist. It's very possible that an "unlikely" fact has an "unlikely" explanation.

It's not reasonable to use the "It stands to reason" argument against evolution as a cause [i.e. that evolution clearly couldn't favour homosexuality at all]. That just begs the question.

while a pathogenic one would fit perfectly in with the Red Queen theory.

I don't really see any connection there. Where is there any mention of a gene which guards against such a pathogen? (I might have missed it)

I don't see much wrong with his theory, but there's a lot wrong with his assumptions - and very little evidence to support the theory.

For example:

...There are associated changes - the lisp, increased neuroticism and depression, etc. Somehow the cause is affecting the brain...

Lisping aside (is that really a serious argument?), it's pretty obvious that increased neuroticism and depression could result from social problems, rather than direct neurological effects.
Skipping from correlation to presumed causation is illogical.

Even assuming that some neurotransmitters ceasing to work were the cause, where is the compelling evidence that this is caused by a pathogen?

This list:

consistent with the low identical twin concordance for homosexuality, with geographical variation in its incidence, with some observations of volume changes in a particular hypothalamic nucleus in homosexual men, and ... the fact that homosexual men do not suffer from general brain damage, do not show symptoms like IQ depression

Would be satisfied by pretty much any (perhaps indirect) collection of environmental causes.

Also, I don't see how low identical twin concordance is a great argument for a pathogenic cause. It's just a good argument against a wholly genetic cause.

With a pathogenic cause, wouldn't the expectation be for many middle-aged men to switch from heterosexuality to homosexuality? I'm pretty sure there's no evidence to support this.

The clear argument against that is that it's only effective early in life - e.g. during development. In that case, why the low identical twin concordance? I'd imagine that in early life, identical twins are exposed to almost identical environment, have very similar genes, and very similar immunities.


Also, the fact that he makes various illogical arguments in his reasoning, doesn't inspire me with confidence that the results he presents without argument aren't also products of woolly thinking.

Perhaps his theory is right (though I'd guess not), but his reasoning often sucks.

I think we already know why people like lemonade. There's not really much controversy. Ask an evolutionary biologist.

But not all people like lemonade. And some only kind of like it. Others prefer to drink it on weekends. Some people like some varieties and not others...
It's a complicated business.

 

[Wild Slop]

your wrong about the lemonade

wrong wrong wrong


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemonade

get your FACTS in order

 

[galsiah]

I stand corrected.

 

[VenomByte]

Aren't co-operative endeavours still evolution at the gene level?

I mean, suppose gene A = make sure own offspring survive. Pretty obviously that's going to spread since it increases the chances of your genes surviving in the next generation.

If gene B = assist your close blood relatives, it's going to spread for the same reasons.

And given that virtually all of human evolution (going by timescales) happened whist we were living in small tribes in the african plains, it's highly likely that 'relative' and 'tribe member' accounted to pretty much the same thing.

So co-operation is still really about genes, rather than the individual...

 

[TheGreatGodPan]

Your application of Hamilton's rule is confused. See reservation 2 here. You are NOT supposed to assume an average person receives the benefit, relatedness is negative if the two are more different than average. It goes to the closest relative. Also, you're talking about one trait in terms of two others, which the rule isn't intended to explain. Group selection seems to be what you've been aiming for. That includes concepts mesh with individual selection like altruistic punishment, but I've never heard of any society that punished heterosexuality, just the reverse.

Evidence please

You want evidence that incentives matter? Do you also want evidence that people remove their hands from fire when they get burned or that they eat when they are hungry? Try an experiment: hire two different neighborhood kids to mow your lawn on different occasions. Pay one of them with money and another with dog turds. Or try offering sandwiches in first and third world countries and see where more people accept your offer. Then once we've got that settled I'll see if I can convice you if water is wet.

Homosexuals might not want to mate, but who's to say they don't want children?

If we were aesexual creatures, that would be just dandy, but as human beings we've had to do the former in order to reach the latter up until in vitro fertilization. In addition homosexual men (like men in general) are not exactly goofballs for monogamy. It is the evolutionary interest of the woman to get the man to help out the kids. It has been hypothesized that the human female's monthly period cycle with fertility in between replaced the more typical "going into heat" in order to keep males confused enough to stick around rather than rutting and moving on. A human father will generally bond with his child after its birth if he does stick around and is confident he is the real father (in sub-saharan africa where more open relationships are common the brother of the mother is often more likely to care for children since he knows he is at least somewhat related), but it has not been the desire for children (rather than sex) that caused their conception throughout most of human evolutionary history.

People throw around the term "evolution" a lot, but what I've been discussing is evolution in the scientific sense, not the "RPGS REDEFINED, LOOK AT THE EVOLUTION!" sense. Basically all these different types of "evolution" have in common is change over time. I've been arguing against the plausibility of genetic causality and for that of an infection, which falls under the usual sense of the term evolution. Are you arguing that it is something like speaking English?

Regarding the genetics of taste, here are some posts on the subject: http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/001553.html http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/003665.html
http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/003932.html
http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2005/10/geneti ... review.php
http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/002139.html (alright, that last one is a different kind of "taste", but it's relevant to our discussion!)

Personally I'd consider it "unlikely" that homosexuality were to exist at all, if I were looking at the situation from the outside. The fact is that it does exist. It's very possible that an "unlikely" fact has an "unlikely" explanation.

A genetic cause would be more likely if we came up with a good mechanism by which there would be positive selection for it or if clones and identical twins had a significantly higher concordance than fraternal twins. The mere fact that it exists doesn't make a genetic explanation likely. The problems that would lead you to consider it unlikely are still present, and the pathogenic theory resolves them.

I don't really see any connection there. Where is there any mention of a gene which guards against such a pathogen? (I might have missed it)

The connection is that evolution would remove traits harmful to fitness like homosexuality, but if it is caused by an infectious agent the agent would be evolving at the same time that we are evolving defenses against it, which would explain why a disadvantageous trait could persist for a long time. We wouldn't necessarily have specific defenses against that one agent, because the blood-brain barrier (a discussion of development of behavior and that with a link more specific to the BBB is here) is effective against a large number of them. The barrier would keep evolving to keep up with agents.

With a pathogenic cause, wouldn't the expectation be for many middle-aged men to switch from heterosexuality to homosexuality? I'm pretty sure there's no evidence to support this.

No, as the previous link points out the BBB is more fully developed when you're older. People don't "catch" narcolepsy either. The brain in general might be too fully developed for an infectious agent to have a similar effect when you are an adult.

The clear argument against that is that it's only effective early in life - e.g. during development. In that case, why the low identical twin concordance? I'd imagine that in early life, identical twins are exposed to almost identical environment, have very similar genes, and very similar immunities.

The concordance is significantly higher for identical twins than random individuals, but only slightly higher than fraternal twins. Identical twins are much more genetically similar than fraternal twins (who are still significantly similar), but the similarity in the womb environment would be common for both. The slight increase in concordance in identical vs. fraternal twins could be explained by genetically derived resistance.

 

[galsiah]

Your application of Hamilton's rule is confused. See reservation 2 here. You are NOT supposed to assume an average person receives the benefit, relatedness is negative if the two are more different than average. It goes to the closest relative.

Well the rule has to be adapted to apply at all. We're talking about the survival of one (or two/a few) genes. The total benefit to the individual isn't important - only the benefit for the individual genes.

The application isn't "confused" - if anything it's inappropriate. But then I wasn't the one who introduced it on the assumption that it covered this situation .
You can't use an overall notion of relatedness when we're only discussing the effect on a couple of genes. The important thing is how related each member is with respect to those genes.
The survival of individuals or their overall genes isn't relevant, since we're talking about the interests of a few individual genes - not individuals.

Also, you're talking about one trait in terms of two others, which the rule isn't intended to explain.

Sure, but there's no reason the rule can't be used as a tool in such an explanation. [although, thinking about it, simply adding the benefits to each of the genes together is a mistake, since both genes need to be fit - one being very fit doesn't compensate for the other having negative fitness]

You want evidence that incentives matter?

Not what I said.
You talked about who "wants it more" having an incentive is different from wanting something. (it's certainly reasonable to suggest that homosexuals might have an incentive to breed)

Also I don't want evidence that wanting things more tends to matter in most situations. I want evidence that it necessarily matters in all such situations - that it's not reasonable to conceive of a situation where it isn't a significant factor.

That's what you're assuming, and it isn't reasonable. It's reasonable as a general rule (i.e. true of most cases). Assuming that it must be true in all cases is a mistake without having considered alternative possibilities.

Try an experiment: hire two different neighborhood kids to mow your lawn on different occasions. Pay one of them with money and another with dog turds.

Which demonstrates (possibly) that incentives (not the same as wanting something more) can make a large difference. It says nothing about cases in general.
It's very clear that wanting something more isn't always a deciding factor. Whether it is depends entirely on the situation. Perhaps it's likely that it's important in historical human mating (I'd say it probably is), but that doesn't make it necessarily the case.

If we were aesexual creatures, that would be just dandy, but as human beings we've had to do the former in order to reach the latter up until in vitro fertilization.

Again, I don't particularly like lettuce. I still eat it quite a bit.

In addition homosexual men (like men in general) are not exactly goofballs for monogamy. It is the evolutionary interest of the woman to get the man to help out the kids.

Sure, but it's also in the interest of the man to support his offspring. Running around screwing everything that moves is possibly optimal (for an individual), but putting more support into a few offspring also has benefits.
In any case, too many men running around screwing anything that moves probably don't do much for a tribe's chances. There's more than the direct fitness of the individual to consider here.

...but it has not been the desire for children (rather than sex) that caused their conception throughout most of human evolutionary history.

First, it's relatively recent evolutionary history (i.e. thousands of years) that's most relevant to homosexuality - there's nothing to suggest it existed before (is there??).

Second, what caused most conceptions isn't relevant. The only relevant case is whether many homosexuals had a strong incentive to breed. The removal of (probably) the strongest incentive in no way implies there weren't others.
In particular, its often been people's children (when grown) who work their land, look after them, and generally further their interests in many societies. Without children, someone's prospects could be significantly less rosy.

People throw around the term "evolution" a lot, but what I've been discussing is evolution in the scientific sense, not the "RPGS REDEFINED, LOOK AT THE EVOLUTION!" sense. Basically all these different types of "evolution" have in common is change over time.

And what I'm saying is that evolution (not genetics) can be applied to anything - just as legitimately and scientifically.

All that is needed is to analyze what makes something "fit" (i.e. has characteristics which make its "type" survive and become more common). You can analyze the scientific evolution of car designs (Which are more likely to get copied?, What attributes tend to aid copying? Which make it unlikely? What designs are "fit" in diverse conditions...), or RPGs, or ideas, just as you can organisms.

All that's necessary is that you have a clear idea what you're studying (is it the cars? is it the designs? is it the companies?...), and what you view as being "descendents" (i.e. derivatives) of those items. Or indeed whether you're interested in descendents or the things themselves (as with e.g. civilizations, tribes...).

After that you can perfectly legitimately talk about fitness, environmental conditions, adaptation, and evolution (in the sense you mean it). It is no less "scientific" simply because it doesn't involve genetics or biology (directly).

I've been arguing against the plausibility of genetic causality and for that of an infection, which falls under the usual sense of the term evolution.

Sure, but it doesn't help to limit evolutionary thinking to the individual level. Tribes evolve too. It just happens that the mechanism for tribal evolution is almost exclusively individual evolution [though not completely - tribes can evolve (in the same sense) structure on a tribal level before there's genetic adaptation on the individual level to favour such a structure]

Are you arguing that it is something like speaking English?

I doubt it. Does it seem like the sort of thing I'd argue?

Regarding the genetics of taste, here are some posts on the subject:

Skimmed a few - perhaps I'll read them later.
Nothing specifically on lemonade though . Of course a specific discussion on lemonade wouldn't make much sense - but then that was my original point.

A genetic cause would be more likely if we came up with a good mechanism by which there would be positive selection for it

Indeed, but our failure to come up with such a mechanism implies nothing definite. Though it is (pretty weak) evidence against the existence of such a mechanism.

or if clones and identical twins had a significantly higher concordance than fraternal twins.

Now that's more convincing, and I agree makes an entirely genetic cause unlikely.

The mere fact that it exists doesn't make a genetic explanation likely. The problems that would lead you to consider it unlikely are still present, and the pathogenic theory resolves them.

How?

I still don't see how it's any more than a wild guess based on the evidence against an entirely genetic cause.

The connection is that evolution would remove traits harmful to fitness like homosexuality, but if it is caused by an infectious agent the agent would be evolving at the same time that we are evolving defenses against it, which would explain why a disadvantageous trait could persist for a long time.

Ok, but where is the incentive for the pathogen to continue having the same effect? The most effective way for the pathogen to evolve would be to stop causing homosexuality.

Perhaps many did evolve that way, but some didn't. In that case, why would there be no other evolutionary response to the problem (i.e. don't develop resistence, but develop e.g. the nerotransmitters in such a way as not to admit the same problem).

If homosexuality has been in the population constantly for such a long period, adaptations not requiring resistance to the pathogen would be highly favoured (assuming that homosexuality severely reduces fitness). If the cause is so specific (in the brain), why haven't these occurred?

No, as the previous link points out the BBB is more fully developed when you're older. People don't "catch" narcolepsy either. The brain in general might be too fully developed for an infectious agent to have a similar effect when you are an adult.

Ok, but that would surely be a compelling incentive for a change in the mechanism by which sexual attraction develops. Is that mechanism so highly evolved that any change is likely to have severe consequences? (quite possible I suppose)

The concordance is significantly higher for identical twins than random individuals, but only slightly higher than fraternal twins. Identical twins are much more genetically similar than fraternal twins (who are still significantly similar), but the similarity in the womb environment would be common for both. The slight increase in concordance in identical vs. fraternal twins could be explained by genetically derived resistance.

I see. Or indeed genetically derived susceptibility to the attack .


I do concede that it's a reasonable theory (though dear old Greg does its presentation no favours with flights of woolly thinking). I certainly don't find it compelling though.

In any case, it stikes me that we've been making a schoolboy error: Ignoring lesbians .

 

[Admiral Rimjob POOBUM]

In any case, it stikes me that we've been making a schoolboy error: Ignoring lesbians Smile.

That's something I've NEVER seen a schoolboy do.

 

[OccupatedVoid]

In any case, it stikes me that we've been making a schoolboy error: Ignoring lesbians Smile.

That's something I've NEVER seen a schoolboy do.

Me 2. :D

 

[OccupatedVoid]

Which codexer did this? I said "ahoy" to him!

http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=578539

 

[KreideBein]

Which codexer did this? I said "ahoy" to him!

http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=578539

Eh, the thread's gone. What was it about?

 

[OccupatedVoid]

THOSE FUCKERS AT THE TESFSTAPO CAN'T STOP ME WITH CENSORSHIP!!!! :twisted:

Which codexer did this? I said "ahoy" to him!

http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=578539

Eh, the thread's gone. What was it about?

Knights of the nine inches

These damn oblivion mods just get gayer and gayer.

FUCK YOU ADOLF SUMMER

 

[Ahzaruuk]

THOSE FUCKERS AT THE TESFSTAPO CAN'T STOP ME WITH CENSORSHIP!!!! :twisted:

Which codexer did this? I said "ahoy" to him!

http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=578539

Eh, the thread's gone. What was it about?

Knights of the nine inches

These damn oblivion mods just get gayer and gayer.

FUCK YOU ADOLF SUMMER

...

I am crying on the inside, really. What the hell did the mods do to get such hostility?

 

[KreideBein]

THOSE FUCKERS AT THE TESFSTAPO CAN'T STOP ME WITH CENSORSHIP!!!! :twisted:

Which codexer did this? I said "ahoy" to him!

http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=578539

Eh, the thread's gone. What was it about?

Knights of the nine inches

These damn oblivion mods just get gayer and gayer.

FUCK YOU ADOLF SUMMER

...

I am crying on the inside, really. What the hell did the mods do to get such hostility?

Some of the mods are Nazis when it comes to anti-Oblivion threads. They'll lock them under the pretense that they're troll threads, though they usually don't have any real evidence. In particular, Summer is notorious for doing such things.

Not all the mods are bad, though. HD and Tegger are both reasonable, though I often disagree with them.

 

[Ahzaruuk]

THOSE FUCKERS AT THE TESFSTAPO CAN'T STOP ME WITH CENSORSHIP!!!! :twisted:

Which codexer did this? I said "ahoy" to him!

http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=578539

Eh, the thread's gone. What was it about?

Knights of the nine inches

These damn oblivion mods just get gayer and gayer.

FUCK YOU ADOLF SUMMER

...

I am crying on the inside, really. What the hell did the mods do to get such hostility?

Some of the mods are Nazis when it comes to anti-Oblivion threads. They'll lock them under the pretense that they're troll threads, though they usually don't have any real evidence. In particular, Summer is notorious for doing such things.

Not all the mods are bad, though. HD and Tegger are both reasonable, though I often disagree with them.

But in retrospect, some of the Anti-Oblivion Threads back in the release days DID erupt into flames and trolling.

After a while I guess it becomes reflex.

 

[OccupatedVoid]

Most of the mods are alright, BUT summer is an exception

 

[Ahzaruuk]

Most of the mods are alright, BUT summer is an exception

but she was nice to me in CD...

Guess she's like a carnival mirror. how you percieve her depends on where you stand.

 

[OccupatedVoid]

When summer wakes up every morning, she does the nazi salute and yells, "Hai Toddler!"

 

[Slylandro]

You want evidence that incentives matter? Do you also want evidence that people remove their hands from fire when they get burned or that they eat when they are hungry?

Actually galsiah is spot on in this. Intuition is insufficient, concrete evidence is what really matters. If we followed the "it's obvious" argument every time we'd never have solved things like the Monty Hall problem. It's trivially true that incentives matter but it's also trivially true that incentives do not matter for every case. A well known example is the overjustification effect which is frequently discussed with regard to philanthropy and business.

 

[Ahzaruuk]

You want evidence that incentives matter? Do you also want evidence that people remove their hands from fire when they get burned or that they eat when they are hungry?

Actually galsiah is spot on in this. Intuition is insufficient, concrete evidence is what really matters. If we followed the "it's obvious" argument every time we'd never have solved things like the Monty Hall problem. It's trivially true that incentives matter but it's also trivially true that incentives do not matter for every case. A well known example is the overjustification effect which is frequently discussed with regard to philanthropy and business.

Ah yes, I remember studying the Overjustification effect in Psychology.

 

[TheGreatGodPan]

Well the rule has to be adapted to apply at all. We're talking about the survival of one (or two/a few) genes. The total benefit to the individual isn't important - only the benefit for the individual genes.

The application isn't "confused" - if anything it's inappropriate. But then I wasn't the one who introduced it on the assumption that it covered this situation .
You can't use an overall notion of relatedness when we're only discussing the effect on a couple of genes. The important thing is how related each member is with respect to those genes.
The survival of individuals or their overall genes isn't relevant, since we're talking about the interests of a few individual genes - not individuals.

Yeah, I introduced in the context of the hypothesis that the benefits to the relatives of those with the trait make up for the reduced fitness of the trait, I wasn't trying to discuss the benefits of different traits.

Also I don't want evidence that wanting things more tends to matter in most situations. I want evidence that it necessarily matters in all such situations - that it's not reasonable to conceive of a situation where it isn't a significant factor.

That's what you're assuming, and it isn't reasonable. It's reasonable as a general rule (i.e. true of most cases). Assuming that it must be true in all cases is a mistake without having considered alternative possibilities.

Incentives matter in all situations involving intentional/purposive action. That covers mating, except I suppose in cases like sleepwalkers who also have sex while they're asleep. Do you know of any situation of the type I described in which incentives do not matter? I bet you I can find a black swan before you find a violation of that principle.

It's very clear that wanting something more isn't always a deciding factor. Whether it is depends entirely on the situation. Perhaps it's likely that it's important in historical human mating (I'd say it probably is), but that doesn't make it necessarily the case.

Which situations does it not matter in? Random events? The situations that I gave all involved higher-level thinking to achieve a goal, but mating involves not only that but also requires desire at a very base level to physically carry out the act (note that I'm discussing males here, although similar traits make conception more likely to be succesful for females and have been selected for). The most severe "social pressure" could result in marriage, but unless others regularly watch you perform your marital duties the heterosexual has a clear advantage in creating offspring. Also, sexual dimorphism, which varies a bit across populations but exists in all, indicates that a certain degree of polygyny has been common throughout human evolutionary history (we're all the descendants of no-good cads, but once you accept monkey ancestry that's no big deal) and if anything social pressure has acted against that.

In addition homosexual men (like men in general) are not exactly goofballs for monogamy. It is the evolutionary interest of the woman to get the man to help out the kids.

Sure, but it's also in the interest of the man to support his offspring. Running around screwing everything that moves is possibly optimal (for an individual), but putting more support into a few offspring also has benefits.
In any case, too many men running around screwing anything that moves probably don't do much for a tribe's chances. There's more than the direct fitness of the individual to consider here.[/quote]Did you read my link on group selection? Also, as I mentioned, in Africa (where the bulk of human evolution took place), we find the brother of the mother rather than the father investing in children, as the fathers cannot be too sure which kids are theirs due to the more open relationships. Admittedly this takes place in low-intensity agricultural areas and populations like the Khoi-San which have been more primitive do not exhibit the same kind of relationships.

First, it's relatively recent evolutionary history (i.e. thousands of years) that's most relevant to homosexuality - there's nothing to suggest it existed before (is there??).

There are some traits that have emerged relatively recently (lactose tolerance, brain volume), but those were surprises to many scientists. They were really strongly selected for and became widespread relatively quickly, although unevenly as they apparently emerged after the Out of Africa event. All the evidence we really know about comes from written history (which is all recently in an evolutionary sense), which seems to contain references to homosexuality arbitrarily far back. As Cochran mentioned, some more primitive peoples like the Khoi-San hadn't heard of it until they came into contact with other populations, although they don't find the idea believable. There was an important group of traits I left off there earlier that were strongly selected for in agricultural populations but disastrously not so with hunter-gatherers: disease resistance. Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs and Steel" contains some poor thinking, but his point on the connection between diseases and agriculture was dead on.

Second, what caused most conceptions isn't relevant. The only relevant case is whether many homosexuals had a strong incentive to breed. The removal of (probably) the strongest incentive in no way implies there weren't others.
In particular, its often been people's children (when grown) who work their land, look after them, and generally further their interests in many societies. Without children, someone's prospects could be significantly less rosy.

At one time it was thought that the younger generation benefits the older generation when the latter is past their physical prime, but it turns out that the benefit ALWAYS (I should clarify I mean at all stages of life, not in all eras of human history, but thing like nursing homes are too recent to matter) flows from the old fogies to the young whippersnappers. Once you're past the age of breeding you don't really matter anymore to your genes, so you consume less and less resources until you pass on. Your children do not exist for you, you exist for your children.

After that you can perfectly legitimately talk about fitness, environmental conditions, adaptation, and evolution (in the sense you mean it). It is no less "scientific" simply because it doesn't involve genetics or biology (directly).

It does involve biology. We've disected brains, and those of homosexuals are different (in fact, I recall that's what sparked my comment on the subject!). I suppose it's possible that people get turned gay by Freud's overbearing mothers and then that warps the brain to such an extent that it causes observable physical differences, but the factors that stand out in changing brains are genes, diseases and trauma (as in blunt force, not the death of a loved one).

Sure, but it doesn't help to limit evolutionary thinking to the individual level. Tribes evolve too. It just happens that the mechanism for tribal evolution is almost exclusively individual evolution [though not completely - tribes can evolve (in the same sense) structure on a tribal level before there's genetic adaptation on the individual level to favour such a structure]

Once again I'm going to recommend looking at the link on group selection. Henry Harpending, who has worked with Cochran on several papers including the famous one on Ashkenazi intelligence, came up with a theoretical model in which group selection would work enought to satisfy Price's equation, but it's assumptions are not really all that plausible.

I doubt it. Does it seem like the sort of thing I'd argue?

I don't know. Are you arguing in favor of a genetic explanation or against a pathogenic explanation?

Skimmed a few - perhaps I'll read them later.
Nothing specifically on lemonade though . Of course a specific discussion on lemonade wouldn't make much sense - but then that was my original point.

The taste for lemonade would be the result of a taste for the components that go into it (like sugar and lemons). We know that sugar tastes really good even though it isn't that good for us because such a quick source of energy was very advantageous to have when such things were far more scarce. Ask a scurvy sailor why citrus is beneficial.

Indeed, but our failure to come up with such a mechanism implies nothing definite. Though it is (pretty weak) evidence against the existence of such a mechanism.

There's not really enough evidence for me to make this claim very strong, but one possibility that seems to make sense to me (and has been proposed by others) is that the high rate of homosexuality in males compared to females (3-4% vs 1-2%, and lesbians different in that there does appear to be a strong political/cultural aspect to it and they are well known for "lesbian bed death" which indicates that physical attraction is not as strong) is due to the fact that all children are initially female and are only turned male later. A pathogen that only harmed the area that determines whether a certain variety of pheromone arouses a person (and tests have shown people do react differently to certain smells based on sexuality) would result in homosexuality. The area of the brain that causes us to react to pheromones was strongly selected for, that's how it evolved into existence. Homosexuality can be easily thought of as a loss of function in that trait. There wouldn't be much analysis necessary for what mechanism would select for it, it's essentially the reverse of the presence of the trait. We may not have this kind of thing at the level of say, moths, but humans everywhere exhibit this, just like pretty much any animal with a sense of smell. In positing a mechanism for selecting homosexuality we'd essentially have to junk something we've already got a very good understanding of. Sorry for the rambling nature of this paragraph, but I was thinking while I was writing, which I promise not to do in the future.

]Now that's more convincing, and I agree makes an entirely genetic cause unlikely.

There are always epigenetic influences and other such things, which is why most genes are described as giving a propensity toward a trait, but identical twins are discordant 80% of the time when one is homosexual, which doesn't even make the trait given the genes "likely" (as in more likely than not). A gene that gave even a small propensity toward homosexuality we would still (ceteris paribus) usually assume would be selected against and its incidence fall to the level of random mutation. The pathogenic explanation would make genes that give a small propensity (i.e don't provide effective resistance) not a constant thing, but changing as the infectious agent evolves.

Ok, but where is the incentive for the pathogen to continue having the same effect? The most effective way for the pathogen to evolve would be to stop causing homosexuality.

Cochran and Paul Ewald actually wrote the book on when it is advantageous for an infection to not harm its host severely. Sometimes it will kill you very quickly, like when you are spreading the disease all over the place through bodily discharges. Ebola is a good example. When a longer period between infection and transmission is likely (many sexually transmitted diseases are like this) it lets you live longer. There is not really much advantage for the infection in you having children once you are an adult. Their time-span is much shorter than yours, and if you are infected in the womb you can bet it won't be around (although its effects will, too bad for polio victims) when you're at child-bearing age. I mentioned above that we can easily think of the infection as doing something as simple as causing a loss of function. That might just be the damage caused by that disease living in that sector of your brain for a bit, not an evolved strategy to alter your behavior for its purposes (although there are infections that do just that). If it stopped causing harm it is true that we would no longer need to keep evolving resistances to it. But stating that it should logically stop causing harm for that reason is ridiculous. It begs the question for the innumerable diseases which keep rapidly evolving because they harm us, many of which have been around in roughly similar form damn near forever.

Perhaps many did evolve that way, but some didn't. In that case, why would there be no other evolutionary response to the problem (i.e. don't develop resistence, but develop e.g. the nerotransmitters in such a way as not to admit the same problem).

If homosexuality has been in the population constantly for such a long period, adaptations not requiring resistance to the pathogen would be highly favoured (assuming that homosexuality severely reduces fitness). If the cause is so specific (in the brain), why haven't these occurred?

I'm kind of confused. What is the significant difference? Not admitting in the problem sounds the same as resistance. Again, there's nothing special about homosexuality in operating in this manner. The same points you are raising would seem to fall on all the diseases that infect the brain at an early point in the development that we evolved the BBB for.

I see. Or indeed genetically derived susceptibility to the attack .

Well that would just be the reverse of resistance, or to use the phrase that makes you sound smart "the lack thereof".

In any case, it stikes me that we've been making a schoolboy error: Ignoring lesbians .

Staying somewhat silly but somewhat serious, lesbians and gays are different. Given the lower incidence there is less of a need to explain how it could be so prevalent. There's also been less study into lesbianism, so it's harder to say. Cochran hasn't suggested that his theory would also cover lesbianism, and I'm not going to try to stretch it out to far.

 

[Data4]

Guys, leave Summer alone. Some people can't help being ass-ugly seeping bags of fetid pus. Lesser people would have committed suicide by now.

-D4

 

[Ahzaruuk]

Some people can't help being ass-ugly seeping bags of fetid pus.-D4

...

That really wasn't necissary...

 

[Data4]

Some people can't help being ass-ugly seeping bags of fetid pus.-D4

...

That really wasn't necissary...

This is the Codex. You're more than welcome to get the fuck out of here if you don't like the kinds of things we say.

-D4