[Solair]

Originally Posted by Dubhlinner

I'm in agreement with your points I've snipped out. Homosexuality is obviously biological

However the above isn't true. Evolution works at the level of the gene and the individual not the group. Gay people can reproduce just as well as straight people and often do. For what you suggest there'd be no need for these individuals to be gay - just infertile... but as I say its not how it works

Evolution isn't as straight forward as that, once you get beyond very simple organisms and start moving into complex social systems.

Let's put it this way: You have tribe A which has no gay members and no gay genes in its library.

While tribe B has some gay genes in its library, even if those genes are not passed on by the actual gay members of the tribe, they are carried through and the tribe occasionally produces a gay member.

Let's assume that tribe B's % of homosexual members proves to be a major advantage and they hunt, gather, and become extra supports for the tribe's offspring, keeping them well-fed and safe.

Tribe B increases in size as more healthy off spring survive ... genes for those characteristics remain in the group. The group's genetic influence grows, and spreads.

Meanwhile, tribe A shrinks, and ultimately fizzles out due to a failed group strategy.

The result is that the genes from tribe B become are dominant in the species, while the unsuccessful tribe's genes disappear.

Evolution is about survival of the fittest.
In individual organisms that's about survival of the fittest individual and his/her ability to reproduce. In groups, it's about the group prospering and spreading influence and genetics - each member of that group does not have to reproduce for that collection of genetic code to keep spreading and moving forward.


So, by that logic, it is perfectly reasonable to conclude that homosexuality could be an evolved-in characteristic that benefits the survival of a group.

We are not single celled free-floating amoeba, we are a hugely complex interconnected social organism that functions as cooperative groups, so evolutionary mechanisms become a tad more complex than simple generational progression (although that also still happens).

We don't just carry the genes that produce a single copy of ourselves, we also carry a huge library of other options that may not be expressed in ourselves, but might reappear in our offspring when our genetics are crossed with the other parent's genetics.
So, other features than those presented by the parent can crop up in their kids. That could be a huge advantage, could produce fairly random results like a % of redheads to non-redhead parents, perhaps gay offspring or, it can go horribly wrong and you get two carriers of a genetic disease like CF who don't have any problems themselves, yet produce a kid who does.

I don't know exactly what the evolutionary advantage to a tribe of having gay members might have been. It could have been stronger supports for the group, it could have improved social cohesion within the tribe, it could have been anything. Whatever it was, the characteristic seems to have been around for a very long time, and be very widely distributed right across the whole human species so it's obviously been something that we have had in our make-up for a very long time.

Also, yeah of course gay people can reproduce, but if you're attracted to the same sex, the opportunity to do so is a little more limited.

All, I am saying is that the whole notion that it's some kind of evolutionary error/hiccup or that it's unnatural does not really stand up at all.

[unfortunately]

Originally Posted by Solair

Evolution isn't as straight forward as that, once you get beyond very simple organisms and start moving into complex social systems.

Let's put it this way: You have tribe A which has no gay members and no gay genes in its library.
...

The idea put forward in your post is called "group selection" which is discredited by modern evolutionary biologists (famously, in Professor Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene).
The only way a tribe would benefit from having gay members (assuming it is genetic) is if they were all closely related.
Say being gay meant no children to take care of thus you would have more food which you can share. If you share to those around you and they are not related to you then you are helping their genes, at the expense of your own.

A gay uncle who helps his siblings (who share half his genes) or his nephews and nieces (1/4) then having a gay person in the family would be good, for the gene. It is a selfish gene - the gene only wants itself or a copy of itself to survive. The level of selection is the gene, not the tribe, nation, race or species or any other grouping.

There is a video where Dawkins discusses possible ways in which a "gay gene" could survive:
1. The gay uncle idea, the gene survives through copies in relatives.
2. "Sneaky fucker idea" - the gene is actually more for bisexuality, and so a gay member of a group may be trusted to protect the women alone and thus pass on the gene that way.
3. The gene has "switched", genes can "be" for more than one thing. So a gay gene in the past may make people have better eyesight - an obvious advantage. But modern civilisation is different from the prehistoric savannah so something like, for sake of argument, being bottle-fed rather than breast-fed "switches" , (or makes it more likely to switch) to the gay gene.

This is all assuming it is genetic, it could be something hormonal in the womb. Having said that, I do think there is an evolutionary argument for homosexuality surviving, seeing as it is expressed in other animals.

All, I am saying is that the whole notion that it's some kind of evolutionary error/hiccup or that it's unnatural does not really stand up at all.

Precisely, if it was an error then natural selection would have killed it off long ago.

[stephen_n]

http://m.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle...e&type=article

Not sure if this works on normal browsers or just mobiles devices but it's an interesting read.

[wonderfulname]

just knock out the m at the start for normal browsers.