The "turn off homosexuality" button

[Darth Wong]

Perhaps because sex has evolutionary uses beyond procreation?

Look at bonobo society, for example.

Since humans do not use sex as a greeting, I doubt that applies to us. If we're supposed to have non-breeding people whose sole evolutionary purpose is to help out with the breeders' hunting and gathering and domestic tasks, then sexual interest is utterly useless for them.

[Lord Woodlouse]

Is there any evidence at all to suggest homosexuals are born into societies with certain conditions as an adaption?

Considering it takes humans about a decade and a half to reach sexual maturity I'm thinking not.

[Rye]

And fertile offspring can't help out the society?

Remain fertile and not breed? That'd be fairly rare.

As I said, no one has any trouble classifying infertility as a defect, yet people screech when someone dares say that homosexuality is an evolutionary sub-optimal trait even though the only arguments they can come up with are identical.

Mass infertility would be bad. Mass homosexuality would be bad. Infertile superfluous offspring wouldn't be bad if for instance, you were nomadic, had low resources and needed adults and not lots of children. It may just be that evolving a womb that's set up to increase the chance of an infertile offspring is more complicated and arduous than ending up with one that favours making homosexuals.

If this is the justification for homosexuality, why aren't there more asexuals?

Sex is a big part of human interaction, as you've said yourself "grownups play with sex," and an inordinate amount of the human brain is set up to deal with it. A biological change in orientation from in utero hormones resulting in a nonbreeding member of society may just be a lot more likely than an asexual.

Asexuals are even more beneficial to society if you need a non-breeding subset, because they don't waste time or energy chasing tail of either gender.

That's great, but the whole trait basis for homosexuality might make for more successful females, (for instance, if the womb conditions were around a female baby, it could make her seek out sex with men more in later life) a trade off like sickle cell.

[Arthur_Tuxedo]

How is this any different from creationists assuming that every trait in the human body must have been designed because we tend to find ways to use them? The fact that we can find uses for non-breeding people does not mean that homosexuals are an evolutionary benefit to the species, since it's quite possible to have a non-breeding heterosexual and creative utility does not necessarily mean evolutionary optimization.

Honestly, this is exactly like saying that infertility is not an evolutionary sub-optimal trait just because it doesn't go away and you can think of uses for non-breeders. Hell, you could make up similar bullshit reasons to justify people who are born with congenital diseases that kill them in their twenties: gee, they can work but they die off before they become a burden to the tribe!

Some things can be sub-optimal if they were prevalent across the entire species, but not sub-optimal if a certain percentage or less have them. So in that sense, I'd say that infertility at the rates it's been observed is not necessarily sub-optimal either, since they increase the contributing adults to needy children ratio, as you pointed out.

Night owl types, for instance, are that way. It wouldn't be good if everyone in the tribe slept during the day and was awake at night, because humans don't see well at night, but it's good to have a few people awake and alert to rouse the others in case of trouble.

[Darth Wong]

And fertile offspring can't help out the society?

Remain fertile and not breed? That'd be fairly rare.

It's not rare at all. In the past, they were called "spinsters". There's hardly any evolutionary need for homosexuals in order to create non-breeders, nor is there any real evidence that non-breeders are particularly necessary in this role. Males perform these functions even if they are breeders, for the rather obvious reason that they are relatively unaffected by pregnancy and childbirth.

As I said, no one has any trouble classifying infertility as a defect, yet people screech when someone dares say that homosexuality is an evolutionary sub-optimal trait even though the only arguments they can come up with are identical.

Mass infertility would be bad. Mass homosexuality would be bad. Infertile superfluous offspring wouldn't be bad if for instance, you were nomadic, had low resources and needed adults and not lots of children. It may just be that evolving a womb that's set up to increase the chance of an infertile offspring is more complicated and arduous than ending up with one that favours making homosexuals.

You're still ignoring the point that nobody ever had a problem classifying infertility as a defect, yet people are making up flimsy reasons to pretend that humanity somehow has an evolutionary need for homosexuals. I understand the motivations: to contradict the fundie idiots saying that homosexuality is unnatural and wrong. But that doesn't justify the argument.

Sex is a big part of human interaction, as you've said yourself "grownups play with sex," and an inordinate amount of the human brain is set up to deal with it. A biological change in orientation from in utero hormones resulting in a nonbreeding member of society may just be a lot more likely than an asexual.

And so you inadvertently point out the problem with your argument: the fact that homosexuals persist in humanity is probably due to the fact that it's a relatively minor change. No overarching evolutionary motive required.

Asexuals are even more beneficial to society if you need a non-breeding subset, because they don't waste time or energy chasing tail of either gender.

That's great, but the whole trait basis for homosexuality might make for more successful females, (for instance, if the womb conditions were around a female baby, it could make her seek out sex with men more in later life) a trade off like sickle cell.

You can offer up all of the maybes and perhaps and possiblys that you want, but there is still no need for these theories of evolutionary homosexuality when one can simply conclude that it's a non-useful variation that persists because it's a relatively minor change.

[The Guid]

I don't think it's appropriate to try and dissect this hypothetical (as with most). Forget re-writing history. Assume that if this button is pushed that the Earth is pretty much the same. Assume that all of those happy gay couples will be replaced with happy straight couples.

In this way, we boil the question down to its core: Do you want gays to go away?

To which I answer, "No."

I do wish to raise an objection to this. The question is not "do you want gays to go away?" . The fact is that a lot of people sufer because they are homosexuals - the question is more "Is it right to save them by changing them?" . To suggest that the question is "Do you want gays to go away" you simplify it beyond recognition and make me seem a bigot, which is why i object.