[Evolutionary Psychology] Our Vestigial Sexual Behavior

[Arsene]

I was philosophizing about why we have sex so frequently, why we get frustrated if we don't, why some of us go to night clubs with hopes to get laid and why senseless fights happen so much when people go out, why people rape, why we devour so much energy just to have sex which isn't going to increase our offspring at all, which has no function besides it being hedonic. To know that, we have to know how our ancestors reproduced.

 

By studying the sexual behavior and selection of our closest relatives the Chimpanzee's we have a fairly good  representation of the sexual behavior and selection used to be for our ancestors about 2.8m years ago. Chimpanzee have sexual structure where the alpha male has the right to procreate with every female of the tribe, and to be the alpha male you'd have to win fights with the others. All you had to do was inseminate the females of your tribe and your offspring would be brought resources and protection by the mother and the whole tribe. (Poor beta chimpanzee's who had to hunt and offer protection for offspring that was not theirs) In this simple communitarian primitive society a strong fatherhood wasn't important.

 

So back than, these frequent sexual needs we have and a strong libido, sexual alphaness and sexual aggression DID lead to more offspring, back than, being alpha or even raping females would lead to more offspring. Once a female was inseminated, you could just run off without consequences and the female could do nothing to prevent the pregnancy. It where those genes that filled the gene pool! Those specific genes which caused those specific neurological structures whereas those specific neurological structures caused those specific primitive sexual behaviors, were being spread! 

 

However, times have changed, we became much more intelligent, our society became much more complex and bigger, because of this, a strong fatherhood now IS crucial and superior for the upbringing of our children. Our society and the upbringing of our children isn't a communitarian bunch anymore but more individualistic. A woman chooses a man and they stay together for a very long period to provide care for the children instead of how our ancient ancestor used to do it: all man hunt together, but only a few of those men, the strongest alpha's, may procreate with all the females of the tribe. We are switching from a polygamous alpha-beta sexual structure to a monogamous sexual structure just like birds (which also stay together as a couple to care for their offspring together). The thing is that we still carry those primitive genes and nature. 

 

Isn't it an inferior trait that we put so much energy into having purely hedonic sex? Isn't this primitive nature of us working against us. Imagine you could live a perfect happy life without having to waste energy and hours just to have sex, instead only have sex when you plan to procreate, wouldn't that be a very much superior trait? I think that we are evolving towards this, this might sound like a very controversial hypothesis but I think that in the very long future, I don't know it can be another million years, that we will only have sex when we are planning to make a child.

 

I compare this with my adopted Asian friend who suffers from eczema. Everytime goes to Malaysia his eczema is cured, but in Belgium he constantly has to apply lotion. That's because his genes are adapted to the humid climate of Malaysia and not the colder/drier climate of Belgium, so for this enviroment he has genetically inferior skin. And for him, the lotion is good, the fact that he needs the lotion is not good. For us all, the sex is good, the fact that we need sex is not good. As for him excluding lotion will cause eczema, excluding sexual activity may very well cause depression because it's going against our nature/our genes.

 

So yeah I think that our sexual strategy is slowly switching from an apelike sexual strategy to a birdlike sexual strategy. And that in the far future we will only have coitus when we are planning to make a child since we won't need it anymore to keep ourselves happy after our genes have adapted fully to this new sexual strategy.

[Will Torbald]

I don't think you're far from the truth in your analysis of how genes for violent reproduction spread out in the early phases of human evolution. They were still probably in the minority as monogamy is still the strongest instinctual drive in the human species nowadays. However, having a low sex drive population isn't good for the survival of the species in the long run. Having a lot of sex drive, and even hedonistic sex, is just a consequence of the reality where we evolved. You die young, so reproduce a lot while you can. We built cities of concrete, but we were made for the wild where there's malaria and leopards. Good luck living past 30 without antibiotics. It will take many generations, millions of years of this civilized world before genes for low libido spread out - and they probably never will considering populations are decreasing in advanced countries since they didn't have at least 3 children per couple.

 

I recommend you watch the r/K selection series for more on the differences of the hedonistic sex havers and the "just for reproduction" couples.

[Donnadogsoth]

 

So yeah I think that our sexual strategy is slowly switching from an apelike sexual strategy to a birdlike sexual strategy. And that in the far future we will only have coitus when we are planning to make a child since we won't need it anymore to keep ourselves happy after our genes have adapted fully to this new sexual strategy.

 

 

With artificial wombs why copulate at all?

[Arsene]

"STer" sent me a message for the term to describe this thing i'm talking about: maladaptation.

"A maladaptation (/ˌmælædæpˈteɪʃən/) is a trait that is (or has become) more harmful than helpful, in contrast with an adaptation, which is more helpful than harmful."

Our sexual behavior used to be helpful but now has become more harmful than helpful. Hence why we are now evolving away from this trait, and hence why I think a couple thousand generations later we might only have sex when we want to procreate.

[dsayers]

 

I was philosophizing about why we have sex so frequently, why we get frustrated if we don't, why some of us go to night clubs with hopes to get laid and why senseless fights happen so much when people go out, why people rape, why we devour so much energy just to have sex which isn't going to increase our offspring at all, which has no function besides it being hedonic.

"One of these things is not like the other. One of these things is just not the same."

 

I think the answer to why people rape is patently different from the other questions.

 

for him, the lotion is good, the fact that he needs the lotion is not good. For us all, the sex is good, the fact that we need sex is not good.

How do you know? In the short term, it's much easier to live for yourself than it is to live for a significant other. The process of having and raising children requires an enormous investment of resources. Both of these claims, if adhered to, would bring the propagation of the human species to a halt overnight. How then have we managed to procreate, even well beyond having the rationality to identify these claims?

 

Having a sex drive makes reproducing a biological imperative. Which incentivizes and motivates people to overcome the hurdle of introducing yourself to an attractive stranger, or managing your time and desires in a way that accommodates a significant other as well. I would argue that having a sex drive isn't just about sex. We can please ourselves, but having binary genders indicates that we are designed to pair-bond. It's supposed to be that sex is greater than the sum of its parts, so a sex drive would be a way to drive us towards the fulfillment that comes from pair-bonding and not just for the sex.

 

Not saying that I'm right. But I think I'm right in saying that to claim it is not good to need sex isn't a certainty. What do you think about this?

[Arsene]

"One of these things is not like the other. One of these things is just not the same."

 

I think the answer to why people rape is patently different from the other questions.

 

How do you know? In the short term, it's much easier to live for yourself than it is to live for a significant other. The process of having and raising children requires an enormous investment of resources. Both of these claims, if adhered to, would bring the propagation of the human species to a halt overnight. How then have we managed to procreate, even well beyond having the rationality to identify these claims?

 

Having a sex drive makes reproducing a biological imperative. Which incentivizes and motivates people to overcome the hurdle of introducing yourself to an attractive stranger, or managing your time and desires in a way that accommodates a significant other as well. I would argue that having a sex drive isn't just about sex. We can please ourselves, but having binary genders indicates that we are designed to pair-bond. It's supposed to be that sex is greater than the sum of its parts, so a sex drive would be a way to drive us towards the fulfillment that comes from pair-bonding and not just for the sex.

 

Not saying that I'm right. But I think I'm right in saying that to claim it is not good to need sex isn't a certainty. What do you think about this?

"Both of these claims, if adhered to, would bring the propagation of the human species to a halt overnight."

 

What has sex were we conciously hinder insemination to do with the propagation of the human species? We are one of the only animals, who have sex while conciously hindering insemination. If we wouldn't need to spend 1 hour a day fucking/fapping to keep ourselves happy but instead be able to have a perfect happy life only having sex a few times in our lifetime when you decide to have children. Than we would be much better of, than we would be a much more functional organism, better adapted to our current environment. The fact that we can't function without having sex, that that would make us depressed, is not superior anymore, I understand how this sexual behavioral nature/drive would be functional and eventually lead to more offspring back when we more like chimps, were the alpha chimp can procreate with every female of its tribe. Than you needed a FREQUENT sexual drive, having this drive would drive you to become the alpha of the tribe so you could fuck all them bitches. And the offspring would've been taken care of by the whole tribe. So it was possible back than. Now we conciously know that how chimpanzee's are procreating wouldn't work for us anymore, because indeed raising children requires enormous investment from both your mother AND YOUR FATHER, but we still share some genetics that shape our brains.

[dsayers]

What has sex were we conciously hinder insemination to do with the propagation of the human species?

My entire post was making the case for this. Could you identify which part you found to be problematic instead of speaking as if wasn't offered to begin with?

 

Another thing to keep in mind is that in evolutionary terms, humans' capacity for reason is very VERY young. We've had the ability to master our environment for much longer, yet we still grow hair. While my last post was one possible explanation for the evolutionary advantage of having a very powerful sex drive, if it turns out to not be necessary due to reason, it's simply way too soon for it to have been selected out. Of course worded like that, the idea that the desire to reproduce even could ever be selected out seems like a fundamental lack of understanding of what you're talking about.

[Arsene]

My entire post was making the case for this. Could you identify which part you found to be problematic instead of speaking as if wasn't offered to begin with?

 

I understand what you are saying but I don't think you made one good argument, the things that you are saying in your arguments sound true but they are completely off point. 

 

Could you please summarize what you think my standpoint/ or what you think that I am arguing in this topic? Just to make sure that that we are on the same page/ that you first get what I am arguing before starting a debate. You make it sound like I think that we will get rid of our sex drive

 

 

 

You realize that birds are better fathers than primates and humans? There are for example NO single mother great hornbills (only widows, but if that's the case, than the chances of the offspring reaching maturity is dropped drasticly). Primates on the otherhand don't have a father-mother-offspring family like great hornbills. Bonobo or chimpanzee males are genetically programmed to fight for alphaness than have sex with all the females of the tribe. The bonobo/chimp offspring will be taken care of by the mother and the tribe. Great hornbill's don't live in tribes, so if a male great hornbil would be out to have sex with all the females they come across, their species would die out, because the mother can't raise offspring on their own and they don't live in tribes so they need a father.

 

So this is why bonobos/chimps have the desire to have sex alot, and this is where our desire to have frequent sex also comes from. do Great hornbills males have sex frequently? No they don't, it makes perfect sense for them to only have sex just a couple times in their lifetime, just for the sake of reproducing. We humans have been evolving away from this alpha-beta male fatherhoodless singlemotherness (like primates) to a mother-father-offspring family (like great hornbills). Some humans are further down this evolution and are able to maintain a mother-father-offspring family (for ex. stefan molyneux), others are not (for ex. jamal & tyrone & all the other single mothers who are benefiting from the welfare state). For a male chimp and a male bonobo, the desire to have alot of sex is not obsolete, it makes perfect sense for them to have this desire. Great Hornbills; they don't have this desire at all, they only have sex once every so many years. We still have this desire but it has become obsolete.  We only do it because we still have those genetics which causes brain structures which causes the desire to have alot of sex, we only do it to please that desire, but it has no function anymore. 

 

"Hunter-gatherers have at least three different kinds of strong bonds: male-male bonds, female-female bonds, and the family made up of mother, father, and offspring. Chimps and bonobos have the first two but they have no families. So far as we can tell, neither chimps nor bonobos have any idea who the father of an infant is." -http://benedante.blogspot.be/2012/09/bonobos-chimps-fatherhood-and-origins.html

 

For the past thousand years we had alot of evolutionary pressure on single motherness, now unfortunately, with the welfare state, we are slowing this evolution down ALOT, now with the welfare state the offspring of single mothers actually make it to adulthood, which wouldn't be the case a thousand years ago, and even worse, they are outnumbering. 

[Archimedes]

Bonobos and and chimps are completely different in their mating behaviour, temper and social structure. It's also a mistake to just compare humans to the more violent and aggressive chimps. Bonobos are far more peaceful by comparions. And it's the females who have the political power. There are no clear alphas among bonobos, since sex is pretty much happening everytime, hence no need to compete for sex. I also don't think that there is a classic alpha among chimps, although their society is much more hierachical and not as much male chimps are getting laid than bonobos. The obvious alphas can be found among gorillas who compete for the sole access of several females. Hence why the male gorillas are almost twice as large as the females. By comparisson bonobos and chimps are less sexually dimorphic. There's a really great book on this topic called Sex at Dawn. It get's into the differences between the primates and also explains how this applies to humans.

[Mister Mister]

You realize that birds are better fathers than primates and humans? There are for example NO single mother great hornbills (only widows, but if that's the case, than the chances of the offspring reaching maturity is dropped drasticly). Primates on the otherhand don't have a father-mother-offspring family like great hornbills. Bonobo or chimpanzee males are genetically programmed to fight for alphaness than have sex with all the females of the tribe. The bonobo/chimp offspring will be taken care of by the mother and the tribe. Great hornbill's don't live in tribes, so if a male great hornbil would be out to have sex with all the females they come across, their species would die out, because the mother can't raise offspring on their own and they don't live in tribes so they need a father.

 

 

Sorry to nit-pick but I don't think this is accurate.  There are a variety of sexual/reproductive strategies in Nature, and none are objectively better or worse than others, they are all adapted to various niches and environments.  We can only apply standards of good and bad parenting to creatures who have free will.  Various strategies also exist among humans, but the problem becomes when the State distorts things, so that people are getting the wrong information about their environment.  The welfare state, financed by debt and inflation, creates the illusion of infinite resources, and less intelligent people breed based of this information, in ways which are unsustainable in the long run.

[Arsene]

 

Sorry to nit-pick but I don't think this is accurate.  There are a variety of sexual/reproductive strategies in Nature, and none are objectively better or worse than others, they are all adapted to various niches and environments.  We can only apply standards of good and bad parenting to creatures who have free will.  Various strategies also exist among humans, but the problem becomes when the State distorts things, so that people are getting the wrong information about their environment.  The welfare state, financed by debt and inflation, creates the illusion of infinite resources, and less intelligent people breed based of this information, in ways which are unsustainable in the long run.

 

 

Honestly, you just come up with some typical sentences (which have some truth) but don't hold any stake at all, you're kinda indoctrinated.

 

"There are a variety of sexual/reproductive strategies in Nature, and none are objectively better or worse than others, they are all adapted to various niches and environments.".

True [but in the end it actually isn't, I totally get what people mean when they say that. But the reason why some species die out is simply because they are less well adapted to their (new) environment than other species. So it's not incorrect to say that we were for example, objectively better evolved and adapted than other competing hominids who have died out in the past. It's fair to say that a nearly-extinct animal is genetically less well adapted than a least-corcern species. It's very fair to say that some mutated human being with an IQ of 40 is genetically inferior, because his probability to reproduce is very low, and even lower in a non-welfare state society.]

 

Now anyway, what stake does that hold? Where do I say that chimps (and its reproduction strategy) are objectivly better or worse evolved than great hornbills? 

 

Do you think our evolution has halted? There are still alot of things in our new/industrialized environment that we are very obviously not well adapted to. And I am arguing that we have been switching from a more chimpanzee like reproducing strategy to a more bird-like reproducing strategy. Not everything that used to be optimal (couple of hundred thousand years ago when we were less intelligent and when we didn't have our own houses etc), is still optimal now. A complex society is the result of our increased intelligence, and in a complex society people tend to be more individualistic, hence why fatherhood is important, the way chimps procreate and care for a young obviously wouldn't work with humans, but I bet that once our ancestors did have a reproduction and raising strategy more like chimps, which I don't think is too controversial.

 

" We can only apply standards of good and bad parenting to creatures who have free will."

Sorry but I can not make sense out of that. And where in evolution did we suddenly gain freewill? What do you mean with free will and what does free will have to do with this conversation?

[FreedomPhilosophy]

It's questionable to project from the other great apes, they are derived species not ancestral. Also there are monogamous primates, so which primate do you pick as your model and why?

 

Have a look at Sex After Dusk, it makes a case against theories of more promiscuous origins.