Sayonara

This entire "hunting buddies" thing is speculation though. It's not based on anything other than a suggestion made further up the thread, yet you are attempting to use it in an explanation of the evolutionary history of homosexuality. "In other words, homosexuality involving love, is quite new to the world. " What do you consider to be "new"?

The fact that you did not explicitly mention a word does not mean that it was not your meaning. We were discussing the evolutionary effects of sexuality (Aardvark's "biological adaptation" comments), in the context of the possible function of sexuality. You are contending that his "hunting buddies" scenario no longer exists - that if that were once the function of homosexuality, it is no longer applicable. In other words it would be of no use, therefore: useless. There are a few things wrong with this. Most of the selective and behavourial drives behind human evolution have stayed the same, but the manner in which they occur has shifted. It would not be difficult to put together a study to show that there are various opportunities open to homosexual people that are simply closed doors to heterosexuals. My issue with that is that it sounded like it was based on a daytime situation comedy rather than being a realistic reflection of actual human communities. I did not accuse you of saying anything about social or physical inferiority. What I said was "drawing sweeping conclusions about the inability of homosexual people to cope with, face or resolve certain common every-day situations". This was implied in the part where you said: That comment infers that the straight guys have moved on and the role of the homosexual is redundant, also that homosexuals are incapable of forming "normal" and/or cross-sexuality friendships. To be honest, reading back through the thread I don't think that was your intention at all I agree with you on this, but I am not sure I see what it has to do with the XYZ scenario. No. I was saying that although the words might be different the message is the same. Fair enough. I noticed you did actually start a post off with "Gay men or women" earlier, but you only seem to be talking about guys. This seems to happen a lot in threads about homosexuality so I'm really overly-aware of it. I think it might happen because gay females are seen as more valid "gay candidates" for passing on genetic information, and the less gay-friendly elements who haunt this kind of thread would like to draw attention away from any functions that might allow homosexuality to be considered anywhere near 'biologically legitimate'.

More like Tuvok + Neelix = Tuvix?

I still don't think you're helping the whole case for "generalisations are bad", you know?

Two good reasons in just two months. Go condors!

In keeping with the thread, I am assuming a scenario whereby humans with desirable genetic traits are cloned as a means of ensuring that their material can be passed on more widely in the next generation through tried and trusted old-fashioned human reproduction. Of course this would be a rather silly way of doing things, but hey - it's a "wooooo human clones are the evil" thread anyway.

This might sound a bit too easy, but have you looked at the FAQ or instructions at the site you got the downloads from?

My mistake. Mea culpa. What questions? I have not asked any. I'll take a look back over the thread and see if the posts about WWII lend themselves to being transplanted elsewhere. Won't take a jiffy. If you had waited to begin with you would not now be making excuses. I suspect that had you thought you could get away with it, you would have linked to the same or similar graphs from home too, perhaps with a link to an article on the same subject. It really doesn't take long to add "this is data collected by X in order to show the case for Y. As you can see the strong indication is of A, which is supported by B." Anyhow, this is all rather redundant. An economic boon is a desirable or auspicious state brought about by favourable results at the ideal time. Unlike a boost, it is not necessarily temporary. Depending on one's explicit definition of "boon", the evidence presented so far could frankly be used to argue either side. No offence, but you don't exactly go out of your way to make your haranguing look different to your chitter-chatter.

No, you don't get to wave them off as "rambling counterpoints". You didn't actually say anything to connect those graphs to the discussion. You presented the graphs with the fairly patronising comment "Big pretty graphs, all simple and shiny", yet you made no attempt to explain when, how, why or where the data was gathered, and offered no interpretation of the information you presented. Giving and explaining data that illustrates a trend and simply giving data are two different beasts. "These charts here show some data that might demonstrate whatever my point is" is all that can be concluded from your post with the link.

Oh, I see what you mean.

I suspect he meant in pre-war Germany. Damn - pipped at the post by a tiny monkey.

You'd still need the modem if you were using a gateway - that makes no odds.

There's also the question of what happened to those figures after the war. If you look at the graph of unemployment from 1933-1937, there is a downward trend. If you map the trend onwards it aligns very well with the average rates from 41-44, and the only abnormality is the declining peak from '38-40, which directly precedes the USA entering WWII (I imagine some of this could be attributed to shaky nerves due to the situation in Europe, but that's speculation and irrelevant). This suggests that the trend would have taken the unemployment rate down to WWII levels anyway, give or take a couple of years. Continuing down the page we see a graph of GDP, the defining characteristic of an economy's strength. The GDP obviously sank during the depression but if we look at 1938-41 (the financial years preceding the USA's active involvement in the war) the figures are higher than they were before the depression began. Clearly in the following years the requirements of a nation at war drove higher production, but I don't think anyone is claiming that the war had no economic impact - just that it was not the economic saviour of the USA. Move further down the page to the table headed "The National Income Accounts for the Great Depression in the U.S." The consumption and investment figures corrolate well to the GDP which is indicative of a consumer economy that is gathering confidence (it may also be indicative of an expanding population, but we don't have the population figures to play with). The only significant war-time anomaly shown in that data is the rise in government purchases in '41 and the leap in '42. This is not surprising but hardly an indication of war bolstering the economy. The next section deals with the autonomous aggregate demand in the US. The author even makes it clear that "the relationship between GDP and AAD is strong but the World War II years do not fall on the line because consumers were not allowed to buy as much as they wanted to and had the income for." Look at the final graph. The trend from '35 to '41 is general economic recovery that has already exceeded pre-depression levels. The figures for 1945 hint at a trailing off. The only conclusions I would be willing to draw from this data are that the war did not save the US from the depression, but it did provide a necessarily unsustainable boost to the GDP.

I'd really like to see you try.

They are talking crap; you are right. That's THE POINT of having a router - as the name suggests it routes TCP/IP packets. I recently bought a Sitecom WL-025 wireless router. It's very nice. It has taken over all the functions of the gateway PC that it replaced, including hardware firewall.

I think hydroelectricity is posssssssssibly a safer example tbh.

Oh boy. Neither does heterosexuality. In general terms the same things that apply to one apply to the other, unless one lives in some crazy repressive country where people who aren't straight are taken out and shot. The point I was trying to make, which apparently still eludes you, is that the usefulness of a person to society is not related to their gender preferences. Hence, since many of the evolutionary selection effects that currently apply to mankind rely on societal interaction, there is little or no difference whether they are driven by straight or gay individuals. Well, you brought up this buddies notion, not me. I don't particularly subscribe to that idea. In any case, the question can just as easily be asked of heterosexual men. You might also want to consider that society is made of of individuals. Perhaps, seeing as we were talking about population biology (essentially), I should have said "community". That's just complete rubbish. Sorry, but it is. People do not live in TV shows where the gays are stuck on super-entertaining queen mode and the straight guys have to be bar-flies so everyone will realise they are not rampant bisexuals who like shopping for shoes. What I meant was that you are drawing sweeping conclusions about the inability of homosexual people to cope with, face or resolve certain common every-day situations, due to their sexuality. Unless you give some actual specifics with the data to back your claims, this is called "rampant discrimination". If you don't understand it, how do you know if it is pointless or not? I was using it to illustrate the logical fallacy of claiming that "homosexuals are not socially useful because heterosexuals are", which is essentially what you did earlier. Well, I'm impressed you think you know what people are thinking and feeling with such accuracy, but there are many many layers of complex mechanisms between the brain and the muscles in the face which help to convey emotion. In someone who faces the very real prospect of being judged and discriminated against every single day of their lives you can reasonably expect a reaction to a question to go through extra processing before it is allowed to damn the owner by revealing their true feelings. The funny thing is is that most people don't realise this applies to gay and straight men. Just as the closeted gay, at minimum, gives a cool or non-committal reaction when confronted with a question regarding a female's sex appeal, a straight guy at minimum feels pressured to make a big show of not having ever considered man-on-man action (even though we all know research shows that pretty much everyone visits that town eventually). I think you'd find if you told your gay friend "if you don't have sex with [insert female's name here] you'll die", and told your straight friend "if you don't have sex with [insert male's name here] you'll die", you'd get pretty much the same kind of reaction. I find it interesting you are only discussing gay men.

I think you grossly under-estimate the social capacities and roles of gay people. Also "X fulfills role Y" does not mean the same as "Z does not fulfill role Y". Seems to you, maybe. Have you ever discussed this issue with any gay men or women?

I was thinking a bit less Huxlean (gotta love cross-thread themes). More of a "quick but potent injection occasionally" sort of dealy. The technical and social requirements for a selective breeding program that used cloning as its mainstay would be incredible.

Theoretically you could clone many copies of someone with desirable attributes and let them loose in the gene pool, as it were. This would however imply a much more advanced knowledge of selection and genetic interaction (as they pertain to humanity) than we currently posses.

Not really, but I'm bored waiting for a reply to post #68

Good for tube and rat-hat makers at any rate.

Errrr... don't really want to take sides in this (even a war is 'just one factor' in the face of such a complex beast as an economy, but there are counter-arguments too), but the most relevant bit I can see in the article you linked to is this jgerlica:

So in conclusion, Love's as good as soma.