Gay gene

[Kranis]

When people talk about homosexuals they say "They dont have a choice" "its genetic", i refuse to believe that, i dont think you can be born gay, but by the experiences people venture through that makes them gay. Also i dont believe in the gay gene because growing up, most of my friends and i didnt like girls till around 4th and 5th grade. i went through that "girls are icky" phase pretty much. Anyways i dont believe the gay gene exists and i do believe its a life choice, people have their free will to choose or not in my opinion, if the gay gene does exist then its a very confusing part of genetics. what do you guys think?

[iNow]

It is almost certainly based on genetic predisposition, regardless of what you refuse to believe or accept. It's almost certainly not based on a single gene, either, but on a family of genes.

 

http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/48358-is-homosexuality-a-mental-illness/page__st__60__p__557128#entry557128

[doG]

Also i dont believe in the gay gene because growing up, most of my friends and i didnt like girls till around 4th and 5th grade. i went through that "girls are icky" phase pretty much.

So you just made a choice one day that you were going to start seeing girls as sexually attractive instead of icky? It was a conscious choice you made? You feel that if you wanted to you could just choose to be sexually aroused by men?

Edited July 8, 2012 by doG

[Kranis]

So you just made a choice one day that you were going to start seeing girls as sexually attractive instead of icky? It was a conscious choice you made? You feel that if you wanted to you could just choose to be sexually aroused by men?

 

i could of. but i didnt.

 

It is almost certainly based on genetic predisposition, regardless of what you refuse to believe or accept. It's almost certainly not based on a single gene, either, but on a family of genes.

 

http://www.sciencefo...128#entry557128

 

but the gay gene hasnt even been discovered, so its still arguable

[John Cuthber]

 

 

but the gay gene hasnt even been discovered, so its still arguable

Several "gay genes" have been discovered so it's not arguable.

[paulk27]

Theres a non genetic theory that if you have older brothers, you are more likely to be gay

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-173878/Boys-big-brothers-likely-gay.html

[iNow]

i dont believe in the gay gene because growing up, most of my friends and i didnt like girls till around 4th and 5th grade.

How is this relevant to your position? It's called puberty. We all experience it, and it tends to make us all much more sexually aware. Whether the subject of our sexual desire is the same sex or opposite sex is peripheral.

[doG]

i could of. but i didnt.

So you could choose to find men sexually arousing if you chose to even today? Personally I don't believe you. I never made a choice. Somewhere along the way girls starting making me feel aroused down below, girls that I found visually attractive to me. Men have never been visually attractive to me and I couldn't choose to make it that way now even if I wanted to. Nature chose for me.

 

BTW, here are hordes of other animals that display homosexual behavior. Do you think they all made a choice too?

[John Cuthber]

It is interesting to note that while homosexual behaviour is known in many species, homophobia has only been recorded in one.

This suggests that the latter behaviour is much more "unnatural" than the former.

[Aethelwulf]

When people talk about homosexuals they say "They dont have a choice" "its genetic", i refuse to believe that, i dont think you can be born gay, but by the experiences people venture through that makes them gay. Also i dont believe in the gay gene because growing up, most of my friends and i didnt like girls till around 4th and 5th grade. i went through that "girls are icky" phase pretty much. Anyways i dont believe the gay gene exists and i do believe its a life choice, people have their free will to choose or not in my opinion, if the gay gene does exist then its a very confusing part of genetics. what do you guys think?

 

I think it could be genetic. After all, homosexuality is observed in nature, in many arrays of animals.

[CCWilson]

At puberty for most of us men there was a rather sudden and quite overwhelming sexual preference for the opposite sex. It wasn't a matter of conscious thought, no logical thinking was going on, we just became aroused by the sight or thought of girls. Presumably homosexual men have a similar sexual preference for those of the same sex, and it's probably just as automatic and uncontrollable as it is for straight men. Anybody who thinks that our sexual orientation is a matter of choice is frankly not too bright, unless they themselves are not strongly sexed in preference, in which case perhaps they can indeed swing one way or the other.

 

Women's sexual preference is a different case, characterized by less intense reactions to pornography and nude dancing and for most of them casual sex - and that's probably because evolution favored men - but not women - who spread their seed widely.

 

With regard to a gay gene, certainly any gene promoting homosexuality should logically be weeded out easily by evolution, because evolution always favors individuals who have the most progeny; that's how evolution works. But like most personality traits, I assume that a number of genes are involved in sexual preference, and surely some individuals are more strongly pushed in the direction of heterosexuality than others.

 

Think for a minute about how genetics could imprint sexual preference in the brain. Not an easy thing to accomplish, I would think. Is there an image of female body parts that's connected to a sexual preference center? Or is there some representation of the newborn's mother that gets imprinted? Since each sex likes others of the same sex as friends, it has to be complicated to separate that out from sexual stimulation in the developing brain. So my theory is that sexual preference is so difficult to codify that evolution came up with the best scheme it could to insure heterosexuality, which is obviously best for sending genes forward, but not a perfect one, so that it gets it right 90% of the time. There is a complicated dance of hormones in the womb that result in proper sexual physical equipment, and things sometimes go wrong there, so something like sexual preference, which is much more complicated to accomplish, is subject to errors, too - maybe partially due to differences in hormone levels. The study mentioned above about boys being more likely to be homosexual the more older brothers they have - that could have a hormonal basis; maybe mother's hormones for use in gestation get partially depleted.

[CharonY]

If it was purely a choice the prevalence of homosexuality would be much higher.

 

With regard to a gay gene, certainly any gene promoting homosexuality should logically be weeded out easily by evolution, because evolution always favors individuals who have the most progeny; that's how evolution works. But like most personality traits, I assume that a number of genes are involved in sexual preference, and surely some individuals are more strongly pushed in the direction of heterosexuality than others.

Not necessarily, if certain sets of genes involved in the development in homosexual behavior increases fitness in some ways (one study showed that at least one of the identified loci may be correlated to higher fecundity) it could easily persist. Only if it was e.g. a dominant trait it would be strongly selected against.

 

But obviously it is not just one or the other, as in most cases an interplay between genetic basis and environmental factors (including sexual imprinting) will play a role.

[StringJunky]

Homosexuality can potentially increase the ratio of care-givers to offspring in a group, particularly families, and hence improve the survivability of the offspring...it makes evolutionary sense. If the target of the homosexual's care is the offspring of his siblings then his 'gay' genes will be perpetuated to preserve that evolutionary advantage.

 

It makes evolutionary sense for 'gay' genes to exist.

Edited July 8, 2012 by StringJunky

[CCWilson]

Homosexuality can potentially increase the ratio of care-givers to offspring in a group, particularly families, and hence improve the survivability of the offspring...it makes evolutionary sense. If the target of the homosexual's care is the offspring of his siblings then his 'gay' genes will be perpetuated to preserve that evolutionary advantage.

 

It makes evolutionary sense for 'gay' genes to exist.

 

I've seen that suggestion before, and don't buy it. One the one hand you have that pretty nebulous family advantage for homosexuality, and on the other hand you have the fact that homosexual men will almost surely have fewer offspring than straights will. Which is stronger? Remember, if you don't have children, your genes don't get carried forward. If you are gay and have fewer children than straights, the chances are that the genes of straights will come to predominate. And if you are postulating that the family's survivability would be increased by having more caregivers, remember that it's the gay person who has the "gay gene", not the rest of the family, presumably, so it would still be lost.

[StringJunky]

And if you are postulating that the family's survivability would be increased by having more caregivers, remember that it's the gay person who has the "gay gene", not the rest of the family, presumably, so it would still be lost.

 

The rest of his family can carry those genes but they don't necessarily have to be expressed in those particular individuals that carry it.

Edited July 9, 2012 by StringJunky

[CCWilson]

That's true, if recessive, but you have to admit that having an extra caregiver is pretty small potatoes with regard to survival, compared with having fewer (or no) children. To me that sounds like a major stretch. And who's to say that homosexuals, at the time this was theoretically getting evolved, stayed with their family consistently enough to have much effect?

 

Creative, I'll give them that, whoever came up with that theory, but it doesn't pass the smell test.

Edited July 9, 2012 by CCWilson

[Ringer]

That's true, if recessive, but you have to admit that having an extra caregiver is pretty small potatoes with regard to survival, compared with having fewer (or no) children. To me that sounds like a major stretch. And who's to say that homosexuals, at the time this was theoretically getting evolved, stayed with their family consistently enough to have much effect?

 

Creative, I'll give them that, whoever came up with that theory, but it doesn't pass the smell test.

 

Although I don't like group selection ideas like this, for various reasons, your argument against it is extremely weak. Most of our history we have stayed in very small groups for the majority of our lives. A large amount of people still do and still do help take care of extended family. It's more likely that since it is a multitude of genes working together produce the given effect individually they probably had a positive effect or little to no effect.

[CCWilson]

An extra caregiver in a family is going to give a big boost in survival? Really? Come on, now! And on the other side of the equation, significantly reduced intersex copulation and offspring. And teenagers are programmed by evolution to rebel, most likely to prevent inbreeding, so many of them tend to leave the comforts of home and seek new adventures and new possibly like-minded friends, so you can't count on the family staying together. If you are Mr. Evolution Designer, taking all that into account, does homosexuality sound like a good idea? Um, let's see.

 

This isn't a close call.

 

It isn't a matter of morality, or whether homosexuality is a good thing today, it's just that all evolution is concerned with is the propogation of an individual's genes into future generations, and on that score homosexuality fails.

Edited July 9, 2012 by CCWilson

[StringJunky]

 

It isn't a matter of morality, or whether homosexuality is a good thing today, it's just that all evolution is concerned with is the propogation of an individual's genes into future generations, and on that score homosexuality fails.

 

Exactly... homosexuality is assisting that perpetuation. If homosexuality wasn't useful the percentage of homosexuals would be a lot less than it is.

 

Nature doesn't care how genes are perpetuated as long as they are. Homosexuality exists because it has found a niche that is beneficial to the species in some way.

[Severian]

I don't believe it is genetic. There may be a propensity that is genetically influenced, but I would say that is true for all things. I think sexual orientation is very much a choice, but for most it is probably not a choice that is easily altered.

[Delta1212]

An extra caregiver in a family is going to give a big boost in survival? Really? Come on, now! And on the other side of the equation, significantly reduced intersex copulation and offspring. And teenagers are programmed by evolution to rebel, most likely to prevent inbreeding, so many of them tend to leave the comforts of home and seek new adventures and new possibly like-minded friends, so you can't count on the family staying together. If you are Mr. Evolution Designer, taking all that into account, does homosexuality sound like a good idea? Um, let's see.

 

This isn't a close call.

 

It isn't a matter of morality, or whether homosexuality is a good thing today, it's just that all evolution is concerned with is the propogation of an individual's genes into future generations, and on that score homosexuality fails.

First, the rebellious teenager is much more of a modern stereotype than you are giving it credit for, if not in subject then at least in degree. For most of human history, and still including today in many places, the extended family has provided a massive support network and was the basis of tribal society and most if not all of the government structures that developed. People did not simply walk out on their families as a matter of course.

 

Second, having a large support network did have a hugely significant impact on survival. We're not talking about having a funny uncle to babysit the kids on Thursday nights. Most of human history saw people acquiring food themselves and living very literally day to day and week to week. A hunter could collect enough food for himself and maybe a couple more people if they didn't have a bad day, which they would. Since family would get priority as far as receiving that excess food, grandparents would be a vital supplemental food source.

 

The fact that there is a correlation between number of older brothers and homosexuality in males could be very important if it is because a homosexual genetic predisposition is more likely to be expressed by a person carried to term by a mother who has already had a number of sons.

 

A pair of grandparents providing for three families are going to be significantly more successful than a pair of grandparents who provide for five families in ensuring that the children all have adequate care to reach adulthood, and a pair of grandparents taking care of three families with the help of two non-reproducing males are going to be even more successful still.

 

Now, you are right that a person reproducing for themselves is going to be more reproductively useful than someone who simply helps raise other people's children, but that usefulness diminishes with each additional reproducer. In a family with one child, it is infinitely more useful for them to start a family than for them not to. In a family with ten children, it's quite possible that having all of them start families would place a prohibitively expensive resource burden on the extended family to everyone's detriment of everyone, whereas having a few refrain from reproducing but increasing the resource pool available to everyone else will ensure a much higher survival rate than would be the case otherwise.

 

 

I am not necessarily a proponent of kin selection as the driver behind homosexuality, but I do think you are underestimating the degree of its potential impact. If it was as weak of a force as you seem to imply, eusociality would be an impossible reproductive strategy to develop, and yet it is actually a fairly successful one as far as it goes.

[StringJunky]

If it was as weak of a force as you seem to imply, eusociality would be an impossible reproductive strategy to develop, and yet it is actually a fairly successful one as far as it goes.

 

Eusociality is a very successful strategy it would appear.

 

Examples

 

The most familiar examples of eusocial insects are ants, bees, and wasps (order Hymenoptera), as well as termites (order Isoptera) – all with reproductive queens and more or less sterile workers and/or soldiers. Austroplatypus incompertus, a species of weevil native to Australia, is the first beetle (order Coleoptera) to be recognized as eusocial.[2][3] Mammalian examples include the naked mole rat and the Damaraland mole rat;[4] however, this classification is controversial owing to disputed definitions of 'eusociality' as well as the existence of other mammals that satisfy the original definition of Wilson (1971).[5]

 

Eusociality with biologically sterile individuals represents the most extreme form of kin selection. The analysis of eusociality played a key role in the development of theories in sociobiology.

 

The phenomenon of reproductive specialization is found in various organisms. It generally involves the production of sterile members of the species, which carry out specialized tasks, effectively caring for the reproductive members. It can manifest in the appearance of individuals within a group whose behavior (and sometimes anatomy) is modified for group defense, including self-sacrificing ("altruism").

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

 

The idea that more-reproductive-units-is-better is clearly not universal in nature.

[John Cuthber]

I've seen that suggestion before, and don't buy it.

Fair enough.

But the genes that are associated with homosexuality will continue to exist whether you believe in them or not.

 

Don't forget that it doesn't take a very high percentage of straight men to maintain fecundity in the group as a whole.

Plenty of men are happy to fill in for their brothers and cousins if those relatives don't want to sleep with women.

Also, plenty of women who prefer female company in bed still want children and may be prepared to accept that there are not many options for getting them.

[CCWilson]

I am not necessarily a proponent of kin selection as the driver behind homosexuality, but I do think you are underestimating the degree of its potential impact. If it was as weak of a force as you seem to imply, eusociality would be an impossible reproductive strategy to develop, and yet it is actually a fairly successful one as far as it goes.

 

Personally I believe that group selection is the driver behind sociality, which is based largely on empathy and its offshoots. I know that group selection is not generally accepted but one version of it makes perfect sense to me.

[Delta1212]

Personally I believe that group selection is the driver behind sociality, which is based largely on empathy and its offshoots. I know that group selection is not generally accepted but one version of it makes perfect sense to me.

In case this wasn't clear, eusociality is a reproductive strategy whereby most members of the species do not reproduce themselves but care for the young of the breeding members of the species who are the brothers and sisters (or nieces and nephews or whatever) of the non-breeders. It is most commonly seen in hive and colony species, like ants and bees.

 

This isn't about socialization and empathetic responses to relatives. It's about an increase in reproductive fitness being achieved by members of the "family" failing to reproduce for themselves.

Edited July 9, 2012 by Delta1212