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RE: How will you explain to your children...
September 10, 2013 at 11:20 am
(September 9, 2013 at 10:57 pm)ChadWooters Wrote: (September 8, 2013 at 10:34 pm)Maelstrom Wrote: I am gay. The only breeding I do is with other men, and thankfully we cannot become pregnant. So if homosexuality is genetic, why hasn't it been breed out of existence by now?
Up until the XX century, people were almost forced into matrimony and had to have children, regardless of the existence of any attraction between the two parents.
Homosexual tendencies already present in ancient Greece, have thus, remained around, however hidden.
These past few decades have seen the homosexual individuals released from such bondage and become somewhat accepted. From now on, homosexuality should decline for the exact reason you expect it to have been bred out.
However, I doubt it will ever go through a complete wipeout, exactly for the same reason many other genetic disorders still pop up on a few individuals...
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RE: How will you explain to your children...
September 10, 2013 at 11:48 am
(September 10, 2013 at 8:46 am)max-greece Wrote: (September 9, 2013 at 10:57 pm)ChadWooters Wrote: So if homosexuality is genetic, why hasn't it been breed out of existence by now?
Its actually not an insane question. There are a number of probable causes of homosexuality, one of which, for example, is not genetic.
It appears that in families which have 4 or more sons the probability that the last son will be homosexual is much higher than the norm for the general population. It is speculated that it might be caused by the mother producing something akin to anti-testosterone as a kind of immune system reaction.
Although I'd hate to accidentally defend Wooters for such a stupid question (and it is stupid because the answer is numerous and obvious), this theory does not hold up since it offers no explanation for the existence of lesbians. By that theory, it would seem that a mother should only produce a gay man or some kind of mega-slut woman or something.
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RE: How will you explain to your children...
September 10, 2013 at 12:01 pm
(This post was last modified: September 10, 2013 at 12:04 pm by max-greece.)
(September 10, 2013 at 11:48 am)Cinjin Wrote: (September 10, 2013 at 8:46 am)max-greece Wrote: Its actually not an insane question. There are a number of probable causes of homosexuality, one of which, for example, is not genetic.
It appears that in families which have 4 or more sons the probability that the last son will be homosexual is much higher than the norm for the general population. It is speculated that it might be caused by the mother producing something akin to anti-testosterone as a kind of immune system reaction.
Although I'd hate to accidentally defend Wooters for such a stupid question (and it is stupid because the answer is numerous and obvious), this theory does not hold up since it offers no explanation for the existence of lesbians. By that theory, it would seem that a mother should only produce a gay man or some kind of mega-slut woman or something.
I am not sure it is fair to expect the theory to explain lesbianism as the route cause may be entirely different. For reasons I do not know the amount of effort put in to explaining lesbianism is significantly less than that to explain homosexuality.
The preponderance of homosexuality amongst 4th sons means this is something of a proven case - but it is not the only cause. In that there appear to be multiple factors involved it is not unreasonable to expect that lesbianism has its own route causes. Some of these may turn out to be common with some of the causes of homosexuality whilst some may turn out to be unique.
(September 10, 2013 at 11:20 am)pocaracas Wrote: (September 9, 2013 at 10:57 pm)ChadWooters Wrote: So if homosexuality is genetic, why hasn't it been breed out of existence by now?
Up until the XX century, people were almost forced into matrimony and had to have children, regardless of the existence of any attraction between the two parents.
Homosexual tendencies already present in ancient Greece, have thus, remained around, however hidden.
These past few decades have seen the homosexual individuals released from such bondage and become somewhat accepted. From now on, homosexuality should decline for the exact reason you expect it to have been bred out.
However, I doubt it will ever go through a complete wipeout, exactly for the same reason many other genetic disorders still pop up on a few individuals...
This is simply wrong. There is no evidence what so ever that homosexual parents (which does happen - a lot) sire homosexual children more often than the general population. The odds are stable - implying that sexual orientation is not passed on via the father.
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RE: How will you explain to your children...
September 10, 2013 at 1:14 pm
(September 10, 2013 at 12:01 pm)max-greece Wrote: (September 10, 2013 at 11:20 am)pocaracas Wrote: Up until the XX century, people were almost forced into matrimony and had to have children, regardless of the existence of any attraction between the two parents.
Homosexual tendencies already present in ancient Greece, have thus, remained around, however hidden.
These past few decades have seen the homosexual individuals released from such bondage and become somewhat accepted. From now on, homosexuality should decline for the exact reason you expect it to have been bred out.
However, I doubt it will ever go through a complete wipeout, exactly for the same reason many other genetic disorders still pop up on a few individuals...
This is simply wrong. There is no evidence what so ever that homosexual parents (which does happen - a lot) sire homosexual children more often than the general population. The odds are stable - implying that sexual orientation is not passed on via the father.
I may have worded it poorly, but I wasn't referring only to male homosexuals.
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RE: How will you explain to your children...
September 14, 2013 at 12:54 am
(September 8, 2013 at 5:27 pm)dimaniac Wrote: In a world where there's no scientific proof of God's existence and of life after death how will you explain to your children why you brought them into the world and why they will have to die?
I'm probably not going to be bringing any children into the world. I tried, I failed a couple times and now I'm moving on. Their birth mother will have brought them into the world and I won't likely be able to answer why she did such a thing aside from the fact that she clearly didn't want to abort them. Or, maybe she loved their biological dad but something went wrong along the way and she needed some help. They will die because everything dies and that is the nature of the universe. It needs no explanation.
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RE: How will you explain to your children...
September 16, 2013 at 9:56 am
When they're old enough they ought to be able to find out for themselves. You can furnish them with a copy of the Magic of Reality when they're about 12.
I don't think atheism particularly excludes the possibility of there being something like a God or an afterlife so it's better to avoid make definitive claims.
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RE: How will you explain to your children...
September 17, 2013 at 6:09 am
(September 8, 2013 at 5:37 pm)dimaniac Wrote: But what if truth is so terrifying that they won't be able to handle it?
So you take child-rearing tips from this guy?
"Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape- like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered."
-Stephen Jay Gould
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RE: How will you explain to your children...
September 17, 2013 at 7:34 am
(September 17, 2013 at 6:09 am)Tonus Wrote: (September 8, 2013 at 5:37 pm)dimaniac Wrote: But what if truth is so terrifying that they won't be able to handle it?
So you take child-rearing tips from this guy?
I bet they would listen...
What truth is so horrifying and terrible that they would break and turn into a mental patient from it? What did you do???????????????????????
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RE: How will you explain to your children...
September 17, 2013 at 10:17 am
(September 17, 2013 at 6:09 am)Tonus Wrote: So you take child-rearing tips from this guy?
...
As a side note, the worst part of that movie was where it asked me to believe that Tom Cruise could psychologically break Jack Nicholson.
Atheist Forums Hall of Shame:
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist
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RE: How will you explain to your children...
September 17, 2013 at 10:42 am
(This post was last modified: September 17, 2013 at 10:42 am by Zone.)
(September 17, 2013 at 10:17 am)DeistPaladin Wrote: As a side note, the worst part of that movie was where it asked me to believe that Tom Cruise could psychologically break Jack Nicholson.
They were supposed to be playing characters though they are always Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson in any film they're in, like how Will Smith is always Will Smith.
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