Is homosexuality genetic?

[Patrick1000]

I am just trying to emphasize that we are not about the chemicals that constitue us

This really seem like you are a dualist. There is very good evidence for brain damage or chemicals to dramatically change personality. So saying you regent this and it is all some immaterial effect is not supported by evidence.

If there was an antigay drug like there are anti physcotic drugs would that mean anything?

I am just trying to emphasize that we are not all about the chemicals that constitute us in some absolute sense.

 

[sol invictus]

I always find such discussions very odd, because they are predicated on what seems to me a fact not at all in evidence - that there are two categories, homosexual or heterosexual, and that it make sense to say that people are either one or the other. The obvious exceptions (bisexuals, people that change sexual preference, etc.) are regarded as either singular exceptions, or as people who took a long time to figure out their "true" orientation or are just pretending.

If you go back even a century or so, you'd find that no category of "homosexual" existed. People didn't classify people that way. If anything, over much of human history the sexual distinction was between active and passive, giving and receiving, or male and female - but none of those distinctions (except the last) were thought of as something fundamental or permanent (and even gender was thought to be an accident, whether in a womb your penis ended up external, or inverted and internal, i.e. a vagina).

So I think the whole discussion of whether homosexuality is genetic is based on a very questionable premise - that there is such a distinction. It's like trying to decide whether liking or not liking broccoli is genetic. Sure, there might be some genes that influence that, but there's obviously an environmental and situational component too, people's preferences change with time, with how the broccoli is prepared, what it's mixed with, etc.

 

[Patrick1000]

Emotions are phenomenological.

What do you think they are?

Do you think emotions are created by a soul, or something similar?

Please answer clearly.

Emotions are phenomenological.

Why do we have to say they "are" something, or are like something? Can't we just let them be, experience them, have them? Can't we just allow them to be what they are on their own?

An emotion is not in need of explanation, nor can it be explained, especially NOT in terms of chemistry. That is simply ridiculous. To ask such a question, is in a sense meaningless.

 

[Alan]

I say they are chemical-based because the evidence in neurology, specifically affective neurology, shows that they are. You don't want an explanation? Then cover your eyes and ignore it. Yet the evidence continues to exist.

What do you know about neurons?

 

[Nonpareil]

I am just trying to emphasize that we are not all about the chemicals that constitute us in some absolute sense.

And you know this how, exactly?

An emotion is not in need of explanation

Well, strictly speaking, nothing needs to be explained. We could live our lives in total ignorance. Granted, they wouldn't be very long, very happy, or make a whole lot of sense, but we could.

That doesn't mean that we can't or shouldn't attempt to explain things.

nor can it be explained

Yes, it can.

especially NOT in terms of chemistry.

Exactly in those terms, actually.

That is simply ridiculous.

Again, you really know nothing about biology, do you? Or neurochemistry, for that matter. Or neuroscience in general. Any high-school student can explain the relationship between emotions and chemical reactions in the brain.

To ask such a question, is in a sense meaningless.

Take it away, Inigo.

 

[Jr1985]

Just because we don't know exactly HOW brain chemicals result in what we experience as emotions, doesn't mean they aren't ultimately responsible. We don't know how neurons generate consciousness either, but suppress their activity or annihilate it altogether and consciousness vanishes.

I suffer from depression and have been on antidepressants for about 8 years now. While they lift my depression, they don't really help much with the anhedonia (lack of pleasure). However, since I started taking dexedrine for ADHD I've noticed my ability to feel pleasure has improved. Dexedrine increases dopamine activity, which acts on the "reward pathway", resulting in the experience of pleasure.

It's possible homosexuality is polygenic, meaning lots of genes control sexual orientation. So it's perfectly possible for straight parents to have gay kids if they themselves only have some of the necessary alleles required, which combine in the child to cause homosexuality.

 

[quadraginta]

<snip>

So I think the whole discussion of whether homosexuality is genetic is based on a very questionable premise - that there is such a distinction. It's like trying to decide whether liking or not liking broccoli is genetic. Sure, there might be some genes that influence that, but there's obviously an environmental and situational component too, people's preferences change with time, with how the broccoli is prepared, what it's mixed with, etc.

Thanks to science we have learned that in some cases there are clear and unequivocal genetic foundations for food flavor preference, and especially avoidance which overwhelm cultural conditioning. (See "supertaster^WP".)

Why can't the same be true for sexual attraction?

 

[Patrick1000]

The point was/is, why does one's sexual orientation need to be grauned in anything?

If a person's brain is no longer functioning (i.e. they're brain dead), do they still feel emotions? I think most people, and common sense, would say they don't, because brain function is necessary for emotions.

You seem to be saying that emotions come from somewhere else than the brain. What is that place? And why does it stop functioning when the brain stops functioning, or change when the brain is changed with chemicals?

From an earlier post:


I'm straight, and of course I'd answer yes. I can't ever remember choosing to be straight, any more than I can remember choosing my skin color or whether to be an introvert, so apparently I was born that way.

If it was a choice, I must have made it in the first couple of years before memories begin, which would be before one can really make conscious choices anyway, and certainly before one can make decisions that stick for 50 years. So being born that way seems the logical answer.

The point was/is, why does one's sexual orientation need to be grounded in anything?

 

[Patrick1000]

I have spent my lifetime studying biology

I say they are chemical-based because the evidence in neurology, specifically affective neurology, shows that they are. You don't want an explanation? Then cover your eyes and ignore it. Yet the evidence continues to exist.

What do you know about neurons?

I have spent my lifetime studying "biology". I study life sciences quite literally every day. I teach biochemistry, physiology and last but not least, clinical medicine as well. I am an attending physician at a teaching hospital in San Francisco.

(When I was a boy, I spent a lot of time doing mathematics. I am not a professional mathematician in the same sense that I am a working doc and a teacher of medicine/physiology/biochemistry, but mathematics colors my life, and albeit most of the time covertly(occasionally not so very covertly), this includes my life as a physician.)

One of my roles as a clinician/physician is coordinating middle of the night care for patients who have suffered some cerebrovascular catastrophe; an intracerebral bleed, a cerebral infarct, a subarachnoid hemorrhage, "a stroke". I am not a neurologist. I work nights, when the world is most beautiful and mysterious, and am in charge of that part of our medical center's intensive care unit that deals with the patients who have just suffered strokes. They come to us from all over northern California, not infrequently, by airplanes. Plenty of patients are quite local as well.

I also am involved in the care of many patients with other types of neurologic problems. I know "some things about neurons".

I am pretty good at what I do, I believe in part because I know a gal cannot be found inside of her brain........


"Heelllllllloooooooo Wendy! You in there ! ? ? ? !

 

[sol invictus]

Thanks to science we have learned that in some cases there are clear and unequivocal genetic foundations for food flavor preference, and especially avoidance which overwhelm cultural conditioning. (See "supertaster^WP".)

Why can't the same be true for sexual attraction?

I'm not saying it can't be - in fact I'd be very surprised if there aren't any genes that influence sexual preference. I just think that what seems to be a basic, underlying premise of this discussion - that people come in two categories, and that split requires an explanation - is unsupported and quite probably untrue.

 

[Patrick1000]

Because a stream's course is affected by bolder does not mean.......

Thanks to science we have learned that in some cases there are clear and unequivocal genetic foundations for food flavor preference, and especially avoidance which overwhelm cultural conditioning. (See "supertaster^WP".)

Why can't the same be true for sexual attraction?

Because a stream's course is influenced/affected by a boulder does not mean large rocks, boulders, fundamentally figure in to the laws of hydrodynamics. And, as a matter of fact, boulders, have nothing at all to do with hydrodynamics, at least not directly at any rate.

Once they, boulders, get big, old, wise, gray, cold, dark, and distant, they do seem to affect the flow of the seas, but then in ways altogether misunderstood and mysterious, indirectly, from a quarter million miles away.

 

[Aridas]

I'm not saying it can't be - in fact I'd be very surprised if there aren't any genes that influence sexual preference. I just think that what seems to be a basic, underlying premise of this discussion - that people come in two categories, and that split requires an explanation - is unsupported and quite probably untrue.

A fair percentage of those who have posted here seem to be more of the opinion that bisexuality is the case for a large percentage of people, with varying genetically and/or early developmentally determined baselines for where on the spread of bisexuality they are. Various cultural, psychological, etc. factors can certainly affect one's choice of partners and admitted desires, within those bounds. As for explanation... it's about as simple as "we want to know everything about how things work, if possible."

Emotions are phenomenological.

Why do we have to say they "are" something, or are like something? Can't we just let them be, experience them, have them? Can't we just allow them to be what they are on their own?

An emotion is not in need of explanation, nor can it be explained, especially NOT in terms of chemistry. That is simply ridiculous. To ask such a question, is in a sense meaningless.

This rather begs a few questions.

1) If one had no neurons, could one still feel emotion?

2) Can emotions be manipulated by means of applied stimulation of the brain?

3) Does loss of large sections of neurons, such as say, the entire frontal lobe, lead to changes in personality or emotions?

4) Can emotions be altered or produced by means of adding chemical substances to the body?

If no to 1 and/or yes to 2, 3, and/or 4, then the safe assumption is that "chemistry" very much does play a part. As for the rest, I think that arguments endorsing ignorance hold little sway in this forum.

The point was/is, why does one's sexual orientation need to be grounded in anything?

And, after this bit of backtracking... let's ask a couple more questions, though I realize that they aren't directly what you asked.

1) Is there any good reason to believe that it isn't grounded in anything, given the rest of the information at our disposal?

2) Is there any reason not to use the tools at our disposal to try to better understand something that we don't understand fully?

 

[Krikkiter]

I have spent my lifetime studying "biology". I study life sciences quite literally every day. I teach biochemistry, physiology and last but not least, clinical medicine as well. I am an attending physician at a teaching hospital in San Francisco.

(When I was a boy, I spent a lot of time doing mathematics. I am not a professional mathematician in the same sense that I am a working doc and a teacher of medicine/physiology/biochemistry, but mathematics colors my life, and albeit most of the time covertly(occasionally not so very covertly), this includes my life as a physician.)

One of my roles as a clinician/physician is coordinating middle of the night care for patients who have suffered some cerebrovascular catastrophe; an intracerebral bleed, a cerebral infarct, a subarachnoid hemorrhage, "a stroke". I am not a neurologist. I work nights, when the world is most beautiful and mysterious, and am in charge of that part of our medical center's intensive care unit that deals with the patients who have just suffered strokes. They come to us from all over northern California, not infrequently, by airplanes. Plenty of patients are quite local as well.

I also am involved in the care of many patients with other types of neurologic problems. I know "some things about neurons".

I am pretty good at what I do, I believe in part because I know a gal cannot be found inside of her brain........


"Heelllllllloooooooo Wendy! You in there ! ? ? ? !

... and you also write stuff for the U.N. right?

 

[Alan]

If you work with people who have had strokes, you should be aware of just how important a person's central nervous system is to who they are. Emotions and sexual lives included.

What types of things might you see in a patient who has had a stroke affecting their hypothalamus?

Perhaps you could read this: http://www.brain-injury-online.com/sexual-dysfunction-and-sexual-performance.html

 

[Pup]

The point was/is, why does one's sexual orientation need to be grounded in anything?

Now there's a question that's harder to answer. Why does one's hair color need to be grounded in anything? Why does one's ability to memorize need to be grounded in anything?

The short answer, of course, is creatures which are able to survive best in changing environments, replicate with variations, which allows natural selection do its work. Things which replicate exactly, or don't replicate at all, can't be affected by natural selection, and so never get "more fit" at what they do.

So people who behave like us (all of us) are the offspring of people who survived and reproduced best in their environment. Apparently, our current combination of sexuality, genetics, sexual types and flexibility among those types, works for now, and if it ain't broke... well, natural selection will let us know when it's not working anymore.

Personally, I think that's pretty amazing, and the world would be a duller place if people hadn't figured that out and were continuing to work on understanding more about it. Being told not to worry about it, goes against all those thousands of ancestors who provided me (and all of us) with genes that make us want to understand how things work.

But so far, we can't really get beyond that, such as why the world developed that way and not some other way. People who aren't satisfied with "we don't know" at that point, usually turn to religion or various spiritual ideas for further answers. Personally, I prefer "we don't know but we're working on it" to "let me make up an answer to satisfy you right now" or, worse yet, "just don't worry your pretty little head about it; you don't need to know."

 

[ponderingturtle]

The point was/is, why does one's sexual orientation need to be grounded in anything?

Because it seems to be, and it can be useful as counter arguments against religious and naturalistic fallacies. People have a harder time blaming people for things that they can not control than things that they can.

 

[ponderingturtle]

A fair percentage of those who have posted here seem to be more of the opinion that bisexuality is the case for a large percentage of people, with varying genetically and/or early developmentally determined baselines for where on the spread of bisexuality they are. Various cultural, psychological, etc. factors can certainly affect one's choice of partners and admitted desires, within those bounds. As for explanation... it's about as simple as "we want to know everything about how things work, if possible."

Here is a something that I have thought about. I like breasts, I never decided to like breasts and likely had some cultural impact on why I like breasts, but it was not a decision or something I am likely to change. So I do not find it strange if people who are bi could be shaped in this way to have a stronger preference for one sex than the other.

 

[Nonpareil]

The point was/is, why does one's sexual orientation need to be grounded in anything?

...because otherwise it exists for no reason?

Everything is grounded in something, Pat. Not even you are arguing against that. You're just arguing that it isn't grounded in something that is entirely naturalistic.

I have spent my lifetime studying "biology".

Then study harder, because it hasn't worked so far.

<snip unverifiable irrelevance>

I know "some things about neurons".

Apparently not half as much as you think you do. Even if one is to believe what you say about your profession, almost everything that you have said in this thread is patently false.

I am pretty good at what I do, I believe in part because I know a gal cannot be found inside of her brain........

No, you believe that a person cannot be found inside their brain. You do not know that. There is a difference.

Because a stream's course is influenced/affected by a boulder does not mean large rocks, boulders, fundamentally figure in to the laws of hydrodynamics. And, as a matter of fact, boulders, have nothing at all to do with hydrodynamics, at least not directly at any rate.

Once they, boulders, get big, old, wise, gray, cold, dark, and distant, they do seem to affect the flow of the seas, but then in ways altogether misunderstood and mysterious, indirectly, from a quarter million miles away.

But we aren't talking about the boulders. We're talking about the riverbeds and ocean floors.

 

[Krikkiter]

For those even slightly interested, P1K's personal opinions should be treated exactly as that - personal opinions.

P1K I take issue with your attempt to build an argument from authority. Especially when your authority is nothing but a personal opinion. This is well documented and it's frankly disgusting that you're trying to deceive others.

 

[Patrick1000]

Funny and very true story

A fair percentage of those who have posted here seem to be more of the opinion that bisexuality is the case for a large percentage of people, with varying genetically and/or early developmentally determined baselines for where on the spread of bisexuality they are. Various cultural, psychological, etc. factors can certainly affect one's choice of partners and admitted desires, within those bounds. As for explanation... it's about as simple as "we want to know everything about how things work, if possible."



This rather begs a few questions.

1) If one had no neurons, could one still feel emotion?

2) Can emotions be manipulated by means of applied stimulation of the brain?

3) Does loss of large sections of neurons, such as say, the entire frontal lobe, lead to changes in personality or emotions?

4) Can emotions be altered or produced by means of adding chemical substances to the body?

If no to 1 and/or yes to 2, 3, and/or 4, then the safe assumption is that "chemistry" very much does play a part. As for the rest, I think that arguments endorsing ignorance hold little sway in this forum.



And, after this bit of backtracking... let's ask a couple more questions, though I realize that they aren't directly what you asked.

1) Is there any good reason to believe that it isn't grounded in anything, given the rest of the information at our disposal?

2) Is there any reason not to use the tools at our disposal to try to better understand something that we don't understand fully?

When I was in medical school, there was this young man who had sustained a major head injury in a MVA. Details aside, the young man wound up having a sizable portion of a frontal lobe resected as part of his treatment.

As I recall, he was about 25 years old or so. He had been in jail several times, always drinking, always cursing, beating his girlfriend, petty theft artist, blah blah blah. Well you can see where this is going. After the head injury and subsequent surgery, he never smacked a gal again, didn't curse, didn't drink. True story. The guy's mother thought he even was MORE INTELLIGENT after the injury and surgery.

Our staff neurosurgeons would laugh and laugh and laugh telling this story to their captive audiences. Most of the time, medical students hate this kind of thing, but in this case, one just had to laugh along, and in earnest. It was that funny. These guy's, the surgeons, would do these imitations of the frontal lobe altered young man's mother and it would really crack us up. She was so thankful. Those insanely talented big shot university neurosurgeons, dad gum!, they had fixed Bobby by removing a piece of his brain!

Sure we should use our tools to understand things, but what is it that you do not understand/know about loving somebody? Seems you do understand it, know it, already to begin with, right out of the blocks there. I do anyway. There SHE! sits, before my eyes. I would do anything for her. Seems that I understand it, know it, perfectly well already.