UniversalAC said:
I'm not the one missing the point, or mixing up evolutionary arguments with extremely modern ones. I'm guessing that's because I don't have an agenda in this, and it seems everyone else talking right now has a personal stake in it.
It's not quite as modern as you might think... Humans are dedicated tool users, that's an ability we gained via the evolutionary trait of having larger brains that are directly fed by the main arteries to our heads. If you look at virtually every other mammal those arteries feed to their jaw muscles. So we evolved to have weaker jaws, but better brains, those better brains allowed the compensation by encouraging tool use and tool making.
So we sit here assuming that asexuality in humans has a evolutionary basis via genetics; however, you take it to the point of a dysfunction, or handicap. Well a human who isn't driven by sexual impulses does have advantages. For example; while others are busy seeking sex, an asexual human isn't bothered by that, thus has more time to dedicate to other things. Other things; like inventing new tools, improving existing tools, finding more efficient ways to prepare food; maintaining fires that discourage predators from approaching, upkeep to the encampment, and so on... Doing such things instead of doggedly pursuing sex have a lot of potential to make that person look more desirable, because they're spending more time on making life easier. So another might see that person as a better potential mate and companion. That one person being asexual becomes less of an issue, because once a relationship is established, many asexual people will engage in sex to please their partner, or to have offspring. So you've got a person here that is doing constructive things instead of having sex, while at the same time those constructive things make them seem like an ideal mate. You've been running under the condition that asexuals always abstain, but that's not exactly the case, which means there is quite a good potential that an asexual person's genes will still get passed on.
Still the genetic argument has a flaw. While there are genetics that are linked to asexuality, homosexuality, and bisexuality, possibly even transgenderism, they're not the only factors. You're leaving out neurological factors, which can be influenced environment at least as much as genetics, if not more so. You're not factoring in hormone influences, both those that occur on a day to day basis, and those provided in the womb before birth. Along with those, there's also factors of subconscious/unconscious thought processes, which can be effected by both neurological and environmental conditions. Speaking of environmental conditions, ones that put stress on a population could partially explain these traits that work against reproduction. If it's getting harder to get by, producing individuals who are less like to reproduce is beneficial for two reasons: The first is that you're still adding a useful member to the group, the second is that as it gets harder to survive their lower likelihood to reproduce means less hungry, helpless children to care for later. So there is a natural form of population control that's beneficial, in that it helps provide better survival for others in the group. Since humans are social animals that live in groups, having ones that might not reproduce, but still function otherwise, still helps provide to the resources necessary to survive.
It reminds me of a species of birds I saw in a documentary, that the name of escapes me now, some in the flock will gravitate to the top of the trees. Doing that allows them to act as defenders of the flock and decoys for predators, thus protecting the nests, eggs, and young of the other members of their flock. Sure this gives them a drastically lower chance of reproducing, but at the same time it provides security to the others, a valid survival mechanism that helps ensure the species continues. Survival mechanisms like these pop up all over the natural world, which means us humans posses our own kind of mechanism. A counter reproductive trait might not be ideal to the individual, but they tend to be beneficial to the species as a whole, by helping ensure the success of others.
On a final note: There are species that are intensely competitive when it comes to mating, to the point they'll kill off young of their rivals to make the females need to mate again. These animals are also extremely sensitive, from a survival standpoint, to external stress factors, which harms their survivability as a species. Meaning they see drastic population declines during any suboptimal conditions, sometimes to the point of extinction. So there's that too.
