Poll: Your stance on monogamy?

[Atmos Duality]

50% divorce rate... and that's just with one partner.
Just based on a jealousy model alone, polygamy won't work without coercion and submission.

Unless you just want a harem of sex-slaves, rather than getting to know the actual person.
Then polygamy is great.

 

[Giest4life]

Monogamy is the last vestiges of a dying human race--the race of the "last men," as Nietzsche called them. There is nothing good, noble, and praiseworthy about monogamy. Just as there is nothing special with polygamy.

If we were meant to be monogamous we wouldn't have any desire to cheat.

Simple as.

Penguins don't cheat, in-fact most of the time when one's partner dies. It will simply never mate again. Some die soon after, thoughts are from grief. Wanna know why? Because they were born to be monogamous.

Be careful with that, sir. When you say "we" how sure are you that you speak for 100% of the human populace, the dead, the living, and those that are not yet conceived? I'd be careful with generalizations like that....

It's human nature to be at the very least curious about having sex with other people. Even if someone doesn't cheat, there is a 100% chance that at some point during any relationship they've had. That they have looked at another prospective mate in sexual way. whether or not they act upon it is another matter.

What I am sure of is that monogamy, especially as far as males are concerned, is counter intuitive as far as survival of the species goes. Atleast in a primitive situation. Spreading your genes to as many mates as possible gives you a greater chance of special survival.

That's not so important now. But old habits are hard to kick. Especially ones that are ingrained on you at a genetic level.

I generalise because it's true.

Again, sir. Do you know if it's true for the 100% of those--even males--that have yet to be, those that are, and those that were? It's a disturbing trend that I've seen amongst humans: the trend to state their observations as the "truth."

you're not observant for pointing out the fact that I'm not every human to have ever existed. Is it also right to say that you don't know that every human is born with blood because you haven't tested every human to prove this? I think I choose to believe in hormones over inane philosophical prattle.

Just because you can't prove something to be statistically true doesn't mean it isn't.

If you must know, statistically, nothing is true, because nothing can really be tested to it's fullest. Name me a study in which the sample is the whole human population. A quick search of "statistics" on wikipedia should have yield you the results you need.

Only the ignorant call it "inane philosophical prattle." I guess, you need to fill in the hole in your, so called, "knowledge."

*woosh* right over your head.

That was kind of my point.

And biologically speaking.... yes... what I'm saying is true.

You don't stop being attracted to other people once you're in a relationship. There is no biological proof to suggest anything to that nature. In-fact oxytocin (the chemical linked with human bonding) begins to fade dramatically after only a few years. And rises once again when you find a new partner.

So yes. I'm going to continue calling what you're saying inane philosophical prattle. Because it doesn't mean anything. It's just a blatant fact that has no relevance to my point, dressed up as something poignant.

The fact that I'm not every human to have ever existed doesn't mean that what we know human biology is wrong. Again. Simply because I can't statistically prove something doesn't mean it's wrong... :/

Again, there is no single biological phenomenon that is universal. Every hormone secreted, every brain function, every twitch of the muscle, every beat of the heart is different in every single one of us. You know, the inconvenient word we use to describe everything that doesn't fit our narrative: mutation.

To prove my point, I heard it on npr, last week, this recorded mental patient who would reach orgasm at the sight of pins---yes, pins!

Though I regret I can't remember the exact name of the patient or the therapist who attended, and recorded that guy.

Ever heard the expression. 'The exceptions that prove the rule.' It is of course going to be true that there are anomalies, we're talking about biology here. Not factory crafted beings. For 99% of the population hormones are going to have the exact same effect. There may be slight differences in the process and length of time involved. But they all do the same thing.


There are bound to be those who are considered mentally retarded. And/or haven't reached sexual maturity. They won't have the desire for sex atall. I thought it was clear that I was talking about normal humans. Not the handicapped exceptions.

When someone is talking about the absolute in a discussion like this. They don't mean (including the anomalies.) If I rephrase 'Everyone' To 'Every healthy (mentally and physically) human.' Will you STFU?

I thought that would have been blatantly obvious and readily available to anyone reading. Clearly not.

You have superbly demonstrated the all-too-human folly: "they" are the exception, you are the rule. There are no "anomalies," it is only your ignorance that fails to see what really is. The human brain fears that which it cannot understand--and label--thus we label these as "exceptions" to the rule to prove a point. The fact is, you and nor any science cannot "prove" anything. There will always be "exceptions."

You, your mentality rather, is the reason man is not yet the "ubermensch."

I have one problem with what you are saying.

If biology works so differently for every person on the planet, why do most people bond, mate, and reproduce in roughly the same way?

If significant differences in biology and arousal were the rule, rather than the exception, it seems to me that mating just wouldn't work. There wouldn't be any reliable way for any one human to attract any other human as their mate.

Keep in mind, in terms of the evolutionary history of human beings, metal pins are a relatively recent invention. If that guy was only aroused by pins in 80,000 BC, would he have been able to find a mate and reproduce?

What dathwampeer is trying to say is not that everyone should be the same, or that everyone is the same. He's saying that human beings fit on a bell curve. Most people's anatomy works the same way, and most people respond predictably to biological impulses. Some people are not 'average' or 'normal', in that their biology works slightly differently.

In other words, pin guy may get aroused by unusual stimuli, but the actual feelings of arousal he experiences are probably not too different than anybody else's.

Try thinking about it this way. If everybody's biology was radically different, then how does modern medicine work? How can aspirin be succesfully marketed as an anti-inflammatory if it only works for a very small portion of the population, because only their biology is specifically tuned to allow aspirin to work? How can doctors routinely administer anesthesia, if the anesthetics they use only work for a small group of individuals?

Clearly, this is not the case. Most people's biology works about the same. There are variations (some men like tits, and some men prefer asses), ther are people who fall outside the mean (some people are allergic to aspirin; good luck with that headache), and some people who are outliers (like the guy who can only get it up if he gets stabbed with a sharp object, or whatever).

As for man becoming the "ubermensch", doesn't that involve the creation of a superior race by ELIMINATING all of the outliers, and bringing mankind into a state of consistent perfection? How does that philosophy jive with accepting the outliers as normal? Maybe you can explain that to me.

Basically, your post leads up to the explanation: modern medicine works. Does it? It has a higher percentage of "success" than ancient medicine. But it doesn't work--not to it's 100% claim. Name one pill, surgery, therapy, medicine, treatment, diagnosis for, forget 100% of the population--a hundred percent of people it's applied to.

No, the point of my post WAS NOT that modern medicine works ALL THE TIME (and you'd probably have a hard time finding any doctors who would make that claim. I DID say that some treatments don't work for some people (If you had actually bothered to read my post carefully, you would have noticed that I mentioned some people are allergic to aspirin - an excellent example of that fact).

The point of my post is that most people are about the same in terms of their biology, and that bringing up one random guy who blows his load whenever someone stabs him with a pointy stick doesn't prove that such extreme variances in sexual behavior are the rule and not the exception.

I was using the capabilities of modern medicine to demonstrate this point; if radical biological differences were the rule and not the exception, modern medicine WOULD NOT WORK AT ALL, because it would be impossible to predict what a particular chemical's effects would be on even a small portion of the population.

In reality, most people respond to common drugs in about the same way, and most people have their vital organs in about the same relative locations on their body. Human beings, biologically speaking, fit on a bell curve. Most people are in the middle. Only a small percentage of the population has radically different biology, and that also applies to sexual behavior.

And you didn't answer my question about the ubermensch. I've never read Nietzsche, so I don't know anything about his philosophy other than the very basic tenets.

I apologize for overlooking the ubermensch reference, in truth, it's a really complicated thing. But it's kind of the ideal, an "overman" a person who conquers man.

Also, again, I'm taking about proof. The point that something doesn't work for everything--so you admit--is proof that we really don't have knowledge. We have fragments what resembles knowledge, which we use to replenish our bruised ego. Since modern science is fallible, all I'm saying is that don't hold too much faith in it--there will be a time when people wiser than us will, too, cast it down and write about us in history books as we do of the Greek mythos.

We should not dismiss these things as mere "technicalities," because nothing remains proven while there is a contradiction. Because we then progress on things based on assumptions, which only take us further away from the "truth." But yes, I do agree: Suum Cuique. To each his own.

I'm not 'dismissing' anything. The fact that pin-guy exists (not to mention people with a lot of other weird sexual predilections) is certainly a significant reality.

Still, sometimes we don't need all the details about reality to have a functional understanding of it.

Think about a road map. All it has on it are roads, locations, and major landmarks. You can navigate just fine by it. It doesn't matter if it's missing the individual bushes, trees, stop signs, and the names of all the families that live in every house, it's still a good map.

Of course, we should always strive to learn more about reality, and figure out how all the deviations fit into the big picture. Still, sometimes you don't need a perfect understanding to get things done and make predictions that work most of the time. I don't need to know about all the little quantum fluctuations that occur in my laptop's CPU as it cranks out operations; I just need to know what buttons to press to make it do what I want it to do.

The same holds true for the monogamy discussion. Maybe you can't say monogamy is good or bad for everyone, but most people know enough about human relationships from watching other people interact, and from their own experiences, to think about what might work best for most people.

Of course, it's entirely possible that, even with such experiences, a person might not have enough information to make a decision that would actually work in reality, just like a city map from 1950 probably wouldn't do you much good when navigating in the present day. But even then, just because a person doesn't know enough right now to come up with a good idea, doesn't mean they can't get to that point eventually.

The concept of there being an absolute truth isn't really a practical concept, because we'll never know all the facts about anything. We usually just have to make due with what understanding we have. When our understanding is adequate, we get good results. When it isn't, we get bad results, and start learning more until our understanding improves.

And yes, a lot of the time, bad results come out of bad assumptions, and we have to revise those assumptions before we can start going towards better understanding. It's a constant process.

But once again, just because you don't have a perfect understanding about how something works doesn't mean your understanding is invalid. Sometimes saying something is "generally true" when it's true for 90% of cases isn't invalid, so long as you recognize the other 10% and take it into consideration when making decisions.

What's most curious about your argument is that you insist upon your point while admitting you don't have "enough knowledge." But that is the epistemological question: what do we know? Nothing I--nor any amount of "proof"--will dissuade you from your skewed perception of reality. And i say skewed because it seems so this way.

I will let you have the last word.

 

[Exosus]

Why is there no option for "To each their own?" If you want multiple partners, have them. If you want a single partner, that's great too. If you want to lock yourself up alone and bathe in royal jelly while writing allegorical fiction about the wrong-headedness of universal reproduction, I will support you in that. What people do with their genitals is no concern of mine (or anyone else's).

 

[Pravus]

Oh, boy. Here we go.

Pre-agricultural man has absolutely no concept of monogamy or sexual fidelity. None, zero, zilch. Like agriculture, man invented the concept of monogamy as a way of further commodifying our basic needs under the (then) false assumption that resources (even sexual) were limited. Monogamy and marriage is bred of an extremely sexist impetus, where women were expected to barter their sexuality in exchange for food and protection, which are unnecessary concerns in a (natural) egalitarian setting. For that matter, paternal certainty and the import we place on lineage is an invention that also sprung into existence to establish the passing of property, in response to agriculture, which itself is an arguably unnatural occurrence in our species, and was in all likelihood the product not of limited resources but of megalomania, an outlier behavior that spread through greed and violence (which are sociopathic behaviors, and for the purposes of this discussion: "not natural human behavior" but learned, for most), and not through any evolutionary impulse. Behaviorally, yes, the illusion of scarcity makes us hoarding, jealous, violent people. This goes against our very nature, and this entire problem (monogamy IS one of the problems) stems from the invention of agriculture.

I know that these are hard pills to swallow, but bear with me.

We evolved in a setting where reproductive sex was secondary to sex as a vehicle for social bonding and tension release. In no setting without agriculture (and, for that matter, without gender inequality) does monogamous pair-bonding occur naturally. Agricultural man is a relatively new age for man, and comprises just 10,000 years of our 200,000 year history, and that's not even factoring in the many hundreds of thousands of years prior, linking us most notably to the ultra-egalitarian and sexually promiscuous Bonobos, whose very survival (like early man's) was contingent on the impulses to share not only food but sex as well. These same impulses survive in us today, but we are a very very repressed species whose social conditioning puts us at odds with ourselves constantly.

Let me address the hyperbole that is "agricultural man" and the absurdity that I can purport to say what man was like over 10,000 years ago. To this very day, over a 100 seemingly-disparate tribes exist throughout the world who share some very fundamental things in common, the most important among them is their lack of agriculture. Like early man, they exist today in the most natural setting imaginable, where megalomania and hoarding and sexual stinginess were regarded as detrimental behavior to society, and such individuals are outcast or swiftly punished. Most of these tribes have no words for our concept of marriage (and it baffles them greatly), no words for the concept of war or even murder. When everything (people included) is shared, there is absolutely no need for violence or sexual jealousy, impulses that we fight every single day (which should be indicative enough that "we're doing it wrong"). These fiercely egalitarian tribes behave the way they do because it maximizes not only their chances of survival (when everyone truly cares about each other, and children don't even know who their "real" father is), but because a sexually promiscuous lifestyle reaps so many social AND health benefits.

Marriage is not a human universal. It's a logical development when resources seem scarce and we want to ensure that our offspring are the sole owners of our property, but this is far from a natural impulse. Like the bonobo, human females are the only other species who remain sexually receptive throughout all cycles of menstruation. Like the bonobo, instances of bisexuality are not outliers but are, in fact, the norm, and studies testing what individuals SAY they're attracted to and what their genitalia is saying have shown that bisexuality is more of a rule than an exception. If marriage and offspring bearing are naturally occurring in our species, bisexuality would not even exist. And yet, here it is.

So, the idea of monogamy is especially baffling in the face of female orgasm. Let's overlook the fact that group sex is the most sought after porn by far, and instead look at a simple truth: women take far longer to reach orgasm than men. The reason for this is that, again, we evolved in a setting where women had multiple sexual partners simultaneously, and it was (and really, still is) utterly necessary for several men to do their thing for all individuals involved to reap the full benefits of the sexual experience. Did you know that the uhh, "sounds" a female makes while mating are (like our bonobo cousins) meant only to arouse and bring other men into the equation? Did you know that the first and last spurts of male ejaculate contains a spermicide so that we can "compete" in reproduction after ejaculation and certainly not before? Did you know that the simple act of genitalia plunging and thrusting removes something like 80% of ejaculate? Remember what I said about hunter-gatherer tribes not having paternity certainty, and how children were raised in an environment where every male in the tribe cared for them as their own? This is how prehistoric man developed and what our bodies are still fine-tuned to respond to.

We have a genetic predilection for sexual novelty, and we are absolutely unable to stay sexually excited with one partner without a variety of tricks like, say, closing your eyes and imagining another partner, or role-playing, or using all sorts of jump-start techniques to make the act exciting again. Sexual dysfunction is a misdiagnoses, and we wrongly assume that something is wrong with us or our partner. Our bodies are telling us something. They're not saying "you picked the wrong person to mate with" or even "spread the seed" or "make babies." They're saying we need to socially bond with many others and that we were meant to do this in the most intimate settings.

All the different schools of thought and terminology we use to describe differing sexual behaviors aren't helping the matter. We are meant, as a species, to love and care for those around us, and both men and women have a need not only for physical and sexual intimacy from those around them, but a need for novelty as well. Like the Muoso tribe, I call it friendship, and the idea of romantic foreverness is never naturally factored into my attraction and egalitarian impulses.

Blah blah, I could gab about this for days. Read "Sex at Dawn" if you want to continue the discussion with all the science weighed in rather than conjecture of what the people immediately around us are doing.

tl,dr: "It's wrong, it goes against our base animal instincts."

 

[baiaishan]

I'm in the "whatever floats your boat" category. As long as everyone in the relationship is on the same page, honest, and happy with the situation, what's the harm?

Also, in response to the above poster-- yes, that may be true for many people, perhaps even most people. It may have been true in the past, but there are quite a few people who do things that "go against our base animal instincts." For instance, a relatively recent study suggests that more intelligent people are more likely to have "evolutionarily novel traits." Check out this summary:
http://www.physorg.com/news186236813.html

So I don't think you can just write off monogamy as completely unnatural and leave the discussion there. Monogamy works for some people, regardless of how pre-agrarian societies handled sexuality.

 

[Artina89]

I personally don't want to be in a polygamous relationship, I just want to devote my time to one person, however, if other people want to be in a polygamous relationship (as long as it is consensual) they can, as long as they don't force their views on me they can do what the hell they want as far as I am concerned.

 

[Orekoya]

Monogamy poll, blah blah blah

Uh, to avoid all this non-sense in the past pages, I'm going to just mention that Bullshit [http://www.sho.com/site/ptbs/home.do] episode on Traditional [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npB4XfBTICA] Family Values [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09_49KL6pgM] which covered this and other family value issues.

 

[Pravus]

Baiaishan, articles like that are definitely part of the problem, and it's important to note the many flaws in Kanazawa's very confirmation-biased arguments.

1. For starters, the vast majority of these studies are conducted strictly amongst college-aged students (for course credit) in so-called First World countries. This one cites "Young adults" as its area of focus, which (in the case of confirmation-bias studies such as this one) NEVER includes an actually diverse sample of humans, and completely and conveniently ignores still-existing egalitarian hunter-gatherer tribal people whose responses would utterly invalidate the data. This is Flinstonization to the highest degree.

2. We can't care for an "indefinite number of genetically unrelated strangers." That's really not a possibility. IQ and liberalism won't change that fact. In a natural setting, tribes that exceed approximately 150 members split into two separate tribes. The brain capacity to care for more people than that is not in us, and this is arguably why communism and egalitarianism simply can't work in present day society. There are far too many people, and it's impossible to really truly care whose resources you're taking away if you'll never even meet the person. This is why leaders and politicians constantly hoard resources when they become further separated from their society, because it's so easy to be a sociopath when you don't know who you're affecting.

I'd argue that our expanding population was the impetus behind the arts, and especially storytelling, to remind us of our similarities through the practice of empathy, which is as innate an impulse as they come. These reminders bind us in a way that is otherwise impossible, because there are simply too many strangers among us. But it's not at all "genetically novel" to care about those around us (but there are limits), or to learn to care about strangers through sharing and empathy. That's the setting we evolved in, and not the other way around. Speaking of which...

3. Kanazawa assumes a setting in which women have ALWAYS been restricted sexually (which, again, completely ignores the [if anything] matriarchal leanings of still existing hunter-gatherer tribes today), and this is utterly false both in terms of our biology and our pre-agricultural history. All unbiased signs point to humans having evolved in a multi-male multi-female mating setting, and applying the mating practices of gorillas to humans (who share a far more recent genetic ancestor with bonobos [conveniently ignored in confirmation bias arguments]) is absurd, and becomes an apples to oranges sort of comparison rather than a Granny Smith to Gala comparison. Restricting female libido is a relatively new invention in the history of man (and again, far from ALL of mankind). Women are NOT innately monogamous, as Kanazawa and most others would have us believe. And that's all it is: a belief.

Certainly, to each his own. But I have to address the "it feels right" or "that's just what we do" folks. Feeling isn't fact. "What we do" isn't what we all do. Monogamy unarguably goes against our nature and is extremely troublesome to our health and our cohesiveness as a people.

Now, whether the alternative I suggest is better is another issue entirely, given our enormous population, given the problem of scarcity and anonymity. Marriage and monogamy may well be your best option for happiness in the world as it presently exists at large. Probably, yeah. But I think we ought to know why it's extremely difficult, or an outright failure of a system, and we ought to listen to what our bodies are telling us and make the most informed decisions.

Blah blah.

 

[DanDeFool]

Monogamy is the last vestiges of a dying human race--the race of the "last men," as Nietzsche called them. There is nothing good, noble, and praiseworthy about monogamy. Just as there is nothing special with polygamy.

If we were meant to be monogamous we wouldn't have any desire to cheat.

Simple as.

Penguins don't cheat, in-fact most of the time when one's partner dies. It will simply never mate again. Some die soon after, thoughts are from grief. Wanna know why? Because they were born to be monogamous.

Be careful with that, sir. When you say "we" how sure are you that you speak for 100% of the human populace, the dead, the living, and those that are not yet conceived? I'd be careful with generalizations like that....

It's human nature to be at the very least curious about having sex with other people. Even if someone doesn't cheat, there is a 100% chance that at some point during any relationship they've had. That they have looked at another prospective mate in sexual way. whether or not they act upon it is another matter.

What I am sure of is that monogamy, especially as far as males are concerned, is counter intuitive as far as survival of the species goes. Atleast in a primitive situation. Spreading your genes to as many mates as possible gives you a greater chance of special survival.

That's not so important now. But old habits are hard to kick. Especially ones that are ingrained on you at a genetic level.

I generalise because it's true.

Again, sir. Do you know if it's true for the 100% of those--even males--that have yet to be, those that are, and those that were? It's a disturbing trend that I've seen amongst humans: the trend to state their observations as the "truth."

you're not observant for pointing out the fact that I'm not every human to have ever existed. Is it also right to say that you don't know that every human is born with blood because you haven't tested every human to prove this? I think I choose to believe in hormones over inane philosophical prattle.

Just because you can't prove something to be statistically true doesn't mean it isn't.

If you must know, statistically, nothing is true, because nothing can really be tested to it's fullest. Name me a study in which the sample is the whole human population. A quick search of "statistics" on wikipedia should have yield you the results you need.

Only the ignorant call it "inane philosophical prattle." I guess, you need to fill in the hole in your, so called, "knowledge."

*woosh* right over your head.

That was kind of my point.

And biologically speaking.... yes... what I'm saying is true.

You don't stop being attracted to other people once you're in a relationship. There is no biological proof to suggest anything to that nature. In-fact oxytocin (the chemical linked with human bonding) begins to fade dramatically after only a few years. And rises once again when you find a new partner.

So yes. I'm going to continue calling what you're saying inane philosophical prattle. Because it doesn't mean anything. It's just a blatant fact that has no relevance to my point, dressed up as something poignant.

The fact that I'm not every human to have ever existed doesn't mean that what we know human biology is wrong. Again. Simply because I can't statistically prove something doesn't mean it's wrong... :/

Again, there is no single biological phenomenon that is universal. Every hormone secreted, every brain function, every twitch of the muscle, every beat of the heart is different in every single one of us. You know, the inconvenient word we use to describe everything that doesn't fit our narrative: mutation.

To prove my point, I heard it on npr, last week, this recorded mental patient who would reach orgasm at the sight of pins---yes, pins!

Though I regret I can't remember the exact name of the patient or the therapist who attended, and recorded that guy.

Ever heard the expression. 'The exceptions that prove the rule.' It is of course going to be true that there are anomalies, we're talking about biology here. Not factory crafted beings. For 99% of the population hormones are going to have the exact same effect. There may be slight differences in the process and length of time involved. But they all do the same thing.


There are bound to be those who are considered mentally retarded. And/or haven't reached sexual maturity. They won't have the desire for sex atall. I thought it was clear that I was talking about normal humans. Not the handicapped exceptions.

When someone is talking about the absolute in a discussion like this. They don't mean (including the anomalies.) If I rephrase 'Everyone' To 'Every healthy (mentally and physically) human.' Will you STFU?

I thought that would have been blatantly obvious and readily available to anyone reading. Clearly not.

You have superbly demonstrated the all-too-human folly: "they" are the exception, you are the rule. There are no "anomalies," it is only your ignorance that fails to see what really is. The human brain fears that which it cannot understand--and label--thus we label these as "exceptions" to the rule to prove a point. The fact is, you and nor any science cannot "prove" anything. There will always be "exceptions."

You, your mentality rather, is the reason man is not yet the "ubermensch."

I have one problem with what you are saying.

If biology works so differently for every person on the planet, why do most people bond, mate, and reproduce in roughly the same way?

If significant differences in biology and arousal were the rule, rather than the exception, it seems to me that mating just wouldn't work. There wouldn't be any reliable way for any one human to attract any other human as their mate.

Keep in mind, in terms of the evolutionary history of human beings, metal pins are a relatively recent invention. If that guy was only aroused by pins in 80,000 BC, would he have been able to find a mate and reproduce?

What dathwampeer is trying to say is not that everyone should be the same, or that everyone is the same. He's saying that human beings fit on a bell curve. Most people's anatomy works the same way, and most people respond predictably to biological impulses. Some people are not 'average' or 'normal', in that their biology works slightly differently.

In other words, pin guy may get aroused by unusual stimuli, but the actual feelings of arousal he experiences are probably not too different than anybody else's.

Try thinking about it this way. If everybody's biology was radically different, then how does modern medicine work? How can aspirin be succesfully marketed as an anti-inflammatory if it only works for a very small portion of the population, because only their biology is specifically tuned to allow aspirin to work? How can doctors routinely administer anesthesia, if the anesthetics they use only work for a small group of individuals?

Clearly, this is not the case. Most people's biology works about the same. There are variations (some men like tits, and some men prefer asses), ther are people who fall outside the mean (some people are allergic to aspirin; good luck with that headache), and some people who are outliers (like the guy who can only get it up if he gets stabbed with a sharp object, or whatever).

As for man becoming the "ubermensch", doesn't that involve the creation of a superior race by ELIMINATING all of the outliers, and bringing mankind into a state of consistent perfection? How does that philosophy jive with accepting the outliers as normal? Maybe you can explain that to me.

Basically, your post leads up to the explanation: modern medicine works. Does it? It has a higher percentage of "success" than ancient medicine. But it doesn't work--not to it's 100% claim. Name one pill, surgery, therapy, medicine, treatment, diagnosis for, forget 100% of the population--a hundred percent of people it's applied to.

No, the point of my post WAS NOT that modern medicine works ALL THE TIME (and you'd probably have a hard time finding any doctors who would make that claim. I DID say that some treatments don't work for some people (If you had actually bothered to read my post carefully, you would have noticed that I mentioned some people are allergic to aspirin - an excellent example of that fact).

The point of my post is that most people are about the same in terms of their biology, and that bringing up one random guy who blows his load whenever someone stabs him with a pointy stick doesn't prove that such extreme variances in sexual behavior are the rule and not the exception.

I was using the capabilities of modern medicine to demonstrate this point; if radical biological differences were the rule and not the exception, modern medicine WOULD NOT WORK AT ALL, because it would be impossible to predict what a particular chemical's effects would be on even a small portion of the population.

In reality, most people respond to common drugs in about the same way, and most people have their vital organs in about the same relative locations on their body. Human beings, biologically speaking, fit on a bell curve. Most people are in the middle. Only a small percentage of the population has radically different biology, and that also applies to sexual behavior.

And you didn't answer my question about the ubermensch. I've never read Nietzsche, so I don't know anything about his philosophy other than the very basic tenets.

I apologize for overlooking the ubermensch reference, in truth, it's a really complicated thing. But it's kind of the ideal, an "overman" a person who conquers man.

Also, again, I'm taking about proof. The point that something doesn't work for everything--so you admit--is proof that we really don't have knowledge. We have fragments what resembles knowledge, which we use to replenish our bruised ego. Since modern science is fallible, all I'm saying is that don't hold too much faith in it--there will be a time when people wiser than us will, too, cast it down and write about us in history books as we do of the Greek mythos.

We should not dismiss these things as mere "technicalities," because nothing remains proven while there is a contradiction. Because we then progress on things based on assumptions, which only take us further away from the "truth." But yes, I do agree: Suum Cuique. To each his own.

I'm not 'dismissing' anything. The fact that pin-guy exists (not to mention people with a lot of other weird sexual predilections) is certainly a significant reality.

Still, sometimes we don't need all the details about reality to have a functional understanding of it.

Think about a road map. All it has on it are roads, locations, and major landmarks. You can navigate just fine by it. It doesn't matter if it's missing the individual bushes, trees, stop signs, and the names of all the families that live in every house, it's still a good map.

Of course, we should always strive to learn more about reality, and figure out how all the deviations fit into the big picture. Still, sometimes you don't need a perfect understanding to get things done and make predictions that work most of the time. I don't need to know about all the little quantum fluctuations that occur in my laptop's CPU as it cranks out operations; I just need to know what buttons to press to make it do what I want it to do.

The same holds true for the monogamy discussion. Maybe you can't say monogamy is good or bad for everyone, but most people know enough about human relationships from watching other people interact, and from their own experiences, to think about what might work best for most people.

Of course, it's entirely possible that, even with such experiences, a person might not have enough information to make a decision that would actually work in reality, just like a city map from 1950 probably wouldn't do you much good when navigating in the present day. But even then, just because a person doesn't know enough right now to come up with a good idea, doesn't mean they can't get to that point eventually.

The concept of there being an absolute truth isn't really a practical concept, because we'll never know all the facts about anything. We usually just have to make due with what understanding we have. When our understanding is adequate, we get good results. When it isn't, we get bad results, and start learning more until our understanding improves.

And yes, a lot of the time, bad results come out of bad assumptions, and we have to revise those assumptions before we can start going towards better understanding. It's a constant process.

But once again, just because you don't have a perfect understanding about how something works doesn't mean your understanding is invalid. Sometimes saying something is "generally true" when it's true for 90% of cases isn't invalid, so long as you recognize the other 10% and take it into consideration when making decisions.

What's most curious about your argument is that you insist upon your point while admitting you don't have "enough knowledge." But that is the epistemological question: what do we know? Nothing I--nor any amount of "proof"--will dissuade you from your skewed perception of reality. And i say skewed because it seems so this way.

I will let you have the last word.

Then the last word will be this:

Right back at ya', chucklecuz. Epistemology is a two-way street.

You're saying that my perception of reality is skewed, but what if you feel this way because YOUR perception of reality is skewed? If people don't really understand anything, how is it that YOU have come to understand that people don't understand anything, if people's inability to understand anything would preclude you from understanding that people don't understand anything?

You're working on the assumption that one must have complete knowledge in order to be right, but what if that assumption is wrong? Isn't it possible to say something true without understanding why it is true? Isn't a stopped clock right twice a day?

Well, not if it's a 24-hour clock. Then it's only right once a day.

To assume that you 'know' something, can be a dubious prospect to be sure, but reality insists that we do this in order to survive. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. The only consistent truth is that human beings must consistently challenge and revise their beliefs, not to attain absolute truth, but merely to survive in a world we can understand very little about. However, just because 'knowledge' is sketchy at best, doesn't mean it doesn't work AT ALL. The very fact that we're having this discussion is proof that knowledge works at least some of the time.

Well, we've gone from debating the merits of monogamy to dissecting the value of knowledge and the nature of reality. At this point, I think we'd better just agree to disagree and move on to something else.

 

[MassiveGeek]

People can do what they want in my opinion.
But that doesn't mean I won't state my personal opinion back at them.

I absolutely love my boyfriend, he provides everything I need in a relationship and I wouldn't dream of being with anyone else as long as I'm with him, which I hope will be a long, wonderful time.

Just him is well more than enough for me.

But if some other people want to have a ton of girl and boyfriends, and everyone feels great about it - sure, go ahead. As long as everything is cool for everyone involved.

 

[Naheal]

Other: I don't care what others do. Any man who wants to tie himself to multiple women will get what he's asking for, though.

 

[Beliyal]

@Pravus, your post is very well structured and informative, thanks

But I tend to think that our "natural animal instincts" cannot be applied to us anymore. If we apply them, we ignore thousands of years of culture and civilization and, above all, evolution. We are biologically still animals and there's nothing wrong with that, but in all other aspects, we are not and we are not driven by pure natural animal instincts (I'm not counting the need for food, water and reproduction here, since no living creature can survive without those). Humans had a lot of "animal instincts" that became unnecessary (such as having 10 or more children; yes, some people still do have that much, but it is unnecessary) because we developed and evolved. And I believe it is wrong to take our "animal instincts" as an excuse to do certain things. We outgrew and learned how to control them; that's what makes us human. So yeah, while that might have been the norm in the past and while it can still be the norm in primitive societies where everyone is used to it and approves of it, it is definitively not the norm in a fully developed world that has all the commodities that we have. Above all, it is unnecessary, unless it is used for pleasure. But then you don't really have to marry and form an official polygamous relationship with 10 people; just be single and have another partner every week. I guess that is our version of polygamy. But for settling down and having a family? Not really something I would consider necessary, or even smart when it comes to resources (five women in the house? Do you have any idea how much money would just the make-up cost? )

On the other hand, I wouldn't practice polygamy and I wouldn't want my partner to practice it either. Maybe it's my possessive side, but I wouldn't like to share my partner with other women. And if he ever thought of doing that, I'd inevitably think that I am not enough, in any aspect, and that he definitively doesn't love me enough. Why else would he want to have 4 more women besides me? Same can be applied to myself; if I felt the need for other men, I would feel it only because the one I have was not good/enough, which means that I have no purpose in being with him if I don't love him.

I don't disapprove of polygamy though, but only if it's a mutual agreement and the wish of both (all?) partners, and I also don't see the need for it to extend to marriage. If you want to have multiple partners at the same time, and all of them agrees, well, it's your/their choice. In any other way, it would be "submissive sex-slave harem" as someone already said, and somehow, that doesn't strike me as something we should end up like, after thousands of years of civilization.

 

[Cheesebob]

Theorectically its not normal.

For instance, Polyandry (a women with multiple husbands) works because it makes sure that the birth rate is somewhere to 1/2 to 1/6th it would originally be if all those husbands had wives. This is brilliant for poorer countries.

Also, I assume most of you are from 1st world countries and have been brought up in a christian country (or one with christian ideals) so you have been conditioned to believe that monogamy feels right. Its not right, nor is it wrong. its just the society we live in.

Even then in times of war, polygamy can be legalised to boost moral and the population.

So I believe it doesn't feel right, its just what I have been conditioned to believe all my life. Would I change it? Well no, because I know no better or worse or different.

 

[Ava Elzbieta]

Where's the "It's right because a relationship is built on trust and cheating violates trust" option? Or, simply, "It's right because I don't want to hurt my partner."

 

[Pravus]

@Pravus, your post is very well structured and informative, thanks

Thank you! I appreciate your thoughtful response as well. =)

I do and I don't mean to imply that we should revert back to a more polyamorous setting. The idealist in me certainly does, and I feel like every major step I've taken into adulthood has been in reconciling who I really am vs. what society wants me to be (and that this should be everyone's growing process), and that is absolutely a path towards inner peace and happiness--says my inner-idealist. Realistically, we have STI's and accidental pregnancies to concern ourselves with, and the woes of limited resources that child-bearing creates in a world of scarcity.

To that end, I think that responsible promiscuity with due protection and utter openness to all partners involved is our best compromise at not being at odds (at the very least) with our sexuality, but it's still a very difficult system to perform effectively. As you've noted, jealousy is not easily overcome, nor is the ideal that we ought to have one consistent partner from death do us part. I've run into my own obstacles with these problems, and I can't deny their relevance in arguing against a sexually egalitarian ideal.

Ah, I must disagree with the notion that humans reproduced in excess (10 or more babies), as this would have been utterly impractical for a foraging tribe who was constantly on the go, and really isn't the reality of prehistoric man. Before agriculture, our population as a species pretty much flat-lined (and in fact dipped to just a handful of people several times through near-apocalyptic events throughout history), but it was never advantageous for our species to reproduce in excess. Again, the "too many people" problem creates inevitable anonymity and we lose the capacity to care if we exceed a certain number of people in our tribe (or "family," if you will).

And I think you're both right and wrong about what makes us "human." Certainly, our society's present definition is characterized by repression and aggressive idealogical reshapings, but I'd like to think that what really makes us human is recognizing how much we've been bullshiited into changing our behavior, and ultimately recognizing how similar all of our needs are when unfettered by cultural demands and politics, so that we can at least emulate some kind of otherwise impossible mass-empathy. Says the idealist in me.

 

[NoNameMcgee]

It's not wrong or right... It's about what you personally want. As long as polygamy is all consensual I mean, it's just a lifestyle choice.

 

[TheLaofKazi]

To each their own, as long as everybody involved is cool with it. I think it's possible for both types of relationships to be mentally and physically healthy and enjoyable, it all depends on the people involved.

 

[Nieroshai]

Religion aside, I'm mainly monogamous because that's the way I'm wired. I'm loyal to the core, yet have only enough patience for one steady partner.

 

[HK_01]

It's right, because that's what the society I live in considers a moral standard. Also, it seems quite natural for humans, otherwise we wouldn't live this way.

 

[Giest4life]

Here, once again, Human Folly raises its ugly head: your claim to "understand" Nietzsche are entirely unfounded. Hell, I don't think Nietzsche himself had a firm grasp on what he was thinking--and writing--and the same would go for Kant. Pride is a good thing, said Nietzsche, but don't impress upon yourself a claim to understand Nietzsche--which is why I never used him as an argument. Also, Spark Notes don't count when you read Nietzsche.

As I have said before, it is precisely our claim that we know logic, mathematics, metaphysics, and Philosophy that renders us so useless. We claim to "know" so many things, and yet we demonstrate so little of it.

And once again you sidestep all of the points upon realising that you don't actually have an argument to make.

I didn't say I could write an in-depth book on Nietzsche and his works. But there are things you can understand from reading him. Basic understanding and mastery are two very different things.

And you were clearly at the very least alluding to Nietzsche with your pointless ?ubermensch? comment, oh so many posts ago.

And I have no idea what 'spark notes' are. Are they like Cliffnotes or something?

All I have to say to your last paragraph is to repeat this from earlier.

?Understanding and mastery are two different things.?

We clearly have humans who understand a great many things. Yet there is likely few who've mastered anything.

"Basic understanding" that you claim, is actually dangerous to the intellect. Go all in, or nothing. If things were so simple, that they could have been broken down into "basic" tenants for people to understand, we wouldn't have the thousands of sects, view points, nuances, and factions that we have now. No doubt your "basic understanding" comes at a cost of not understanding anything of relevance. My "ubermensch" is a reference not to Nietzsche; it is to an ideal.

Also, as with everything, you claiming that I don't have an argument does not make it say--well maybe for you. It only shows that you don't want an argument.

And yes, sparknotes are cliffnotes.

It really is just pointless talking to you isn't it?

Basic understanding is all we have. There are obvious levels of human understanding, from absolutely zero to relatively comprehensive. No true scientist claims to have total knowledge of anything. Because through research and hypothesis. We inevitably expand on our original understanding. IT IS NOT DANGEROUS. It is how we develop understanding. Without the basic understanding. How exactly would we come to have total understanding?

Knowledge isn't something we can just meditate on and pray for. We have to wok for it. The way you are talking is very dangerous. It's so nihilistic I could spit. You seem to think that everything we know is wrong simply because we can't prove that it is 100% correct. (The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence) Patterns and observable correlations do actually mean something. If only that they are the key to eventually reaching total knowledge. If such a thing could even exist.

Simply saying 'we don't understand anything fully so we should just accept that and not understand anything at-all', is so ass-backwards in dark-age zeal that I want to scream in rage that there are still people who think and practice it.

As humans. I believe we are going to have to always accept that we can't know 100% about anything. But that should not discourage us from believing in what we currently think to be correct. If we approach everything in a fair and logical way. Then eventually. We will correct most of our commonly held misnomers. This is evidenced in history. And thousands of years from now, people may look back at this time as an age of relative ignorance to their present. Just as we do to those who lived thousands of years before us. But it will have been through our mistakes and our triumphs that they found what they believe to be truth. This is human progression. And sitting back feeling smug because you think you've found out something special in that no one truly knows anything get's us precicely nowhere.

That's the problem I have with you.

And Nietzsche is credited for the concept of Ubermensch. It's not really odd that I'd assumed you mentioning was your way of alluding to it,

It seems that we have reached the exact same conclusion. Had you read my original post on the subject (though I don't fault you for that). I had merely suggested to a user that broad generalizations should serve no purpose in such a personal thing as human relationships. That was all.

But what I do dispute is your assumption that things are "fair," "logical," and "true." Each and everyone of them were, are, and will change with each passing thought in each an everyone of us. It is a gross mistake to say that we should look at things in a "logical" manner and strive to achieve "fairness" in what we do. These things simply don't exist. Our basic cerebral processes have changed continuously, and the manner at which we experience the world are in a constant flux. Any idea of "logic" "rationality" and "justice" you come to will be smashed by a later generation, and then we will be back to square one.

This is what I'm advocating we should change.

I read your original post. I still disagree with it. Human biology isn't so diverse. chemically. Most of us are the same. Hormones play a large enough part in our love lives for me to generalise accurately. Normality isn't just a concept. Especially when you're talking about biological normality.

Logic isn't really something that suffers from the passage of time. It can strengthen. But it still follows the same basic pattern as it did thousands of years ago. And hubris aside. It is clearly heading in the right direction. The last few hundred years have been so important scientifically. With the secularisation of societies. Discovery has bloomed. Just because things we've found out will be expanded upon and re-written after we're dead doesn't mean we should act as if we're not correct now. And our current definitions of fairness and truth are all we can act upon. Until someone re-writes them to be more accurate.

And the conclusion from my last post isn?t something I've just arrived at. I've always know the fragility of understanding. I just choose not to let that hinder my though process. We can't imagine the changes the new few hundred years will bring to science. We make do with what we currently understand.

I respectfully disagree. Especially with the logic part.

Logic isn't a separate entity. It's a fragment of human understanding--his fragile spirit and reasoning.

I see what you are saying with us acting upon our available knowledge, now. But all I'm saying is that we need to break this cycle, and come with new standards of knowledge. It may be a futile effort, because as Nietzsche said, "truth is the folly without which certain species can't survive." But that, to me, is no deterrent.

Also, if it may seem that I'm denying the usefulness of science, I'm not. I'm merely suggesting that our faith in it seems unfounded, but that I guess, is the characteristic of faith.

I think that logic itself has changed very little. For instance. The logic behind simple mathematics can't possibly have changed. Because maths is a constant. Although very complex theories are proven and then dis-proven. The basics of maths has been and will always be the same. It's the language that transcends everything. And perhaps the best evidence of logic. I suppose it could be argued that different forms of logic have changed dramatically. But when you saw down to the bone. Logic itself cannot actually change.

I don't think we can come up with a new standard of knowledge. You simply can't know something until someone has hypothesised, explained and tested it. And as you point out nothing can ever be tested to it's fullest. By our very nature. Our slow acquisition of knowledge through trial and error is all we have. We can't just do away with it because it's ineffective. If there are better ways of obtaining knowledge. We don't know about them yet. And our mind's likely can't comprehend let alone decipher them.

We're just working with what we have.

Science is the 21st century religion in many respects. There are still people who make outlandish claims and just expect people to believe them obediently. I for one wouldn't argue with Hawkins on the universe. Even though all he can do is postulate. I'm not intelligent enough to argue with him. But we just have to be as vigilant as possible. Learn and understand what we can, so we're not merely running on an almost religious blind faith in science. The mere fact anyone with any understanding of science admits that everything is debatable is proof enough that we're heading in the right direction. Years ago people dealt in firm absolutes. Science is progressing in the right direction and about as fast as one could hope.

The logic of math hasn't changed? Logic of math has changed. It is only be overlooking the obvious jarring flaws in the logic that has kept it from changing. Kinda like building the tower of Pisa: you know it's crooked, but you keep building upon it because you think it's too expensive to abandon it now. They are a LOT of assumptions when it comes to solving even the simplest of math problems. Logic, again, is your creation--a creation which is obviously flawed.

You're working with what you have, you say, well I'll tell that what you have isn't very much and it isn't very good. You claim that just because science is intelligible, we're heading in the right way. That my friend is very cynical, I tell you; a train track laid with only a few degrees off will lead you very, very far from where you want to be when the continent ends.

There are just as many firm absolutes yesterday as they are today, but what ires me isn't our inability to achieve a perspective beyond man (hence the term, ubermensch), it is our unwillingness to achieve it. The larger society is, I know, fearful of the change and this is what makes society particularly despicable. I always thought Montesquieu was a bit harsh on mankind when he declared us creatures of fear, but I guess he wasn't.