Re: Patriarchy: Re: What Matriarchy?
Bryant (mycol1@unm.edu)
5 Sep 1996 15:11:34 -0600
In article <qp+5T$AH5uLyEwum@oldcity.demon.co.uk>,
Shez <shez@oldcity.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In article <50i423$3fmk@argo.unm.edu>, Bryant <mycol1@unm.edu> writes
>Perhaps my memory is slipping ,but I do seem to recall, statistics
>showing that many rapists, do not eject, and do not leave semen in the
>vagina, Surely that is not a evoulutionary adaption, its just a need to
>control, to be powerfull,
1. I wasn't defending the specific hypothesis of rape being an evolved
mating strategy for males--only the right of scientists to test that
hypothesis.
2. Current adaptiveness can be a tricky way to assess ancestral fitness.
If I were inclined to defend the hypothesis, I'd probably argue that
*if* rape led to pregnancy only one time in fifty, and men raped when
they had little chance of mating non-coercively, then rape behavior
would be favored by natural selection, *unless* there were sure and
severe costs to the rapist's fitness.
>how can you fit your general theory that rape
>is ok, because it is a natural adaption into those statistics.
>to me those who rape a woman or a man, are the lowest form of life.
Um, what are you trying to say? Nobody presented a general theory that
rape is "ok" or morally acceptable. That was a view explicitely denounced
by all sides of this discussion.
Nature cannot inform our morality. If it did, we would think that killing
babies and eating our mates were acceptable, because these things occur in
nature.
>it may not be a scientific theory , but it is mine.
>I am sure you will adapt and come up with an answer.
Actually, your moral statement is not a "theory" at all (neither is the
evolutionary hypothesis of rape being discussed).
A theory is a hypothesis that has been so well tested that folks have begun
to feel that it's safe to treat it as if it might actually be an accurate
approximation of the way a given something is.
The idea being discussed is a "working hypothesis," tested only once (by
Thornhill but none of his critics). Hence it's still a hypothesis.
Your statement was moral assertion, and is of course utterly untestable,
scientifically. 'That make sense?
Cheers,
Bryant
>Shez shez@oldcity.demon.co.uk
|