Search Results for: Homosexuality

Homosexuality, epigenetics, and zebras

Posted on January 12, 2013 by gcochran9

The recent article in the Quarterly Review of Biology has some good points. It does not argue that homosexuality is adaptive, which would be silly. It does not argue for Lamarckian epigenetics, which would also be silly. I should also … Continue reading →

Posted in Homosexuality | 172 Comments

Group Selection (and homosexuality)

Posted on January 10, 2013 by gcochran9

You can imagine situations in which natural selection would favor an increase in frequency for a trait that aided group survival while hurting individual reproductive success – but it’s not all that easy. Here’s the problem: imagine a situation in … Continue reading →

Posted in Homosexuality | 137 Comments

Paternal Age and Homosexuality

Posted on January 6, 2013 by gcochran9

There’s something interesting about the paternal age effect in homosexuality – apparently there isn’t one. It certainly exists for autism, schizophrenia, manic-depression, and mental retardation, which suggests that de novo mutations play an important role in all of them. But … Continue reading →

Posted in Homosexuality | 119 Comments

Kolmogorov’s options

Posted on May 19, 2021 by gcochran9

A while ago, Scott Aaronson wrote about Kolmogorov’s way of dealing with life in a Stalinist paradise. He mentions how Kolmogorov testified against his former mentor Luzin. It is suggested that Kolmogorov was blackmailed into doing this by the secret … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 35 Comments

Gay genes

Posted on September 23, 2019 by gcochran9

A recent paper discussed the results of a GWAS study of same -sex behavior, based on data from the UK Biobank. The data wasn’t ideal – it was based on self-reporting, and asked whether the respondent had ever had a … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 131 Comments

Not Even Yong

Posted on October 17, 2015 by gcochran9

There was some noise at ASHG about someone (Tuck Ngun) claiming that he’d found evidence supporting that idea (published a couple of years ago) that homosexuality might be caused by epigenetic leakage. Which I doubted.  Everyone seems to have disbelieved … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 38 Comments

Transsexuals

Posted on May 8, 2013 by gcochran9

Transsexuals, people that believe their psychological gender conflicts with their physical gender, are not a particular evolutionary paradox, because they’re far rarer than homosexual men. One in tens of thousands of men seek sex reassignment surgery – that is, pay … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 166 Comments

Evolution of Virulence

Posted on April 24, 2013 by gcochran9

Once upon a time, I thought a lot about evolution and pathogens.  I still do, on occasion. It used to be the case [and still is] that many biologists thought that natural selection would inevitably tend towards a situation in … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 60 Comments

Biological Determinism

Posted on April 21, 2013 by gcochran9

[“On a chilly Ohio Saturday morning in 1979, some time after divorcing his first wife Linda, Jim Lewis awoke in his modest, middle-class home next to his second wife, Betty. Jim – a romantic, affectionate type – was determined that … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 95 Comments

Not Final!

Posted on April 18, 2013 by gcochran9

In mathematics we often prove that some proposition is true by showing that  the alternative is false.  The principle can sometimes work in other disciplines, but it’s tricky.  You have to have a very good understanding  to know that some … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 70 Comments