On Fri, 24 Oct 2003, Keith Hudson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>Ray,
>
>At 11:05 24/10/2003 -0400, you wrote:
>>Yes but is it genetic?
>>
>>REH
>
>No, it isn't in my view -- for the vast majority of homosexuals. There
>is a very small number of people (as intimated in the article) who have
>genuine problems of identity caused by brain development/hormonal
>anomalies and one feels deeply sorry for their psychological confusion.
>There is only one published research paper that I'm aware of looking for
>genetic causes of ordinary homosexuality and, if I remember rightly, the
>findings were subsequently demolished and the author admitted failure to
>prove his case even thopugh he still believed in a genetic cause. I don't
>think you will find a single authoritative geneticist in the world who
>believes in the genetic basis of 'ordinary' homosexuality. Bearing in
>mind the large number of biologists and geneticists who are likely to be
>practising homosexuals you would have thought that some genetic reason
>would have been found -- if it existed.
Keith, I'm surprised you haven't synthesized from your own information
the likely process here. You have been posting lately about epigenetics,
the processes whereby environmental factors affect genes, so that
divers phenotypes can result from the same genotype. Combine this
knowledge with the epidemiological evidence linking homosexual
male offspring with "high strung" anxiety-prone mothers, and you
have a simple recipe for an epigenetic effect resulting from stress
hormone levels during pregnancy. This means you won't find any
clear evidence looking for purely genetic effects, but at the
same time, the effect is hardly due to "free choice" on the part
of the subjects. This should be quite obvious anyway: I already knew
I was clearly and irrevocably heterosexual by the age of three, as I
could tell by my physiological and psychological reactions to beautiful
female forms in life or in imagery, even though I didn't understand
why they occured. There was no hope in hell any sort of "predatory
intervention" by someone promoting another sexual orientation was
ever going to have any effect on me other than deep revulsion. The
wiring was already way too deep and too complete. There was never
any state of ambiguity or conscious choice subject to social pressure,
as one must surely expect, otherwise however would all the other
non-social mammals get it right enough to maintain their species?
It would take, I suggest, a pretty extraordinary set of circumstances
for this most basic of instincts to become so submerged that social
pressure could overwrite it in a majority of cases, and one that has
not occurred.
-Pete Vincent
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