Debunking Sexual Selection in Dating

It blows my mind how you explained it to him and he sounded like he got it but kept going. 

As a person with both a zoology and cultural anthropology degree, I hate it when pop psychologists and creepy men try to defend or excuse misogynistic behavior by saying “but it’s natural”.

Your points are both very good:
1) Culture is all about structuring society so we don’t act out on our impulses.
2) This misinterpretation of Darwinism began early and from the very beginning was used for terrible things, mainly the theories of inferior and superior races and the idea that humans can and should accelerate selection through eugenics.

The other thing that counters this “men are naturally sperm distributors” idea is that, even among primates, there is a wide range of “natural” behaviors from monogamy, to matriarchy, to patriarchy, to “free love”. There’s no obvious “best” arrangement.

In human societies, the foundation of stable relations between people, sexual or other, has been the ability to trust. In our society, we have success when we agree on how we’d like to act toward each other and stick to it. Crisis comes when that ability to rely on other people fails.

The reason men have a mushroom shaped head on their penis, is to literally work like a plug to withdraw another man's semen. (It's real, Google it).

Women can have sex with multiple men on a night, without stopping. Men cannot.

We could use all these facts to theorise that women are supposed to sleep with many men. Yet most do not.

My answer to this ridiculous logic is that we are civilized now, and if you want to be with the other civilized humans, you will have to treat them in a civilized way.

Sounds like evo psych ("evolutionary psychology") nonsense.

This answer only works if offspring need little to no care. Considering a) humans are a social species and b) we are the few to only species that can raise another child while still tending to the need of and infant born before it indicates that multiple parent rearing was needed. To add with, the exposure of men to their infants drops their testosterone levels permanently by a third in order to facilitate more nurturing.

Tl;dr: this guy is saying has no idea about childhood mortality and thriving, or motherhood mortality, and limited it to see capability rather than species outcomes. 0/10, do not ecology further.

Edit to add: Outcomes of children raised in 2 parent households also point to communal rearing. Greater success rates and thriving in children from 2 parents. Also, fatherhood is linked with thriving in children.

The ability of humans to have physiological, chemical responses to partners shows pair bonding behavior, something that humans can't just will into existence, but has evolved over soooo many generations, indicates the breed and leave progression not suitable for our species. In fact, such behavior indicates an abnormal organism in our species that is lacking and shouldn't be selected as a mate in the first place.

Has he heard of bonobos?

Closest relative species to humans. They live polygamous, and there’s lots of sex going on that has various social functions around the bonding between individuals and stress resolution within the group, and that includes a wide variety of homosexual stuff.

That sort of manosphere, pseudoscientific understanding of natural selection is, at best, childish and coming from a place of ignorance. It relies heavily on generalizing human behavior based on a very small and cherry-picked selection of (often not particularly intelligent) animals.

Human beings are always already social creatures; there's no such thing as presocial man. Intelligence, communication, and sociality are among our principle survival mechanisms (also a willingness to eat almost anything, but that's neither here nor there). Anything that jeopardizes group cohesion is antithetical to survival instincts. 

A certain kind of man (usually prone to libertarianism) likes to believe the silly fairy tales about caveman nuclear families. They like the narrative of the individual man protecting his family from "predators", but that's a just-so tale to justify their antiquated world view rather than anything rooted in evidence. Humans have always lived in groups of mutual care where each contributed to the protection of all.

Ask him if he plans on dying by the age of 35, having fathered a dozen kids but only two will survive to age of five?

Ask him if he grabs food off a stranger’s plate when he’s hungry. No? He’ll wait and handle his own food requirements without starting shit with other people?

If he can manage to restrain his reactions to his appetite, he can manage to restrain his actions related to sexual urges and be in a monogamous relationship.

I think the arguments you put forth were very good and I'm glad you won't be seeing him again.

I think the gist of these types of arguments that some men make are basically "men are more likely to cheat because biology and thus we [the men] aren't responsible or accountable for what we do. But it's really important that women be faithful".

'Men have a natural instinct to have sex with as many women as possible' Ok but how many of those offspring can he realistically provide for? Food/shelter/safety etc. That's a huge hole in the logic of that argument unless it's insinuating that women were meant to exclusively provide care and shelter for an infant that is constantly squalling and can't walk or feed itself for a year and somehow keep herself warm and fed... I just don't know if can ever buy into that line of thinking.

The worst part is its based on a piss poor understanding of sexual selection

Sounds like premeditated cheater that wants to say later, "you knew what you were signing up for"

I think there's a distinction that should be drawn between what are possible explanations for certain instinctual behaviors existing and using them as some kind of moral justification for the resulting behaviors in humans.

A male of any species using force to copulate with a female can be a reproductively successful method; because humans are capable of reason and the concept of morality, we call that rape.

This reminds me of a guy who compared sex with women to using a bathroom. It was something like" I would prefer a gold toilet but a gas station toilet at 2am will do". I had to point out that us guys do not need sex to function its a natural want not a need for an individual's wellbeing. It flew over his head and he says "it is cool you do not need sex. More power to you"

There is a difference between having an intrinsic tendency as a result of our evolutionary heritage and that being the primary motivating factor in actual behavior.

Other important and relevant factors also include countervailing genetic considerations, pre and post natal effects, early development, overall upbringing, environmental and cultural influences, socialization with peers etc.

Also, the study of sex differences in humans has been and continues to be a contentious subject in academia. You can search Google Scholar for papers on evolutionary perspectives on human mating, sexual selection in humans etc. A vast amount of literature has accumulated over the past several decades.

There are tons of monogamous animals. I really just can’t bring myself to get past that idea lol. Monogamy isn’t unique to humans.

You finished the date? You’re much more tolerant than I am. Good for you trying to elicit an empathy response. Shame it went nowhere.

Speaking of "natural tendencies" - the male human penis evolved to be plunger shaped in order to scoop the semen of the previous male from the females vagina; so "naturally" - women should have multiple partners.

(an example of the same psuedo-science being used to come to the opposite conclusion)

. This literally makes me think of growing up and my mom telling me repeatedly… “men and boys will tell you exactly what you want to hear or make up guilt trips to get in your pants. You make your choice if your feeling it go for it but don’t get coerced into it. “ also his pseudo science theory leaves out a whole bunch of variables. Like people with higher libido’s.

Wow does he yeet dookie too?

I bet it felt pretty awful.

It was probably just anger, actually.

That ideology always baffled me. Let's say it's true - in the wild men would just hump everything available because biology. Then why the fuck would women, in that same imaginary habitat, seek out men to protect them and their young? If all men just want to reproduce and that's it, then zero men would be sticking around to protect anyone. By that logic, women would never expect them to protect anything, so that would never be a factor in their choosing a mate.

That's the worst pickup attempt I've ever heard

TLDR: Any study done by evolutionary psychologists has 1) a small sample size that's drawn primarily from white, wealthy college students under the age of 25, 2) Terrible data collection methods, 3) A tiny effect that disappears in studies with better data collection and/or larger sample sizes, 4) A complete mismatch between what the study authors claim the data says and what it actually says, 5) sweet fuck-all to do with human evolution since none of the studies are done on humans from a million years ago.

Show me an evo psych study and I will poke it so full of holes it'll look like the St. Valentines Day massacre. It's a form of pseudoscience.

Yes, our instincts may or may not drive a certain type of behaviour that at some point in our biological history helped us survive.

But unless your partner intends to spend the rest of their life living in a cave and hunting antilopes by chasing them until they collapse, their "natural instincts" are of little use.

After we evolved our cool brain parts (my biological knowlege fails me here. Prefrontal cortex?), we've been creating and improving a social structure much faster than natural evolution works. If you look at the world around you and still resort to your instincts, your cool brain parts probably need some work...

It's kinda like people trying to justify racism by saying that there are biological differences. Yes, there are. But name one situation in modern world where these differences would matter over education, experience and cultural background?

As someone who does not and cannot have children... I don't have sex with people that could protect hypothetical children that are never going to exist, I have sex because it feels good (most of the time). Granted, I don't often have the interest required to have sex so...

OK, so your story is awful and that dude is a joke. Good thing you kicked him to the curb. Good riddance.

"men have a natural instinct to have sex with as many women as possible". I want to see the survey. How many men did he survey? Where did he find these men? Are these internet loners with a crippling porn addiction or family men with fruitful careers? Or is it just him? Is it just him and he projected to all men?

"while women want to only select men who will be a good protector for their infant."

So women are just in it for the protection/status? Always have been, right? Women don't enjoy sex or connection or intimacy whatsoever and it's not like they're capable of one, or several, orgasms (to be fair maybe this is accurate for his experience).

Still, his entire dipshit premise is built on two assumptions he's making. But you got him good with the responses you gave and I wouldn't have been able to come up with that off the dome lol.

I think his bullshit argument could be easily dismantled with follow-up questions to challenge his idiocy and failure to understand evolutionary psychology or sexual selection or whatever.

tl;dr: a lot of these nerds think they're the next genghis khan because of evopsych but it couldn't be farther from the truth.

I'm not entirely onboard with everyone here shitting on evolutionary psychology, though. Yeah, some redpill losers oversimplify it and take it to mean "have sex with as many women as possible to spread my genes bc darwinism"

That's just putting spin on it so they can be a depraved loser and justify it while trying to sound smart. Any kind of ideology can be spun to fit your own personal agenda like you said about eugenics, and many people have twisted evolutionary psychology for the dumbass smegma male narrative. Evolutionary psychology has been an enduring source of truth and insight for me in understanding myself and others so I take it a little personally when people corrupt it.

Really, there's a lot more variables that feed into our psychology as a whole, but I do believe that they are rooted in how we evolved as humans.

First off, like what the dude's first mistake was, you cannot discard human culture when making psychological generalizations. Culture is important and it's one of the highest-levels of our decision-making ability. This man would disregard the culture that supports monogamy and respect, making the argument that chimps aren't monogamous or whatever in nature and the alpha gets all the females while human monogamy is just a "cultural quirk." Let me guess, "monogamy was invented by women to control beta males." Or, even better: "monogamy was invented by beta males so the alphas wouldn't take all the women."

Culture, like evolution, adapts gradually to provide us with the toolkit most suited for surviving our environment. It is a side of the memetics and genetics coin. We are now shifting to a culture that upholds mutual respect for all partners because that is what the environment currently supports (it didn't always, unfortunately). Sure, evolution doesn't stop you from punching a guy in the face or cheating on your wife, but culture does. And guess what? We evolved as social animals with a peerless innate ability to adapt and assimilate into culture. If you punched a guy in the face, you would be locked up in jail. There is no evolutionary psychology behind this simple causality. You disobey the culture, you suffer consequences. That goes to say that both culture and our biology are in lockstep, and are equally important.

It is critical to understand that human behavior is the result of both biological and cultural evolution, and they cannot be fully understood in isolation.

Secondly, not even our physiology supports that line of thinking. Childrearing a human baby is HARD. It takes a considerable amount of resources to raise even one child alone, let alone several. A human baby takes over a decade to become an adolescent and be useful in a hunter/gatherer society. That is a decade of struggle for both parents and the immediate family. Chimps take about 7 years to reach adolescence and they aren't picky eaters or need constant attention. Point is, human babies require investment and commitment. If the moron who you went out with tried to get with every female in a hunter gatherer society, realistically, he would be killed or exiled (which is basically death). His evolutionary strategy of fathering as many children as possible is proven to not be economically viable. A tiny community with 1 father and multiple children would implode. The real strategy is in a father directly helping to raise his children. Not everyone has the resources of Genghis Khan.

So that ties it back to sexual selection. No, men are not "designed" by fucking Darwin to reproduce with as many women as possible. Our memes and genes do not support this. From an evolutionary psychology standpoint, we are wired to commit to childrearing. Men, women, and the immediate community all contribute. The only reason people can do it alone or in small family units is due to the wonders of civilization. There's a reason for that old saying: it takes a village.

​

sorry for the tangent. As you were!

I’ve always argued that if men are so compelled to “spread their seed”, evolutionarily speaking, then women are apt to only sleep with top tier candidates to ensure that their potential offspring get top tier genetics due to the time/ resource investment of raising them. In that case, men like him would likely never get laid.

What gets me is that he brought it up! So he's the kind of guy who was prepping for this moment. He has been reading a lot of this crap on the internet and thought "I'll lay this on this chick and she'll be impressed and I'll be able to manipulate her into fucking me!" He could have used the love bomb, or negging, or conspicuous consumption or flat out lying, he just happened to choose this tactic instead. Instead of just talking to you like a normal person and getting to know you, he chose to employ a tactic in case you were stupid enough to fall for it and he could easily get laid that night.

Like, I'm not sure how old you are, but I'm 50 and I've seen it all. Men like this think they've discovered some secret code that will get them what they want, when really, the last guy tried exactly the same thing. They don't realize how transparent and common their ploys are.

Good on you!! You're exactly right about Darwinism and evolutionary theory. Also that ending made my eyes roll out of my head what an idiot, although not surprising for someone who believes in sexual selection.

Humans are animals, so there are a lot of things at a base level that we have in common with other animals.

But we also have these big weird brains that we only barely understand, and they complicate our social interactions in ways that, again, we only barely understand.

Trying to reduce the complexities of human social interaction down to this kind of evopsych jibber-jabber is, frankly, not a very good application of the powers of the human mind. It’s reductive and simplistic, which is why some people find it very appealing. They really want “one weird trick” that can crack the human social code, when in reality all they need to do is be cool to people and not say weird evopsych shit.

I'd say:

You know, better humans than you and I have spent eons trying to figure out how we're better than animals - from the Bible to Aristotle to Descartes, humanity has been trying to do better than just instinct. I'm not looking for Aristotle or Descartes, but if you can't put in the minimal effort to be human, maybe I should treat you like a monkey rather than a man.

And then proceed to make monkey noises and order anything banana-flavored for him.

I wish a knew a way. I had a rather long argument with a former classmate about this sort of thing. It went on for days and I ended up having to block him because we just got talking in circles and his argument basically resulted in the idea that women can’t be trusted to pick their own partners.

I talked about the numbers, how it’s just not mathematically possible for men to sleep around without women sleeping around (unless we’re talking gay men but they never are)

I pointed out that his experience on tinder didn’t represent the world as a whole since so few women are on app compared to men.

I explained all the very modern societal reasons for women to not be as inclined to casual sex, using stories from my dating experience.

I pointed out that the whole alpha beta nonsense came from a debunked wolf study that was shown not to hold water outside of captivity.

Idk maybe we need to start saying “well then I’m going to select someone else then” and leave. It might not convince any one but at least you won’t waste too much time. After all that is the crux of the issue… these men spout this shit because they think they will be the ones who get to sleep around but statistically (according to their own theory) that’s not what’s going to happen. They have this weird world view where hypergamy is the natural order, and yet they hate. They are already performing so many mental gymnastics to explain why women having more sex leaves them with less sex, anything on top of that is just a light stretch.

From a biology standpoint, sadly I agree that there is selection, as we don't exist in hardy weinberg equilibrium and mating isnt random and not everyone will mate D=

However, our species have big brains, complex emotions and feelings. We aren't all the exact same as animals even though we may share orthologs, but behaviors aren't conserved. The excuse that some cavepeople approach to mating is a definitive explanation is more of an excuse for people to be doo doo heads, as it ignores that we all have personalities, feelings and preferences.

“How many children do you have?”

“What?”

“If men are meant to have as much sex as possible with as many women as possible, how many children do you have?”

“Oh, well none. I don’t want a bunch of kids, I can’t pay for all that.”

“Then I guess it’s not that hard wired…funny how biology can be turned off like that if you just don’t want to.”

Damn, sounds like you handled it way better than I would have. Well done.

I teach this topic as part of a college course. I give the usual caveats that I always give for evolutionary psych -- that these theories are easy to generate and very hard or impossible to test.

I think the reasoning for some of theories is sound, but whether they're true or not has zero bearing on what kind of behavior is ok.

 I say at end that having a tendency or urge to do something for evolutionary reasons doesn't make those things moral or ethical. I give the example of violence. Murder is still wrong even if some amount of aggression gave our ancestors an evolutionary advantage.

I cannot stress enough that much of Darwin’s sexual selection theory is just straight up wrong. Natural selection was extremely well thought out and he collected tons of info on it. Sexual selection was worked out to fill in gaps. And most of it comes down to cause the other sex mysteriously likes it for some reason. It’s the segment of evolutionary theory that is in need of work…and a healthy dose of removing western monotheistic ethical preconceptions from science.

I think there are arguments that humans we're also polyamorous as a survival strategy. If a woman had many partners, there would be more people invested in the rearing of children. If the paternity is uncertain, then each man is more invested in the rearing of each child, as each child might potentially be theirs.

Well done. I wouldn't have bothered talking to him further.

... and he just got selected out! :-)

Not all animals have the same breeding styles. They’re pretending that lek type species, or troops of gorillas with one silverback, 20 adult females, and all of their children, are the only natural states. But there are a LOT more family types in the animal world than that.

Black widow spiders eat their male sex partners after mating.

Clearly it’s natural baby! /s

Anywho, this is my fave argument against that asinine belief.

I mean, If somebody wants to push the idea that they are psychologically underdeveloped to the point where their actions in a social setting are determined by evolutionary biology and make themselves sound like a troglodyte, be my guest.

”Sure, but I’m also pretty certain at some point in your life you’ve wanted to punch someone in the face and didn’t because we are capable of overriding our instincts.”

We are a complex civilization capable of art and technology and there are people who collaborate across the globe with other people they’ve never met before to generate unique creations, innovations and discoveries. Can WE NOT reduce complex human relationships down to the mating behavior of CHIMPS?

These pretty much nail the rebuttal I had in my head as I started reading this. Just adding on - SO MUCH of what these people attribute to "natural instinct" is more easily explained by cultural and socioeconomic causes.

What I hate most about it is that it's used to justify behaviors that don't even apply to me as a man.

"Men are less emotional than women because evolutionary selection." Perfect, that explains why I cry at movies more than most of my girlfriends do.

"Men get less attached than women because they don't need to raise babies." Motherfucker I'm 34 and I still talk to my therapist about my first girlfriend when I was 13 and the one who cheated on me when I was 22.

It's just bullshit.

I've read "The Moral Animal" which calls it evolutionary psychology. A lot of the theory is anecdotal, so I'm skeptical of the details, but I have to believe we have evolutionary/genetic incentives for some of our behaviors. But let's be very clear, even if it's natural doesn't mean it's good or morally defensible. We live in a society, and as thinking animals we can transcend our base behaviors.

Even if you think the evidence is weak and the conclusions are disgusting, understanding the theory will help prepare you for dealing with it on the fly. Yes, men can have more offspring if they have many sexual partners, but also if they only have a few offspring and invest energy into them, they're more likely to be successful adults. Women are more likely to have successful offspring if they have multiple sexual partners who think the kids might be theirs, so they have an incentive to sleep around, but if she has one high value partner she doesn't have to do so much risky relationship juggling. But is making babies really the main goal here? If they're arguing that they're not trying to reproduce, just biologically maximizing their dopamine or self satisfaction, tell them they can accomplish the same things with porn, high calorie foods, and drugs.

If anyone lies, cheats, or manipulates people for sex, people are going to be mad at them. The way you handled it was great. Not that it's your responsibility to educate stupid/selfish men, but you might make an impression on them if you just show the situation from a different perspective, without their red-pilled buddies encouraging and reinforcing their bad mindset. You won't reach all of them, so don't sweat it. Evolutionarily speaking, you should prioritize your own relationships and your situation more than you should try to make a global change.

I can appreciate your desire to try and reason with them but baby just ask for the check. Lonely men perceive conflict as intimacy because they often have no friends and no other way to feel this. That's why they go out of their way to sharpen these bad faith arguments and pick fights with women on the Internet. They don't want to be right or make sense they just want to feed off your emotion.

mackenmurphy recently posted a tiktok about sexual selection. Some of my stuff below is stolen straight from there.

Men do look for more partners than women. Lots of studies back that up, so if you start from a position that it can't be true because it's toxic, that's ignoring reality. But just because it's true doesn't mean it's a significant truth. Like you said, we're capable of overriding instinct.

But what actually is the instinct we're overriding?

90-95% of men in cultures that permit having multiple wives don't have multiple wives (Tsapelas et al., Routledge, 2010). And monogamy has cropped up as the norm in every culture in history (Fisher, W. W. Norton & Co, 2016), suggesting that even if men are less monogamous, monogamy has a profound effect on our psychology and we seek it out.

Studies on happiness, meanwhile, also show that married men are happier than single men source. And men die younger when they have no long term partner. And older men often die shortly after losing their partners.

What you might not want to hear, however, is that a 2023 study concluded that the happiest men are 'serial monogamous', meaning they live in a succession of trusting relationships but never getting married. source Men seem to want more partners than women, but aren't trying to date 5 women at a time. They want relationships, but maybe not permanent life-long ones.

So I'm incline to believe most men want to be in a relationship more than to sleep around, but they might get bored after, idk, 7 years or so?, by virtue of the whole '7 year itch' idea being a thing. Although there are studies on open marriages and happiness that have interesting implications on this. Worth a google search if you have some free time.

Lol Im old enough not to waste my time trying to argue with that kind of guy. Been there, done that, there's no convincing them.

When you try to argue against a person's deeply held beliefs, oftentimes it backfires and actually leads them to dig in their heels and hold those beliefs even more deeply. There's a term for this but it's escaping me. Point being, arguing is very unlikely to change his mind.

There's nothing wrong with stating your beliefs, saying you disagree, making it clear that his attitude is a major turnoff, etc. You can and should tell him that attitude is both incorrect and disrespectful, and you're not interested in pursuing a relationship because of it. But trying to convince him to change is futile. You're not his mother, it's not your job to teach him to respect women.

There are many animals that mate for life. Males protect the young and the female during her breeding and childrearing periods. Wolves mate for life. So do swans and eagles.

There are many advantages to this. The point is mostly for genetic reason: passing on their genes with a well known and proven mate is simpler than risk failing to find a new mate each breeding season.

When both parents raise the offspring, there is more guarantee of successful healthy offspring. And finding a good territory for breeding is easier, since the two mates usually stay in the same range, and often breed in the same place each year.

So mating for life does in fact convey evolutionary advantages. And not mating at all, as in the case of dumb jerks like your ex date, definitely conveys an evolutionary advantage. Survival of the smartest is a thing, you know.

Favorite dating app question: are you a feminist. Surprising what comes from that.

I mean, it's not even valid from the perspective of animal studies, as not all mammals (never mind the rest of the animal kingdom) follow that selection strategy. I'm pretty sure most do not.

Edit: I'm trying to think of which ones DO (my background is in agricultural and environmental science) and I'm largely coming up blank. Pair-bonding is far from universal in the animal kingdom, with the exceptions being noteworthy rather than them being the rule!

Pretty much everywhere in the animal reign, animals have evolved to :

• Show when they are fertile (for females)
• And/Or for males, being able to know when the females are fertile

Take our closest relatives, the monkeys, they show and know when the females are fertile.

Yet, it is not the case for the human race. Why ? Probably because more than any other race, humans have sex for fun. Or try to, anyway.

Why would anyone even bring this up on a first date?

I've read a lot of books on evolution, I understand the various credible theories about all of this, but it's not really the kind of thing I'd bring up unless it was super pertinent, like the person I was on a dare with was a professor of evolutionary biology, and even then... It's like, why?

It's clear to almost anyone that most men have a more aggressive attitude when it comes to sex than most women, but I think OP nailed it with the comparison to having an urge to want to punch someone - but you control yourself because we're past that, and we live in a society where it's expected of us to not act like savages.

All of these theories are pointless to discuss, because regardless of what is right or wrong, these ideas applied to ANCIENT ancestors who we have almost nothing in common with.

It is what it seems to be, a frisky dude trying to justify his shitty behavior.

We all have urges, he's trying to excuse his lack of self control.

I get urges too, I have thoughts and ideas that I know are wrong, but I keep myself in check, it's not hard. We're defined by the things we do, not the fleeting thoughts or urges we have.

This dude sounds like he might be the kind of person who says something like:

"Andrew Tate might be a misogynist, but not everything he says is wrong..."

Saving this and coming back to it because I totally resonate and wow I love the question you asked him! 

Maybe it's true maybe it isn't. Who cares, we are sentient beings, we give evolution the finger, we do what we want, we have a concept of morals

I completely agree that any of the instincts we have that we can also observe in animals is easily controlled by using our big brains, however I also think that using strategies initially developed via natural selection can be advantageous for women.

We live in a capitalist dystopia and since that is the case I support women preferring to form long-term relationships only with men who are financially stable - whether or not they choose to have children. 

I’m not any kind of expert but I’m not sure that all species of animals follow the ‘males mate with as many females as possible’ behaviour either.

I swear you could tell these men that red and yellow make orange and they will argue and tell you it makes pink because they know better than any woman... Then theyre surprised when no one wants to date them.

I mean, I think Sexual Selection exists in humans. I don't think Sexual Selection in humans exists to support "men are supposed to have a lot of sex. Women are not."

I think it's likely that the sexual dimporhism in humans is, in some way, tied into sexual selection. All mammals feed their young milk, but humans have breasts all the time. I wouldn't be surprised if human breasts are related to sexual selection. That doesn't mean "Humans intrinsically want big boobs" or that "breasts inherently sexual actually," but considering we know breast size doesn't actually correlate with milk production, it doesn't seem like it would help either the parent or offspring survive longer.

And I know some people theorize the loss of the penis bone is an example of sexual selection.

I feel like with how common sexual selection is across the animal kingdom, I feel like it's a little anthropocentric to presume humans are immune to sexual selection. Idk. I have a bachelor's degree in anthropology and psychology (double major, not two seperate majors), and I took a lot of classes on hominid evolution and primate behavior, but I wouldn't call anyone with exclusively a bachelor's degree an expert, and I don't want to pretend like I know anything definitively.

I don't think that anyone should be using sexual selection as a justification in modern dating, though.

For those unfamiliar it basically takes animal mating behaviors and applies them to humans

That's stupid. Anyone that knows a little bit about biology knows that very similar species can have vastly different mating behavior (ex : bonobos vs chimpanzees).

I'd like to see the idea he was "joking" unpacked a little Like is he asserting he wouldn't have had sex if you would have bit on one of the "joking" offers?

Tell him women evolved to have many lovers and have lovers to secure ressources and protection in case something happens to the father. Also women would mate with a man that has the highest testosterone level in her vicinity and yes that means cheating, but you know people learnt to suppress those instincts because the survival of the human species thrives on trust. Sorry English is not my first language and had to type this with one finger lol.

Wait til he finds out why men’s dicks have mushroom-shaped tips…make sure he’s sitting down when you shatter his world with cold hard facts

May the best swimmer win 🤭

First, block and ignore him. He's not arguing in good faith. As for the "biology" argument, there's many things wrong with it.

1) Men cheat/rape because it's their instinct.

Has he ever been really hungry while walking in public? Why hasn't he ripped an arm off the nearest human or snatched up a dog and bitten into it? Because even though hunger is a primal feeling, humans are sentient beings who can control their biological urges. Biology does not define human culture and if he can't overcome his "biology", he's no better than a rabid dog and should be locked in a cage for everyone's safety.

2) Men want to spread their genes.

Ignoring #1, humans are high-investment-few-offspring. (Unlike something like cockroaches, which are low-investment-many-offspring.) Getting a female pregnant only to abandon her when she and the baby will most likely die is not a winning strategy here. Also, females need to be thriving for their offspring to do well. How does abuse and/or abandonment facilitate that again?

3) Men are hebephiles (pedophiles with a dictionary) because of biology.

Again, ignoring #1, experienced females (ones with successfully surviving offspring) should be the cream of the dating crop. Whether they previously had offspring with another male should be a draw. Teenaged girls should be unattractive because their offspring are more likely to die (ie. have fewer resources, teenagers' bodies don't handle pregnancy/birth as well, etc.) The only reason for men to go after inexperienced/virgin women is because they are "easier", whether due to their inexperience or because another male isn't guarding her. In return, females should only choose the top 20%ish of experienced males to reproduce/pair with, and the others will die alone and ostracized. Is this reflected in modern society? (ha)

What other myths do people want to chime in with? These are the common ones I hear, and I hate this kind of pseudo-science.

It’s pop evolutionary psychology bullshit. Anyone can tell you human behavior is extraordinarily more complex and heavily influenced by social factors because we are social and rational beings. We make decisions based on what’s best or what we believe to be best after thinking about how different situations, hypotheticals, needs, etc…

There are so many people peddling shit like this nowadays and convincing men that they’re biologically inferior to other men even though it logically makes no sense. It frustrates me to no end.

The thing is, overall, humans are not great at reproducing. Pregnancy and childbirth are so risky and hard on a mother's body, and offspring are helpless for years. Social relationships are how we managed to survive and thrive as a species. This includes men sticking around to contribute to raising their offspring. Not to mention that when humans lived in small, nomadic communities, their ability to 'spread their seed' was fairly limited. Established groups weren't likely to just let random men come along and have their way.

You nailed the responses. Nothing to add. Perfectly played.

This guys didnt know what sexual selection even is. Sexual selection is about traits that are passed down that have no evolutionary benefits outside of being perceived as sexually attractive. Humans having way bigger dicks than gorillas is an example. All of that are just scientific theorys at the end of the day.

If you want to debunk, look up pair bonding and how it helped hominids in the evolutionary path to becoming intelligent.

However, why would you bother with someone like him? He’s trying to push buttons and he’s being a jerk. Don’t engage with him.

I am overwhelmed by the amount of responses so maybe this has already been said, but if we’re gonna theorize that women look for the most suitable partners, it’s not for protection but based on best genes, and that we actually are meant to collaborate with other women to raise our children. Hence why we live longer.

"Yeah, I agree with that. Sexual selection means that the part who invests more, the female who gets pregnant, chooses the best mate possible. So only about 10 to 20 of males have sex. It's the most beautiful, tallest, and strongest. So, have a nice day." And you get up and leave.

Don't feed the incels. You did a great job explaining but 100% need to filter these morons out before even the first date.

These animal arguments are so stupid… How are they forgetting we aren’t animals and can easily control our own behaviour and choices in a way animals cannot. If they’re going to use that poor excuse for logic, they ought to strip naked and go live in the woods.

It’s the same kind of hilariously bad logic found in relationship “self help” books, especially PUA. If you don’t want to be monogamous, no-one is forcing you and you can easily form a healthy, honest poly relationship.

Some people like myself and my partner aren’t together because we feel socially obligated, but because we want to. We’re truly in love, can’t even imagine being with anyone else. Some people aren’t into it, that’s fine but don’t bullshit with this “animal instinct” crap 😆.

His specific argument shows how little he knows about women. Not all women are intrinsically maternal. Some, even if they don’t have anything against children just don’t want to have any. They don’t get clucky when they see friends of families with children, they don’t give a crap about their “biological clock.” If there are any animal instincts at play, they clearly don’t have enough of an effect to override individual choice.

https://psmag.com/environment/17-to-1-reproductive-success

So historically kinda true. I mean 17 women would make babies with 1 man historically, but I like to think culturely we are better than that now. Of course there are Elon Musks and Donald Trumps that have had babies with multiple women so statistics still kinda holds, but let's face it, would you want to have a kid with a guy like that? Really? Didn't think so.

I think this came from a good place, and though it was an interesting "rant" I'm not sure if the points were really relevant to the title of the post/initial point for me.

Guy sounded like a weirdo, so it was a happy ending!

The only convincing sexual selection argument I came across was an explanation for why our brains are so big and why our theory of mind is stronger than every other animal.

Being that humans use social status as a sexual selection criteria and ended up having to compete with each other in smarts and understanding other humans.

We're way too smart to justify the energy cost for survival to be realistic selection pressure.

There are things like flat earth, sexual selection in dating, etc. which fall in the category of not even wrong. They need to be improved a lot to even fall under an 'incorrect theory' classification.

​

I personally wouldn't engage with such a person.

To be human is to reject our baser instincts. Even if his theories are true (this is highly debatable) it is largely poor logic/appeal to nature which is a fairly common logical fallacy. Something being "natural" does not make it inherently more desirable or morally good.