xssve
Posts: 3589
Joined: 10/10/2009 Status: offline
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i.e., if all that is true, it still doesn't make the converse untrue, polygyny poses particular problems in populations of any size, but it has a proven track record of reproductive success, as does polyandry - even if it's gotten short shrift politically and economically, as a reproductive strategy, it works as well, maybe better, but it's not because women have a greater sex drive, it's because of a greater flexibility in potential strategies among women, erotic plasticity - theoretically anyway. Paternity assurances are more important to men, women know who the mother of their child is, unless there's some mix up in the baby ward, it's beyond dispute, thus men (and mammalian males in general) tend to be motivated to establish breeding monopolies over one or more individual females (monogamy, polygyny), while playing the field themselves (opportunistic breeding), women are motivated to find a caregiver (monogamy), but also to obtain a diverse range of genetic traits and inherited immunities in their children (polyandry). Nothing is either/or here, it's all about trade off's, opportunity cost: heterosexual marriage is a compromise, not the only compromise, but it has a proven track record, even if it's less than perfect, it's just the simplest and most immediately functional compromise, it always works in a pinch, it's socially just in terms of male:female ratios, the only problem is that the diversity problem is still there, it doesn't go away, and all sorts of informal behaviors are generated to satisfy it: swinging, cheating, serial and social monogamy, etc., etc., some can strengthen the pair bond, others weaken it. Polyandry, in fact, is probably the better strategy overall, of all the strategies discussed: it assures both genetic diversity and potentially enhanced subsidization of reproductive costs, without generating a population of angry, marginalized males like polygyny does - polygyny is associated with often profound levels of internecine violence, so while a proven reproductive strategy, it's a generally poor social strategy leading to an overall decline in group fitness - it's suits a pastoral economy where the requirements for large grazing territories makes small, isolated social clumps adaptive, it works a lot less well in diverse, densely packed, and economically interdependent urban and semi-urban populations A strategy that satisfies diversity and subsidization of reproductive costs, and results in male social bonding rather than disenfranchisement and violence really would be the best of both worlds, you don't have to resort to bullshit to make that argument, I just don't see it catching on in a big way if you guys are the models - and you are.
< Message edited by xssve -- 3/9/2012 7:55:12 AM >
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Walking nightmare...
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