This paper argues that male homosexuality evolved as part of human intelligence and social development. It posits that the evolution of bipedalism in humans led to changes in mating behaviors and positions among early human ancestors like bonobos, which utilized more face-to-face mating. This allowed for traits like male homosexuality to emerge and for less aggressive males to still reproduce, passing on genes for increased intelligence. The paper provides various examples from primate behaviors and physiology to support this theory.
Reproductive behaviour: 1-Sexual behaviour in animalsrhfayed
Reproductive Behaviour involve behaviour patterns associated with courtship, copulation, birth, maternal care and with suckling attempts of newborn. It is species specific behaviour
Reproductive behaviour: 1-Sexual behaviour in animalsrhfayed
Reproductive Behaviour involve behaviour patterns associated with courtship, copulation, birth, maternal care and with suckling attempts of newborn. It is species specific behaviour
1 Bonobo Sex and Society The behavior of a close relaMargaritoWhitt221
1
Bonobo Sex and Society
The behavior of a close relative challenges assumptions
about male supremacy in human evolution
by
Frans B. M. de Waal
(Originally published in the March 1995 issue of SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, pp. 82-88)
FRANS B. M. de WAAL was trained as an
ethologist in the European tradition, receiving his
Ph.D. from the University of Utrecht in 1977. After a
six-year study of the chimpanzee colony at the
Arnhem Zoo, he moved to the U.S. in 1981 to work
on other primate species, including bonobos. He is
now a research professor at the Yerkes Regional
Primate Research Center in Atlanta and professor of
psychology at Emory University.
At a juncture in history during which women are seeking equality with men,
science arrives with a belated gift to the feminist movement. Male-biased
evolutionary scenarios – Man the Hunter, Man the Toolmaker and so on –
are being challenged by the discovery that females play a central, perhaps
even dominant, role in the social life of one of our nearest relatives. In the
past few years many strands of knowledge have come together concerning a
relatively unknown ape with an unorthodox repertoire of behavior: the
bonobo.
The bonobo is one of the last large mammals
to be found by science. The creature was
discovered in 1929 in a Belgian colonial
museum, far from its lush African habitat. A
German anatomist, Ernst Schwarz, was
scrutinizing a skull that had been ascribed to
a juvenile chimpanzee because of its small
size, when he realized that it belonged to an
adult. Schwarz declared that he had stumbled
on a new subspecies of chimpanzee. But soon the animal was assigned the
status of an entirely distinct species within the same genus as the
chimpanzee, Pan.
http://www.emory.edu/YERKES/
http://www.emory.edu/YERKES/
http://www.emory.edu/PSYCH/Faculty/dewaal.html
2
The bonobo was officially classified as Pan paniscus, or the diminutive Pan.
But I believe a different label might have been selected had the discoverers
known then what we know now. The old taxonomic name of the
chimpanzee, P. satyrus – which refers to the myth of apes as lustful satyrs –
would have been perfect for the bonobo.
The species is best characterized as female-centered and egalitarian and as
one that substitutes sex for aggression. Whereas in most other species sexual
behavior is a fairly distinct category, in the bonobo it is part and parcel of
social relations – and not just between males and females. Bonobos engage
in sex in virtually every partner combination (although such contact among
close family members may be suppressed). And sexual interactions occur
more often among bonobos than among other primates. Despite the
frequency of sex, the bonobo's rate of reproduction in the wild is about the
same as that of the chimpanzee. A female gives birth to a single infant at
intervals of between five and six years. So bonobos shar ...
This essay supports a few posts in the Reimagined Mahabharata blog (http://reimaginedmahabharata.blogspot.com/) in which I assert that South Asia had three matriarchal cultures in 4000 BCE that participated in a great revolution around 2000BCE that is the source of the Mahabharata.
1 Bonobo Sex and Society The behavior of a close relaMargaritoWhitt221
1
Bonobo Sex and Society
The behavior of a close relative challenges assumptions
about male supremacy in human evolution
by
Frans B. M. de Waal
(Originally published in the March 1995 issue of SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, pp. 82-88)
FRANS B. M. de WAAL was trained as an
ethologist in the European tradition, receiving his
Ph.D. from the University of Utrecht in 1977. After a
six-year study of the chimpanzee colony at the
Arnhem Zoo, he moved to the U.S. in 1981 to work
on other primate species, including bonobos. He is
now a research professor at the Yerkes Regional
Primate Research Center in Atlanta and professor of
psychology at Emory University.
At a juncture in history during which women are seeking equality with men,
science arrives with a belated gift to the feminist movement. Male-biased
evolutionary scenarios – Man the Hunter, Man the Toolmaker and so on –
are being challenged by the discovery that females play a central, perhaps
even dominant, role in the social life of one of our nearest relatives. In the
past few years many strands of knowledge have come together concerning a
relatively unknown ape with an unorthodox repertoire of behavior: the
bonobo.
The bonobo is one of the last large mammals
to be found by science. The creature was
discovered in 1929 in a Belgian colonial
museum, far from its lush African habitat. A
German anatomist, Ernst Schwarz, was
scrutinizing a skull that had been ascribed to
a juvenile chimpanzee because of its small
size, when he realized that it belonged to an
adult. Schwarz declared that he had stumbled
on a new subspecies of chimpanzee. But soon the animal was assigned the
status of an entirely distinct species within the same genus as the
chimpanzee, Pan.
http://www.emory.edu/YERKES/
http://www.emory.edu/YERKES/
http://www.emory.edu/PSYCH/Faculty/dewaal.html
2
The bonobo was officially classified as Pan paniscus, or the diminutive Pan.
But I believe a different label might have been selected had the discoverers
known then what we know now. The old taxonomic name of the
chimpanzee, P. satyrus – which refers to the myth of apes as lustful satyrs –
would have been perfect for the bonobo.
The species is best characterized as female-centered and egalitarian and as
one that substitutes sex for aggression. Whereas in most other species sexual
behavior is a fairly distinct category, in the bonobo it is part and parcel of
social relations – and not just between males and females. Bonobos engage
in sex in virtually every partner combination (although such contact among
close family members may be suppressed). And sexual interactions occur
more often among bonobos than among other primates. Despite the
frequency of sex, the bonobo's rate of reproduction in the wild is about the
same as that of the chimpanzee. A female gives birth to a single infant at
intervals of between five and six years. So bonobos shar ...
This essay supports a few posts in the Reimagined Mahabharata blog (http://reimaginedmahabharata.blogspot.com/) in which I assert that South Asia had three matriarchal cultures in 4000 BCE that participated in a great revolution around 2000BCE that is the source of the Mahabharata.
1. On the Origins of human sexuality
The etymology of human homosexuality in males: The gateway to modern intelligence
This paper is a postulation that male sexuality is prenatal, part of the evolutionary
process and without it the human species would be less evolved and aggressive,
neolithic and considerably less intelligent than we are at present.
Evolution of male homosexuality began at the birth of the evolution of our species.
Primates indicate this. For purpose of contrast and comparison, the social difference
between bonobospan paniscus and chimpanzees pan troglydytes prove this theory.
Chimpanzees are often cited as our nearest ancestral relation, but in fact the much rarer
and relatively unknown species is genetically more similar to human genes. They
demonstrate more cognitive functioning in scientific experimentation, and show basic
understanding of self-awareness and abstract concepts such as grammar and empathy.
The main social comparison between these two outwardly similar, but intrinsically
different is that chimpanzees use aggression and violence as a method of controlling the
group. They are essentially dominated by the alpha male of the species. When they
encounter another group, or troop, of the same on their territory, the meeting is
aggressive, violent, and they even kill each other to protect their troop and territory. The
massively contrasting social difference with bonobos is that they immediately have sex
with the invading troop Importantly,they also use sex as a means of controlling the social
order of their own individual societal troop The crucial element is that the species is
dominated by the alpha-female of the species. They perform male gay sex, often 'sword-
fencing' where males rub erect penises together, they perform masturbation, on
themselves and each other, they kiss, they perform oral sex, and females rub clitorises.
There is no anal penetrative sex amongst this species, but it exists in other species, one
example is the bull, during which full penetration of the male results in penetrative
orgasmic sex. This is commonplace. Much of the bonobos sexuality is non genital, which
Freud discovered in the study of human sexuality. Kissing, sucking of breasts and oral
sex serves no evolutionary purpose, and Freud regarded this as fixation, dysfunction
even, but many humans will insist this is a natural, erotic experience, and an intrinsic
element of sexuality. Bonobos enjoy the same pleasurable activity. troop Even juvenile
bonobos experience the same disciplinary procedure. Sex is used as an expression of
power and dominance. The males in the species social status is determined by the social
standing of his mother. Once the alpha female dies or is overpowered by the what was
beta female, her son is designated to the lowest ranking social position, but not rejected
from the troop
Now we should consider the physiological evolution of humans. When female primates
(excluding humans) are ready to mate, the genitals become engorged with blood and as
they are primarily quadruped this physical signal is visible to males that she is receptive
to sex. This is essential, as primates breast feed for an average of four years, so she is
only ready to mate for two weeks, the four years after she is either gestating or feeding,
2. and conception is impossible. Now we need to consider the shape of the human penis.
We are the only species that has evolved a glans, or cock-head. Experiments have
proven that this is designed to pull out any previously deposited sperm. Penises of
identical size remove 80% of any previous deposits. Penises that curve upwards are
considered more highly evolved because they stimulate the female internal g spot which
induces female orgasm, mating position considered. (This may also be relevant for
stimulating the male 'g-spot', the prostate, discussed later). This is proven to increase the
likelihood of conception because during this essentially human phenomenon, the neck of
the cervix contracts and dips down and 'sucks up' the sperm. Larger penises are more
likely to increase the probability of conception. Although bonobos do not have this
essential glans, there are many missing link species that science has yet to discover.
There is no data available on the comparative size of bonobos' penises compared to
chimpanzees, but human penis size in relation to body size compared TO other
mammals is the biggest of all mammalian species. Alpha male chimps are happy to allow
the female to engage in sexual activity when she is not in oestrus, but guards her during
her most fertile period.
Now we need to consider the physiological differences between us and other primates.
The main advancement of great apes was the evolution of walking on two feet,. This
enabled the evolution of the thumb, which is essential in tool-making and manipulation of
the environment to its own genetic advantage. Hands were free to do many other things
other than walking and holding onto tree branches. Monkeys do not possess thumbs,
and use tails to coordinate mobility. They have five fingers, ideally suited to a life in trees.
As the species came down to dominate the ground, the tail disappear and the thumb
evolved (could this be the appearance of male masturbation in great apes,a well-
documented phenomena?) Another complication with the new appearance of bipedal
mobility, of which the bonobo is much more likely than the chimpanzee, is that the
engorged vagina of the female became defunct. Homo erectus. This rendered it
impossible for the alpha male to know what gender was present prior to sex. This caused
confusion in mating. In order to achieve successful conception, an indication of the
otherwise neutral appearance was necessary. And so the female breast evolved. The
actual lactic glands account for five percent of the breast. The rest is subcutaneous fat
and serves no purpose other than to indicate that the particular specimen is female. An
advertisement of its gender. This displaced the engorged vagina which was rendered
invisible due to bipedal gait. A now invisible but what was a clear indication of gender.
Residual traces of this exist in humans today, when the females genitals become
engorged with blood and swell during sexual arousal. A major complication of bipedal
evolution means that it is impossible to give birth through a pelvis that is greater than
dilation of 10cm. Due to gravitational force, a wider pelvis would have made bipedal
walking impossible. To compensate for this, the cerebral cortex of the human brain,
where all the mental activity takes place, is an intricate, unique structure of fissures and
gyri, deep folds and creases, that permit the greatest brain functioning of all life forms
that have ever existed. The brains of chimpanzees have very few gyrus, Many scientists
regard this as the ultimate of cerebral evolution. This is why the newborn baby is so
underdevelpoed at birth. Other mammals are ready to move with its family at birth and
find nutrition and avoid predators, They can walk instantly, their vision is fully developed.
3. Similar to marsupials, human babies continue to develop outside the womb. They cannot
walk, cannot see properly, and have no means of defending themselves. They are
defenceless, and consequently, they are attached to their mothers rendering them both
immobile and dependant on the father. The uniquely human emotion of love has evolved
to ensure that the family unit will develop a psychological attachment which ensures that
the newborn will enjoy the protection and nurturing parents to facilitate its ongoing
postnatal development and temper the promiscuous behaviour of the male so that there
is less genetic competition in other offspring. It is important to note that in both chimps
and bonobos, the care for infants is often shared throughout the community. Infants
initially go though short phase of recognising their mother, then there is a window of
approximately two weeks during early infancy when they do not. This is case they are
rejected, or their mother dies during childbirth. This facilitates their 'adoption' and
attachment yo and by other mothers to prolong their development and life expectancy. In
our evolutionary past, the mother of a new stillborn can pick up a baby whose mother has
died during childbirth or rejected it, and the newly formed pair have no awareness of their
true genetics. This phenomenon is even more apparent in troops of primates. The males
have no idea which of the youngsters are their own, and so care is given to all of the
young in the group.
Now we need to consider how evolution has adapted our species in the display of
gender. The male proboscis monkey has an unusually large nose and red penis and
black scrotum. This is a clear display of gender, a common aspect of physiology in birds.
The bonobo females have significantly larger breasts males. Again, subcutaneous fat
This supports the argument that breasts have evolved to emulate the buttocks, or more
importantly what is in between them, namely the now concealed vagina, especially in
modern humans which explains the male heterosexual eroticism of female breasts, which
are in fact purely non sexual and designed purely for infants. Heterosexual males find the
idea of suckling on a breast erotic, but when sucking on such a breast during lactation,
much less so. The mating position is also a crucial factor in this hypothesis. Virtually all
primates mate in the 'on all four position with breast tissue invisible Extremely rarely,
chimpanzees mate in the 'missionary' position, with the female lying on her back with
face to face contact. This position, however, is much more common with bonobos. During
this time, the females breasts are a visible indicator of her gender. For successful
conception, it is established that the male needs to identify the gender of his mate. For
sexual pleasure, however, this is not essential..There are other great apes who also
engage in solitary and mutual non-reproductive sexual activity purely for gratification and
pleasure. It is during the advent of this that the orgasm and homosexuality, and indeed
other non productive sexual activity emerged during our evolution, along with the orgasm,
which is essentially a human element of sex not present in any other species. And the
most recent factor of the evolution of our own species. (There is little research on this,
but most biologists agree that other animals do not experience anything like a human
orgasm,).
It is important to note that evolution is a gradual, continuous process, and there is little
evidence of what is termed 'the missing link,' which would crucially explain the
transformation from apes to humans, although humans are also categorised technically
4. as great apes also. One thing that is certain is the appearance of bipedal walking,. It is
plausible that this transformation also affected the mating position. If we apply this, at
some point in evolution, the mate in the lower 'all fours' position raised to their feet, with
the male behind responding to this. This engages the female 'g-spot' resulting in a more
intense and commonplace orgasm. If the lower mate moves upwards into a more upright
position, the location of the vagina becomes more difficult to engage, and the lower
mates anus replaces the previous position. Females do not possess a prostate, and so
there is no psychical reward for sexual intercourse. If we place a male in this newly-
evolved previously female slightly raised position, however, the penis of the insertive
male engages the prostate of the receptive male, thus providing sexual arousal and
gratification for the receptive male. It is known for males of both sexual orientations to
experience undesired erection or even full orgasm during medical prostate examination.
In this event, the insertive male would have no idea, or indeed concern, that this was
anther male he was having intercourse with.
Homosexuality is present in other species. There are around 500 species of animals that
display homosexual behaviour. (Around eight percent of sheep, for example practice
exclusively homosexual sex) Mothers who were pregnant during the blitz in Dresden
gave birth to a disproportionate large number of gay males. This triggered research, and
rats were exposed to harsh conditions; constant low levels of lighting, lack of stimulation
in the environment, sleep deprivation, constant noise and so forth. It was noted that many
of the male offspring of females raised in these conditions performed lordosis as adults;
an act of lowering the front part of the body and presenting the raised rear for mating.,
This experiment has also proved positive in otter animals. This could be natures way of
controlling reproduction in a harsh environment that was unsuited to sustain healthy living
conditions. This would also explain the widely accepted argument that homosexuality
exists in humans to reduce aggression in our species. Females that are victims of child
sex abuse, in particular penetrative sex, will often become lesbian as adults. The penis
that damaged them before puberty is rejected after. Timing is crucial during gestation.
Foetuses are conceived female XX. A wave of androgens in the womb will convert the
foetus to male/ What was the clitoris becomes the penis, and the vaginal labia fuse
together to become a scrotum, and the ovum become testicles. . At eleven weeks, there
is another wave of androgens and this masculinises the brain of the foetus,
predominantly an area of the brain called the hypothalamus. If this wave occurs outside
this window, the hypothalamus remains 'female.' Another explanation of great interest is
what is termed 'Gay Fraternal Birth Order Syndrome.' When a woman gives birth to a
male, the statistical probability of that child becoming homosexual is between six and 9
percent. KINSEY. The odds are identical for a second son, the probability goes up by
thirty three percent, and another 33%each time for each subsequent male born from the
same womb, regardless of paternalism. There are significant biological differences
between homosexual and heterosexual men. Gay men are forty percent more likely to be
left handed (lesbian women 90% more so), the direction of hair growth on gay men. gay
men are three times more likely (23% vs. 8%) to have a counter-clockwise hair whorl (as
seen on the left, below) than men in the general population. The index fingers of straight
men are more likely to be shorter than their ring fingers, whereas in gay men, they are
more likely to be of the same length, or even shorter in ratio. In gay men of gay fraternal
5. birth order syndrome, there is also more probability that there will be asymmetry in both
hands. Gay people have unique style of fingerprints. Perhaps the most fascinating area
of physiological difference is penis size. Gay men’s penises are thicker (4.95 inches
versus 4.80) and longer (6.32 inches versus 5.99. It should be noted that these statistics
were self-reported however. It could be that gay men have a bias to exaggerating their
own penis size)There are other physiological traits that support the argument that gay
males are born this way; Research indicates a significant predisposition to the XQ28
gene. one of the strongest arguments for a genetic predisposition to homosexuality is
that monozygotic twins, which demonstrates a massive fifty percent correlation where
both are gay. Such studies take into account environmental factors, a good deal of
research coming from adopted twins). Indeed, there is no correlation of people turning
out gay that were exposed to factors that were historically deemed to influence sexuality,
including children raised by gay parents, or victims of child sex abuse. (This does not
always apply to female children, however). Freud postulated that male children often
became gay due to a distant or absent father and over-protective, dominant mother. This
is widely regarded as a symptom not a cause of male homosexuality. The father detects
the child's sexuality early on during the phallic psychosexual stages of development and
withdraws, and the mother rushes in to fill the void in the child’s life. (Environmental
factors can, however, develop sexual attraction of males to transsexuals, and females
with attached phalluses Little is know of the causes of transsexualism itself.)
Evolution is determined by how change and adaptation affects the proliferation of our
species. Darwin discovered that the success of a species is determined by its ability to
reproduce many offspring; many of the same species facilitate easy reproduction,
environmental factors permitting. This does not necessarily indicate the necessity of
intelligence, which at base level is an organisms ability to manipulate its environment to
the benefit of itself or its gene pool. In order to understand the evolution of modern man
intelligence, which is huge in comparison to other life forms, we need to again revert to
the social habits of chimpanzees and bonobos, and contrast their mating habits.
Intelligence is clearly visible in both species. One only has to observe their behaviour to
see human characteristics that are unnervingly similar to our own. Facial expressions,
communication, love and affection, altruism, tool-making, ranking of social order are but a
few. But there are subtle but significant differences which may explain the etymology of
male homosexuality. The alpha male chimpanzee of a troop is the father of most of his
troop. He is strong, aggressive and dominant. He often 'rapes' the female during
conception. This is influential in ensuring that he is powerful enough to overcome his
mates resistance and thus pass on this strength and power to his offspring. However, an
elegant method of passing on less powerful, but more intelligent genes has developed to
facilitate reproduction of the beta male. He is weaker, smaller and lacks the power of his
alpha male, but beta males more intelligent will often utilise a crafty ploy to allow his own
smarter genes to reproduce,. Two or more beta males will go out into the bush away from
the troop and pretend to fight., Alpha male rushes out to seize control of the situation,
and during this time another beta male will sneak in and impregnate the reproductive,
sexually receptive female. This also correlates with the method that chimpanzees
collaborate as a team, each with its own role when hunting. We have established that
6. bonobos virtually never use aggression to control. The alpha-female uses sex to assert
her social positions and rank. It could be argued that both species are the exact mirrored
inversion of each other,. If we map this onto the methods of control and dominance to
bonobos, it would transpire like this:
The males go out to into the bush as do chimpanzees. In order to convince other males
that mating is taking place, one of them has to assume the role of the female . The other
males are attracted to this, aroused by the possibility of mating. During the time that they
are distracted, the more intelligent male who is waiting for his cue, dashes over to the
receptive female and impregnates her, thus those that are intellectually superior, as
opposed to those that are physically superior, are the ones that achieve reproduction.
This transposes well onto the modern-day human chimpanzee male-dominated culture.
Could it be that this newly evolved alpha male of this missing link species is, like his
predecessors, in full control of the reproduction of his troop, and in that circumstance
there is no possibility of of any other genes breaking through until he is displaced by the
new alpha male as he becomes older and weaker, which is normally his own offspring,
possessing the same characteristics as himself and this preventing any significant
genetic mutation, evolution of the species arrested for millennia. That is until
homosexuality evolved into the species.
The scenario could have been thus: Third son, camp, young and effeminate goes out into
the bush, as per the young chimps pretending to fight, and the alpha male is tempted
away from his receptive females, assuming due to the position of lordosis that this is a
female he is about to mount. No breasts are visible, and so no visual gender indicators
are present. His anus takes the position that a female's vagina would normally take,
penetration occurs, and both males receive sexual stimulation and gratification. During
the time that he is mounted on the male, the other older brothers sneak in and
impregnate the receptive female. Any sperm preciously deposited is removed, and so it is
the more highly evolved and intelligent genes that succeed in reproduction. Those of the
aggressive, violent alpha male fail and so his traits are evolved out of the species.
If this plausible theory is true, one should consider the impact that this would have on a
modern society: a reduction in aggression, rape, violence, and a significant increase on
family values of working together for the same end, and most crucially, a portal that
facilitates the evolving in of human intelligence. Without this, we could possibly be living a
little more developed lifestyle than Neanderthal man.
This would also explain modem gay culture. Gay men gravitate towards strong women,
Madonna, Bette Davies, for example. Would this be, similar to Freud’s Oedipus complex,
that we are still looking for the same characteristics (strength, power, protection) of and
from our fathers when we eventually reconcile the anxiety that it causes, , but without a
penis? i.e. in our mothers? A famous experiment by John Money, whereby a tragic
circumcision of a baby boy ended up in his persuading the parents to change the sex of
the infant and raise him as a girl proved that gender identity is partly innate, and not just
the processing of humans during Freud's phallic stage. The child assumed that he was a
girl, but still had considerable male mannerism and traits. Indeed the unfortunate child
7. was called 'monkey girl' by her nasty classmates from a very early stage in his life.
Monkey girl, or boy bonobo. Maybe there is a little of both in all of us.