Aylene

I think it's a great theory. Meaning, I love how they imply that all the historians from the Renaissance have been in a big conspiracy. My first instinct is to yell "Far-fetched!" and dismiss it out of hand, but they say the same thing about the accepted timeline, so I guess we're left to decide for ourselves which is more far-fetched. They have no proof to support their theory, but part of their theory is the elimination of all the proof we think we have for our timeline. Which also makes it useless. Without proof to back up either of the timelines, the world will stick with the old established one. I know I will.

No angry response here, just a mild sense of bewilderment and a lot of "EH???" I think Dante is right about the overcomplicating. Nature is pretty simple, always follows the same straight lines to get to its goals. Prey that does not run gets eaten, so an instinct to flee or fight (fear) evolves in those who are liable to be hunted. This includes ALL modern-day mammals, the rabbit and the wolf but also the elephant and the human. Our ancestors were small vole-like creatures, if I'm not mistaken, and they were much lower in the food chain than the lizards of those days. Humans fear, even those with power. You conclude this yourself in your final paragraphs, so I'm not sure where you want to go with this post. Also seems a bit redundant ... if you look at it that way, is not everything we do futile? We're all going to die in the end. What matters is what we make of life, but only so long as we're alive. In the end, it all ends :) As for transcending our role ... what do you mean by that? (I'm a bit hazy there, never studied much philosophy, so there may be something I'm missing.) The prey or predator question ... I thought we were both? Don't humans share most similarities with other apes, and pigs, with the eating habits, tooth structure and bowel volume of your typical omnivore? I once read somewhere that our ape ancestors were food-gathering herbivores, getting their meager supply of protein from insects and carrion. As they moved from the forest to the plains, they started walking upright, and were able to bring down animals for meat working together and using their developing brains, which subsequently grew with the abundance of protein as their bowel volume shrunk because their diet relied less and less on fibrous plants. I don't know if it's true - I have most of my knowledge of biology from high school and TV documentaries - but it would explain why we still like (and need) to eat both meat and a healthy amount of plants.

It seems to be a question of sex discrimination to me. Formulating the question like this, "Can the government grant Miss X a license to marry Mr Y, yet withhold the same license from Mr Z, for the sole reason that Mr Z is male and Miss X is female?" what do you think the answer should be?

I'm sorry if it seems that I omitted viewpoints of yours that were important to your argument. I think I addressed most of them, but it may be I missed some here and there. As for claiming a viewpoint for my own - I am aware that the "Romantic Feelings" term comes from you, and put it in specifically in order to make it clear that my viewpoints were similar to yours on that point (i.e. that it is who you have "Romantic Feelings" for that defines whether you are homo, hetero, or possibly bi). I never stated that people, being bisexual at birth, conditioned themselves into becoming either homo or heterosexual. I honestly don't know where you read that in my post. About people who said they choose to be gay - what they have chosen is to give in to their feelings for the same sex. It is indeed true that a gay person can choose to have a relationship with someone of the opposite sex, and it may even work. That does not mean they might not be happier with someone of the same sex. So yes, there is a choice ... in behavior. Not in nature. The gay testimonials do not convince me much because some of these people may be bisexual, and others may refer to the lifestyle as opposed to their actual sexuality. You make a good point about the rams, but the swans seem odd to me. Nurse-swans? Then why was there no male to fertilize the eggs? To me, it seems these two swans found someone they considered attractive (or who released some type of hormone... dopamine is it? in their brain) and it started the chain reaction in their bodies that prompted them to fill a nest with eggs. I don't think swans think in terms of male and female. If they think at all, it will be in terms of "compatible" or "incompatible". They're not love-addicted, any more than heterosexual swans. They just want to procreate, and the swan that registered in their brain as "compatible" happened to be of the same sex. I honestly don't know why dogs hump legs. I've actually had a female dog hump my leg once, which was odd, because she obviously did not have a penis. Can't say I know enough about that to draw a conclusion, but I get your point that the male dogs who do this have probably found a way to release sexual tension, and it is no sign of leggosexuality or whatever in them. So yeah. I get what you're saying, that our choices separate us from animals. I wouldn't word it that way myself - I'd say animals don't think about consequences the way humans do, and therefore just make the choice that benefits them most in the short term. When a person who calls himself gay gets offended at the idea there's no choice, I get the idea that he was proud to make the choice to come out, that he feels there is a choice between being closeted and miserable, and out-of-the-closet and happy. (Or just the gay way and the straight way if they're bi, of course, which you can never tell.) Animals don't have this choice, because they don't do closeted-and-miserable. As I said, they don't think in terms of male and female, or gay and straight, or acceptable and unacceptable. The combined facts that 1) The vast majority of gay people does say they did not have a choice and 2) there are bisexual people who, unlike gay people, do have a choice, and 3) there is a choice of sorts between coming out and staying closeted convince me that homosexuality is indeed a biological phenomenon. The evidence with animals supports this, at least from my point of view, but I can imagine that you're sceptic towards it. Peace right back at you :) Aylene

Hi all, This is my first post on these forums ... they were brought to my attention by a friend. I have spent hours enjoying the various philosophical and other debates, sometimes wanting to reply, but usually someone would come up with my viewpoint on the subject, so I felt a reply from the newcomer would be redundant. In this case however, I feel there are still things to be said. I realize that it is an old thread, and if bringing it back to life is a bad thing to do, I apologize in advance. Gunwounds, I will start by saying that I think I understand your viewpoints, even if I do not agree with them. You argue from the perspective of a Christian who believes in evolution - God is the Creator of all things, but he did not make it all in the six days of the Bible. (If I'm wrong, correct me.) As such, you would believe that everything in the universe has its purpose. Everything is designed by God to make sense in some way. Homosexuality to you cannot be a biological phenomenon, because God designed the penis to fit into the vagina. I think this blinds you to arguments, and even evidence, to the contrary. Most homosexuals never wanted to be gay, and never perceived it as a choice, no matter how many people you can quote who say that it was. They just realized at one point that they would never be happy with someone of the opposite sex. What do you do when that happens? Do you stay with them? Does staying with your opposite-sex partner make you heterosexual? I think you will agree that they are homosexual, no matter who they sleep with. If the "Romantic Feelings" they have are for persons of the same sex, they are homosexual. Whether they looked up to same-sex older siblings/friends as children or not. As for homosexuality in animals being a fallacy - this is another example of you being blind to reality. Rams prove their superiority by banging their heads together, not their nads. I agree that alpha male baboons mount lower-ranked males as a show of superiority, but in rams this does not seem to be the case. It does not explain this either: http://www.egale.ca/index.asp?lang=E&menu=12&item=1237 Rather a long article, I know, but it states clearly, if not explicitly, that there was a case of lesbian swans in Boston. Now to me, this contradicts both the idea of homosexuality among animals being a question of dominance, and your theory that homosexuality is the result of some misinterpretation of feelings by pre-pubescent humans. Will these swans have fantasized of sex with eachother and masturbated to it? I am not familiar enough with swan anatomy to say that it is impossible, but I consider it highly unlikely. So what if homosexuality really IS a biologically determined phenomenon, and not a choice influenced by misinterpreted feelings? How do I explain the people who say they felt they did have a choice? Simple. By a phenomenon that is largely ignored, probably because it is too confusing for some to grasp: Bisexuality. If homosexuality is caused by a different balance of hormones in the womb, then it stands to reason that it is not a binary black-and-white question. Not everyone will be strictly homosexual or heterosexual; there are gray areas. These people will sometimes display a preference for one sex, then develop one for the other, and sometimes they have no preference at all. The reason that the way you think offends so many people, and makes Dante wash his hands of the subject, and hurls Dragoon into a rage of righteous fury, is that you are laying the blame for homosexuality (as far as anyone needs to be blamed for it) with the homosexual. You imply that their situation would not have existed if they had not made the mistake of fantasizing about men when they were 13 years old, and perhaps that they could change and become "cured" if they put their minds to it. To people who have tried to "cure" themselves for years, and failed (yes, these are the Pure Gays if you will, and those who do get "cured" are bisexuals), this can only give offense. I understand that for someone who believes the universe is designed, it is hard to believe that homosexuality fits into it all. However, you are not a fundamentalist who believes everything the Bible says. You can think for yourself, and you should not have that much trouble believing that perhaps God has a plan for homosexuals, as he has a plan with the universe that none of us should presume to just explain out of hand. From my experience, the homosexual men I know have always been more understanding towards my feelings as a woman than any man was, whereas at the same time they seemed to know what made men tick. There may be a hidden purpose there. I guess what I'm trying to say is - just because you can't explain it, does not mean it's not true. Nobody is trying to make homosexuality look mysterious, because it's not. It has biological causes, which I agree are a little hazy, but who cares? The effects are clear. You don't care to know exactly how all your household appliances work, do you? What's important is that they make your coffee and wash your clothes. Same with homosexuality. It's not mysterious - it's just something you have not looked into enough with enough prior knowledge to draw any educated conclusions. And why should you? I know I don't. When homosexuals say they have no choice in being homosexual, I have no reason not to believe them. And I don't see why you shouldn't. Regards, Aylene