Homosexuality: nature or nurture?

[Wootah]

Hi all

As of 29 July 2022. What does the science say? What do you think?

Homosexuality: nature or nurture?

[Miles]

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Don't know about "As of 29 July 2022." However, from an article appearing on the PBS News Hour web site Aug 29, 2019 .

[The] GWAS [genome-wide association study] study found that, like with many human behaviors, sexuality doesn’t have a strong genetic backing.

When the team looked for DNA patterns that had strong correlations, they found that no one gene could account for any more than 1 percent of people’s sexuality. The strongest signals came from five random genes.

Two of those genes correlated with same-sex sexuality in males, one of which is known to influence the sense of smell. One gene cropped up for females and two others showed solid patterns in both males and females. But their individual scores never passed this 1-percent mark — meaning they are all minor contributors to same-sex sexual behavior.

When the team looked more broadly across all the genomes — across the thousands of genes that they screened for the nearly 500,000 subjects — the genes similarities they found could only account for 8 to 25 percent of same-sex sexual behavior.

“It’s effectively impossible to predict an individual’s sexual behavior from their genome,” said Ben Neale, a geneticist at Massachusetts General Hospital and the Broad Institute who led the study. “Genetics is less than half of this story for sexual behavior.”.
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“[Our study] underscores an important role for the environment in shaping human sexual behavior and perhaps most importantly there is no single gay gene but rather the contribution of many small genetic effects scattered across the genome,”
source

The thing to keep in mind s that no one chooses their sexual preferences.


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[Wootah]

[Replying to Miles in post #2]

Are you disagreeing with the study? What do you mean no one chooses their sexual preferences?

[Miles]

[Replying to Miles in post #2]

Are you disagreeing with the study?

No. I'm just presenting its findings.

What do you mean no one chooses their sexual preferences?

Neither I, nor anyone else I've ever spoken to on the subject of sexual preference, ever said they consciously chose to be heterosexual, homosexual, or bisexual. Did you intentionally choose which sex most attracts you?


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[Wootah]

[Replying to Miles in post #4]

I think I personally do. I think conscious decisions become habits over a life time of training. A cricket batsman does not consciously choose their shot in the microsecond before the ball gets to them but a lifetime of habit helps select the correct shot. I know what I say to my children guides them in their future choices as well.

I mean I am not attracted to fat girls, or girls with no shape. Why is that?

edit: Nor am I attracted to muscular girls - because I am trained not to be attracted to men.

[brunumb]

[Replying to Miles in post #4]

I think I personally do. I think conscious decisions become habits over a life time of training. A cricket batsman does not consciously choose their shot in the microsecond before the ball gets to them but a lifetime of habit helps select the correct shot. I know what I say to my children guides them in their future choices as well.

I mean I am not attracted to fat girls, or girls with no shape. Why is that?

edit: Nor am I attracted to muscular girls - because I am trained not to be attracted to men.

How do you account for the fact that homosexual people are born and raised in heterosexual families? When they reach sexual maturity they have already been exposed to what you would consider a "life time of training" in heterosexuality, but they somehow find themselves attracted to the same sex. That often leads to anguish and pain, so it is hard to imagine that one can so easily dismiss it as simply a matter of choice.

[Tcg]

[Replying to Wootah in post #1]



No one trained these penguins to be gay. Query answered.


Tcg

[Wootah]

[Replying to Miles in post #4]

I think I personally do. I think conscious decisions become habits over a life time of training. A cricket batsman does not consciously choose their shot in the microsecond before the ball gets to them but a lifetime of habit helps select the correct shot. I know what I say to my children guides them in their future choices as well.

I mean I am not attracted to fat girls, or girls with no shape. Why is that?

edit: Nor am I attracted to muscular girls - because I am trained not to be attracted to men.

How do you account for the fact that homosexual people are born and raised in heterosexual families? When they reach sexual maturity they have already been exposed to what you would consider a "life time of training" in heterosexuality, but they somehow find themselves attracted to the same sex. That often leads to anguish and pain, so it is hard to imagine that one can so easily dismiss it as simply a matter of choice.

Lots of bad cricketers in the world as well.

I also thing bad experiences with the opposite sex are a major cause. The problem is that every sexual interaction outside of marriage is necessarily a bad experience.

People love anguish and pain. Seriously. In the society I live in we promote wokeism and suffering and celebrate it.

I am not dismissing anything as simply a matter of choice. I think there is a lot of deep pain and anguish and trauma behind the decision to be homosexual as well as whatever nature contributes. We all have genetic issues to deal with in life. But i do wonder - I can see 'genes' that make us male and female but genes that make us attracted to other things that would be interesting to discover. I really am interested in the science.

Still, I will stick with my point by analogy. I remember taking my wife on a date to a movie and there was violence on the screen and I sat there not reacting and she sat there squeaming. It was the first time I realised how conditioned I had become to violence. Now I consume less violence and actually like to watch violence less. All in all, the less tv the better. But conditioning is a thing to not discount.

[Jose Fly]

Two questions.

First, what does it matter to you whether it's a choice or innate? If it's a choice, then it's no different than religion and the people who choose to be queer should be free to live as they choose. If it's innate, then it's no different than being tall or short and the people who are born that way should be free to live as they are.

Second, every single LGBTQ person I've ever known has been adamant that they were born that way. Who are any of us to tell them that they're wrong, that we know their feelings and background better than they do, and that they're either lying or deluding themselves? Seriously...who do you think you are?

[Difflugia]

First, what does it matter to you whether it's a choice or innate? If it's a choice, then it's no different than religion and the people who choose to be queer should be free to live as they choose. If it's innate, then it's no different than being tall or short and the people who are born that way should be free to live as they are.

Just for completeness, "choice" and "innate" aren't the only two options. In fact, I didn't even read the OP in terms of choice (even though it's now apparent that's what was intended) because "nature vs. nurture" is usually presented as a difference between innate behaviors and early operant conditioning, neither of which represents a conscious choice.