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Gay at birth?
Factfinder said:@ZeusAres42
It's like did any heterosexual ask why they are? No they just accepted it. Do we blame them? No. So why do we tend to blame the homosexuals for why they are? There are certain people on this site who need to believe its a choice so their god doesn't come off the jerk. But the fact is people can't help what they're attracted to. And if god exist then god made them, like everything else. So there's no reason to persecute them. Of course the real reason not to persecute them is they leave more women for us!
There are certain people on this site who need to believe its a choice so their god doesn't come off the jerk.
AKA cognitive dissonance. Also, they could be struggling to come out of the closet themselves.
@Factfinder
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Gay at birth?
@ZeusAres42
It's like did any heterosexual ask why they are? No they just accepted it. Do we blame them? No. So why do we tend to blame the homosexuals for why they are? There are certain people on this site who need to believe its a choice so their god doesn't come off the jerk. But the fact is people can't help what they're attracted to. And if god exist then god made them, like everything else. So there's no reason to persecute them. Of course the real reason not to persecute them is they leave more women for us! 
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Gay at birth?
@just_sayin
From the original papers you referenced (I wonder why you didn't quote any of this??)Introduction This article has two related goals. The first is to provide a current summary of scientific findings regarding sexual orientation. Although we focus most on causation, we also address other scientific issues concerning sexual orientation, including its meaning and measurement, sex differences in its expression, its development, and its expression across time and place. Regarding causation, we provide a taxonomy of causal hypotheses and review evidence for them. These include hormonal, genetic, social environmental, and nonsocial environmental influences. Our second goal is less scientific and more analytical: to criticize and improve common but incorrect reasoning in this domain. For example, the commonly phrased question of whether sexual orientation is “a choice” is a poor one for advancing either scientific understanding or policy. A more meaningful formulation is whether sexual orientation is socially influenced.
Our review has led us to the following conclusions. Sexual orientation refers to relative sexual attraction to men, to women, or to both. People who are sexually attracted to the same sex (whom we denote as “nonheterosexual”) represent a minority of adults. Those with predominantly same-sex attractions comprise fewer than 5% of respondents in most Western surveys. Data from non-Western cultures are consistent with this conclusion. There is no persuasive evidence that the rate of same-sex attraction has varied much across time or place. Male and female sexual orientations differ in several respects. Women are more likely to report a bisexual than an exclusively same-sex orientation; men show the opposite pattern. Men’s sexual orientations are closely linked to their pattern of sexual arousal to male versus female erotic stimuli; women’s are not. Women appear more likely than men to experience same-sex attraction in the context of close affectionate relationships, and their patterns of sexual attraction appear more likely to exhibit change over time.
The question of choice Do people choose to be homosexual or heterosexual? This question is perhaps the most common causal question asked in the sociopolitical context. It is asked much less commonly in scientific contexts because, as we shall see, it is a bad question. This is partly because there are at least two different, mutually inconsistent meanings of “choice” that are often conflated.
Choice as uncaused action. The correlation between one’s beliefs about the causes of sexual orientation and one’s degree of tolerance of nonheterosexuality appears to be based on the following logic: If there are causes— other than free will—that lead certain people to be nonheterosexual, then those people were never entirely free to be heterosexual and hence cannot be held responsible for their nonheterosexuality. For example, finding a gene that increases the chance a man will be homosexual would mean that the man is not completely free to choose to be heterosexual. To the extent that the gene causes his homosexuality, we should neither blame him nor discriminate against him. This is the essence of the argument regarding sexual orientation and choice. Yet this is a bad argument, and the word “choice” (and associated concepts such as freedom and responsibility) lies at the root of the problem. Why would discovery of a gene for sexual orientation imply that homosexuality is not freely chosen? It would do so only if we could assume that free will is the null hypothesis on which causal studies chip away. This assumption is not scientific, however, and is not intellectually defensible (Dennett, 1984; Pinker, 2003). For instance, to the extent that a trait is not genetic, it is caused by the environment, not by free will. If a trait is not present from birth, then it is caused by events occurring after birth, not by free will.
Choice as decision to act. There is an alternative sense of “choice” that is more meaningful: the sense of making a decision. This ordinary-language sense of “choice” is something that is commonly understood. “I chose to raise my hand,” “I chose to eat broccoli,” “I chose to rob a bank,” and “I chose to have sex with that person” are all meaningful sentences. It is this sense of “choice” that people likely mean when they debate whether sexual orientation is a lifestyle choice. Note that cause has nothing to do with it. The four sentences all make sense even though the respective choices to which they refer could all be determined by a combination of genetic and environmental factors. People may choose to do things for environmental reasons—perhaps a woman has been offered a million dollars to raise her hand. Or they may choose them for genetic reasons—perhaps a man chose a blue car because his genetically determined color blindness made red and green cars unappealingly gray. In a deterministic world (which behavioral scientists assume), decisions have causes. The meanings of words can be illuminated by how people use them, and an important regularity in the way people use “choice” concerns the distinction between behavior and feelings. We choose our actions, but we do not choose our feelings. Consider the following two sentences: 1. “I choose to have sex with partners of my own sex.” 2. “I choose to desire to have sex with partners of my own sex.” The first sentence is conventional and sensible; the second sentence is neither. Einstein summarized Schopenhauer’s famous argument appropriately and thusly: “Man can do what he wills, but he cannot will what he wills” (as quoted in Planck, 1933, p. 201). Applied to sexual orientation, it makes sense to say that people choose their sexual partners, but it doesn’t make sense to say that they choose their desires. Sexual orientation is defined as relative desire for same-sex or other-sex sex partners. Thus, it makes no sense to say that one chooses one’s sexual orientation. One does, however, choose to behave consistently or inconsistently with one’s sexual orientation. That is a lifestyle choice.
Bold Added
One of the original papers was referenced earlier via one or more links from @just_sayin. More can be read and ideally should be read here: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1529100616637616.
Another original paper:https://www.researchgate.net/profile/J-Bailey-4/publication/282051582_Genetics_of_Human_Sexual_Orientation/links/5748ce0a08ae5bf2e63efbee/Genetics-of-Human-Sexual-Orientation.pdf
Contemporary academic literature:Sexual Orientation: Categories or Continuum? Commentary on Bailey et al. (2016): https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1529100616637618
Biological foundations of sexual orientation
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/280579236_Biological_foundations_of_sexual_orientation10 - Gay Genes? Genetics and Sexual Orientation
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 September 2020 - https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/are-we-slaves-to-our-genes/gay-genes-genetics-and-sexual-orientation/3C1A61B7C5207BA60C152301E205CCB4
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aat7693 (reference earlier by you too @just_sayin, I think)
Moreover, I disagree with your misinterpretation of the scientific literature and the misalignment with contemporary data. Non-immutability and/or fluidity mean variances across natural developmental stages; it has nothing to do with libertarian free will!
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Can Artificial Intelligence Programs Make Better Decisions Than Humans?
@ZeusAres42
Ai's will always lack one thing, emotion. That can be good in some ways, very bad in other ways. For getting to the facts ai's are very helpful. In the end instinct should prevail. No matter what's the best logical or practical choice, there are times in our lives it seems intuition, a gut feeling guides us one way and we follow to our rewards. You know? Considering the lives of innocents? I don't think ai will ever be capable of that. Not a perfect science by any means but in the end I could not in good faith turn over all decisions to ai as the best decision could be logically we don't survive but some of our ideals prevail. Then it would just be a semblance of humanity that reaches out to space. -
Gay at birth?
Something very obvious that I would like to insert in this discussion is that the question of what causes homosexuality is separate from the question of whether it is changeable at will. Even if homosexuality was purely environmental (which it very well might be), it still would not imply that it can be changed intentionally. Human psychology has incredible memory, and 90-year old people are still chiefly run by their childhood traumas. Someone who had a very traumatic confrontation with their parent when they were 5, may still experience painful flashbacks every time they enter a confrontation at the age of 95. They were not born with these flashbacks, but they are so deeply ingrained in their psychology that they might as well be an inherent part of their brain.
Changing one's behavior is difficult enough. Changing one's preferences is downright impossible without very serious and long inner work. Take someone who hates the taste of carrots and try to get them to love it - most likely will not happen. And changing disliking one vegetable to liking it is a billion times easier than changing being sexually attracted to one gender to another.
Lastly, I invite anyone who seriously believes that homosexuality can be changed into heterosexuality at will - conduct the opposite experiment. Pick a month and, assuming you are heterosexual, live it as if you were homosexual. Go on dates with guys (involving making out), share bed with them, watch gay porn... Then let us know how it went.
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Can Artificial Intelligence Programs Make Better Decisions Than Humans?
I understand this was meant as a joke, but it made me think of the automation bias, which you may or may not be aware of. This is a cognitive bias in which we tend to place much reliance on automation tools to work for us, and that includes AI now as well. Some examples come to mind: spelling and grammar correction tools such as Grammarly, which now has AI capabilities; another is AV tools to protect one's computer from infected malware. Many malware programs now have AI capabilities, can infiltrate systems and bypass even advanced AV tools (AV tools with AI abilities). Hence, one or more humans with specialised expertise in this area are needed in cases like this.MayCaesar said:If you cannot answer this question without asking an AI, then yes, an AI is likely to make better decisions than you.
Moreover, "Do AIs make better decisions than us?" is too vague. It depends on the AI program, the subject, and the conditions. If we are talking specifically about chess, for example, then yes, that would be Stockfish!
@MayCaesar
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"Unfair universe" paradox
Max quote You are disregarding science.
I disregard pseudo science, and I think I have the maturity to differentiate one from the other. Bit worried about you, though.
Max quote Did you not read the link?
As a matter of fact, I did. The reason being, because you are doing such a lousy job of presenting any argument at all that races do not exist, that I got bored again and I thought I would go to your source. As expected, your link was laughable. It was nothing but diseased English, which was probably written by Sir Humphry Appleby himself. You probably tried to read it too, but the reason why you could not use it as a source to write a reasoned argument supporting your position, is that not did not make any sense to you, either? Diseased English is the art of writing blithering nonsense in an authoritative way in order to fool the gullible who want to be impressed. It did not fool me one whit. I suppose that I could go through your link, paragraph by paragraph, pointing out the waffle and the meandering logic? But I have been down that track before, only to have my opponent swamp me with even more stu-pid links. So, I end up being the one who does all the work while my opponent just submits ever more links, “Dreamer” style. I challenge you to read your link and if it makes any sense to you, use it to form your own argument. But that will never happen, because it is just a series of spurious declarations written in an authoritative way, which is impossible to use to form a cohesive argument.
Max quote Or the many other high quality science links, showing why and how humans are all one race because we are to similar to be classified as sub races except by sociology concepts?
Then you had better find one which is a lot more credible than the one which you submitted in your last post. Unlike your link, my position is simple to understand and is supported by evidence which most informed people already know is true. Most informed people know that science does recognise race because they know that the reason why so called “anti racists” claim that “white men invented racism” is because in the 19th century, science itself was very interested in race. And in those days, science was almost solely the preserve of white European men. But even today, it is an easily provable premise that science recognises race, regardless of how many woke “scientists” there are who are consider their ideological beliefs to be more important than science. They know that the people who use their “scientific reports” will never look at them with a critical eye, or verify if they are true. So, they can misuse the great respect which most people have for science to push that government mandated ideological agenda.
Max quote These links clearly back up my statement.
Your link was supposed to prove that races do not exist. There was no cohesive argument on that topic at all. It basically said “I am a scientist and I say that race does not exist. So there!” That hardly impresses any person who has any capacity to think, any more than a woke biologist claiming that it is impossible for science to differentiate between a male and female skeleton. Or, the once respected medical journal Lancet claiming that the Wuhan virus did not originate in a Chinese bio weapons lab in China. Or, climate scientists claiming that the north pole will be ice free by 2013, and the London and New York subways will both be drowned.
Max quote You on the other hand, give me a botanist who lived in the 1800s
So did Charles Darwin. I suppose that his advocacy for evolution should be dismissed entirely because he was just an old white guy who lived 150 years ago? I sure hope your woke “scientists” don’t decide that evolution is not politically correct, so Darwin should be air brushed out of science too? All they would need to do to impress you, would be to write some pseudo scientific reports in diseased English claiming that evolution was fake, and you would lap it up without even bothering to turn on your critical analysis circuit to really read the nonsense they were writing?
Max quote and one you tube video of dubious quality.
Then here is another one which proves that geneticists, who are scientists, recognise race.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HlGhVgV3Yw&t=176s
The problem for woke ”scientists” today is that smart people are just too informed with lots of media sources that they can use to keep up with what is going on in politics and science. They can fool the gullible and the misinformed, but they can’t fool people who like to be aware of what is happening in the world around them, and who can think straight.
Max quote Give me a few high quality science links that back up your statements.
That would be like the Catholic Church during the Inquisition demanding to know the names of any scientist who supported the idea that the earth was not the centre of the universe. We live in an age where universities have been taken over by government supported, crazy cultural revolutionaries who shout down, sack from their jobs, destroy the careers, and “cancel” any academic who dares to oppose their government sanctioned worldview. So, just like in the days of Galileo, if you want to understand the world around you, you have to pick up unbiased bits of information from wherever you can, and link them together to form a picture. Naturally, you won’t do that, because that would require a sceptical mind and some effort. Easier to just toe the woke party line, confident that the people who are destroying western civilisation, suburb by suburb, city by city, and country by country, really know what they are talking about.
Could I also add that in many western countries today, it is illegal to claim that races are not equal. This topic is so super sensitive in Canada, that the Trudeau government is legislating that anybody who “offends” their new imported electors should be jailed for life. Scotland’s new “Hate Laws” mandate seven years jail for saying something racist in your own home. I live in Australia, and if I lived in the state of Victoria, I could be prosecuted for writing this reply to you. If you really do have the capacity to think, then you should be able to figure out that when the authorities demand that you not think or write about something, they definitely have got something to hide. The only reason for political censorship is to protect those at the top with their power, prestige, perks, and privileges. They have a state ideology which was invented to keep the proles on the bottom and themselves at the top, and they don’t want the proles thinking. They seem to have succeeded in that nefarious aim with you.
Max quote Yes, conceptually there are sub races; biologically in humans; no.
Your premise is illogical. If every mammalian life form excepting polar bears (and that for good reason) exists solely as sub species, then it stands to reason that your premise does not make sense. If not, then I challenge you to write a reasoned argument explaining how it is that human beings are exempt from the same evolutionary forces which have created sub species in every other mammalian species. It is no good looking up your “authoritative scientific reports” to help you, because the evil little bastards who wrote that cr-ap already know that I am right. And there will be nothing in their waffling links that will help you. So, c’mon Max, show us all how you can think. Show us all how informative and logical your links are. Since you claim to be just telling the scientific truth, then it should be easy for you to use your “scientific” links that you have such faith in, to prove that whatever evolutionary forces affect the creation of sub species in every other vertebrate creature, can not apply to human beings.
London to a brick that you will not answer. You can’t answer because your premise is illogical. Which is why your whole idea that races do not exist is logically bankrupt.
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"Unfair universe" paradox
People who have religious mindsets like Factfinder, who want to believe in social fantasies because they most fervently wish that they were true, usually resort to the three monkeys rule. : First deny, deny, deny, then pass the buck, and if that doesn't work, shoot the messenger -
Gay at birth?
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Heterosexual At Birth?
Could it be that people choose to be heterosexual? the evidence shows that we are born homosexual at birth. And that is logical since it is natural. Other animals are born homosexuals and don’t have a choice when some change gender and even some animal males give birth.
Take a look at kids when there growing up. They are heterophobic and shun the other sex and relate to their own sex.
it is only later in life that some people choose to turn heterosexual because of perhaps there parents happened to be heteros or it just happened to be trendy at the time and look cool to be different.So therefore it is just a social condition that make some people turn hetero and there is no evidence to show they were born that way. Some people don’t sit comfortably about people being attracted to the other sex because we know what they do and they spread a lot of STDs. So should it really matter if heterosexuals choose there life style?
