/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.11501698]

I have spent the last few months reading about sexual selection, and there is something that doesn't add up.
From the evolutionary standpoint, I don't see how monogamy was selected for males.

Polygamy makes sense for females
>Creates confusion as to who fathers your child, lowers chance of rogue males killing your offspring due to this confusion, lower ranking males will often protect you in exchange for sex outside of estrus, and during estrus they can just mate with the high ranking males for reproduction. Some species go with this.

Monogamy makes sense for females
>Creates a strong pair bond of a male that will protect the female and the offspring in a best case scenario, provide food, etc etc. Some species go with this. Also goes well with the selection algorithm of finding the "best" male.

Polygamy makes sense for males
>Basic male selection algorithm. Impregnate as many as possible, hope some of the offspring makes it, hope some lower ranking male will take care of it. You have basically infinite gametes to spread around anyway.

Monogamy makes no sense for males. I can't find an evolutionary reason to support it. Yet it became the prevalent thing for human males to desire. You see so many talking about finding a life long pair bonding partner. Why did this happen? How was this selected when there is no advantage to it? What made males start choosing this unrewarding strategy to them?

[Anonymous No.11501714]

tl;dr

[Anonymous No.11501719]

>>11501714
There was no way to say this in less words. Just put your big boy scientist brain into it and I'm sure you can read it.

[Anonymous No.11501778]

>>11501719
ok i got the gist of it
i think you're trying too hard to go at this from a scientific standpoint. there's a spiritual/emotional element to this that answers your question. You see, life is born from brutality. Kill or be killed. Eat or be eaten. Rape to reproduce. Millions/billions of years of this has taken a toll on DNA itself. Sadness is what monogamy is born from. It is too sad to continue down the path of animalism. It is painfully sad and depressing to be nothing but a hollow animal destroying everything when this has been taking place for so long. DNA is fed up with it. DNA is desperate for meaning/purpose/value/beauty. Men are generally creatures of destruction moar so than women which is why most men are desperate to create a beautiful love story and accept women's shit to any extent to obtain it. Because men have so much more brutality in their DNA and it sickens them so much as to do anything for their woman. There is potential for so much moar than just being disgusting stimulation seeking animals. It is a man's job to make this fantasy a reality.

[Anonymous No.11501815]

>>11501698
First of all:
>The word monogamy derives from the Greek μονός, monos ("alone"), and γάμος, gamos ("marriage").
Second of all, what makes you think males desire monogamy? Isn't it just learned from culture? What evidence is there that it was selected for? Civilization has been interfering with natural selection for millennia.

>>11501778
>>>/lit/

[Anonymous No.11501828]

>>11501815
oh fucking believe me i have resisted being the real me my whole FUCKING life because of the FAGGOTY FUCKING poetic little FUCKING faggotboy i am dear god i hate this or do i love it? jesus fucking christ why god why do i come off as this little fucking faggotboy i have done REaAL FUCKING shit in this life i have fucked shit up and restrained my horrible human nature so fucking much why am i liek this holy fuck i dont want to be mentally ill i dont want to be institutionalized im not fucking crazy

[Anonymous No.11501836]

>>11501815
>What evidence is there that it was selected for?
It's very prevalent. Almost every very prevalent thing we do can be traced back to evolutionary psychology.
How do you explain it randomly coming up otherwise?

[Anonymous No.11501848]

>>11501828
Not crazy, but a bit mentally unstable. It's ok anon, a lot of us have been there. Just try to get a grip and treat your brain well. Remember, it's not an independent black box. It has inputs it requires to function efficiently. Get plenty of rest, meditate, eat well, address the problems in your life. With a little elbow grease and guidance, you'll be fine.

[Anonymous No.11501850]

>>11501698
I wish I had a dozen bfs/gfs.

[Anonymous No.11501854]

>>11501848
thanks bro

[Anonymous No.11501856]

You can pour your resources and care to the family unit. It's hard to pass down the skills of hunting, medicine and gathering etc. If the boys come from two different mothers, and thus you have to juggle with many families.

[Anonymous No.11501859]

>>11501856
what if one really really big family

[Anonymous No.11501863]

>>11501698
post a single peer-reviewed paper that supports widespread selection for monogamy across species who sexually reproduce

[Anonymous No.11501866]

>>11501836
Can Christianity be traced back to evolutionary psychology? Can limited liability corporations? You're describing a cultural practice far removed from natural selection.
>>11501856
Or the tribe. Guys, you're just projecting your nuclear family bias.

[Anonymous No.11501876]

>>11501863
I'm not sure what you mean. My point is exactly that it doesn't make sense in humans, precisely because it's not that prevalent, and whenever it does show up in nature it seems to benefit females only.

[Anonymous No.11501879]

>>11501866
>Can Christianity be traced back to evolutionary psychology
Unironically yes. Religions, patriarchal structures, etc and many other traits common to Christianity can be traced back to evolution, even if the specific details can't. You understand what I mean, right?

[Anonymous No.11501882]

>>11501698
>Monogamy makes no sense for males
Yes it does, weak/unattractive males benefit from monogamy.

Look at animals in cold climates. Or animals during the cold season. They're more monogamous, the males are less competitive, and they have lower sexual dimorphism.

[Anonymous No.11501888]

>>11501879
>advanced shitposting

[Anonymous No.11501893]

>>11501876
generally when scientists make a claim (you: monogamy is widely selected for) they have read publications which back up their claim

I'm asking to see a single study which supports your conjecture

[Anonymous No.11501895]

>>11501876
generally when scientists make a claim (you: monogamy is widely selected for) they have read publications which back up their claim

I'm asking to see a single study which supports your conjecture

[Anonymous No.11501944]

>>11501698
Alright fuck I guess I'll give you somewhat of an answer since everyone else here is fucking retarded.

In some cases it is hyped-up mate guarding. You mentioned this in your second paragraph but incorrectly, I'm not aware of a species where low-ranking males protect females in exchange for sex outside of estrus; in species with defined ovulatory/estrus periods, sex rarely occurs at all outside of them. But mate-guarding does occur, either by physical presence (big chimp scares away little chimps while female is fertile) or other cool ways (like leaving a copulatory plug in the females vagina so no one else can put it in). Monogamy is an exaggerated version of this where the male gains entire (well close enough) access to a female for either a breeding season or sometimes a lifetime.

Another reason this can happen is if offspring care necessitates two parents. For example, in many species of songbirds, if one parent dies or leaves, the chicks die too, because they are too much work for a single bird mom. So if you are a male bird, you need to stick around and raise your kids because if you don't you won't pass your genes along at all.

Other stuff can happen too but these are two examples of selection pressures for it, and both have probably occurred in humans btw

[Anonymous No.11501949]

>>11501893
Again. I'm talking specifically about humans. I'm NOT saying monogamy is widely selected for in other animals.
I'm talking about humans. Do you need me to draw this for you?

Or are you actually asking me for evidence that humans are widely monogamous? Just type "monogamy in humans" on google scholar and watch the results, you absolute sperg. I'm not gonna list them for you because there's literally thousands of results.

[Anonymous No.11501985]

>>11501944
So the benefit for males is always indirect? As in, an altruistic benefit to see your child successfully grow, even if at your personal detriment?
Also the thing about mating outside of estrus was some chimpanzee paper I was reading, I'm trying to find it again here. But basically how female chimps had evolved cuckoldry as a way to avoid coercion by stronger males. If they mated with lower-ranking males just before ovulation, and then with high ranking males during ovulation, it creates confusion as to who fathers the child and lowers the chance of infanticide. Something along those lines.

[Anonymous No.11502002]

>>11501985
Ok I gotcha on the chimpanzee stuff, yes chimps have rather promiscuous groups (both species) and the confusion as to who is the father is probably an incentive against infanticide.

Not sure what you mean by altruistic or indirect benefits; we are talking about evolution, so it's about replicating your genes. If your children survive and reproduce, that is successful and that is what is selected for.

[Anonymous No.11502114]

>>11501944
There was a documentary on elephant seals. A seal with a harem may pass a mate to a secondary male for protecting the harem. Who knows if it is just one mate, but clearly if a male is holding dominance on a whole group it can't just fight every male all of the time. I am GUESSING that creatures with this aspect have unique pressures on physical limitation. Maybe because males fight instead of posture, or in the case of elephant seals, they stop eating during the breeding season.

[Anonymous No.11503055]

This is all pseudo-science, you can't prove any of it.

[Anonymous No.11503101]

>>11501698
I believe it has to do with humans being smart enough to cooperate in large numbers. The few alphas can't compete with the beta alliance when they all band together so the alphas are forced to agree to a pseudo-monogamous system where they fuck other females behind the betas' backs. This keeps the betas mostly happy while the alphas get a chance to spread their genes to multiple females.

[Anonymous No.11503406]

In humans it makes more sense because of how long it takes from birth to be self sufficient. Hence it makes more sense to invest heavily in a few offspring than invest nothing in many. There are other reasons, obviously, but most stem from our only real asset being our brains, and the fact that we need to be taught by and cooperate with others. I’m not sure about other species though (like swans or ducks). I know there’s a correlation between the degree of polygamy and the phenotypical differences between males and females in a species.