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Homosexuality: Nature or Nurture
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| occrider |
I hadn't really formed an opinion on the issue until I read an article a while ago about the ability to manipulate a fruit fly's sexual orientation by changing temperature.
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When flies get fruity
Males courting each other form a chain
Scientists can turn the homosexual tendencies of laboratory flies on and off at the flick of a switch.
Researchers introduced a mutant gene into the fruit flies that is sensitive to temperature.
When the insects were warmed above 30 Celsius, communication between a particular set of nerve cells was disrupted.
This made the mutant males less interested in courting female flies and open to the advances of other males.
New knowledge
The flies reverted back to heterosexual courtship behaviours at cooler temperatures.
The study by Toshihiro Kitamoto, of the Beckman Research Institute of the City of Hope, California, US, is published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Previous research has suggested that fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) sexual orientation is genetically determined, although the neuronal pathways important for controlling sexual preference are unclear.
Dr Kitamoto sought to explore these issues through the introduction of the mutant gene called shibire into the midst of the fruit fly's neurons.
Inactivated system
The normal gene plays an important role in the secretions of a chemical signal.
The results showed that relations between males are suppressed by the action of neurons whose role could be to detect or to interpret the signals of anti-aphrodisiac hormones, Dr Kitamoto said.
The neurons affected by the mutant gene include nerves sensitive to taste, located in the head and legs. The role of these neurons could be to halt the attraction between male fruit flies by detecting or interpreting aphrodisiac pheromones produced by other males.
Dr Kitamoto told the BBC: "My interpretation is that male-male courtship is somehow inhibited by certain systems in the fly nervous system and using my method I think I inactivated those inhibitory systems so male courtship is induced."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/2266135.stm
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Yes humans are significantly more complex than a fruit fly, but the experiment does pose the question: is our sexual orientation simply the result of chemical reactions in the brain? What do all of you think? |
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| marcus82 |
i think that homo sexuality can be an acquired preference or innate.
chemically there have been many species where homo sexuality has been exhibited, most species lack the social structure that humans have so learning from one's peers is out of the question. however, sexuality can also be acquired, because there are also bi-sexuals.
it depends on the person, and you can never generalize, each person is different and subject to different cirucumstances. |
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| cougar23 |
Being a psychologist in training, and through experience, it is wise to note that both nature and nurture have effects on almost everything. Genes and biological makeup leave you predisposed to certain conditions when you are born. How you are raised may effect how far from this "starting point" you wander through your life. But the farther you end up from this starting point, the harder the path is, and subsequently, the less people can make the journey.
Psychological reaserch in this area is mixed and inconclusive, and is just beginning to form a relevant database of information. Journal articles contradict articles that contradict each other. Every finding has been debased by someone else. My conclusion is that it has to do alot with biological makeup, but the environment a human is raised in can either enhance or detract from these predispositions. |
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| occrider |
| quote: | Originally posted by cougar23
Being a psychologist in training, and through experience, it is wise to note that both nature and nurture have effects on almost everything. Genes and biological makeup leave you predisposed to certain conditions when you are born. How you are raised may effect how far from this "starting point" you wander through your life. But the farther you end up from this starting point, the harder the path is, and subsequently, the less people can make the journey.
Psychological reaserch in this area is mixed and inconclusive, and is just beginning to form a relevant database of information. Journal articles contradict articles that contradict each other. Every finding has been debased by someone else. My conclusion is that it has to do alot with biological makeup, but the environment a human is raised in can either enhance or detract from these predispositions. |
Ok, good argument. Let's speak in absolute terms however. Is our innate sexuality something that we grow into or is it something that we are born with? For example, let's say that my upbringing has resulted in me being homosexual. Will I feel any innate instinctual urge to be attracted to females? Let's say you raise a child from birth under the disposition that homosexuality is the norm. He is culturally taught that the male body is something to admired and that societal acceptance is based upon homosexual relations. However, if that male still instinctually lusts for females isn't that an indication that sexuality is ultimately determined through genetics? That any kind of sexual orientation achieved through upbringing is a mistake? |
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| OLi_A |
in reagrds to occriders comments i think that there is a genetic factor that may determine your sexuality, but with anything, the environment you grow up in hugely influences what you become.
i was watching a documentary one time about the origins of homosexuality and it was noted that women who were pregenant during wartime were predisposed to have homosexual offspring. what they were getting at was that these women were under extreme stress, and it may have been this stress that influenced the sexuality of their children. interesting |
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| marcus82 |
yep, it's true too, society does exhibit major pressure on individuals (peerps, media whatever).
it's like the 2 kids (one male and one female) on a desert island, would they grow up loving each other as brother and sister or as mates?
life is like plinko! u can't get the same results more than once! |
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| cougar23 |
| quote: | Originally posted by occrider
Ok, good argument. Let's speak in absolute terms however. Is our innate sexuality something that we grow into or is it something that we are born with? |
I was actually debating this in a different forum about a week ago, and I found a good study that suggests that hormonal levels in the mother during pregnancy effect sexual orientation. (Now I can't find my old post or the citation I used, dammit.:)) I have never found any evidence suggesting that it is genetic, but that does not mean it is not biological. Hormonal levels effect the way the brain develops in the womb, which, in turn, may alter sexual orientation. Of course, there is lukewarm support for this study, but there is no really conclusive evidence out there to begin with.
| quote: | | For example, let's say that my upbringing has resulted in me being homosexual. Will I feel any innate instinctual urge to be attracted to females? |
Probably not. Aside from that first study, there are a handful of other ones that suggest late birth order is correlated with homosexuality. There is only speculation as to why this happens, but apparently it is biological, since birth order occurs before any "nurture" can take place.
| quote: | | Let's say you raise a child from birth under the disposition that homosexuality is the norm. He is culturally taught that the male body is something to admired and that societal acceptance is based upon homosexual relations. However, if that male still instinctually lusts for females isn't that an indication that sexuality is ultimately determined through genetics? |
It would be. This is what homosexuals are taught, only with the opposite sex. Males are taught to admire the female body (I don't know a homosexual who was actually encouraged to be gay). But there are many ways of attributing deviance from the norm that are not genetic/biological. I think sexual orientation has alot to do with self-perception, as well, and that is completely learned. Certain events can have different effects on people with different biological makeup. If one is biologically predisposed (lets say through hormonal imbalances in the womb) towards the homosexual side, then the abscence of a father figure in life might
tip the balance, and he could easily become homosexual. Without this biological predisposition, though, abscence of a father will almost never lead to homosexuality.
It also may be interesting to note that neither sex nor sexual orientation are black and white things. There can be, and there is "in betweens." There are cases of genetic females being born with male genitalia, and vice versa. While genes have something to do with biological aspects of sex, so do hormones. Hormones stimulate (or retard) growth of certain areas of the brain and genitalia. If this hormonal imbalance occurs early enough, it can change the entire sex phenotype of the fetus. If it occurs later, it can change just the sexual orientation of the brain, as the brain develops later. Of course in life, tendencies can either be encouraged or repressed by parents, peers, and society.
In conclusion, though, it is a very complex matter. It is not simply a "choice" as some put it on another forum. Nor is it simply a difference in genotype. Genotype is good at predicting simple biological matters like eye color, etc., but when it comes to complex things like sexual orientation, which is heavily controlled by hormones, social learning, etc., it starts to break down. Sexual orientation is not just a switch that can be flipped on and off in the brain. It is more like a multi-dimentional crossfader, with a bunch of other volume and gain knobs in the same circuit. |
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| DaveSaenz |
THey must all repent of their sins or they shall face eternal damnation!!!!!!1 
I mean...err...nature.
Why would someone consciously choose to be faced with that kind of discrimination????? :confused: :confused: |
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| cougar23 |
| quote: | Originally posted by DaveSaenz
THey must all repent of their sins or they shall face eternal damnation!!!!!!1
I mean...err...nature.
Why would someone consciously choose to be faced with that kind of discrimination????? :confused: :confused: |
...because being true to themselves is worth more than social acceptance.... |
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| ahlamalek |
| I think its more nurture than nature... based on things I've seen. |
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| LiquidX |
- Well, I think it's nurture more then nature, its probably the fews who I can say nature.
People become gay for various reasons. They've had too many womans and would like to experiment something new (it's true!!!! ) or, when they were small, parents who would've liked to have had a girl, treat the kid as a girl, becoming gay. Or, they've been abused in some way or were introduced to things such as prostitution at early age. Most of this things play a role so.. that's why I think it's not nature. |
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| Arbiter |
I'm going to agree with cougar23 for the most part on this one. In a sense, sexual orientation is a lot more like height - obviously it is significantly influenced by genetic factors. However, environmental factors can almost certainly accentuate or counteract innate predispositions. Like cougar23 I've also read about the possible effects of the mother's hormone levels on the future sexual orientation of the fetus.
Were homosexuality attributable to simply one thing - a gene, for instance, it is highly likely science would have already established this beyond any doubt. It is because this characteristic arises from a variety of innate and external circumstances that science has been unable to definitively pinpoint the source of human sexuaul orientation.
Of course, the many individuals out there who view homosexuality as some sort of active choice ("Hey, I think I'm going to be gay from now on.") are always those who have absolutely no concept of the biological and social factors which give rise to homosexual behavior. |
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