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I am quite aware of all of Bob's motivations when he posts. What he meant to say was…
Actually with our current knowledge of biology and neuroscience we can probably tell if its pleasurable or not.I still have the same question. What is the evolutionary advantage of physiological processes that cause a lot of mating with an associated pleasurable experience, as compared to without any such experience? We can't know what the reproductive process feels like to an ant, or a bluebird, or a platypus. But would we expect these organisms to be more or less successful at reproducing themselves, depending on whether they experienced the process as pleasurable?
Actually with our current knowledge of biology and neuroscience we can probably tell if its pleasurable or not.
I still have the same question. What is the evolutionary advantage of physiological processes that cause a lot of mating with an associated pleasurable experience, as compared to without any such experience? We can't know what the reproductive process feels like to an ant, or a bluebird, or a platypus. But would we expect these organisms to be more or less successful at reproducing themselves, depending on whether they experienced the process as pleasurable?
Actually with our current knowledge of biology and neuroscience we can probably tell if its pleasurable or not.
It's a biological drive to both serve the functions of procreation and social cohesiveness. We developed an emotional need as a matter of instinct.
If sex were purely for procreation then I would imagine we would be like most mammals and only care during times of fertility. That we care all the time suggest it has further utility.
I doubt it. The best you could hope to do is measure certain physiological processes in other species, compare them to human responses, and make reasonable guesses. But there is no way to get information about a subject's experience except through the subject's report of it.
But that's not really what I'm getting at, which is the evolutionary advantage of sexual pleasure. Things like blinking our eyes and increasing our heart rates and respiration in stressful situations are also physiological responses that apparently have been selected for because they increase our chances of survival. And yet we don't need to feel ecstatic pleasure from those acts to do them.
You do not speak for me, ever.
I do not grant you any authority to state what my motivations are, nor what I “…meant to say.”. Please refrain from doing so.
I doubt it. The best you could hope to do is measure certain physiological processes in other species, compare them to human responses, and make reasonable guesses. But there is no way to get information about a subject's experience except through the subject's report of it.
But that's not really what I'm getting at, which is the evolutionary advantage of sexual pleasure. Things like blinking our eyes and increasing our heart rates and respiration in stressful situations are also physiological responses that apparently have been selected for because they increase our chances of survival. And yet we don't need to feel ecstatic pleasure from those acts to do them.
You're touching on a broader philosophical question.
We don't know why evolution produced minded machines rather than mindless ones.
Brains all use similar structures and Nero chemicals to suggest we don't feel things the same or almost the same way is ludicrous given the evidence. The assumption being that the development is typicalNope. We can guess, sure. But we can't know. We don't even know (in the epistemological sense of the word) that other human beings are experiencing in the same way that you are. For all you know you might be the only one. Everyone else in the world might be empty shells, completely devoid of the feeling of awareness you are having right now.
We all assume that everyone else is experiencing (and it's probably a safe assumption to make). Partly, we're programmed to assume that way. We have empathy. We look at someone's face contorted in pain, our brain recognizes certain facial cues, and it produces an experience of empathy, an experience of "oh yeah, I know what you're feeling. You're feeling pain, I've felt that before too. It's not good".
But that doesn't mean we know. In fact, that part of our brains is easily duped. Our brains are so good are recognizing the subtle facial cues or behaviors (someone shouting "ouch") associated with certain emotions that we see false positives constantly. Drawings, video game animations, even the smiley faces on we use here on this forum. The pixels on your screen when you're watching a video of someone crying are not experiencing anything. But your brain doesn't know this, it sees the cues, and it does what it evolved to do - empathize as if there was a person crying in front of you rather than a hunk of plastic and silicon.
Right now we have no clue how to objectively verify experience or sentience. Science can't even define what it is right now. The best we can do is recognize physical processes that we believe are correlated to sentience such as facial cues, behavior, neuron firings in a particular area of the brain etc.
It's fun?
The purpose is whatever you make it. Some people find sex with their spouses torturous, so I guess torture is one purpose of it. Heh
There is no inherent purpose. It's a pet peeve of mine when people try to project their own intentionality onto a mindless thing like evolution. Nature/evolution doesn't intend us to procreate. Nature/evolution doesn't care at all whether you procreate or if every living organism stopped procreating and died out. It makes absolutely no difference to evolution. Nature don't give a ****. :mrgreen:
Evolution simply explains how it came to be that organisms that feel a desire to reproduce are common today. That's it. The purpose of you having sex, the purpose of anything you do, is up to you. Why do you want to have sex. What purpose does it serve to you. Those are the questions you should be asking. Nature has no opinion on the matter whatsoever.
You do not speak for me, ever.
I do not grant you any authority to state what my motivations are, nor what I “…meant to say.”. Please refrain from doing so.
Some people find sex with their spouses torturous, so I guess torture is one purpose of it.
Note to moderators: This is a philosophical topic but I will only be slightly disappointed if you decide to move this to the Sex and Sexuality Forum.
What is the purpose of sex? The average person thinks of sex at least on a daily basis. Some people are consumed with sex on such a level that they may think of it hourly or even every waking moment. This seems like a massive waste of mental energy considering that the average person only procreates less than 3 times in their life and for many they never procreate. Those who never procreate still have to deal with the joys and aggravations associated with sex. If the purpose of sex is to procreate wouldn't those desires turn off at a much early age? Wouldn't those desires only occur once or twice a year? Wouldn't those desires go away after a reasonable accomplishment of procreative activity especially in females? The procreation argument really makes no sense. Surely sex has a biological purpose that exceeds procreation.
Some may say that sex is a source of entertainment that was necessary in times past before internet, television, radio or other technological advances used to entertain us every waking moment. This could be true but it seems that these technological advances just exacerbates our desire and our access to sex. This too may be a poor argument.
I do have a theory that merits discussion. Humans require a drive for sex to give humans the inclination to connect and build relationships with other humans for their own well being. This can explain statistical data that suggests married people are happier and also statistically live longer lives. Does this theory undermine sexually deviancies such as homosexuality, polygamy, serial monogamy or other types of promiscuous sexual behavior? Absolutely not. The human desire for sex is the desire to have a companion either permanently, temporarily or even momentarily. Two people stand a much better chance of survival in this world than one person roaming the world alone. I believe that the drive for sex has to be frequent and long living in our life to extend our drive to build strong friendships which increases our potential to survive.
Sexual thought engages our mind way too much in my opinion and most certainly deserves an explanation. Sexual relationships can sometimes be confusing and/or frustrating sometimes with married couples but most commonly with single persons on the pursuit. I am certain that in polygamous relationships the confusion and frustration would be even greater. This type of unnecessary frustration must have a biological explanation that makes sense.
Any thoughts?
Then I will ask you. Were you asserting a Biblical purpose to explain why sex exists?
I don't know about “Biblical”, per se.
It's not really possible to completely separate my views on sex and marriage from my religious beliefs.
One purpose of sex is to create and foster a bond between husband and wife. I think, from a secular point, it is clear that this is indeed an effect of a sexual relationship—to create a deep emotional and spiritual bond between the two participants—and from a religious viewpoint, it is clear to me that this is the way that God designed us, and that marriage between a man and a woman is intended to be exclusively the context in which this bond is to be cultivated. I think that it is also clear that as beneficial and essential as this bond in in the context of marriage, that it is damaging to form it without this context.
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