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Many of the religious ideas about masturbation were wrong, e.g. that it caused blindness. These ideas were created by priests who felt guilty about masturbating
by kikishortler 10y ago
Many of the religious ideas about masturbation were wrong, e.g. that it caused blindness. These ideas were created by priests who felt guilty about masturbating.
Many of the modern ideas about masturbation are also wrong, e.g. that it is 'healthy'. These are merely scientistic attempts to reverse the former shaming and guilt.
For me the question remains: is masturbation any better or worse than taking drugs?
- oh_sigh 10y agoIs food any better or worse than taking drugs?
- kasparsklavins 10y agoIt could be argued that food is a form of drugs. It does affect our brains in a psychological manner.
- oh_sigh 10y agoOK...so could we rephrase your original comment as "Is masturbation any better or worse than eating food?"
- Waterluvian 10y agoI will always bet on what comes natural to most to be healthy. It's absurd to think we evolved "wrongly" and need to fight natural tendencies.
- burkaman 10y agoIs your only life goal to survive long enough to reproduce? If you want more than that out of life, it's at least plausible that you might need to second guess some of your natural instincts.
- zkhalique 10y agoPerhaps those who wanted more than that out of life had less genetic fitness than those who wanted exactly that out of life, so most people want that out of life. On the other hand, I'm not sure how to explain the presence of homosexuality in a population when the theory of evolution predicts that any such trait (which leads to much lower genetic fitness) would have disappeared a long time ago. How does it stay at this level from generation to generation?
- taxicabjesus 10y ago> How does it stay at this level from generation to generation? Perhaps the trait is mostly non-genetic. Gay passengers had a tendency to hit on me. I tried to be courteous, but did not appreciate the shoulder-rubs.
- joeyo 10y agoRe: homosexually, there are several possibilites. A plausible explanation is that it's linked with genes that confer fitness to siblings. As with most traits, however, it's likely to have both heritable as well as environmental antecedents.
- bhaak 10y agoI think I recall some articles about studies that showed that homosexual people (that don't reproduce themselves) are useful as caretakers for close relatives as they want to ensure the survival of similar genes. Your question is similar to the question why old humans don't just die off when they can't reproduce anymore. This is most obvious with women when they enter menopause but also the quality of sperm declines with men with age. They are either useful to some extent to reproduction or improving the survival rate of the offspring, or at least the evolutionary pressure is too small to eradicate these traits. But as we have descended from group animals, I suspect the former.
- ta0967 10y agoexplain the presence of homosexuality in a population when the theory of evolution predicts that any such trait (which leads to much lower genetic fitness) would have disappeared a long time ago one's homosexuality may improve fitness of one's family: if we're brothers and i'm homosexual, we won't be splitting resources between your and my children, and i'll be an extra "parent" looking after your kids. genetically speaking, that is still a (qualified) success for me. also, genes don't give a damn about individual's reproduction, and local optima are rampant. edit: what siblings have said.
- zem 10y agosugar is a good counterexample to that
- return0 10y agoIt's absurd to think we evolved "rightly" either. Also, what about our environment? We clearly didnt evolve with concrete and steel, asphalt and gasoline.
- Waterluvian 10y agoYup. Apologies if it sounded like I was suggesting that. I just wanted to communicate that there's no "wrong" way for things to evolve. Evolution just is.
- Klinky 10y agoSaying someone who masturbates is going to become a sex/porn addict is just as bad as preists saying it leads to blindness. Really your post sounds like someone confused by their own shame.
- dwaltrip 10y agoYour post would have been less downvoted if you provided thoughtful rational for your analogy between "drugs" and masturbation. Also, HN generally doesn't have a favorable opinion of the the way drug prohibition currently exists in the U.S., so that adds another complication to the comparison.
- witty_username 10y ago> Many of the modern ideas about masturbation are also wrong, e.g. that it is 'healthy'. These are merely scientistic attempts to reverse the former shaming and guilt. Why are they wrong? Could you elaborate?
- return0 10y agoYou could then widen the question "Is any non-procreational form of sex worse than taking drugs ?"
- collyw 10y agoYou don't do both at the same time?
- throwanem 10y agoWell, at the very least, all the neurochemicals involved are endogenous. That's got to count for something. As to the rest, I figure that if God meant humans to masturbate, He'd have made our arms long enough so we could reach our genitals.