robison@eosp1.UUCP (Tobias D. Robison) (12/23/83)
Attention span has nothing to do with making a connection between Sexual Intercourse and pregnancy. What matters is pattern matching, which happens to be one of the most extraordinary activities noticeble in higher, and some lower life forms. Ever try to figure out how much pattern matching your pets can do? The reports of human tribes unable to make the connection keep getting repudiated by researchers with better field techniques. I don't believe there are any such tribes. Old anthropological reports are clearly short on studies of how the researcher was being fooled. - Keremath, care of: Robison decvax!ittvax!eosp1 or: allegra!eosp1
tmh@ihldt.UUCP (12/27/83)
Actually almost all primitive peoples are able to make the connection between sex and reproduction. However, because of the importance and religious significance of human reproduction they frequently deny the human portion and have some other story. One real life example (remembered from my days as an Anthro student) is from a Southwest U.S. Indian tribe (I think it was one of the Apache), they breed sheep and use fairly sophisticated selection techniques to crossbreed for certain traits. This implies that they not only have made the connection between sex and procreation, but have worked out some of the basic genetic principles (i.e. about the same thing Mendal did with peas). For human reproduction their ideas are completely different. They believe that all females have small babies already inside them, and that the penetration of the vagina disturbs one of the babies and causes it to start growing. It is pretty easy to see that if they figured out how sheep reproduction works they would have figured out how human reproduction works. Yet, even if you point out the similarities they still would deny the human story (the conclusion being that while they knew how humans worked they preferred the baby story (it being poetical and all) and since this story was impractical when it came to breeding sheep they applied a more factual version of what goes on i.e. knowing the mechanics of sheep breeding is culturally critical, while the mechanics of humans breeding is unimportant and therefore subject to a little enhancement). One other thing that I should point out is that our own culture has its own myth of reproduction i.e. the stork brings the baby. Oh I'm an Archalog and I'm OK, Tom Harris
tim@unc.UUCP (12/28/83)
Here is part of an article from Tobias Robinson: Attention span has nothing to do with making a connection between Sexual Intercourse and pregnancy. What matters is pattern matching, which happens to be one of the most extraordinary activities noticeble in higher, and some lower life forms. Ever try to figure out how much pattern matching your pets can do? Your second sentence is quite remarkable. Do you plan on trying to support it, or even to explain it? It is meaningless and unsupported as is. However, giving you the benefit of the doubt for now, if it is a pattern matching activity, then it is a matter of reconciling data with a given set of patterns. The data in this case are the sexual activity and the pregnancy. Unless the data are in memory at the same time, the pattern matching cannot take place, and the attention span of animals makes this coincidence of data impossible. The reports of human tribes unable to make the connection keep getting repudiated by researchers with better field techniques. I don't believe there are any such tribes. Old anthropological reports are clearly short on studies of how the researcher was being fooled. That would be a lot more convincing with some citations of studies. I will try to get Pam to supply her data on tribes which do not know of the sex-pregnancy link; in the meantime, please supply some evidence for your assertion, since you seem to be on top of things. -- Tim Maroney, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill duke!unc!tim (USENET), tim.unc@csnet-relay (ARPA)
trb@masscomp.UUCP (Andy Tannenbaum) (12/29/83)
I don't see how animals could know that coitus is a vehicle for reproduction. We all know because we were told. I bet that if I were born and dumped in isolation somewhere that I'd never know that coitus was a vehicle for reproduction. I venture to guess that if I never was aware of other creatures humping or otherwise stimulating themselves sexually, that I'd never think to try it myself. I suspect that animals hump because they see other animals hump, and they find that they enjoy the sensation, NOT for reproductive purposes. Andy Tannenbaum Masscomp Inc Westford MA (617) 692-6200 x274
gds@mit-eddie.UUCP (Greg Skinner) (01/03/84)
>I bet that if I were born and dumped in isolation somewhere that I'd >never know that coitus was a vehicle for reproduction. I could accept the above statement, but... >I venture to guess that if I never was aware of other creatures humping >or otherwise stimulating themselves sexually, that I'd never think to >try it myself. I find it impossible to believe this. There is documented evidence that when the male and female of the human race reach puberty, due to certain glandular & other metabolic body changes, their thoughts and actions turn to exactly that -- thinking of trying it themselves. Lots do it too. -- --greg ...decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!gds (uucp) Gds@XX (arpa)
rlr@pyuxn.UUCP (Rich Rosen) (01/04/84)
re: Tom Harris' article on primitive peoples understanding that sex in animals is intended for procreation, but not recognizing that fact in human beings Sounds very much like the root of anthropocentric thinking---Man (usually the people who speak this way refer to 'man', so please excuse the sexist connotations of the word) is different from all the animals; Man is destined to rule the earth; Man is superior to all the pitiable small things in the universe because god created him [sic] to... It gets even more boring after a while. I suppose it's sort of natural to think that one is different (superior???) from everything around one's self. But if we were that superior to everything around us why have we still not realized that we are a part of the universe and not some magnificent force of light destined to conquer the very heart of the universe with... (Sorry) On one side of me, I see the fundamentalist religionists clamoring for my head because I say "Who the hell is God?" and on the other side are the objectivist/Thelemist/pseudohumanist/new romantic individualists who shout me down for saying that members of the species Homo sapiens are not glorious seekers on a quest for purpose on the road to becoming gods, but simply just another collection of animals, albeit with more elaborate brains. (I don't *really* see this; it's just a vision I had. Maybe if I duck, all the arrows will float past me to land in antipodal targets.) -- Rich Rosen pyuxn!rlr