So if you’re interested, (which if you are interested at all in love you should) take a listen to the following podcast.
http://radio.seti.org/episodes/248
(You can also find this podcast on iTunes if you search for “Seti Are we alone”. If you prefer to listen to it on your ipod.)
Then come back here and tell me what you think about life long partners, homosexuality and the idea of injecting ourselves with chemicals that could make you more likely to stay with a partner.
1. Should couples stay together for life?
2. Is homosexuality natural?
3. Is cheating natural?
4. If you could be injected with a gene that would make you more likely to stay and not sway from your partner, would you?
Please listen to the podcast first before answering. Thanks
1. It would be nice, but probably boring.
2. Yes.
3. Sort of. Nature doesn’t expect other mammals to be monogamous. So what’s natural is having multiple partners throughout one’s life… I don’t think deceiving others and lying and so on is natural though.
4. Probably not. I’d like to be able to do that on my own.
Btw, the link to actually listen to the podcast didn’t work for me =(
K, I listened to it.
1. Depends on the couple.
2. Define natural.
3. Ibid #2.
4. Doubtful.
@SerenaDante – When you click on the link I provided you then just have to click on the “Listen Now” link on that page. It’s a pretty interesting podcast, they always do a great job. High production value.
I don’t have time at this moment… I will listen when I get home from work.
@methodElevated – By natural I mean, it occurs in nature so is it natural for man to do this? As in do you think it’s built into us, perhaps in our genetics?But to expand on that, if it is, is it natural for us to force ourselves not to do these things?
@SerenaDante – I agree with you on your number three. I think there is a big difference between it being natural and everyone (or at least everyone involved) accepting it, and doing it behinds someone’s back.
@jewjewbeedragon – Cool. It’s a good episode so it’s worth a listen.
@roxics – I know, the listen now thing didn’t work. “Internet explorer cannot display this webpage.” My net sucks, apparently… =(
@roxics - I think sexuality of all forms (hetero, homo, bi, trans, etc.) is a mixture of nature and nurture. I think some people are predisposed to being one way or another, and that their environment as they grow and mature ultimately sways them in one direction.
As for cheating, I think it’s natural but almost never emotionally healthy (in that it creates results/consequences that end up hurting one or more parties). Sure, it creates more genetic diversity, but it seems we don’t really need that anymore as a species… at least, not nearly as much as we did thousands of years ago. We’re incredibly diverse as it is, and we have advanced medical science to make up for some of the existing discrepancies.
I could type out a huge response to this pulling in research statistics, but I’m lazy. I’ve posted a few essays about some of this stuff, though.