I think the wide email response
(Paris, Moscow, Berlin, Washington!) to my last post makes the blog the best
place to present these statements:
(1) Since I can't critically think
my way out of my discomfort at seeing men kiss each other I take it to come
from instinct.
(2) I take the instinct to be one
of those deep ones established by the need for survival. Our species, a social one, is more
likely to survive if infertile relationships are discouraged.
(3) The instincts built into us by
the need for survival are maintained even after, and maybe long after, survival
is assured.
So, my discomfort is a relic, made
so by mankind's increasing ability to guarantee survival. In me (and Mary Anne, and Alex
Arhangelskii) I take the relic to be irremovable.
And I think Darwin could explain
that. "Species have a better
chance of surviving if, no matter how secure a generation is, a few relics are
preserved so that the species will persist through the least secure
generations."
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