A fascinating look at some of the modern theories, experiments, and observations breaking the biological and "evolutionary psychology" myths that males mate freely and females don't — or, as the anonymous[1] doggerel has it:
Hogamous, Higamous,
Man is polygamous,
Higamous, Hogamous,
Woman is monogamous.
Turns out that when you go back and look at the animal kingdom, that's not what you see (unless you walk in with that assumption), and that the foundational experiment that established the idea can't be reproduced (so to speak).
(Note for folk outraged by the implications to humans: this has nothing to do with morality, nor with what societal rules about sexuality should be. There are a lot of things in the animal kingdom — eating one's offspring, for example — that humans usually choose not to emulate. That said, this knocks a prop under the idea of what is Natural And Therefore Moral, which is fair because that view of Natural was based on what Victorian Society, and following, considered Moral.)
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[1] See http://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/03/28/hogamous/ for more discussion.
Data should smash the biological myth of promiscuous males and sexually coy females
Aphids are often born pregnant – trying to synchronize morality with Nature, or vice versa has always been problematic.
I sometimes remind people that hemlock is all-natural, organic, and gluten free! None of which are indicators of a healthy diet.
On another note, it is good that scientists are repeating experiments and validating (or invalidating!) previous conclusions. Science is stronger when challenged and replicated.
+Samuel Smith Repetition of experiments to prove, or disprove, results is a fundamental element of science that I am glad to see in action! Too many people look at one isolated experiment and go 'wow that's earth shattering!' when in reality the veracity of the results is dubious at best. I'm glad to see old results being re-examined.
+Samuel Smith My example of "all-natural" is usually oleander, but same difference (and I have a particular childhood kink about oleander).
Beyond that, yes — there's weird "Natural Law / Look to Nature to see what is Natural and Therefore Morally Correct" thing that is truly zany as it was formulated in this same Victorian Era, and therefore Nature was bowdlerized to fit the prevailing ethos, which was then justified by pointing to the bowdlerized Nature.
In many ways what is truly human (in a laudable fashion) is how we choose to not be like other critters on the planet.
There's been a lot of interesting reexamination of past psychological experiments that are considered definitive — looking at the recorded data, looking at conclusions, or actually re-running the experiments. In a remarkable number of cases, the Received Wisdom has turned out to be unfounded.
That's not an indictment of science. That's an indictment of sloppy science.
+Dave Hill Hey Dave Hill