The Misinterpretation Of "The standard narrative of human sexual

evolution" (hereafter shortened to "the standard narrative") and the

false declaration of it as the elements of human nature rather than an
adaptation to social conditions.


Research question: How is human sexuality is naturally built and what
does it have to do with our conception of sexuality and sexuality norms.













Amir Segev Sarussi
Handasaim High school
Class twelve (a)(and Orly Wiener's class)
Some Date

Handed to: Orly Wiener

Introduction:
Being in a situation highly adrenalized, in a scale of which is usually
called "losing control", always helps you remember. Remember that
we're not above nature. If we're above nature, it's only in the sense that
a shaky legged surfer is "above" the ocean. As far as we are to examine
ourselves scientifically we have not descended from apes, we are apes.
Homo sapiens are in fact one of the five surviving species of great apes
along with chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and orangutans, whereas
with two of them (chimpanzees and bonobos) we shared a common
ancestor just five million years ago. This is, in fact, "the day before
yesterday" in evolutionary terms.
It might be looking obvious that the conventional monogamous
marriage is the natural way for happiness. That these easy solutions are
the right ones. Examining our society shows very different details half
of our marriages collapses, many contain sexual frustration, libido killing
boredom and impulsive betrayals. Women sexual dysfunction break
records (42% in the USA according to the AMA) while pornography and
Viagra breaks sales (more than hundred billion dollars annually in the US
alone).
In this project, I'll disprove the standard narrative. The people who are
interpreting our sexual behavior ignore many facts about our history. For
example, they do not keep in mind that when viewed against the full
scale of our species' existence, ten thousand years (the time passed
from the agriculture revolution) is a brief of a second. In order to trace
the deepest roots of human sexuality, it's vital to look beneath the thin
crust of recent human history.






Pre Agriculture Humanity

Modern human are estimated to have existed as long as 200,000 years.
With the earliest evidence of agriculture dating to about 8000 BCE. Pre
agriculture time is 95% of our collective experience, at most (and keep in
mind that just 500 years ago most of the planet was still occupied by
foragers).
Until agriculture, human beings evolved in societies organized around an
insistence on sharing just about everything. This sharing wasn't a result
of nobility/generosity, but was a norm. They were as noble as you are
when paying income taxes. Culturally imposed sharing was simply the
most effective way for our highly social species to minimize risk.
Examining the changes with the shift to agriculture (hierarchical political
structures, private property was invented, a shift in the status of
women, human population growth in contrast to quality of life decrease)
that the norms where radically different. Humanity before agriculture
was organized neither monogamously nor polygamously - individuals
had several ongoing sexual relationships at any given time. Though often
causal, these relationships were not random or meaningless. Quite the
opposite: they reinforced crucial social ties that held the community
together.








Norms Influence Over Our Urges

What trips up the scientists is the same cognitive failing we all share: it's
hard to be certain about what we think we know, but don't really.
Although we're sure we know where we are, most of us tend to go with
our gut and ignore the evidences.
Disgusts and carvings are due to arbitrary response preprogrammed by
our culture. Take food, for example.
We would rather believe we are passionated to the food because of the
food itself, but the evidences are everywhere. You may thing bacon and
eggs just go together, like French fries and ketchup. But the
combination of bacon and eggs for breakfast was dreamed up about a
hundred years ago by an advertising agency hired to sell more bacon.
We all know that different cultures have different preferences
(Ausralians prefer cricket to baseball, French find Gerard Depardieu
sexy,..), but one of the greatest examples is actually with insects and
"disgusting" meat. How hungry would you have to be before considering
plucking a moth from the night air and cook it? If lamb chops are find,
why are its brain horrible?
It's a fact that bugs and crickets are healthy and complete our nutrition
perfectly, but can we be passionated to it? Yes, indeed: When British
travelers first came to Australia, they reported the natives to be
"starving to death". Why is it so? Because they saw natives "resorting to
lest resorts" eating insects. Witchetty grubs, and rats, critters that
surely "nobody would eat unless he isn't starving", but later it was found
to be considered "delicious".
My point? That something feels natural or unnatural doesn't mean it is.
We're all members of one tribe or another bonded by culture, family,
religion, class, education employment, team affiliation, or any number of
other criteria.

Is Women Libido Really Is That Low?

Today's Evolution Psychology "realists" argue that nature leads us to
wage war on our neighbors, deceive our spouses, and abuse our
stepchildren. They argue that rape is an unfortunate, but largely
successful reproductive strategy.
Their standard narrative contains several clanging contradictions, but
one of the most discordant involves female libido. According to that
narrative women are the choosy, reserved sex; as for them sex is
about the security emotional and material of the relationship.
Physical pleasure of women "does not exist".
Despite this assurances that women are not sexual creatures, around
the world men have made violent and fanatic steps to control female
libido. Female genital mutilation, head to toe chadors, medieval witch
burning, chastity belt, suffocating corset, muttered insults about
"insatiable" whore are all part of the worldwide campaign to keep the
supposedly low-key female libido under control.
One of the most absurd steps are the paternalistic medical diagnoses of
nymphomania and hysteria. Why the electrified high-security razor wire
fence to contain kitty-cat?
A good answer to that question can be derived from examining Lews
Henry Morgan's work on family structure evolution. Morgan had
researched the family lives of native American tribes, before
hypothesizing a far more promiscuous sexuality as having been typical of
prehistoric times. As such, he claims that:
"The husbands lived in polygyny(i.e., more than one wife), and wives in
polyandry (i.e, more than one husband(, which are seen to be as ancient
as human societ. Such a family was neither unnatural nor remarkable,
It would be difficult to show any other possible beginning of the family in
the primitive period. there seems to be no escape from the
conclustion that a state of promiscuous intercourse was typical of
prehistoric times, ". This claim was not hesitatly given, as Morgan had
taken years of thoughts before coming against what was just
determined by his generation scientists. The indirect evidence in favor of
this belief was back than extremely strong; and now both direct and
indirect has grown much stronger.
[Promiscuous comes from the Latin root 'miscere', "to mix", and that's
how I mean it. I do not imply randomness in mating or immoral of it, as
choices and preferences still exert their influence. I describe behaviors
which were normal or are normal to the people in question. They are
not rebels/idealists. ]

















Even In Ancient Greece It Was Known

The understanding that a woman has as nasty libido as a man has comes
back to ancient Greece. Tiresias, a prominent figure in Greek mythology,
had a unique perspective on male and female sexual pleasure.
While still a young man, Tiresias came upon two snakes entwined in
copulation. With his walking stick, he separated them and suddenly
transformed into a woman. Seven years later, female Tiresias was
coming across another two snakes, but learned her lesson, and
transformed back into a man.
This unique "experience" lead Zeus and Hera consult him in their
argument "who enjoys sex more, men or women?"(Zeus insisted that
women enjoyed more while Hera insisted the opposite)
Tiresias replied that not only did females enjoy sex more than males,
they enjoyed it nine times more! ("Out of ten parts of joy, women enjoy
nine")
His response incensed Hero so much that she struck him blind. Did I
mention the effect of norms?

So what is the cost of these norms?

There are costs involved in denying one's evolved sexual nature, costs
paid by individuals, couples, families and societies all the time. I suggest
that this attempt to rise above nature is a step we pay with our
happiness.




Primates Sexual Behavior From Closest To
Furthest

You might be surprised by the following fact. Genetically, the chimps and
bonobos at the zoo are far closer to you than they are to the gorillas,
orangutans, monkeys or anything else in a cage. Our roughly 1.6 percent
differed DNA makes us very close to chimps and bonobos.
So close, that we're closer than an Indian elephant to an African
elephant, white crested gibbon and white handed gibbon, a dog to a fox
and even a red-eyed vireo to a white eyed vireo.




Some facts:
Human testicles are far larger than any monogamous primate would
ever need.
Human testicles are vulnerably spotted outside the body, where cooler
temperatures help preserve stand by sperm cells for multiple
ejaculations.
Human males have the longest thickest pines found on any primate of
the planets.
Women are capable of reaching orgasm after orgasm.

The ancestral line leading to chimps and bonobos splits off from that
leading to humans just five to six million years ago (though interbreeding
probably continued for a million or so years after the split), with the
chimps and bonobo line separating somewhere between 3 million and
86,000 years ago. In a great contrast to this close cousins other apes
are at a far larger distance: the gorilla peeled away around nine million
years ago, orangutans 16 million, and the gibbons (which are the only
monogamous ape), took an early exit about 22 million years ago. Our
striking similarities to chimps and bonobos is so tangible, that many
biologists today in fact advocate to reclassify humans, chimps and
bonobos together.
Even at the fifteenth century, Nicolaes Tulp(a well-known Dutch
anatomist), commented on his nonhuman ape's anatomy: "it would be
hard to find one egg more like another."
So what are these similarities? Like us, chimps and bonobos are African
great apes. We all have no tails, spend a good part of our lives on the
ground, highly intelligent and intensely social creatures.


Starting with the chimps:

Chimps have been taken the place of the savanna baboon as the best
living model of ancestral human behavior. The babbon model was
abandoned when it became clear that baboons lack some fundamental
human characteristics: cooperative hunting, tool use, organized warfare
and power struggles involving complex coalition building.
Chimps are reported to be power made, jealous, quick to violence,
devious and aggressive. Murder, organized warfare between groups,
rape and infanticide are prominent in accounts of their behavior.
These reports made theorists inthe1960s quickly propose the "killer ape"
theory of human origins, perhaps not surprisingly. The cunning brutality
displayed by chimpanzees, combined with the shameful cruelty that
characterizes so much of human history, appears to confirm these
notions of human nature. But, there are, however, some serious
problems with turning to chimpanzee behavior to understand
prehistoric human societies:
1. Chimps group are hierarchical, while groups of human foragers
are vehemently egalitarian.
2. While chimps from one area appear to confirm notions of ruthless
and calculating selfishness human nature, other appears to be
quite the opposite. We shall be cautious about generalizing from
the limited data we have available of free-ranging chimps.
3. Chimps are reported to be harmless when there's nothing worth
fighting over. In other words human like chimps tend to fight
when there's something worth fighting over. But for most of
prehistory, there was no food surplus to win or lose and no home
base to defend.


A great counter model the Bonobo:
Just as the chimpanzee seems to embody the Hobbesian vision of
human origins, the bonobo reflects the Rousseauian view. Da Waal sums
up the difference between these two apes' behavior: ""the chimpanzees
resolves sexual issues with power; the bonobo resolves power issues
with sex."
When two bonobo communities meet at a range boundary, not only
there is no lethal aggression, as sometimes occurs in chimps, but there
may be socializing and even sex between females and the "enemy
community" males.
Bonobos were late to be researched due to the place they live in
(Democratic Republic of Congo). Bonobos have no formalized rituals of
dominance and submission like common to chimps, gorillas another
primates. If there is a rank order, it is largely based on affection and
seniority rather than physical intimidation.
Anatomically, both human and bonobos have what's called a "repetitive
microsatellite", important to the release of oxytocin. We're both
supposed to have feelings like compassion, trust, generosity, love and
eroticism. The weakness of the "killer ape theory" of human origins
becomes clear in light of what's now known about bonobos behavior.
Bonobos often stare deeply into each other's eyes, walk arm in arm, kiss
each other's hand and feet, and embrace with long, deep, tongue
intruding French kisses.(according to Dr Helen Fisher, PhD Biological
Anthropologist)
Some facts:
1. Bonobos are sensitive, lively, and nervous, whereas
chimpanzees are coarse and hot-tempered.
2. Bonobos rarely raise their hair; chimpanzees often do so.
3. Physical violence almost never occurs in bonobos, yet is
common in chimpanzees.
4. Bonobos defend themselves through aimed kicking with their
feet, whereas chimpanzees try to pull attackers close to bite them.
5. The bonobo voice contains a and e vowels, whereas the
chimpanzee uses more u and o vowels.
6. Bonobos are more vocal than chimpanzees.
7. Bonobos stretch their arms and shake their hands when calling,
whereas chimpanzees do not.
8. Bonobos copulate more hominum and chimpanzees more
canum.

The only major problem scientists appear to find in the bonobos model
is the frequency of their sex. Bonobos engage in sex to ease tension, to
stimulate sharing during meals, to reduce stress while traveling and to
reaffirms friendships during anxious reunions.


On a great contrast the only monogamous ape, the gibbon:
The gibbon lives in small family units consisting of a male/female couple
and their young isolated in a territory of thirty to fifty square
kilometers. They never leave the trees, have little to no interaction with
other gibbon groups, not much advanced intelligence to speak of, and
infrequent reproduction-only copulation. Monogamy is not found in any
social, group living primate, except if the standard narrative is to be
believed us.




I can sum up and conclude that modern man's seemingly instinctive
impulse to control women's sexuality is not an intrinsic feature of human
nature. It is response to specific historical socioeconomic conditions
conditions very different from those in which our species evolved. If you
understood this conclusion and its backing - and you have acknowledged
a key to understanding sexuality in the modern world. Any "evidences"
you may find about hierarchical, aggressive and territorial behavior are a
recent adaptation to the social world that arose with agriculture.

















Women Are Not Less Eager Than Man


Judging from the social habits of man as he now exists, is not a reliable
method for understanding prehistory. While the Standard Narrative of
human sexuality is stuck in the pivotal assumption of man being randy
and women choosy, this unsubstantial assumption faces difficulties.
Examining facts shows that this "genetic basis" is not possible in pre
agriculture societies, and opposes behavior common in apes like us
humans.













How agricultural-revolution actually was?

What gets cultivated in soil and minds is not necessarily beneficial to
the individuals in a given society. Something may benefit a culture
overall, while being disastrous to the vast majority of the individual
members of that society. Individuals may suffer and die in wars from
which society can greatly benefit.
This disconnection between individual and group interests is the concept
I used to explain why the shift to agriculture is normally spun as a great
leap forward, despite the fact that it was actually a disaster for most of
the individuals who endured it. Increased famine, vitamin deficiency,
stunted growth, radical reduction in life span, increased violence all
are consequences of what eventually caused a great leap forward. In
other words that shift from foraging to farming was a giant leap while
also a dizzying fall from the grace for most people.
The great evolutionary advantage of human over other animals is our
ability to socialize. That endlessly complex interactions with each other
is our "giraff's neck", our "elephant's ears".
We have another quality that is especially human in addition to our
disproportionately large brains and associated capacity for language.
Something woven into our all-important social fabric: our exaggerated
sexuality.
No animal spends more of its allotted time on Earth fussing over sex
than Homo sapiens not even the famously libidinous bonobo. While all
monogamous creatures are hyposexual(having sex infrequently, quietly
and for reproduction only), human being are at the other end of the
libidinal spectrum: hypersexuality personified.
Human beings and bonobos use eroticism for pleasure, for solidifying
friendship, and for cementing a deal (recall that historically, marriage is
more akin to corporate merger than a declaration of eternal love). This
frivolous sex makes our species human- not "animalistic".

Examples backing my claim of social influence

1. Ache people of Paraguay When an anthropologist working there
asked his subjects to identify their fathers, the 321 Ache claimed
to have over six hundred fathers. It turns out the Ache distinguish
four different kinds of fathers. According to the anthropologist
Kim Hill, the four types of fathers are:
Miare: the father who put it in;
Peroare: the father who mixed it;
Momboare: those who spilled it out; and
Bykuare: the fathers who provided the child's essence
2. Tahitians by captain James Cook, the first western to sail there
"gratified every appetite and passion before witnesses."


There are many more examples of living societies, which, despite years
of missionary about "sexual norms" and "the morality of shame"; exhibit
sexuality one may find "unnatural".
Except from those societies, another great example to show that
jealousy is not natural is of sport groups. Desmond Morris spent months
observing a British pro soccer team in the late 1970s and early 1980s,
later publishing his thoughts in a book called "The Soccer Tribe". The
soccer group behaviors were similar to those of a tribe.
Morris write: "The first thing you notice when footballers talk among
themselves, is the speed of their wit. Their humour is often cruel and is
used to deflate any team-mate who shows the slightest signs of egotism.
If one of them scores (sexually), he is not possessive but is only too
happy to see his team-mates succeed with the same girl."
This natural form of egalitarianism shows that despite claimed to be
natural, many characteristic defining human "monogamous nature" are
preprogrammed by society norms.


So what is wrong with the standard narrative?

The assumption following assumptions:
1. Males "invested" in a particular female and her children
2. Male sexual jealousy is preprogrammed genetic behavior.
3. Women has low libido while men are eager to have sex all the time.
4. The explanations given to women's ovulation being "hidden". While
we now know it shows that human are apes who communicate, using
sex to keep social connections; the standard narrative finds it either as a
way of women to confuse their man paternity so that their offspring will
not be massacred or as a way to reassure access to men's resources and
a way to cheat them.
5. Every culture is organized around marriage and the nuclear family.











My Own Experiment Testing The Claim Of The
Book



As far as my general knowledge concerns, I know Oxytocin as the
hormone released in both sexes while reaching orgasms or sexual
pleasure. So, if the books claim would be true, than I would expect to
see some correlation between the level of Oxytocin creation in our body
and the occurrences of social bonding.
After a small search, I've found that there has been a session of
experiences that just proved my theoretical assumption: Not only it has
been found correlated, but an experiment in which was testing a directly
causation has found Oxytocin causing people to be more trustful and
"moral".
To read more you are invited to see the links I left on the bibliography,
which are very interesting, at least from my perspective.
I can end up saying that this causation that proved supports the claim
that sex before the effect of preprogrammed social norms on our habits
was used for keeping bonds between people. We might conclude that
human sexuality was indeed in the form of some ongoing sexual
relationship at a time, while none of them random or meaningless.










Reflection

Apart from being fun and interesting, working on this project has greatly
influenced my weltanschauung. I have been exposed to many
perspectives over complex human behaviors, many of them on a higher
level than at school. Likewise, in my research I learned how to integrate
many different claims; all to base the main relatively far message and
get the listener to your way of thinking.

One significant influence I took from the project is connected to the
understanding of myself. Since I matured, I found out that I have
completely lost the ability to feel jealousy. I found jealousy, a feeling
which I formerly thought to be natural, a feeling that is preprogrammed
by society. Noticing the fact that I am less effected by social norms than
most other individuals, I came to understand that I have actually been
acting more naturally.














Bibliography


Sex At Dawn a book co-authored by Christopher Ryan, Ph.D and
Cacilda Jeth, MD
Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family - an 1871
book written by Lewis Henry Morgan

Greek Mythology the story of Tiresias
Bonobo The Forgotten Ape by FRANS DE WAAL (chapter 1) -
https://www.nytimes.com/books/first/d/dewaal-bonobo.html [(C) 1997 The Regents
of the University of California All rights reserved. ISBN: 0-520-20535-9]