The Purpose of Sex

CaptainCourtesy said:

I am quite aware of all of Bob's motivations when he posts. What he meant to say was…

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You do not speak for me, ever.

I do not grant you any authority to state what my motivations are, nor what I “…meant to say.”. Please refrain from doing so.

I suppose it varies from person to person. for me, the purpose of sex is to test how quickly my own blood clots. At least when the piano wire is too tight...

I still have the same question. What is the evolutionary advantage of physiological processes that cause a lot of mating with an associated pleasurable experience, as compared to without any such experience? We can't know what the reproductive process feels like to an ant, or a bluebird, or a platypus. But would we expect these organisms to be more or less successful at reproducing themselves, depending on whether they experienced the process as pleasurable?

matchlight said:

I still have the same question. What is the evolutionary advantage of physiological processes that cause a lot of mating with an associated pleasurable experience, as compared to without any such experience? We can't know what the reproductive process feels like to an ant, or a bluebird, or a platypus. But would we expect these organisms to be more or less successful at reproducing themselves, depending on whether they experienced the process as pleasurable?

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Actually with our current knowledge of biology and neuroscience we can probably tell if its pleasurable or not.

The purpose of sex. Well I'm kinda like a squirrel. I'm trying to get a nut.

tacomancer said:

Actually with our current knowledge of biology and neuroscience we can probably tell if its pleasurable or not.

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I doubt it. The best you could hope to do is measure certain physiological processes in other species, compare them to human responses, and make reasonable guesses. But there is no way to get information about a subject's experience except through the subject's report of it.

But that's not really what I'm getting at, which is the evolutionary advantage of sexual pleasure. Things like blinking our eyes and increasing our heart rates and respiration in stressful situations are also physiological responses that apparently have been selected for because they increase our chances of survival. And yet we don't need to feel ecstatic pleasure from those acts to do them.

matchlight said:

I still have the same question. What is the evolutionary advantage of physiological processes that cause a lot of mating with an associated pleasurable experience, as compared to without any such experience? We can't know what the reproductive process feels like to an ant, or a bluebird, or a platypus. But would we expect these organisms to be more or less successful at reproducing themselves, depending on whether they experienced the process as pleasurable?

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You're touching on a broader philosophical question. Why we have experience (or qualia or sentience or whatever you want to call the "inner movie" that we each experience) at all. It's (logically) conceivable to imagine an organism that behaves exactly as we do (having sex/procreating, eating when its stomach is empty, pissing when its bladder is full, ducking when a rock flies by its head, glaring at another person to signal a warning, etc etc) but has none of the "inner movie" playing that we have. Philosophical zombies they're called.

To put it simply, we don't know why. We don't know why evolution produced minded machines rather than mindless ones.

tacomancer said:

Actually with our current knowledge of biology and neuroscience we can probably tell if its pleasurable or not.

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Nope. We can guess, sure. But we can't know. We don't even know (in the epistemological sense of the word) that other human beings are experiencing in the same way that you are. For all you know you might be the only one. Everyone else in the world might be empty shells, completely devoid of the feeling of awareness you are having right now.

We all assume that everyone else is experiencing (and it's probably a safe assumption to make). Partly, we're programmed to assume that way. We have empathy. We look at someone's face contorted in pain, our brain recognizes certain facial cues, and it produces an experience of empathy, an experience of "oh yeah, I know what you're feeling. You're feeling pain, I've felt that before too. It's not good".

But that doesn't mean we know. In fact, that part of our brains is easily duped. Our brains are so good are recognizing the subtle facial cues or behaviors (someone shouting "ouch") associated with certain emotions that we see false positives constantly. Drawings, video game animations, even the smiley faces on we use here on this forum. The pixels on your screen when you're watching a video of someone crying are not experiencing anything. But your brain doesn't know this, it sees the cues, and it does what it evolved to do - empathize as if there was a person crying in front of you rather than a hunk of plastic and silicon.

Right now we have no clue how to objectively verify experience or sentience. Science can't even define what it is right now. The best we can do is recognize physical processes that we believe are correlated to sentience such as facial cues, behavior, neuron firings in a particular area of the brain etc.

tacomancer said:

It's a biological drive to both serve the functions of procreation and social cohesiveness. We developed an emotional need as a matter of instinct.

If sex were purely for procreation then I would imagine we would be like most mammals and only care during times of fertility. That we care all the time suggest it has further utility.

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At least one other primate uses it to 'defuse aggressive situations' in social situations. Bonobos use it as a mechanism to stop fights between members of the group. Chimps fight instead.

I think it depends on the sex you are having. I'd it is unprotected vaginal sex during peak ovulation cycles, than of course it's to procreate. If it is oral, anal, contraceptive sex between infertile or non breeding couples it's for pleasure, revenge, exhibition, any number of things.

matchlight said:

I doubt it. The best you could hope to do is measure certain physiological processes in other species, compare them to human responses, and make reasonable guesses. But there is no way to get information about a subject's experience except through the subject's report of it.

But that's not really what I'm getting at, which is the evolutionary advantage of sexual pleasure. Things like blinking our eyes and increasing our heart rates and respiration in stressful situations are also physiological responses that apparently have been selected for because they increase our chances of survival. And yet we don't need to feel ecstatic pleasure from those acts to do them.

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Try not blinking. How long can you not blink?

Something that is a functioning constant - when you take it away - it's pure misery.

Eating: why do we need to have good tasting food? Why is it that kids refuse to eat perfectly good food because it's not sweet enough? Because of sugar - it's our main source of fuel and our body's are designed to crave it. If something has more sugar than another food, that's what we want.

To hell with overall health - we want that sugar fix.

Bob Blaylock said:

You do not speak for me, ever.

I do not grant you any authority to state what my motivations are, nor what I “…meant to say.”. Please refrain from doing so.

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You speak for you, Bob... and I nailed your position, perfectly. If I am wrong, refute it.

matchlight said:

I doubt it. The best you could hope to do is measure certain physiological processes in other species, compare them to human responses, and make reasonable guesses. But there is no way to get information about a subject's experience except through the subject's report of it.

But that's not really what I'm getting at, which is the evolutionary advantage of sexual pleasure. Things like blinking our eyes and increasing our heart rates and respiration in stressful situations are also physiological responses that apparently have been selected for because they increase our chances of survival. And yet we don't need to feel ecstatic pleasure from those acts to do them.

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Because if we don't do them we get discomfort. If we don't do sex our genes don't get passed along, meaning that the genes of people who find sex pleasurable are more likely to survive.

the_recruit said:

You're touching on a broader philosophical question.

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Yes, I think I am.

We don't know why evolution produced minded machines rather than mindless ones.

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And never can know that--but it's odd that the experience of pleasure could somehow give an organism an advantage. All the more odd, if you believe, as I tend to, that the popular idea that we do things because we want to is wrong. It makes more sense to me that the experience of desire to take some action is just a byproduct or "epiphenomenon" of the physical processes that are actually causing us to take the action.

Just as food for thought, could the ability to imagine a pleasurable act, say copulation, be a way of keeping us ready to copulate even when the visual stimulus (an attractive partner) wasn't there? No need for any such partner actually to come within your view, and then move or act in a way that stimulates your desire, to get you ready to act. You've already been simulating opportunities for copulating by imagining them--i.e having sexual fantasies--even before any such opportunity presented itself. Sort of like house cats rehearsing their hunting moves by playing, maybe, even when there's no opportunity to hunt anything.

It's fun?

The purpose is whatever you make it. Some people find sex with their spouses torturous, so I guess torture is one purpose of it. Heh

the_recruit said:

Nope. We can guess, sure. But we can't know. We don't even know (in the epistemological sense of the word) that other human beings are experiencing in the same way that you are. For all you know you might be the only one. Everyone else in the world might be empty shells, completely devoid of the feeling of awareness you are having right now.

We all assume that everyone else is experiencing (and it's probably a safe assumption to make). Partly, we're programmed to assume that way. We have empathy. We look at someone's face contorted in pain, our brain recognizes certain facial cues, and it produces an experience of empathy, an experience of "oh yeah, I know what you're feeling. You're feeling pain, I've felt that before too. It's not good".

But that doesn't mean we know. In fact, that part of our brains is easily duped. Our brains are so good are recognizing the subtle facial cues or behaviors (someone shouting "ouch") associated with certain emotions that we see false positives constantly. Drawings, video game animations, even the smiley faces on we use here on this forum. The pixels on your screen when you're watching a video of someone crying are not experiencing anything. But your brain doesn't know this, it sees the cues, and it does what it evolved to do - empathize as if there was a person crying in front of you rather than a hunk of plastic and silicon.

Right now we have no clue how to objectively verify experience or sentience. Science can't even define what it is right now. The best we can do is recognize physical processes that we believe are correlated to sentience such as facial cues, behavior, neuron firings in a particular area of the brain etc.

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Brains all use similar structures and Nero chemicals to suggest we don't feel things the same or almost the same way is ludicrous given the evidence. The assumption being that the development is typical

Northern Light said:

It's fun?

The purpose is whatever you make it. Some people find sex with their spouses torturous, so I guess torture is one purpose of it. Heh

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the_recruit said:

There is no inherent purpose. It's a pet peeve of mine when people try to project their own intentionality onto a mindless thing like evolution. Nature/evolution doesn't intend us to procreate. Nature/evolution doesn't care at all whether you procreate or if every living organism stopped procreating and died out. It makes absolutely no difference to evolution. Nature don't give a ****. :mrgreen:

Evolution simply explains how it came to be that organisms that feel a desire to reproduce are common today. That's it. The purpose of you having sex, the purpose of anything you do, is up to you. Why do you want to have sex. What purpose does it serve to you. Those are the questions you should be asking. Nature has no opinion on the matter whatsoever.

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Very thoughtful and worthy of response. I wish I had the inclination to analyze your points. Maybe later??

Bob Blaylock said:

You do not speak for me, ever.

I do not grant you any authority to state what my motivations are, nor what I “…meant to say.”. Please refrain from doing so.

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Then I will ask you. Were you asserting a Biblical purpose to explain why sex exists?

Northern Light said:

Some people find sex with their spouses torturous, so I guess torture is one purpose of it.

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:shock:

vasuderatorrent said:

Note to moderators: This is a philosophical topic but I will only be slightly disappointed if you decide to move this to the Sex and Sexuality Forum.

What is the purpose of sex? The average person thinks of sex at least on a daily basis. Some people are consumed with sex on such a level that they may think of it hourly or even every waking moment. This seems like a massive waste of mental energy considering that the average person only procreates less than 3 times in their life and for many they never procreate. Those who never procreate still have to deal with the joys and aggravations associated with sex. If the purpose of sex is to procreate wouldn't those desires turn off at a much early age? Wouldn't those desires only occur once or twice a year? Wouldn't those desires go away after a reasonable accomplishment of procreative activity especially in females? The procreation argument really makes no sense. Surely sex has a biological purpose that exceeds procreation.

Some may say that sex is a source of entertainment that was necessary in times past before internet, television, radio or other technological advances used to entertain us every waking moment. This could be true but it seems that these technological advances just exacerbates our desire and our access to sex. This too may be a poor argument.

I do have a theory that merits discussion. Humans require a drive for sex to give humans the inclination to connect and build relationships with other humans for their own well being. This can explain statistical data that suggests married people are happier and also statistically live longer lives. Does this theory undermine sexually deviancies such as homosexuality, polygamy, serial monogamy or other types of promiscuous sexual behavior? Absolutely not. The human desire for sex is the desire to have a companion either permanently, temporarily or even momentarily. Two people stand a much better chance of survival in this world than one person roaming the world alone. I believe that the drive for sex has to be frequent and long living in our life to extend our drive to build strong friendships which increases our potential to survive.

Sexual thought engages our mind way too much in my opinion and most certainly deserves an explanation. Sexual relationships can sometimes be confusing and/or frustrating sometimes with married couples but most commonly with single persons on the pursuit. I am certain that in polygamous relationships the confusion and frustration would be even greater. This type of unnecessary frustration must have a biological explanation that makes sense.

Any thoughts?

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Pretty much, going by observation.

Sex for humans is, on the basis of frequency, primarily for social bonding. In a state of nature, women are infertile for years and years after having a child, and usually have no more than 3 or so, spaced significantly apart. And yet, women continued to have sex regularly, despite lack of opportunity for pregnancy. This "bub every year" thing that we've had the last few thousand years is a result of higher body fat and hormone exposure which occurred due to agriculture.

So, humans mostly had sex for connection. We see this in other highly social species as well.

But as you say, humans desire connection for lots of different reasons. Long-term bonds, short-term bonds, fun, adventure -- whatever the case may be.

And again, that's pretty much supported by observation. Humans send to be long-term maters, but not necessarily life-long, and we do have our flings in between, or even during. Basically, we are not a super promiscuous species, but we're not a purely monogamous one either.

I think there is probably something to be said against treating sex as a function that just feels good and gives a bit of a work-out where attachment must be avoided though, as some in the casual pool are prone to do. Human connection often includes sex, but it includes lots of other things. That doesn't mean romance or even long-term, but it does mean you have to be engaging in the act honestly and openly. Hard to do when your primary focus is on avoiding connection.

I think where this mindset comes from is that Western society is still struggling with its old monogamy model. We don't understand sex outside the context of romantic love, or outside the context of life-long marriage.

We fail to recognize that sex has its own communicative value, separate from romantic love or any other kind of general relationship. Like every mode of bonding, it functions best in conjunction with some other mode(s), but it has its own specific set of characteristics.

We don't know how to experience the connection of sex without putting a bunch of rules and implications on it. We don't know how to appreciate what something is, rather than what we think it should be. And that's where all this talk of "catching feelings" comes from.

I've had a couple lovers. And yes, I was attached to them. But I was attached to them as what they were -- friends I had a good relationship with. And because sex was being combined with a friendly or intellectual mode, rather than a romantic one, the sex itself was different. In some ways, it was a little more open a little more quickly -- there's a neuroticism that comes with romantic love that can inhibit that. There's other stuff you don't get when combining sex with the friendly/intellectual relationship mode, such as the outwardly simple but inwardly complex "making love."

They're different. But to me, not any less meaningful.

And being attached to someone doesn't mean anything about how you handle that. I'm attached to everyone I know well. But nowhere except in romantic love is that supposed to translate into a series of rules, or complete break-downs if the mode of interaction changes.

I can be attached to someone and not lose my mind if/when it ends, or we change to a different kind of interaction. Anyone can. As long as they have truly internalized the fact that every connection is valuable, and it remains valuable even if it's broken or altered. It's an internalization that it's the PERSON who has meaning, not the MODE of interaction.

In that mindset, if the mode of interaction changes in such a way that we no longer have sex, or if the connection ceases all together from some kind of natural growing apart, I can still be happy that person exists and we had that experience.

Of course, I'll have my feelings as well -- my sadness, my nostalgia, my anger, whatever. But they lose their sense of desperate agony when you stop focusing on the mode and treat the people you connect with as people.

In short, I think some of our problems with the semi-promiscuous nature of humans are things we have done to ourselves, not things we are by nature -- at least not on the whole. Individuals will vary in their preferred behavior, of course.

vasuderatorrent said:

Then I will ask you. Were you asserting a Biblical purpose to explain why sex exists?

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I don't know about “Biblical”, per se.

It's not really possible to completely separate my views on sex and marriage from my religious beliefs.

One purpose of sex is to create and foster a bond between husband and wife. I think, from a secular point, it is clear that this is indeed an effect of a sexual relationship—to create a deep emotional and spiritual bond between the two participants—and from a religious viewpoint, it is clear to me that this is the way that God designed us, and that marriage between a man and a woman is intended to be exclusively the context in which this bond is to be cultivated. I think that it is also clear that as beneficial and essential as this bond in in the context of marriage, that it is damaging to form it without this context.

Remove the erotica and sex is for procreation of billions of species and nothing more.

Bob Blaylock said:

I don't know about “Biblical”, per se.

It's not really possible to completely separate my views on sex and marriage from my religious beliefs.

One purpose of sex is to create and foster a bond between husband and wife. I think, from a secular point, it is clear that this is indeed an effect of a sexual relationship—to create a deep emotional and spiritual bond between the two participants—and from a religious viewpoint, it is clear to me that this is the way that God designed us, and that marriage between a man and a woman is intended to be exclusively the context in which this bond is to be cultivated. I think that it is also clear that as beneficial and essential as this bond in in the context of marriage, that it is damaging to form it without this context.

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So, Bob. Tell me... how does this differ in any way from what I said your position was?

The only reason is procreation.

Evolution has caused sex to be enjoyable on a chemical and physical level, which has caused humans to attribute all these other reasons (social bonding, power, fun) to sex. There's nothing wrong with attributing our own purposes to things we experience, but the only objective reason per se is procreation. All others are subjective/secondary, tricked onto us by evolution (a great trick, but a trick nontheless).