The Red Queen discussion thread

[xxThe_Lebowskixx]

The Red Queen was cited in one of the PUA threads. I read it recently and thought is was very interesting. Something I learned and general ideas of the book:

Men and women have different minds because they have different evolutionary histories.

Men are naturally polygamous, but it is not their nature to have multiple wives. Even Kings who had thousands of women at their disposal still had a 'first wife'.

Youth and beauty are the most important things that a male seeks in a women, while wealth and status are the most important things that a women seeks in a male.

Women are monogamous, however if they feel that their husband is a loser, they will cheat on him.

A large percent of men are raising children that they believe to be there own, but are another males.

Men from the lower income brackets are more likely to be raising a child fathered by a man from the higher income brackets then it being the other way around.

Homosexual porn does not make women horny.

Orgy porn makes women less horny than a single male and female.

There was an African tribe that sold all of its ugly women into slavery.

Women risk more by having sex then men, thus they are more selective. Men take a role raising children, thus they are also selective.

Male animals who do not take a role in raising the child find older females just as attractive as younger females.

Men are better at math. Women are better at social interaction.

Mens and women's magazines are both more likely to have a women on the cover.

Female sexual fantasies are passive, intimate, emotive and contextual. Male sexual fantasies are more frequent, visual, sexual, and promiscuous.

Women overwhelmingly fantasized about sex with a familiar partner.

A polygamous is society is worse for the majority of men than it is for the majority of women. A rich man can still offer more to a second wife than a poor man can to a first wive. In history, rich men horded all of the women forcing other men into celibacy, ending their gene line.

Males and females were hunters and gathers. This meant that luck played a large role in survival. It also meant that men had to work together to survive, thus men were more likely to be monogamous. The introduction of agriculture reduced the luck factor, and it made it unnecessary for men to work together.

Wars are not fought over resources, they are fought over women. Helen comes to mind.

Women are more likely to cheat on their husband when they are fertile.

If a man has been away from his wife all day, his body creates more sperm than if he had been with her all day.

Feminists and other groups do not want to admit that men and women have different minds.

Women are less competitive than men, and are thus disadvantaged in a mixed-sex schooling system and their work place.

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I just bought The Orgins of Virtue by the same author and I am very excited. What about books do you recommend? I am most interested in learning how men and women think.

[BigPoppa]

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A polygamous is society is worse for the majority of men than it is for the majority of women. A rich man can still offer more to a second wife than a poor man can to a first wive. In history, rich men horded all of the women forcing other men into celibacy, ending their gene line.


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I think this is an interesting point that rarely gets discussed.

The losers in a polygamous society are low status males (who often never get a woman at all) and high status females (who have to share man they'd otherwise have to themselves). The winners are high status males (obviously) and low status females (who often do better with part of a high status male than they would with an entire low status male).

I've also read that polygamous societies tend to be less stable because an underclass of disaffected males is shut out of the family life that would ordinarily keep from trouble. The best argument against polygamy, in fact, is one based around all the unfortunate side effects on society.


BTW: The book "The Moral Animal" was my introduction to evolutionary psychology, but might be a little dated now.

[xxThe_Lebowskixx]

I would be interested in hearing any criticism of this book from 2+2ers or anyone in the scientific community for a more balanced opinion.

[garcia1000]

It's a good book.
The same author has a book called 'Genome' but I found it less interesting.
I'd suggest the standard stuff if you are interested in popular evolutionary biology like Selfish Gene and Extended Phenotype and so on.

[xxThe_Lebowskixx]

What are your opinions about David Deida and Jarred Diamond? Both have tons of books with similar titles, which for me is usually a sign of mediocrity.

[Daddy Warbucks]

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Men from the lower income brackets are more likely to be raising a child fathered by a man from the higher income brackets then it being the other way around.

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This surprises me, because it doesn't seem to make sense. As previously stated, power and all its proxies(in this case money) is what attracts women to men for 2 main reasons
1)The successful person is more likely to have good genes(intelligence, athletic ability, good bone structure etc) than an unsuccessful one
AND/OR
2)A sucessful person has more money than an unsuccessful one. This means they can provide better resources for a womans child, better education, better access to facilities, networking opportunities etc, meaning the child is also more likely to be successful and carry on passing on their genetics.

Now most people can see how gold diggers fit into number 2. However, because men don't generally have to have the qualities of number 1 to be rich, 1 and 2 do not necessarily go hand in hand. So in this way, a woman can get the best of both worlds if she marries the rich guy, but then cheats on him with the other guy. She then gets the good genetics from the poor good looking guy, but gets to raise him with the rich guys resources, while the rich guy thinks he's raising his own seed.

The only way the opposite makes sense to me is if the poor guy has enough resources to sufficiently raise the child(even if its only one), she'll opt for the choice of better genetics at the sacrifice of resources.

[xxThe_Lebowskixx]

I am trying to find where in the book this was mentioned so I can give you a more detailed explanation.

Something else I found interesting. If two cousins have sex, the chance of a recessive deleterious gene emerging from such a match is small, and the advantage of genetic alliance to preserve complexes of genes that are adapted to work with one another probably out weighs it.

The reason why society doesn't want people to marry their cousins is because it allows them to horde wealth.

[gumpzilla]

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Something else I found interesting. If two cousins have sex, the chance of a recessive deleterious gene emerging from such a match is small, and the advantage of genetic alliance to preserve complexes of genes that are adapted to work with one another probably out weighs it.

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I seem to recall somewhere in the Selfish Gene that Dawkins mentions a study they did on some sort of wild animal (I think lions) on this subject. It turned out that the mate of choice was usually a first cousin.

[ceczar]

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The only way the opposite makes sense to me is if the poor guy has enough resources to sufficiently raise the child(even if its only one), she'll opt for the choice of better genetics at the sacrifice of resources.

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i think you need to think of it less as an evolutionary strategy (to marry the poor guy and have affairs with rich men). if we take as true both previously stated facts that: women are attracted to wealth and status, and women are more likely to cheat if they think their husband is a loser, then it makes sense the women married to poor men are more tempted to cheat with a rich guy than the opposite. also, just because they can have affairs with rich guys doesn't mean they would have the option of marrying rich guys.

[xxThe_Lebowskixx]

DW,

I can't find it in the book. It might have been from Sperm Wars which I was reading at the same time. If I remember correctly, a women with a rich husband has more to lose by cheating on him than she has to gain. Whereas all women are attracted to men of wealth and status.