Biology and Behavior

DON IMUS: So, I watched the basketball game last night between -- a little bit of Rutgers and Tennessee, the women's final.
SID ROSENBERG: Yeah, Tennessee won last night -- seventh championship for [Tennessee coach] Pat Summitt, I-Man. They beat Rutgers by 13 points.
IMUS: That's some rough girls from Rutgers. Man, they got tattoos and --
BERNARD McGUIRK: Some hard-core hos.
IMUS: That's some nappy-headed hos there. I'm gonna tell you that now, man, that's some -- woo. And the girls from Tennessee, they all look cute, you know, so, like -- kinda like -- I don't know.
McGUIRK: A Spike Lee thing.
IMUS: Yeah.
McGUIRK: The Jigaboos vs. the Wannabes -- that movie that he had.
IMUS: Yeah, it was a tough --
CHARLES McCORD: Do The Right Thing.
McGUIRK: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
IMUS: I don't know if I'd have wanted to beat Rutgers or not, but they did, right?
ROSENBERG: It was a tough watch. The more I look at Rutgers, they look exactly like the Toronto Raptors.

Al Sharpton wants his FCC license revoked? Massive protests? Come on! What about freedom of speech? What about debating him on what he said rather than preventing him from saying it? Sure, it wasn't the most sensitive, or even intelligent of comments, but if someone went on the air and said something about Indians or posthumanists I wouldn't freak out. The fact is, female basketball players are pretty manly, and especially black women players. He shouldn't have said it, and I know Don Imus isn't one for discretion. Give the guy a break, though. It sells. If I want to listen to Imus, why should the FCC take that away from me? They're curtailing my right to hear what I want.



A recurring theme of this blog is the influence of biology on behavior, in that the physical makeup of your body changes how you act. The mind and the body are connected. Kind of cliche.

Anyway, heres a study by psychology today:
"Although past research has shown that masculine features (strong brow ridges, wide jaws) attract women, females don't prefer them when choosing a long-term companion."

"They attributed poorer parenting skills and aggression to more masculine faces, and linked more feminine faces with better parenting, supportive behavior, and diligence."

"Males and females preferred men with less masculine features as dating partners for their daughters."

"Facial masculinity is related to testosterone levels, which have demonstrated connection with rates of infidelity, violence, and divorce."

Allright. So, now we have somewhat of an explanation for the "bad-boy," phenomena, where women profess a desire for a "nice guy," but always end up going for the tatooed biker. They use the tatooed biker to get quality genes for short-term mating, but the nice guy provider for long term child raising. I'm probably going to get hell for this, but it seems there is an interesting contrast between male and female mating strategies. For women, if they're going to sleep with someone in the short term, then the guy has to be a stellar rock star, dominant guy. If they're going to have a LTR with him, he doesn't have to be as high up there. Guys have the opposite dynamic. If I'm just hooking up with a girl, she can be a slut or not even that attractive. If I'm going to have a relationship with her, though, then she has to be worth my time. Girls must learn that while they want to "tame" the bad boy, they make for pretty lousy boyfriends and fathers. The world is not fair.

Now, the race card. Guess what-African Americans have more testosterone, and surprise surprise, take on the bad boy characteristics: "which have demonstrated connection with rates of infidelity, violence, and divorce."
Physiological explanation for black male looser behavior. But hey, girls are still willing to put out.

I heard on Tariq Nasheed's podcast the other day a woman calling in to complain about a guy she was with who got her pregnant and wasn't even there for the delivery. Now, sure we can complain about black men and their poor fathering skills, but that's old news.

As Tariq said, "the only thing worse than a looser nigger is the ho who's fucking with him." What I venture to say is that yes, the black women are to blame for their inability to distinguish the solid (rare) guys from the next dude.

But, what if the reasons are biological? What if the average black man is programmed to not be family oriented, and the black women, evolutionarily, subconsciously expect it? That the only reason why they complain is because society expects all the races to act the same when it comes to relationships, and they feel left out? Let's be honest: these drug dealing, jail living, basketball players get more tail than the nerdy black dude who will stick with the girl and provide. It's no coincidence.

Sexual selection provides the rationale. When women are able to take care of their young by themselves by gathering available food, they do not have to rely on a male figure to assist with raising the child. In this case, because of a lack of pair bonding, males instead compete purely for sexual opportunities and to mate with as many women as possible. They increase in testosterone levels and polygynous behavioral patterns. The women select the men WITH THE BEST GENES, NOT WHO CAN PROVIDE.

The mating mind talked about a study done in modern hunter gatherer societies (warm climates). The women admitted that the men were more trouble than help, and often ate more and consumed more care than they gave. Lack of cooperation.

And guess what? When things got colder, the women couldn't gather anymore (wurm glaciation period) and had to rely on men. Then, we have pair bonding, and so on. Testosterone levels aren't as high, and the men and the women have to cooperate to raise the kid.

Now, if people still don't agree with me and think that "love" is something that is beyond biology, I can simply point to the prarie vole experiment.

http://www.emory.edu/EMORY_REPORT/erarchive/2004/July/er%20july%2019/monogamy.html

"Researchers at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center and the Center for Behavioral Neuroscience (CBN) have found that transferring a single gene, the vasopressin receptor, into the brain's reward center makes a promiscuous male meadow vole monogamous.

This finding, which appeared in the June 17 issue of Nature and drew national media attention, may help better explain the neurobiology of romantic love, as well as disorders (such as autism) of the ability to form social bonds. In addition, the finding supports previous research linking social bond formation with drug addiction, also associated with the reward center of the brain."

So, if genetics can explain a tendency to form relationships, why can it not explain the racial disparity in marital success?

See, that's why you can't expect all races to be the same. And that's why many of the founding fathers did not agree with slavery, but also didn't believe that African Americans and Whites could live in harmony.



And an article in today's SI advance mentioned the possibility of biology affecting our sense of morality. Apparently, the VMPC-ventromedial prefrontal cortex is important in making moral judgements.

"In the study, people were given hypothetical dilemmas: Would you throw a fatally injured person off a lifeboat to save everyone else? Would you kill a healthy hostage? Most normal people said no. Most people with VMPC damage said yes."

Now, following up on that, not only does biology influence behavior, but also BELIEFS. Oh wait, no? That all your beliefs are carefully reasoned out and not influenced by emotion? Bullshit.

I think the reason why people become more religious after a death of a loved one is because of a physiological change in the brain that makes people more disconnected from the material world.

I think the reason why people become conservative as the get older (you've heard the phrase: if you're young and conservative, you're heartless, but if you're old and liberal, you're an idiot, or something like that) is not because of a more realistic viewpoint, but because of a physiological change in the brain that makes altruism less attractive. It's probably because after one has children, (if asian or white) the brain zeroes in on the kids and focuses on giving them advantages in life. Worrying about starving children in Africa is less of a priority.

I, personally, find myself vaccilating between having disgust with the indulgent partying of New Yorkers, and loving every minute of it-depending on whether I'm in a good mood or not. In both cases, my logic is working and I reason it out-whether its okay that our rich throw money at status symbols while so much shit goes on in the world. Today, I'm neutral. Yesterday, I was listening to club music and thought it wasn't so bad.

Biology, Biology, Biology.