The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour • Hacker News Board

Re: The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

#61

Post by BobaFloutist » Fri, Dec 15, 2023, 10:49 PM UTC

marcellus23 wrote: post #55

BobaFloutist wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because we have easily observed societal norms that have to account for some percentage of the difference, without measuring differences absent those norms we have no conceivable way to know that hereditary traits contribute to any percentage of the differences.

> we have no conceivable way to know that hereditary traits contribute to any percentage of the differences. Right, that explains why we can't know what % heredity contributes. It doesn't explain why we should assume that % to be small.

Because many historical cases of what were thought to be fundamental differences between the genders turned out to be strictly socially informed. I think it's more likely that the current suite of stereotypes is also incorrect than that we just happened to finally get it right.

Re: The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

#62

Post by SkyMarshal » Fri, Dec 15, 2023, 10:53 PM UTC

Log_out_ wrote: post #59

lupusreal wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Men who are respected by many other men are more attractive to women than low status men.

Not necessarily .. We worship fearless idiots who jump in wingsuits into rocks. Death cult lifestyle defiantly is not selected for via social hierarchy.

Do we actually worship them, or cheer them on in the secretly morbid hope of seeing accidents, self-maimings, and Darwin Award events?

Re: The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

#63

Post by naasking » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 5:08 AM UTC

bumby wrote: post #18

photon_lines wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, because they have more to gain from taking the risk. Think about it for a moment.

The article's main thrust is a focus on risks that have negligible gain. So in that context your argument reads, "they have more to gain from a risk that has negligible gain."

Negligible gain can still be enough to distinguish oneself. What gain do colourful feathers on birds really have except to draw attention.

Also, evolution is likely not precise enough to have evolved accurate intuitions about the fitness value of all possible risks. We should expect some reasonably broad degree of randomness around the value of risk taking.

Re: The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

#64

Post by naasking » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 5:11 AM UTC

BobaFloutist wrote: post #52

marcellus23 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you think it's more likely to be societal and not inherited?

Because we have easily observed societal norms that have to account for some percentage of the difference, without measuring differences absent those norms we have no conceivable way to know that hereditary traits contribute to any percentage of the differences.

> we have no conceivable way to know that hereditary traits contribute to any percentage of the differences.

That's exactly what cross-cultural studies do. The evidence is pretty suggestive.

Re: The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

#65

Post by lupusreal » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 1:23 PM UTC

Log_out_ wrote: post #59

lupusreal wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Men who are respected by many other men are more attractive to women than low status men.

Not necessarily .. We worship fearless idiots who jump in wingsuits into rocks. Death cult lifestyle defiantly is not selected for via social hierarchy.

> Not necessarily

Of course it isn't true literally every single time, but it's certainly true on average. There is a strong correlation between a man being respected by many other men, e.g. high status among his peers, and that man being a stable reliable provider.

If their is a famine, who gets cut off from the communal source of food first? The man all the other men like, or the man none of the other men respect? If the company is shedding dead weight who is more likely to get laid off? Who gets the best reviews from their colleagues and is most eligible for promotion? In all cases, the man most respected by other men has an advantage. Such men are desired by an larger than average portion of women. This in turn creates a reinforcing dynamic where women see a man being desired by women and in turn desire him for themselves more. This in turn causes even more men to respect him.

Tldr it's good to be respected. And because respect begets more respect, it doesn't even necessarily matter how the respect was initially seeded. Having others witness you being respected is at least as important as doing something actually worthy of respect.

Re: The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

#66

Post by sjducb » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 3:50 PM UTC

BobaFloutist wrote: post #53

sjducb wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our closest relatives Chimpanzees are patriarchal. Humans are patriarchal. It’s probably genetic. One female can have about 10 babies. Regardless of how powerful she is. One male can father hundreds. The genetic rewards are there for males only. That’s why it’s only males that take crazy risks to get access to hundreds of women.

Our closest relatives Chimpanzees are not particularly close relatives. Most human societies tend to be patriarchal, but some have not been. And who tends to hold positions of power isn't necessarily 1:1 with who tends to take the most risks, in fact, most of our leaders are usually prone to putting themselves in less danger than those they govern.

I’m curious why you bring up the rare cases of matriarchal societies as a way to disprove the general thrust of the argument. The existence of a few matriarchal societies doesn’t disprove my argument that biology makes us patriarchal.

If I said Dutch people are taller than Spanish people you wouldn’t start talking about your one tall Spanish friend as a way of disproving my argument.

Something is making you clutch at straws to try to disprove the argument that biology causes patriarchy.

On the second point. Leaders take risks to get into the leadership position. That’s why the lower ranks are taking huge risks.

Re: The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

#67

Post by sjducb » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 3:56 PM UTC

BobaFloutist wrote: post #54

golemotron wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're lucky that we can look at other primates and mammals and see the same patterns.

Many mammals are matriarchal. Far more don't exhibit much in terms of gendered differences in leadership whatsoever.

In hominids leadership is linked with male mating success.

In most of the other mammals leadership is orthogonal to mating success. For example a pride of lions is a matriarchy. The lionesses are in charge. However there is only one mature male in the pride he mates with all of the lionesses.

Other males will take extraordinary risks to kill that male and take his pride.

Re: The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

#68

Post by sjducb » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 4:30 PM UTC

Shorel wrote: post #43

pfannkuchen wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> like sea-horses I don’t think it’s fair to represent an edge case, “noteworthy for being different” type species as being just one example out of many. As far as I’m aware the behavior exhibited by sea horses is extremely rare, and I recall it being highlighted as such in, at least, The Selfish Gene. Can you think of other examples?

I would not paint it that way. For fish, it is often the case the male takes care of the eggs, and the females are free of any responsibility. There are other behaviours in the sea, and they are in general so different to mammals that we can consider them as alien. I would even say mammals are the edge case, just by virtue of having a fewer number of species than fish, arthropods, insects, and almost any other clad.…

Can you cite some sources?

Re: The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

#69

Post by Log_out_ » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 4:52 PM UTC

lupusreal wrote: post #65

Log_out_ wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not necessarily .. We worship fearless idiots who jump in wingsuits into rocks. Death cult lifestyle defiantly is not selected for via social hierarchy.

> Not necessarily Of course it isn't true literally every single time , but it's certainly true on average. There is a strong correlation between a man being respected by many other men, e.g. high status among his peers, and that man being a stable reliable provider. If their is a famine, who gets cut off from the communal source of food first? The man all the other men like, or the man none of the other men respect?…

In a famine.. the man who believes in a ordered hierarchical society with laws are worthless. Family clans and crooks is what survived. Example: Africa, or the collapse of the ussr

Re: The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

#70

Post by bumby » Sat, Dec 16, 2023, 5:19 PM UTC

naasking wrote: post #63

bumby wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article's main thrust is a focus on risks that have negligible gain. So in that context your argument reads, "they have more to gain from a risk that has negligible gain."

Negligible gain can still be enough to distinguish oneself. What gain do colourful feathers on birds really have except to draw attention. Also, evolution is likely not precise enough to have evolved accurate intuitions about the fitness value of all possible risks. We should expect some reasonably broad degree of randomness around the value of risk taking.

I disagree. It's a self-contradictory point. I was being charitable to call it "negligible" considering the article also refers to the gain as "non-existent."

>"What gain do colourful feathers on birds really have except to draw attention"

When drawing attention gives you a disproportionate advantage to attracting a mate vs. attracting a predator, it's a very important (and non-neglible) gain.

>We should expect some reasonably broad degree of randomness around the value of risk taking.

I don't think this negates the point. Just because the there is a distribution in the value doesn't mean there isn't a statistically significant directionality of that distribution. I can say there's a distribution of individual player height in the NBA, but that doesn't mean we can't draw conclusions about height having generalized value at the population level regarding the chances of making it to professional basketball.