*** OFFICIAL Movies & Movie Recommendations Thread ***

[OngBonga]

I'm not going to read all that at 4am (my sleeping pattern is fucked, doing night shifts and housekeeping) but from the brief glance I took, it seems that study was observing female dolphins and their behaviour during estrous, whatever that is, presumably the dolphin term for "in season".

Inbreeding bad, leads to bad things.

There's no dispute here.

Ergo, animals that do it will die off

This is in dispute. Why would they die off? Presumably the implication is that incestual beings are only fucking their family members. First of all, this happens when populations become too small, and that might or might not mean extinction, so it's not a given they die off. Secondly, this assumes that incestual beings are exclusively incestual, that is they aren't having non-incestual relations. But that isn't the case. In most cases in the animal kingdom, incest is also rape. It's sexually aggressive males doing what they want to do, and submissive females accepting it, or weaker males hating it.

and animals that avoid it will survive to pass their non-incest-doing genes on to the next generation.

Again, implying it's exclusive, that it's a "preference" in an individual caused by a gene, rather than a simple behavioural response to hormones, coupled with a lack of morals and empathy.

We're probably the only animal on the planet that has figured out it's bad. If dolphins give no fucks (and yes I appreciate I haven't shown it to be definite), then I'd be surprised if any other wild animal has the intelligence. Maybe some primates have figured it out.

I could be wrong of course, but it's not how I understand evolution. Evolution is a product of chance. Incest isn't a product of a genetic mutation that will ultimately get weeded out of the gene pool. If it was, it would only happen very rarely. Normal sexual behaviour is more likely to result in reproductive success than incestual, so an incest gene would get weeded out of the gene pool. Clearly that hasn't happened.

[Poopadoop]

estrous, whatever that is, presumably the dolphin term for "in season".

Sort of, yes. But it's not what dolphins call it, it's what biologists call it.

this happens when populations become too small,

If you add this caveat, then sure I agree. But before you said (with no evidence) that dolphins would mate with anything, which presumably includes their close relatives.

this assumes that incestual beings are exclusively incestual, that is they aren't having non-incestual relations. But that isn't the case. In most cases in the animal kingdom, incest is also rape. It's sexually aggressive males doing what they want to do, and submissive females accepting it, or weaker males hating it.

It's the fitness of the offspring that matters in all this. Given a choice between mating incestuously and mating non-incestuously (that's the crucial point here, there being a choice), your genes have a better chance of survival if you mate non-incestuously.

Again, implying it's exclusive, that it's a "preference" in an individual caused by a gene, rather than a simple behavioural response to hormones, coupled with a lack of morals and empathy.

You're putting the cart before the horse here. Evolution doesn't care about morals and empathy, it cares about behaviour. That's one of the things that makes altruism so mysterious. Sure, if you jump on a grenade to save your buddies you're a great guy, but you're also taking yourself out of the gene pool.

Even if screwing your sister made you a hero in the eyes of your tribe, it'd still be bad evolutionarily. The universal moral construct of a social taboo around incest emerges from the fact it's a bad idea evolutionarily.

We're probably the only animal on the planet that has figured out it's bad. If dolphins give no fucks (and yes I appreciate I haven't shown it to be definite), then I'd be surprised if any other wild animal has the intelligence. Maybe some primates have figured it out.

Animals probably haven't read Darwin, even the smart ones. But you don't need a conscious awareness of evolution in order to behave in ways that promote your genes. You can be human and not even believe in evolution. You're still going to be trying to survive and pass on your genes.

Evolution is a product of chance.

Wut?

Incest isn't a product of a genetic mutation that will ultimately get weeded out of the gene pool. If it was, it would only happen very rarely.

It does happen only very rarely. Prove otherwise. Using science, not some random thing you read on R/dolphinsaredicks or wherever you're getting your information from.

Normal sexual behaviour is more likely to result in reproductive success than incestual, so an incest gene would get weeded out of the gene pool. Clearly that hasn't happened.

It has happened. Incest between close relatives is extremely rare, about as rare as hemophilia. In animals, it only happens when there's no other mates available.

The idea that bad genes must immediately disappear from the gene pool is oversimplistic. There's plenty of nasty diseases and conditions caused by recessive genes that only express themselves when those recessive genes get matched with a partner's recessive genes in their offspring. That's the main reason incest is a bad idea in the first place - you're more likely to pass on some shitty genetic condition to your kids, even if you don't have the condition yourself because you only have one of the recessive genes in the pair.

[CoccoBill]

I could be wrong of course, but it's not how I understand evolution. Evolution is a product of chance. Incest isn't a product of a genetic mutation that will ultimately get weeded out of the gene pool. If it was, it would only happen very rarely. Normal sexual behaviour is more likely to result in reproductive success than incestual, so an incest gene would get weeded out of the gene pool. Clearly that hasn't happened.

Saying it's a product of chance is a mischaracterization, mainly coming from the intelligent design folks. There's randomness and chance involved with genetic mutations sure, but the process of evolution isn't at all based on it, it's just whatever works, works. The incest gene would get weeded out only if it comes with strong negative selection pressure, and that's only true for exclusive cousin-bangers. If someone also jovially does 2nd and 3rd cousins, not such a problem. Even if not, the genes are not just instantly deleted from all humans, it may take a lot of time for them to get lost. We still have crap like tailbones that are not useful, and appendixes that can kill us.