Gender — an evolutionary sociobiological hack — ‘it’s all about having kids’
[SKETCH] early groundwork for fitting conservative and liberal views on gender into a single framework
Published in
2 min readMay 27, 2019
- reproduction is the key stage of life around which all other stages are oriented
- binary gender facilitates mating/child-rearing-pairing which (biologically) *always* involves a polarised binary-pairing — regardless of the variegated biological/sexual realities of particular individuals
- gender outside the mating/child-rearing-pair is practice or educative-role-modelling for life within the mating/child-rearing-pair
- as population approaches carrying capacity child-rearing becomes less of a necessity for individual/group survival, and increasingly a potential liability
- children are the prototypical ‘pension’ — and the primary measure of evolutionary fitness
- does non-heterosexual orientation/behaviour increase as populations approach carrying capacity?
- culture operates within modal cognitive limits of individuals — so gender is only as complex as necessary to ensure adequate functioning of the individual and society while leaving room for all other cultural elements. As child-rearing declines/transforms as a universal activity, the myth of gender needs to adapt, within cognitive limits, to reflect this.
- we are lacking a broad enough base of myth to accommodate — in ways conducive to healthful society — the broadening possibilities for child-rearing, involvement in child-rearing or abstention from such activities
- the further outside established (gender-)myths we stray, the harder life becomes — we operate off-script, so others don’t know how to treat us and we don’t know how to behave — more and more must be invented from scratch which can increase anxiety and cognitive load on all involved
- consider: the genetic/evolutionary layer driving biological reproduction and physical drives; and its interactions (healthful and pathological) with the cultural layer driving social reproduction and mental life; and gradations of this, eg the emotional layer as a mediating layer?
- consider: evolutionary/historical limits on cultural transmission, variety, complexity and whether they might be changing/expanding in this historical moment — and the implications of the risks that these limits will contract again in the future: simple gender myths are vital (and intrinsically persistent) because they (have) endure(d) civilisational collapse, while complex myths are fragile and cannot survive beyond the complex civilisations that support them.
