The Airportline: Observations

So, last Wednesday I went to a conference about sex. I told you I would report something about this, but as you know: I never do what I say I will in this blog. But our esteemed Airportline contributor from the Oil drinking nation of Norway felt that this was a great waste and took it upon her to explain what exactly went on there before that morning coffee and all those free drinks we had afterwards. So: this is what we learned:

Dr. Ken Kraaijeveld
Explained that in asexual mating all individuals are female. They get a lot more offspring, but since they reproduce through cloning there's not too much genetic variation and they are reliant on mutations to adapt to new environments. (Airportline does not really understand this)

So, while sexual reproduction yields fewer offspring, and provides a now sexual selection on both genders (fastest sperm, most attractive egg (Airportline finds the idea of attractive eggs very comedic), but also less depressive results, like clever females), it is the best and most sustainable evolutionary way of reproduce, because it combines genomes from different individuals and thus we have more variations in a population, which in return provide more protection against parasites. Ok, that sentence was ridiculously long, sorry. But this is especially reflected in our complex immune system, and it is believed that attraction between humans might be based on a search for mates with a different immune system than yours to make super-babies in the battle against pathogens. (Airportline: what?!)

What have we learned? If you must reproduce asexually, you should be tiny, i.e. unicellular, like bacteria, so that your generation time is minimal, and mutation rates should be high. However, if you want to become a complex multicellular being, sex is the way to go. Fewer offspring, but more invested in them.

Dr. Ellen Laan
Argued that there are 237 reasons for humans to have sex. i.e. it's not just for reproduction. The main reasons listed for men and women are similar (1. pleasure 2. Love and commitment 3. Experience searching).

(Airtportline was impressed that she quoted Woody Allen early in this lecture: ‘masturbation is sex with someone I love’ being the memorable line she used when she discussed the definition of sex)

However, the parental investment theory says that the gender contributing most energy and resources to the offspring should be more choosy in picking a mate. In most mammals, incl humans, this is the female, since we're going through 9 months of carrying a bowling ball in our uterus and need to feed it from our glands for at least some months after birth (WHICH IS LETHAL AND COMPLETELY INSANE WHEN YOU THINK OF IT). In that case women should be better than men at controlling their sexual response, such as mentally turning the sex drive off after getting turned on, but in her research she didn't find any empirical evidence for this (remember, the chair, the vibrator and the erotic movie-experiment?). Rather, men were better at controlling this.

She also said that the main reason that post-menopausal women experience a lower sex drive and a bad sex life is not hormonal, bur rather dependent on the state of their sexual state prior to menopause. So, an exchange of partner might be better than taking hormones. Haha (Norway oil drinking laugh)

Dr. Tristham Wyatt
THE PURPLE VELVET SUIT!!! (Airportline ads that he was wearing a highly impressive suit which I almost asked him about after three beers and four bitterballens)

Success of the smelliest? Pheromones drive sexual selection in many many phyla. this has been widely accepted for insects since 1959 (MOTHS!) but now we know that pheromonal attraction occurs also among higher mammals, and the elephant's pheromone consists of the same as the moths'. (so, why don't moths fly and try to mate with an elephant? because the composition is different in the different species!)

- Pheromones is not correct greek (or was it latin..?), it should be pheroromones, but that's ridiculous. (Airportline ads that this actually was a very funny joke, but maybe not so much in writing)

-Being smelly also means being easily discovered by enemies that want to eat you. Being smelly AND ALIVE sends signals to the females that your super-genes allow you to be super-quick in escaping from predators, or very strong etc..it's called honest signalling of good genes cause it gives the males a handicap they have to overcome, and it's very sexy for females. The classical example is the peacock's tail-feathers, which is highly conspicuous. Males with a poor gene-combination could never get away with that kind of ornament, they would be dinner.

Dr. Julie Bakker
Ok she was not so interesting but i noted that sex differences is also present in monkeys when it comes to preferring human gender-based toys.
Dr. Eva Becher
I fell asleep. twice. and drew a picture of a face on the note page. (Airportline also fell asleep, and then drew strange shapes that in no way resembles Picasso's Guernica.)

Dr. Rob Knell
He speculated whether resistance to STDs would function as honest handicaps (see above). Thing is, STDs are pathogens, often viruses attacking us just like other viruses, but exploit our reproductive strategies to spread themselves to new hosts. However, humans on the other side would not wish to have an STD so we should have evolved ways to discover which individuals are infected by these diseases and avoid them. So why do 50% of promiscuous Scandinavians have chlamydia (yes, it is an epidemic. yes, one should get tested!)?

Thing is, for a pathogen, the goal is NOT to destroy its host. The human body functions as their habitat, just like we exploit the resources from our habitat. First thing they should learn, and it seems like they're better than humans at this, is to apply SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT. Exploiting their hosts' resources all at once and killing it off is not very good, cause where do they go from there? I.e. strains of pathogens that destroyed their hosts quickly also died at the same time, and since the STD's are dependent on keeping their host still sexually attractive for their own spreading, their should evolve to become less virulent by time. Like syphilis.

So, therefore, we have not evolved detection of potential mates with STDs. STDs may be annoying, painful and shameful but not to the degree that humans stop reproducing. They're like the cold-virus, dependent of their host coughing at strangers to spread, and so keeping their host chained to their bed is not very good for them.

Airportline wants to thank our special biology expert and sporadic blogger for this detailed report from a nice conference day.