The sisters of gay men tend to have more children, helping explain the persistence of homosexuality in larger populations, while straight men may also carry genes predisposing them to being gay, the study found.
[snip]
Based on Chaladze’s calculations, published in the journal Archives of Sexual Behavior, male homosexuality is maintained in a population at “low and stable frequencies” if half of the men and roughly more than half of the women carry genes that predispose men to homosexuality.
(No link with given to the study.)
The problem that I see is that no “gay gene” has ever been found:
The trumpets were left at home and the parades were canceled. The press releases and campaign signs were quietly forgotten. The news was big, but it did not contain what some had hoped for. On April 14, 2003, the International Human Genome Consortium announced the successful completion of the Human Genome Project—two years ahead of schedule.
The press report read: “The human genome is complete and the Human Genome Project is over” (see “Human Genome Report…,” 2003, emp. added). Most of the major science journals reported on the progress in the field of genetics, but also speculated on how the information would now be used. The one piece of information that never materialized from the Human Genome Project was the identification of the so-called “gay gene.”
It is a hope based upon a “the Devil made me do it” defense, only substitute gene for devil. Or from their point of view, God made me this way.
It is easier to say what has not been discovered: the researchers in the United States whose findings were announced last week have not found a gene that causes homosexuality and they have not proved that homosexuality is hereditary.
They believe they have evidence linking a region of the X chromosome – which men inherit from their mothers – with the sexual orientation of some gay men. If they are right, they have uncovered hard evidence of a genetic basis of homosexuality.
The gene has still to be found. The specified region of the X chromosome may carry several hundred genes in all, and the researchers are still some way from identifying which one it is.
But the Human Genome Project, mapping all human genes, was completed in 2003, see above.
As the discipline of genetics changed, so too did the scientific approach to homosexuality. In 2012, scientists examined the possibility that variations in hormone levels in the womb could influence the expression of genes that affect sexual orientation, a line of inquiry that falls under the emerging sub-discipline of epigenetics. The popular media, once so easily convinced by LeVay that homosexuality resulted from brain size and by Hamer that homosexuality was genetic, promptly changed its tune to declare that homosexuality was now epigenetic. Hooray? If it’s hard to get excited about these studies, it’s because, at this point, biological explanations for homosexuality are like iPhones—a new one comes out every year.
The statement ” Based on Chaladze’s calculations,…” from the “Half of all people could be carrying ‘gay genes” story make me think that the study is nought but a statistical analyse, and offers no direct proof that a gay gene exists. Rather give a statistical modal to support the supposition that a gay gene does exist, but that it is so evenly distributed in the population that the Human Genome Project could not find it.
I wish that I could have found the study to see the sample size, and the type of analyze none on the group.
Here I underline the weasel words:
Half of all people could be carrying ‘gay genes’
Around half of all people, including straight men and women, could carry “gay genes
while straight men may also carry genes predisposing them to being gay
if half of the men and roughly more than half of the women carry genes that predispose men to homosexuality.
Weasel words are “what iffing”,and offers no proof of anything.
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