
Sex and Sexuality - raleighm
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sex-sexuality/
======
ArtWomb
We may be headed to a possible future in which technology makes it possible to
decouple "romantic" impulses from the reproductive drive. Surrogacy at scale,
artificial wombs, even gamete design and editing are all possible within this
generation's lifetime. Concomitant relaxations in regulations regarding sexual
work and the commodification of sexual satisfaction would be one possible
outcome. The philosophic quandary then shifts from sex to the nature of love.
Is it simply another innate need with primal place atop the human hierarchy?
Or an evolution-tuned biochemical survival mechanism that can itself be
synthesized akin to the "pregnancy substitutes" in Aldous Huxley's _Brave New
World_?

Again, back to Plato (as all inquiries lead), but this time consider _The
Republic_ and its ideal family-state. Plato envisioned a community of parents,
and a dissolution of the edicts of traditional marriage. In which the entire
village parented each child as if they were their own. And privileges
associated with hereditary and parentage begin to disappear in deference to
the needs of the state.

Another modern evolution in traditional practice is the use of Tantric and
Orgasmic Meditation. Hindu philosophy usually places desire beyond prosperity,
knowledge, duty and spiritual perfection. But it is fairly easy to see how
cults wholly consecrated to Venus may arise.

~~~
watwut
Knowing what we know about human psychology, emotions and behavior, this
proposal alone make me think that Plato did not understood much about those.
You can't raise 30 children "like few of your own" not even if another 30
adults mess with that too.

~~~
wetpaws
There are certain tribes in human history that did exactly this for centuries.

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arketyp
Foucault is spot on in saying in this day of age we are obsessed with sex and
its labels. Sadly I don't see much liberation in the HBQT movement. All those
labels are just shackles on a heavy chain of controlling discourse.

~~~
AnIdiotOnTheNet
It's worse than that. The way our minds work, labels are part of our self-
image. Once we attach a label to our identity it becomes part of who we are
and we often try to conform to the expectations of the label.

~~~
themodelplumber
Human communication is set apart by its advanced facility for label-finding,
which is what allows us to effectively solve problems. The term "label" has
multiple levels; at a low level, just finding the "right" words to communicate
something is labeling.

Labels have their downsides, but the upside is an enormous communication
advantage over other species, one that brought us the ability to foster life
and evolve other species with us. In effect we are now _better, more nuanced
labelers_ than we were in the past, which is really the goal--eliminating
labels stunts our ability to identify and solve problems, so using them better
is the only way to go.

TLDR: "We label too much" itself is a label for a problem; even though it
necessarily leaves out nuance, that's also the very factor that gives a
labeler more leverage. To move up and away from that problem, we will need to
find new labels that get us better traction in that area. The amazing thing is
that there are so many billions of ways of labeling a problem, each with
respective advantages/disadvantages.

~~~
AnIdiotOnTheNet
I'm not saying we label too much per-se, but I think it is important to
remember that our minds use labels as a shortcut for understanding the
properties of the things we label. Useful, but not always accurate.

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hackandtrip
Talking about Plato and his idea of sexuality and love, the Symposium[0] is
worth a read. Aristophanes speech in particular is, in my personal opinion,
one of the best thing ever written in this context.

~~~
jgrahamc
Can you link to Aristophanes' speech?

~~~
seanchapman
[http://www.john-uebersax.com/plato/myths/androgyne.htm](http://www.john-
uebersax.com/plato/myths/androgyne.htm)

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lainon
Why has this been flagged?

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Vaskivo
[Off Topic] I absolutely LOVE Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. I've been
learning and reading about philosophy and this website as been a good
resource.

They have it organized by people and thematic. It is very accessible in
writing and structure. It doesn't resemble an encyclopedia. It's more like a
structured collection of essays and summations on the themes and people.

I'd only wish we could download the pages as epub, instead of only in PDF.

~~~
barking
>I'd only wish we could download the pages as epub, instead of only in PDF.

I find calibre great for converting formats

~~~
dsr_
An awful lot of this is most easily done with pandoc. Use wget to pull pages
down, pandoc to convert to markdown, apply edits (for example, a table of
contents), and then pandoc again to make it an epub.

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poster123
I think the discussion in the article of how to define perversion is
interesting. Nowadays it is difficult to say that certain consensual sexual
practices are morally wrong without being condemned as a bigot.

~~~
selllikesybok
Perhaps, rather, it is morally wrong to say that certain consensual sexual
practices are morally wrong?

~~~
virmundi
Nope. There is no such thing as morality apart from God. The universe doesn't
care (it can't). All morality then is man made. To say something is morally
wrong is to create an absolute. No one has the power to do so. The best you
can say is that you think it's wrong, which means you don't feel something as
positive.

~~~
poster123
I strongly disagree. I am atheist but have no doubt that wantonly killing
people (or for that matter, animals) is morally wrong. Empirically, I don't
think atheists are much more likely than theists to commit crimes.

~~~
troupe
Is it a moral problem for a lion to kill its prey or another lion for that
matter?

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poster123
Since lions kill to eat, their killing is not "wanton". By wanton I mean just
for the fun of it.

~~~
troupe
So is it different if the lion or other animal is not killing for food?

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dschuetz
I'm still waiting for the point in history of this planet that people abandon
the concepts of sexual orientation or identity or gender completely. The only
interesting thing to know is whether a person is able to give birth,
biological sex that is, and that's only interesting for medical reasons.

~~~
Anita_kiss
The vast majority of the planets population accepts and cherishes their gender
identity. The wishful thinking of a few people will not change that.

The attempt to force any kind of ideology that makes everybody exactly the
same and eradicates differences is , in my view, problematic.

~~~
matthewmacleod
_The vast majority of the planets population accepts and cherishes their
gender identity._

I'm not sure that's the case – I get the impression that the "vast majority"
of the planet's population doesn't really ever think about gender identity at
all.

~~~
notahacker
The vast majority of the planet's population might roll their eyes at the mere
mention of the words "gender identity" if they're even familiar with the
concept, but everything from simple clothing choices to complex social
interactions are consciously and unconsciously influenced by [local,
contemporary] behavioural norms along gender lines (including when, why and
how far they're happy to deviate from them). Men don't start seriously
considering wearing dresses to work or stop telling their daughters that
certain actions aren't very "ladylike" just because they suspect gender
studies courses are a waste of time.

