When I'm in my more responsible moods, I try to read things that disagree with me every so often. It's occasionally possible I can be wrong, and we've been told since we were kids that other points of view can be important and educational. And, I figure if nothing else, I'll at least find the reasons for believing what I do, and find ways to counter the counter-arguments.

Sometimes, it's interesting and rewarding. Sometimes it's physically painful. Sometimes I just sit there boggled. Sometimes it's like my own private re-enactions of MST3K. Sometimes, it's like debating which restaurant is better without ever agreeing.

Unfortunately, this time, it's not one of the better ones. I'm reading Darwinian Fairytales, despite my own better judgment. The premise of the book is evolution doesn't apply to human beings. I saw it on the shelf at work, read the back and the blurbs on the book cover, and kinda shook my head. Then I was thinking about it, and figured I should go ahead and read it, despite the blurbs that seemed to be missing a big part of how evolution actually works. They're just blurbs, after all.

( Bad feelings and faulty assumptions and scientific theories, oh my. )

I may stop every couple of chapters and point out the flaws I've found, rather like Slacktivist has been doing with the Left Behind novels. And as much as it's been paining me to read the inaccurate and completely off science through parts of this, it's given me a few good ideas (which I'll try and make into a sensible post later) while I've been finding the places where he's wrong. So I'm not getting absolutely nothing out of the book, but I'm getting it from the negative space of the book.

And I'd be inclined to agree with the unnamed "eminent biologist" mentioned in the Introduction. The science in this book is pretty terrible and awful.

I have a theory. About evolution, sex, and relationships. At least partially about them. It's probably stupid though.

So, scary movies. $Guy and $Girl go to some scary movie. Ohnoes! There's a monster on the screen! Now, everybody knows full well it's just a movie, it's not real. On a conscious level, anyway. But part of our brain doesn't realize that. It sees a big monster. Huge. On some level, you see it, it's real. So, $guy puts his arm around $girl, to "protect" her. And hey! Movie ends, monster goes away. Even though it's not exactly relevant these days in most of the developed world, one of the important things women looked for in a mate for millions of years was the ability to protect her and any spawnlings from monsters. Usually lions or other kinds of happy grassland critters, and not so much zombies, but the principle's the same. And since the monster in the movie didn't eat $girl, then $guy gets some credit for protection. Not on any conscious level, 'cause dudes, it's just a movie. But there's a lot more bits in our brains than the parts that think in words.

Or I could just be thinking too much and talking bullshit. Or all three!