Are men wired to cheat...?

saxmaniac

This is misguided. Science can be whatever it wants to be. Just keep changing your variables until you do like the answers, then call it science and try to make all the people buy it as absolute truth. Sorry, but I'm not buying this.

Respectfully, you have no idea what science is.

Science makes a testable prediction of how things will behave, along with an explanation why. Other people try to replicate that prediction by testing it out. If it doesn't make a prediction, or can't be tested, it is not science.

RobynC79

Humans are animals. Cognitive reasoning is one aspect of human biology.

This. I'm glad to see there's at least one other smart person on MFP who understands the difference between biological imperatives vs. rational thinking, and how they coexist in the same being, and even the same brain. But ya gotta simplify...

Biological imperative: EAT CHOCOLATE CAKE UNTIL STUFFED. FEELS GOOD. NOW! NOW!!!
Cognitive reasoning: This is too much cake for my dietary needs, If I eat too much chocolate cake I'm going to be fat and miserable in the future, so I'm going to skip it.

Biological imperative: F--K SEXY HOT NEW PERSON. FEELS GOOD. NOW!! NOW! NOW!!!
Cognitive reasoning: Having sex with that person would be cheating since I promised not to. If I do I will lose the trust of my spouse, who won't trust me in the future, so I'm going to skip it.

Yes, we have "wiring" to seek sexual variety, men more so than women, since men can easily make 10 babies a day, and women can only make 1 every 9 months.. But we have rational brains to overcome that, in service of a greater goal. That's not a moral excuse to cheat, but it explains where the feelings come from.

Fortunately, these old part of our brains aren't very smart... it can be tricked with porn, 50 shades, and Splenda.

Yes indeed. Nicely stated!

CayleyRidgeRunner

This is misguided. Science can be whatever it wants to be. Just keep changing your variables until you do like the answers, then call it science and try to make all the people buy it as absolute truth. Sorry, but I'm not buying this.

Respectfully, you have no idea what science is.

Science makes a testable prediction of how things will behave, along with an explanation why. Other people try to replicate that prediction by testing it out. If it doesn't make a prediction, or can't be tested, it is not science.

I don't take offense to that at all. Perhaps, I should've been more precise and not as ambiguous in my statement. After all, this is an MFP thread - not a consortium of scholars weighing in on the human species' propensity to cheat. That being said, just saying that "science proves that men are wired to cheat" without any supporting information is utter bull$hit.

Jebbster007

If a man (or woman) is "wired" to cheat....then they have wired themselves that way through their behavior. Contrary to popular myth, sleeping around with a ton of people prior to making a marriage commitment (or habitual cheating inside supposedly committed relationships) does not "get it out your system". In fact it does the opposite, it makes it more unlikely you won't cheat in marriage since you have not been training yourself to be satisfied with one person. I'm not saying every person who has slept around before marriage is going to cheat. I'm saying you make it more difficult for yourself to be true. Though infidelity is a hurdle to be overcome in ALL marriage relationships, those with less sexual baggage are more likely to be satisfied with one person. Assuming of course that its a loving marriage to begin with, with 2 people who are absolutely committed to the other persons good.

travisseger

I don't believe men or women are wired to cheat. I believe many people have been conditioned to want what they can't have and to believe that the grass is always greener on the other side. I also believe humans do have a base need to love and to be loved, and if those needs are no longer being met, they start to go out and look for someone/something to fill that void. But we are not wired to cheat. Anyone, man or woman, who cheats and uses their "wiring" as an excuse, is someone who wasn't worth being with in the first place and with whom you're probably better off without.

RobynC79

That being said, just saying that "science proves that men are wired to cheat" without any supporting information is utter bull$hit.

Which would be why no one actually said that. 'Science proves' is a phrase that will never come out of the mouth (or from a keyboard) of a scientist.

Science provides evidence for x, y or z, or against them. Proof is for mathematicians.

perfectingpatti

Which would be why no one actually said that. 'Science proves' is a phrase that will never come out of the mouth (or from a keyboard) of a scientist.

Ahh, but you used science as your basis for making a declarative statement that humans are wired to cheat. Did you not?

CJisinShape

Oooookaaaay.....

1. We are not animals.
a. Cognitive reasoning
b. Speech
c. If you don't understand the other two, we build and program computers, along with bridges, skyscrapers and indoor plumbig.

2. We sin.
a. We know what is right and do wrong

3. Just because some scientist said so doesn't mean you should believe it.

Humans are animals. Highly complicated, intelligent, emotional animals. But still animals.
Cognitive reasoning is one aspect of human biology. It could also mean it makes us clever enough to cheat and get away with it.
Speech ? So we can tell each other about it?? Not sure I get the reasoning here.
Yes, modern humans build all sorts of things. It doesn't mean we've abandoned all our biological imperatives.

'Sin' is a societal construct. It's not a concept with universal understanding by the majority of modern humans. We're talking about wiring, in the sense of instinct and natural behaviour. We put societal constraints on many of our natural urges, and we constrain them, but not every human does so, and it doesn't erase those instincts from existence. Love, faithfulness and not cheating are all good things, and many humans do them very naturally. But there are still instincts in there that can push us to do otherwise.

'right and wrong' Complicated, and not a good way to ask questions about 'wiring'. See above

Scientists generally say things that have evidentiary support provided by interrogative experimentation. It doesn't make us always right, but it certainly makes us *more likely* to be right, because we have evidence for our claims. Science is still science even if you don't like the answers!

Oh, we're do I begin?

Yes, evidence. Look in the mirror. In it you will see a complex organism whose genetic code written out would fill a library. Two orbs are complex input monitors wired to a supercomputer. Open your mouth - it serves as a part of outgoing audio, and part of a nutrient intake system. It sometimes serves as part of an emergency nutrient waste outflow system. The skin on your body serves as a heating and cooling unit, an antiviral and antibiotic coating, and a receiver of sensory input.

We haven't scratched the surface of just one aspect of a human (it's flesh). We see this highly organized evidence everyday, "science" said it was coincidental.

"Science" found a few bones in the dirt. More than 250 scientific papers were written on these bones which science said was the missing link. How many PhD dissertations were written on it I'm not sure, but I think near 100. Forty years later, wha wa waaaaa....it was a hoax.

One arrowhead or clay pot can convince a scientist intelligent beings created it, but the most complicated, intelligent thing on earth - man - the same scientist thinks is coincidence. No wonder he thinks he came from a monkey.

Sorry if I came off sounding like a know-it-all. I am just very frustrated by our generation. We have become so smart that we're dumb.

CayleyRidgeRunner

That being said, just saying that "science proves that men are wired to cheat" without any supporting information is utter bull$hit.

Which would be why no one actually said that. 'Science proves' is a phrase that will never come out of the mouth (or from a keyboard) of a scientist.

Science provides evidence for x, y or z, or against them. Proof is for mathematicians.

Really? Are we going to start splitting hairs to that extent? Good lord. There is a difference between "proof" and proves. I could've, and for your benefit, should've said "Science shows that men..." or "Science supports the idea that men...".

I'm well aware of the scientific method and mathematical proofs. I didn't spend years in EE to overlook the difference. Never would've made it out alive with some of the professors I had.

RobynC79

Oooookaaaay.....

1. We are not animals.
a. Cognitive reasoning
b. Speech
c. If you don't understand the other two, we build and program computers, along with bridges, skyscrapers and indoor plumbig.

2. We sin.
a. We know what is right and do wrong

3. Just because some scientist said so doesn't mean you should believe it.

Humans are animals. Highly complicated, intelligent, emotional animals. But still animals.
Cognitive reasoning is one aspect of human biology. It could also mean it makes us clever enough to cheat and get away with it.
Speech ? So we can tell each other about it?? Not sure I get the reasoning here.
Yes, modern humans build all sorts of things. It doesn't mean we've abandoned all our biological imperatives.

'Sin' is a societal construct. It's not a concept with universal understanding by the majority of modern humans. We're talking about wiring, in the sense of instinct and natural behaviour. We put societal constraints on many of our natural urges, and we constrain them, but not every human does so, and it doesn't erase those instincts from existence. Love, faithfulness and not cheating are all good things, and many humans do them very naturally. But there are still instincts in there that can push us to do otherwise.

'right and wrong' Complicated, and not a good way to ask questions about 'wiring'. See above

Scientists generally say things that have evidentiary support provided by interrogative experimentation. It doesn't make us always right, but it certainly makes us *more likely* to be right, because we have evidence for our claims. Science is still science even if you don't like the answers!

Oh, we're do I begin?

Yes, evidence. Look in the mirror. In it you will see a complex organism whose genetic code written out would fill a library. Two orbs are complex input monitors wired to a supercomputer. Open your mouth - it serves as a part of outgoing audio, and part of a nutrient intake system. It sometimes serves as part of an emergency nutrient waste outflow system. The skin on your body serves as a heating and cooling unit, an antiviral and antibiotic coating, and a receiver of sensory input.

We haven't scratched the surface of just one aspect of a human (it's flesh). We see this highly organized evidence everyday, "science" said it was coincidental.

"Science" found a few bones in the dirt. More than 250 scientific papers were written on these bones which science said was the missing link. How many PhD dissertations were written on it I'm not sure, but I think near 100. Forty years later, wha wa waaaaa....it was a hoax.

One arrowhead or clay pot can convince a scientist intelligent beings created it, but the most complicated, intelligent thing on earth - man - the same scientist thinks is coincidence. No wonder he thinks he came from a monkey.

Sorry if I came off sounding like a know-it-all. I am just very frustrated by our generation. We have become so smart that we're dumb.

Ok, I have to admit at this point that I do not have the time to devote to further intro-to-science classes - I have a job to do (as a scientist, somewhat unsurprisingly). However, I will close with this.

Evolution by natural selection is not 'a coincidence'.
Science is a process. We collect small pieces of evidence and fit them into a whole. From that we make assertions (not claims of proof) based on the weight of evidence. Science is often wrong, but by correcting and continuing to question what is currently known, it corrects itself and advances.

If you want to argue about the validity of scientific practice or knowledge, go crazy, but at least try to represent it correctly.

CJisinShape

Well, first off, I don't mean to disparage your field. I went to school to major in biomedical engineering, so clearly i have an interest in science. But I didn't like what I saw in academia. The politicking and posturing, the volumes produced on minutia. The waste at the end of terms to get all the grant money spent. It used to be that great scientists were polymaths, but not anymore. I think it's gotten too specialized to the point where if a microbiologist doesn't see it under a microscope, they can't see it, even if it's big enough to put on a seat belt next to them in the car. Scientists are naturally limited to exploring evidence. What it lacks, I surmise, is perspective. They see the tree, and not the forest.

fat2fitKara

The Triceratops never even existed and Pluto isn't even a planet anymore?!?! Science seems like a bunch of crap to me!

CayleyRidgeRunner

In other news, the SERIOUS question of the day has been asked and it requires no further explanation. Respectfully, I'm sure all of our whiz kid scientists on this thread are ready to pounce with their beakers, lab coats and TI-84's. Enjoy! : )

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/760151-are-women-wired-to-make-sammiches?page=6#posts-11268924

perfectingpatti

"Cheating” is a moral term (at least I see it used). To “cheat” one must be in a committed relationship. Since this does not apply to “non-moral beings” (those that cannot commit themselves by moral choice to a single person) or “non-persons,” they are incapable of cheating, by definition. Certainly the scientists in this thread know that "cheating" would not apply to other animals.

Louisianababy93

in deffence of the "GOOD GUYS"

NOT ALL men cheat!!

iAMsmiling

"Cheating” is a moral term (at least I see it used). To “cheat” one must be in a committed relationship. Since this does not apply to “non-moral beings” (those that cannot commit themselves by moral choice to a single person) or “non-persons,” they are incapable of cheating, by definition. Certainly the scientists in this thread know that "cheating" would not apply to other animals.

Sort of depends on what the definition of "is," is.

perfectingpatti

More food for thought for our evolutionary biologist: The struggle to direct or order one’s biological desires in accord with reason and moral choice/commitment is definitely a part of human experience but that does not mean we are “hard-wired” for cheating. It simply means that there is sometimes (or even oftentimes) a struggle to harmonize one’s biological tendencies with intellectual and moral choice. So, for instance, we may choose to eat something we know is not healthy for us. This doesn’t mean we are “hard-wired” for eating junk food it only means that we struggle to bring our bodily desires into harmony with rational thought.

KimmyEB

Humans are animals. Highly complicated, intelligent, emotional animals. But still animals.
Cognitive reasoning is one aspect of human biology. It could also mean it makes us clever enough to cheat and get away with it.
Speech ? So we can tell each other about it?? Not sure I get the reasoning here.
Yes, modern humans build all sorts of things. It doesn't mean we've abandoned all our biological imperatives.

'Sin' is a societal construct. It's not a concept with universal understanding by the majority of modern humans. We're talking about wiring, in the sense of instinct and natural behaviour. We put societal constraints on many of our natural urges, and we constrain them, but not every human does so, and it doesn't erase those instincts from existence. Love, faithfulness and not cheating are all good things, and many humans do them very naturally. But there are still instincts in there that can push us to do otherwise.

Hope you don't mind, but I'm quoting this as my opinion too, since I'm nowhere near as eloquent as you.

Ruger2506

Just curious. I think it's a cop out, but I also know some with this excuse every day!

Not to cheat. But to hump every woman we can...heck yes. It is in our nature to want to spread our seed. It isn't our fault nature made us horney for every woman.

perfectingpatti

Hope you don't mind, but I'm quoting this as my opinion too, since I'm nowhere near as eloquent as you.

Cheating is NOT natural, Kimmy. Cheating is the moral choice to betray someone with whom you are in a committed relationship. How can science even try to explain morality?