Blah Blah Flowers

I've just finished the superb Evolution's Rainbow by Joan Roughgarden. It's a wonderful book. Her central premise is that Charles Darwin was mistaken about a few things when he came up with his theory of evolution. The urge to procreate isn't the sole driving force behind the animal kingdom, of which humanity is a part. Darwin and those who followed him were too determined to explain the behaviour of animals by putting them in narrow boxes of two genders and insisting they were only interested in rutting. Instead, Roughgarden gives examples, first in the animal kingdom, then in the third main section from humanity throughout recorded history, of multiple sexes beyond 'male' and 'female', multiple genders, and differing sexual behaviours. She suggests, in the second and middle section of the book, that the driving force is actually social, animals working together (for certain values of 'working together') for the chance of access to breeding opportunities. The attraction and advantage is that while Darwin's blunt evolutionary theory condemns queers and transexuals as genetic blunders, Roughgarden frees us, we're not mistakes, queer people rarely come from queer parents, so there's some biological reason for our existence (bisexuality is largely overlooked and mentioned only in passing).

I can't really criticise the thesis, possibly because it appeals to me, I don't know enough science to know the difference between the thing that evolved into the human arse from the thing that evolved into the human elbow but the book is extremely accessible and well worth a read.