NancyLebovitz comments on Problems in evolutionary psychology - Less Wrong

55 Post author: Kaj_Sotala 13 August 2010 06:57PM

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Comment author: NancyLebovitz 14 August 2010 08:19:37AM 4 points [-]

Interesting.

The problem with the corelation with homosexuality is that homosexuals are frequently up against violent prejudice, though less so in recent years. Being bullied can cause longterm psychological damage.

I know someone who endured really bad depression for a long time [1], and it's plausible that the major reason she didn't commit suicide was that she had a child.

Did deCatanzaro [2] look at whether whether people actually have children? Whether abandoning children has a high correlation with suicidality? Admittedly, it would be hard to tease out the causality in the latter.

[1] She was being treated for depression. What she actually has is Bipolar 2 (bipolar with so little mania that it's hard to notice), which is metabolically quite different from straight depression-- the right meds made a huge difference.

[2] That's how it's spelled on his website [3]-- there's no space between the e and the C.

[3] I think of the web + google as the larger part of my brain.

Comment author: Oligopsony 14 August 2010 05:14:56PM 4 points [-]

The problem with the corelation with homosexuality is that homosexuals are frequently up against violent prejudice, though less so in recent years.

Suicide rates for gay teens have been dropping like a rock for the past two decades (though they remain above the heterosexual rate.) Homophobia is still awful but it's one of the most obvious ways in which the world is getting better.

Comment author: Violet 15 August 2010 07:31:15AM 3 points [-]

If the rates are changing dramatically wouldn't this imply they are not mainly caused by genetic components?

Comment author: knb 14 August 2010 06:36:57PM 1 point [-]

DeCatanzaro did look at the effect of not having children, which was significantly correlated with suicide.