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Douglas_Knight comments on When does heritable low fitness need to be explained? - Less Wrong Discussion

15 Post author: DanArmak 10 June 2015 12:05AM

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Comment author: Douglas_Knight 10 June 2015 10:18:24PM 0 points [-]

You might as well ask why people adopt strangers as ask why they half-adopt by using strangers as donors. The answer is that people are adaptation-executors, not deliberate fitness maximizers.

I hear about people asking for donations from friends more than family, which seems to me to be a bigger risk. Being on bad terms with family because of orientation probably is a reason, though.

Comment author: DanArmak 10 June 2015 10:23:15PM 0 points [-]

People have always sometimes adopted the children of near relatives who couldn't care for them, at much higher rates than adopting strangers; that's fitness increasing. It's not a stretch to imagine that crossing over to sperm and egg donations.

Both friends and family have the large advantage (at least I imagine it to be so) that they are known quantities: you know them well and can evaluate them as biological parents just as you would a potential mate. I wonder why sperm banks don't seem to offer the sperm of people with known qualities at higher prices: not just screened for diseases, but known to have strong positive traits like good looks and intelligence.