h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

ok, no red meat, alcohol with moderation, fresh fruits and vegetables...
but you can´t be serious in saying that sex shortens your life!
i heard the opposit.

Hey, Bub, you may have HEARD that sex lengthens your life, but that may be just wishful thinking! I wouldn't know 'cause I don't have any statistics. But I know that natural selection works like this: after you've reproduced, you're expendable. After reproduction has been insured you can die right there and your genes will still be carried on. So in nature there are many creatures that die right after, or even while, having sex: flies, spiders, praying manises, salmon ... Usually in these species, sex assures reproduction. Individuals that have not reproduced yet might hang on a bit longer to increase their chances - but as soon as they score, it's game over. This does not affect the species at all: the species survives because there is always a new generation. It just affects the individuals involved. What the heck, after having reproduced, your mission in life is accomplished; why would you want to stay around much longer anyway? At least that's the way it works in these species, but it is not too far fetched to assume that similar trends operate in all species, albeit at less extreme levels. I can't say for certain that it works like that with humans, too. But I do know that even in humans the hormone that increases sex drive in males - testosterone - increases aggression and stupidity (though I'm not sure the last has been scientifically proven) and tends to decrease lifespan. Whether this depends on the sex life of the individual involved, again I don't know.

no,no,no

While your still sexually active (as a male, anyway) you are still able to reproduce and so, are still useful and will live. Once you stop having sex there's no point in your genes surviving so you'll die.

Even if I'm wrong, which I din't think I am, you'll die happier.

Come to think of it, if it's about reproduction why don't women die during the menopause?

Hey, I said it doesn't work exactly like that in humans! Life is indeed not just about reproduction. There are many different selection factors operating. For instance, humans take care of their children while fish and mantises do not. So if the parents live long they can help their children be more successful parents and the genes for longevity will be carried on. I was saying was that sex does not automatically lengthen an individual lifespan. The studies mentioned mice, not people. I wanted to explain that there are factors that work along with the sex drive that can work against a long individual lifespan. In general the animals that reproduce the most rapidly also die the soonest. If they did not their populations would first explode and then crash. But after a number of these wild cycles things usually stabilize: either the rate of reproduction goes down or the lifespan goes down.

Women may not die during or after menopause, but having many children may shorten their lives because pregnancy and childbirth is still a bit of a risk and a great stress on the body. The fact that they don't generally die after menopause seems to go against what you said just before. After all, if after menopause they cannot reproduce, they aren't useful any longer and there will be no point in their genes surviving and so they'll die. According to your theory, not mine.

The theory that sex increases longevity can be traced back to the song "Lovers Live a Little Longer, Baby" by ABBA. This lends considerable weight to that particular argument. After all, they are ranked among the immortals of pop music. Being Swedish, their sex lives are probably healthier than most. So there. Satisfied?

It's not my theory?!?

Let's get the theories sorted out. Correct me if I'm wrong. My theory is: if sex is the supreme goal of life, then once you've attained it, you might as well die. Your theory is: if sex is the supreme goal of life, you'll die as soon as you stop attaining it. Is that your theory or not? Does it apply to men only, or also to women? Who knows? Maybe sex makes you live longer, maybe it doesn't, maybe it makes your life seem to go by more quickly or more slowly, maybe it fulfills you like nothing else, or maybe you spend all your time and energy in frustration trying to get it - in life, and in sex, it's not the theory that makes the difference, but the practice.

Actually the goal in life is not having sex, but ensuring the imortality of DNA. In order to achieve that goal you should not only have sex, but live long enough to take care of your children untill their able to get by on there own. That's why you don't automaticly die after sex and women don't die soon after menopause.

My thoughts were just about men, the Menopause bit was an after thought. Men only need to live while they are reproducing whereas women nurture ofspring which they can do all their lives, so already live longer than men.

If the goal of life is "ensuring the imortality of DNA" then shouldn't we have him frozen? or maybe cloned?

Yes, please. No sugar for me, I'm sweet enough, I'll just stick my little pinky in. Just cream....
I have considered you guys freezing your DNA, sometimes you just
piss women off, but we like to keep you around if there is any Hard work to be done, and I do mean hard. Break a sweat for me now....
I have been in menopause since I was 21 and with HTR...the help of horse piss... I'm doing just fine, now what's this black widow syndrome you all are discussing. I've had it with this Kiss of the Spider Women theory... that's what you guys are reduced to when we're not around.....worlds of Love, JLC the TTp

The above should read HRT( hormone repalcement therapy) and just to clarify one more thing. I don't have any children that I am nurturing, although my philosopy is that "men are my babies" might fit in with the theory. I definately do have plenty of purpose. I find that most men don't really need wives, they need keepers. A little conflict of interest here...I prefer to be kept.... I like a hard working man.
Brains with my sex. Thanks you please. I think Brains and Mental Power are very sexy. I'll take care of the physical gratification for both of us if need be. "Relax, don't do it when you want to get to it." is how the song goes. Isn't that what is going on here...Mental masturbation. I get it now

This is all very interesting. Somewhere I heard a comparison of men and women--yes, yes, another generalization--to hunter and farmer/gatherer culture types. Simplified, the males of the human species are off hunting, bringing home the bacon, if you will; while the females are nest-building for the offspring and their nurturing that she is hard-wired for.

Is this relevant or an attempt to back in to behaviorial explanations? Is it the mission of my kind to deliver the seed to nest-building females who are ready to receive it? Just one? Will my life span be lengthened* or shortened by my participation with a female in the creation of offspring?

Can't say. Jimmy Buffet said gumbo is a little like religion and a lot like sex in that you never knew when you are going to get your next serving. I sure think my life is lengthened in anticipation of the next opportunity for having sex, never mind that my vasectomy means that I'm just keeping the tradition alive and no longer planting seeds.
_____
* Recent research has concluded that men who stare at women's breasts live longer than those who do not. I'll drink to that!

Just as long as you're not drinking milk, it's been linked to Prostate Cancer in research studies of late. ...Drink to me, drink to my health , you know I can't drink anymore...to quote Paul McCartney.

I would be very intressted to know where you guys are getting your reports. Every medical doctor I have talked to about the subject of sex and healthiness (yes both of them) have agreed that: 1, sex is a great low impact cardio exercise therby incressing health and longetivity. 2, frequent ejaculation from sex and/or masterbation more than halves the chances of prostate pain later in life. 3, Testostorone help regulate bone and tissue replacment helping prevent osterprosis and finally from a diffrent source A British doctor followed 918 men btween ages 45 and 59 and discovered that men who had two or more orgasams a week were half as lickly to die compared to those who had fewer than 1 orgasam a month.

In addition to this there are many longitivity advantages involved in sex for women as well that unless there is a high demand for I am not going to list. I think the correct phrasing is that longitivity incresses with frequent, SAFE, sex.

you are right, that testosterone is closely linked to aggresion.but aggression is one of the most important feelings, for it made us survive thousands of years meanwhile.
it is the ability in controlling aggressions which makes us human.i´m just saying this, because it sounded as if you meant aggresson is something negativ!!the absence of regulation is negativ,not the feeling itself.

concerning your opinion testosterone makes stupid...are you working for the vatican somehow?
how can one of the most important hormones bring harm to your body??
it is always a question of the dose.and the body regulates the dose itself, whenever too much is produced.
so the conclusion is:a longer life has also to do with the fact,if you are happy and satisfied...this means:have sex as often as you need, and you will be happy and satified...and live longer!

yes, please. I am in total agreement and will have another helping.

yes, please. I'M IN TOTAL AGREEMENT

Aggression - is it good or bad? You are right, in itself it is not bad. Yes, if we control our aggressiveness, it helps us succeed and accomplish things in life. And testosterone is a hormone everybody needs, it carries out vital functions in the body related to growth and activity, you cannot live without it. But the body does not always regulate hormones perfectly. You get people with abnormally low or abnormally high levels of certain hormones. Variations in hormone levels can be due to genetics, diet, lifestyle, diseases, or chemicals in the environment. To have too little of a certain hormone is harmful, and to have too much of it is also harmful. What is important is to have just the right level.

If you don't believe me, just a few examples. Diabetes is a sickness. It arises when the body CANNOT REGULATE the release of the hormone insulin. That is why diabetics have to inject insulin themselves. If their insulin levels drop too low, they die. But the same goes for levels that are too high. If a diebetic injects more insulin than the prescribed dose, death can follow quickly. So insulin is one of the most important hormones AND it can bring harm to the body. Now, growth hormone. If a child gets too little growth hormone at the crucial stages of its development, its growth is stunted. Nowadays this problem is treated by administering growth hormone. But too much growth hormone causes gigantism or acromegaly - people who are giants and have abnormal growth of the body tissues. This always goes hand in hand with health problems and these people usually die early - sometimes very early. So it is the same with just about any
hormone: high levels or low levels cause problems. And the body does not always regulate the hormones if their are too much or too little of them. In fact many common diseases and debilities are caused by the inability of the particular individual to regulate hormones in the body. It can happen to anyone.

I don't work for the Vatican, I just know a few things about hormones and how they affect the body, hormone levels, and the problems that can arise from imbalances in hormone levels. These problems vary from very subtle to dramatically catastrophic.

People who have levels of testosterone that are too high may be very aggressive. The aggression I am opposed against is this: the kind that leads to anger, assault, rape, murder, verbal insults, reckless behaviour. Especially nowadays aggression is more dangerous than ever before, because people have access to incredibly powerful weapons: cars, guns, bombs, missiles, airplanes. The instinct of aggression is something that is built into us and it has not changed since the times before civilization when individuals did not have this kind of power. In the old days when combatants did not have any weapons, at most you could kill a single opponent, while nowadays a single man can get the means to kill millions of people. So unless we can tone down the level of aggression in the world at large, mankind as a whole is at risk.

Up to a certain level aggression may extend a person's life expectancy, but beyond that level it may decrease a person's lifespan. Extremely aggressive individuals will land themselves in dangerous situations time and again and the odds are that sooner or later they'll get themselves killed. I'm not talking about "regular folks" here - I mean super-aggressives who really thrive on conflict and violence. You may find it hard to believe but there are many such people in the world.

Such superaggressives also have extraordinary sex drives. They will not have any qualms about using force to get sex. If they don't kill the women they've had intercourse with, they will tend to leave a lot of descendants, who will also tend towards aggressiveness.

In human history aggression has favoured certain groups of people over others. But not aggression alone. For instance, the Aztecs may have been more aggressive than the Europeans, but because the Europeans had better weapons, they wiped out the Aztecs. So it is not necessarily the most aggressive that survive.

And make a distinction between the lifespan of a species and the lifespan of an individual. The length of time for which humanity has survived says nothing about the length of time that an average human survives. Suppose you have two groups of people. The first group is very aggressive. Its members live on average thirty years but in that time produce six children. The second group is not aggressive. Its members live on average ninety years but in that time produce only two children. The first group will multiply much more rapidly than the second group, and if they are in competition, the first group will crowd out and replace the second group. So the first GROUP lives longer than the second GROUP, but the INDIVIDUALS of the second group live longer than the INDIVIDUALS of the first group.

It is my contention that people who are TOO aggressive will not live as long as people who are JUST aggressive ENOUGH. It's just my personal opinion that a little bit of aggression is enough and most people I know get angry and upset and violent much too easily. And regarding stupidity: people who are too aggressive do reckless things. Even if they have high IQ's, they will get into needless confrontations and do things that are unnecessarily dangerous. To me that is stupid.

Okay, I admit it is not necessarily related to testosterone, like you say it means these people are not regulating their aggression well enough. It just so happens that too much testosterone can exacerbate the situation by causing greater levels of aggression that will be more difficult to regulate. I live in a continent where violence reigns supreme. Here there are more wars than anywhere else, there are more shootings, murders, beatings, rapes, theft than anywhere else, there's more AIDS than anywhere else. In this climate uncontrolled aggression, sexual or otherwise, thrives. At the very same time, it is deadly. The aggressive climate thrives, but the people die like flies. The life expectancy here is lower than anywhere else in the world. While some European countries have a life expectancy approaching eighty, there are countries on this continent where it is under forty. Understand now: it is not testosterone that creates the situation, and it would be very wrong to say that Africans are inherently violent. There are many reasons why we are in the mess we're in. But in this violent climate, people tend to have higher levels of testosterone than in more prosperous, peaceful countries. They need it just to stay alive. Compare Africans with Americans or Europeans: on average they're more muscular, physically they are stronger and have higher endurance, they have stronger sex drives, they are more aggressive. This helps us survive in this harsh country. But it also tends to keep the country harsh. There is something of a vicious circle effect to it. It will take a considerable collective effort to break out of it.

You say that a longer life has to do with happiness and satisfaction. You are right. I would say that the key element is to have contentment and inner peace and be free from stress. People who are too aggressive will be dissatisfied with everything and have A LOT OF stress and LITTLE inner peace. That will tend to shorten their lives irrespective of dangerous situations they might land themselves in, and irrespective of the ways they try to keep themselves happy. Sex is relaxing, it can help relieve stress, and this is good and contributes to a long life. But for someone who is too stressed out, it may not be enough. An overaggressive person may have a lot of sex and still feel angry, upset and dissatisfied.

My only aim in writing the piece I wrote was to explain that there is a link between sex, testosterone and aggression. I still stand by this: HIGH testosterone levels lead to a HIGH sex drive and HIGH levels of aggression. And if these levels are TOO HIGH, it is a bad thing, and can lead to a shortening of potential lifespan. Aside from the high aggression, high levels of testosterone have other debilitating effects on the body, same as insulin, same as growth hormone, same as any other hormone. Now, your testosterone levels are what they are: high, low, or just enough. If you find that you are too aggressive, make a point of learning to control your aggression. Also, hormone release is regulated by the brain, so your attitudes and mental activity have effects on your body chemistry. If you cultivate the right states of mind you can bring balance to the levels of hormones and other chemicals that your body releases naturally. But you don't need to tone down your sex life. It is not the "sex" part that is dangerous, it is the "aggression" part that is dangerous! It just so happens that on the level of hormones, the two are linked.

Let's get back to sex. You say: "have sex as often as you need, and you will be happy and satisfied ... and live longer!" Now for a person with a normal sex drive that is good advice. But a person whose sex drive is EXTREMELY high - so high that it CANNOT be satisfied without resorting to extreme measures - will tend to be unhappy and dissatisfied and become worn out early in life and probably die too soon. To state the other side of the coin: a person with a VERY LOW sex drive will probably be unaggressive, lethargic and will lack ambition and enthusiasm and as a result may also not have a happy, full and long life. If you have a too strong or too weak sex drive it points to an underlying problem, one that can be fixed by a bit of attention to your diet, lifestyle, and underlying attitudes - or be cured with the right medicine. So you see, the whole issue is one of BALANCE, the golden middle way. That's all I want to say. I hope this has been of help to you.

Aggression - is it good or bad? You are right, in itself it is not bad. Yes, if we control our aggressiveness, it helps us succeed and accomplish things in life. And testosterone is a hormone everybody needs, it carries out vital functions in the body related to growth and activity, you cannot live without it. But the body does not always regulate hormones perfectly. You get people with abnormally low or abnormally high levels of certain hormones. Variations in hormone levels can be due to genetics, diet, lifestyle, diseases, or chemicals in the environment. To have too little of a certain hormone is harmful, and to have too much of it is also harmful. What is important is to have just the right level.

If you don't believe me, just a few examples. Diabetes is a sickness. It arises when the body CANNOT REGULATE the release of the hormone insulin. That is why diabetics have to inject insulin themselves. If their insulin levels drop too low, they die. But the same goes for levels that are too high. If a diebetic injects more insulin than the prescribed dose, death can follow quickly. So insulin is one of the most important hormones AND it can bring harm to the body. Now, growth hormone. If a child gets too little growth hormone at the crucial stages of its development, its growth is stunted. Nowadays this problem is treated by administering growth hormone. But too much growth hormone causes gigantism or acromegaly - people who are giants and have abnormal growth of the body tissues. This always goes hand in hand with health problems and these people usually die early - sometimes very early. So it is the same with just about any
hormone: high levels or low levels cause problems. And the body does not always regulate the hormones if their are too much or too little of them. In fact many common diseases and debilities are caused by the inability of the particular individual to regulate hormones in the body. It can happen to anyone.

I don't work for the Vatican, I just know a few things about hormones and how they affect the body, hormone levels, and the problems that can arise from imbalances in hormone levels. These problems vary from very subtle to dramatically catastrophic.

People who have levels of testosterone that are too high may be very aggressive. The aggression I am opposed against is this: the kind that leads to anger, assault, rape, murder, verbal insults, reckless behaviour. Especially nowadays aggression is more dangerous than ever before, because people have access to incredibly powerful weapons: cars, guns, bombs, missiles, airplanes. The instinct of aggression is something that is built into us and it has not changed since the times before civilization when individuals did not have this kind of power. In the old days when combatants did not have any weapons, at most you could kill a single opponent, while nowadays a single man can get the means to kill millions of people. So unless we can tone down the level of aggression in the world at large, mankind as a whole is at risk.

Up to a certain level aggression may extend a person's life expectancy, but beyond that level it may decrease a person's lifespan. Extremely aggressive individuals will land themselves in dangerous situations time and again and the odds are that sooner or later they'll get themselves killed. I'm not talking about "regular folks" here - I mean super-aggressives who really thrive on conflict and violence. You may find it hard to believe but there are many such people in the world.

Such superaggressives also have extraordinary sex drives. They will not have any qualms about using force to get sex. If they don't kill the women they've had intercourse with, they will tend to leave a lot of descendants, who will also tend towards aggressiveness.

In human history aggression has favoured certain groups of people over others. But not aggression alone. For instance, the Aztecs may have been more aggressive than the Europeans, but because the Europeans had better weapons, they wiped out the Aztecs. So it is not necessarily the most aggressive that survive.

And make a distinction between the lifespan of a species and the lifespan of an individual. The length of time for which humanity has survived says nothing about the length of time that an average human survives. Suppose you have two groups of people. The first group is very aggressive. Its members live on average thirty years but in that time produce six children. The second group is not aggressive. Its members live on average ninety years but in that time produce only two children. The first group will multiply much more rapidly than the second group, and if they are in competition, the first group will crowd out and replace the second group. So the first GROUP lives longer than the second GROUP, but the INDIVIDUALS of the second group live longer than the INDIVIDUALS of the first group.

It is my contention that people who are TOO aggressive will not live as long as people who are JUST aggressive ENOUGH. It's just my personal opinion that a little bit of aggression is enough and most people I know get angry and upset and violent much too easily. And regarding stupidity: people who are too aggressive do reckless things. Even if they have high IQ's, they will get into needless confrontations and do things that are unnecessarily dangerous. To me that is stupid.

Okay, I admit it is not necessarily related to testosterone, like you say it means these people are not regulating their aggression well enough. It just so happens that too much testosterone can exacerbate the situation by causing greater levels of aggression that will be more difficult to regulate. I live in a continent where violence reigns supreme. Here there are more wars than anywhere else, there are more shootings, murders, beatings, rapes, theft than anywhere else, there's more AIDS than anywhere else. In this climate uncontrolled aggression, sexual or otherwise, thrives. At the very same time, it is deadly. The aggressive climate thrives, but the people die like flies. The life expectancy here is lower than anywhere else in the world. While some European countries have a life expectancy approaching eighty, there are countries on this continent where it is under forty. Understand now: it is not testosterone that creates the situation, and it would be very wrong to say that Africans are inherently violent. There are many reasons why we are in the mess we're in. But in this violent climate, people tend to have higher levels of testosterone than in more prosperous, peaceful countries. They need it just to stay alive. Compare Africans with Americans or Europeans: on average they're more muscular, physically they are stronger and have higher endurance, they have stronger sex drives, they are more aggressive. This helps us survive in this harsh country. But it also tends to keep the country harsh. There is something of a vicious circle effect to it. It will take a considerable collective effort to break out of it.

You say that a longer life has to do with happiness and satisfaction. You are right. I would say that the key element is to have contentment and inner peace and be free from stress. People who are too aggressive will be dissatisfied with everything and have A LOT OF stress and LITTLE inner peace. That will tend to shorten their lives irrespective of dangerous situations they might land themselves in, and irrespective of the ways they try to keep themselves happy. Sex is relaxing, it can help relieve stress, and this is good and contributes to a long life. But for someone who is too stressed out, it may not be enough. An overaggressive person may have a lot of sex and still feel angry, upset and dissatisfied.

My only aim in writing the piece I wrote was to explain that there is a link between sex, testosterone and aggression. I still stand by this: HIGH testosterone levels lead to a HIGH sex drive and HIGH levels of aggression. And if these levels are TOO HIGH, it is a bad thing, and can lead to a shortening of potential lifespan. Aside from the high aggression, high levels of testosterone have other debilitating effects on the body, same as insulin, same as growth hormone, same as any other hormone. Now, your testosterone levels are what they are: high, low, or just enough. If you find that you are too aggressive, make a point of learning to control your aggression. Also, hormone release is regulated by the brain, so your attitudes and mental activity have effects on your body chemistry. If you cultivate the right states of mind you can bring balance to the levels of hormones and other chemicals that your body releases naturally. But you don't need to tone down your sex life. It is not the "sex" part that is dangerous, it is the "aggression" part that is dangerous! It just so happens that on the level of hormones, the two are linked.

Let's get back to sex. You say: "have sex as often as you need, and you will be happy and satisfied ... and live longer!" Now for a person with a normal sex drive that is good advice. But a person whose sex drive is EXTREMELY high - so high that it CANNOT be satisfied without resorting to extreme measures - will tend to be unhappy and dissatisfied and become worn out early in life and probably die too soon. To state the other side of the coin: a person with a VERY LOW sex drive will probably be unaggressive, lethargic and will lack ambition and enthusiasm and as a result may also not have a happy, full and long life. If you have a too strong or too weak sex drive it points to an underlying problem, one that can be fixed by a bit of attention to your diet, lifestyle, and underlying attitudes - or be cured with the right medicine. So you see, the whole issue is one of BALANCE, the golden middle way. That's all I want to say. I hope this has been of help to you.

Sorry about the double posting.

Thank you for the clarification. I love double postings, it proves my theory thata) we are all obsessive compulsives and either double click to be sure the message got posted. or b) the PC, IBM double click-mainia still rules cyberspace.
Also, I go for verbosity and appreciate your clarification again.
Worlds of Love, JLC the TTP