07-28-2003, 02:40 PM
Reply to Jester, but all are invited into this side bar discussion.
A year or so ago, I presented the mechanical argument in a similar discussion. I was hoping to elicit a few laughs. Is it time to take a closer look at the mechanical argument and some logical grounding of the sodomy laws? Given that the Supreme Court has, after some 35 years, finally ruled that "between consenting adults, the state has no place" we might consider on what basis the sodomy laws could have been defended: the "conclusion" might surprise you.
If sex is aimed at function by design, then the sexual organs can be looked at from a very simple mechanical perspective: tab d goes into slot c, just like on a cereal box top. For regular male female intercourse, the variety of tab d slot c geometries can be defended as appropriate to optimizing function based in imperfect fit or state of skeletal or muscular health, and as such many positions once defined as "illegal" are shown to be acceptable on a valid functional basis. Hooray so far! :D (Woof Woof)
Even assuming that functional relationship as valid, the sodomy laws approach other tab-slot relationships.
Alternate tabs first:
As to tabs: fingers, tongues, carrots, noses, zucchinis, vibrators, the list is long and distinguished. None of these tabs can induce procreation, unless previously filled with reproductive matter and having suitable plumbing/piping provided. We won't open Pandora's technology box, and will limit the scope to base equipment levels, sort of a "come as you are" approach. (Sorry, a bad pun.) If sex is aimed at both function and pleasure, then it matters not, but if sex is by design functional, then the pleasure sensation is an inducement to promote reproductive behaviour and so ensure the survival of the species. Surrogate tabs, then, might be considered a valid path to practice for the "real event?" Hard to say. (bad pun) ONe could also consider the "pleasure is irrelevant" argument of those Muslims who Circumcise/mutilate females. (BOOO HISSSSSSSSS!!!) I reject that on four grounds. It takes intervention to make it happen, violating the "come as you are" premise (in more ways than one), so By Design, no way. Damnit, it's just plain mean! If the pleasure was not functionally necessary, it would not be a feature. (The Buzzard argument.) It completely ignores the condition of pleasure of the other tab/slot participant! I think I am right, but have proved nothing. I have not answered the exam question yet:
Biologically, was sex designed as a solely functional reproductive tool? Put a completely different way, does a cow ever have an orgasm? We can be pretty certain the bull does. But does he enjoy it on a spiritual level, or is it just "release" in the same way that a person gets a release after having had to hold one's coffee/beer for too long before finally getting to rebalance fluid levels in the loo?
Since we don't know the answer to that, not the orgasmic cow, but the "is it a dual purpose functional design" we have to explore a bit more. I lean for dual purpose, but I admit to a bias in that regard, and really want to keep this a bit more objective, since I can't prove it. :)
Slots: Functionally, this boils down to three. The original, which both functionally and sensorily appears to fit all bills, and the two most popular options: the mouth and the rectum. But slots are not designed equally! That much we do know. :)
(As to non bodily surrogate slots, such as apple pies, we will leave that to an equivalent of the practice via zucchini.)
Slot functionality can be described in terms of the check valve. Is it a one way check valve, or a two way check valve?
The mouth is a two way check valve, by design. Food in, puke up the poisons by reverse parastalsis out, as well as spitting for out. That is allows "oh baby oh baby" utterances as well as the "oh God, I'm--" well, you get the picture. (This thought strengthens our "multipurpose" overall design principle, by the way, so hurrah for zucchinis! No jokes about "as American as apple pie" please. Oops, just made one!)
The original orifice, is a two way check valve: tab and seed in, baby out.
The rectum is by functional design a one way check valve: waste out, no basic function for in. (Note: proctologists are all violators of nature, blast them, even if they are trying to save your life!) The motive muscle tissues are not designed to pull anything up and in, though the check valve part does allow deliberate "stoppage" of the process now and again. (Else we'd all still wear diapers.) On the other hand, how did Papillon save his money? The supository depository, old school European banking on Devil's Isle . . . but back to our subject at hand.
One could conclude from a functional basis that the only illogical form of tab/slot is anal intercourse, but that does rely on the check valve model being the correct analogy. All others can, at least from the input output design frame of reference, be argued as being at least functionally appropriate, even if it is an alternative function.
This takes us back to what the genitals were designed for. They were, of course, dual purpose from the beginning, being both the path for the exchange of reproductive materials AND the path for liquid waste products leaving the body. No functional tool is equipped for ingesting solid or liquid waste (technically, poison) and indeed, a whole array of sensors are provided for preventing the accidental ingestion of solid or liquid waste:
Eyes Hands(touch) Ears Nose Brain (decisions on whether or not to eat the buffalo chip) -- The risk that the mouth or nose can be used as a waste ingestion orifice requires the higher sensory functions, the brain, to use those sensory pathways to prevent that self destructive act. (Hmmm, where does Guinness fit into this? Ah, yes, Guinness is a surrogate for Mother's Milk, all is well! :D Lte's have another, each of us, before we proceed.
*Drinks* *Sighs with sensory pleasure* *Belches* *wipes lips* Where were we? Right, back we to go science and sex.
My conclusion? Wait, this is hardly science! :D My punch line? The Lesbian is on far stronger "functionally moral" ground than the gay male, since the typical pleasure pathways fit into pre existing functional roles, and the only sodomy functionally illegal is the term as applied narrowly. (Yeah, I am talking to the proctologists too!) Once again, biology is completely unfair, only this time, it is against rather than for the (gay) male. (The old "uterine unfairness" of the fem libbers being what I am lampooning here.)
But any functional discussion of the validity of sodomy statures is moot until we re examine the root cause (bad pun, again!) of this discussion:
Is sex designed for function, for pleasure, or for both? If both, then is it by definition aimed at pleasure for one or the other partner, or both? How multi purpose is multi purpose?
While my view is that "it" is designed as a two way physical and emotional pathway/interaction (you make love with some one, not TO someone) that point of view is hardly universal.
But luckily, even the zucchini is dual purpose, as it can be sauteed, grilled, steamed, or curried, so one need not toss them into the dust bin even if one takes the "functional only" approach! A recent teen angst film showed me that apple pies were, little had I known, also multipurpose. Arent you all glad that "Portnoy's Complaint" was never a mainstream movie?
We live and learn, but sometime, it all seems to be Too Much Information. :o Sort of like this post.
Apologies for any bad visuals induced by this post. I blame the caffeine.
*No Guinness was actually consumed during the creation of this post, which is not to say that Guinness consumption over a period of years did not have an influence on the brainwaves that made it all possible. Thanks, Arthur.*
A year or so ago, I presented the mechanical argument in a similar discussion. I was hoping to elicit a few laughs. Is it time to take a closer look at the mechanical argument and some logical grounding of the sodomy laws? Given that the Supreme Court has, after some 35 years, finally ruled that "between consenting adults, the state has no place" we might consider on what basis the sodomy laws could have been defended: the "conclusion" might surprise you.
If sex is aimed at function by design, then the sexual organs can be looked at from a very simple mechanical perspective: tab d goes into slot c, just like on a cereal box top. For regular male female intercourse, the variety of tab d slot c geometries can be defended as appropriate to optimizing function based in imperfect fit or state of skeletal or muscular health, and as such many positions once defined as "illegal" are shown to be acceptable on a valid functional basis. Hooray so far! :D (Woof Woof)
Even assuming that functional relationship as valid, the sodomy laws approach other tab-slot relationships.
Alternate tabs first:
As to tabs: fingers, tongues, carrots, noses, zucchinis, vibrators, the list is long and distinguished. None of these tabs can induce procreation, unless previously filled with reproductive matter and having suitable plumbing/piping provided. We won't open Pandora's technology box, and will limit the scope to base equipment levels, sort of a "come as you are" approach. (Sorry, a bad pun.) If sex is aimed at both function and pleasure, then it matters not, but if sex is by design functional, then the pleasure sensation is an inducement to promote reproductive behaviour and so ensure the survival of the species. Surrogate tabs, then, might be considered a valid path to practice for the "real event?" Hard to say. (bad pun) ONe could also consider the "pleasure is irrelevant" argument of those Muslims who Circumcise/mutilate females. (BOOO HISSSSSSSSS!!!) I reject that on four grounds. It takes intervention to make it happen, violating the "come as you are" premise (in more ways than one), so By Design, no way. Damnit, it's just plain mean! If the pleasure was not functionally necessary, it would not be a feature. (The Buzzard argument.) It completely ignores the condition of pleasure of the other tab/slot participant! I think I am right, but have proved nothing. I have not answered the exam question yet:
Biologically, was sex designed as a solely functional reproductive tool? Put a completely different way, does a cow ever have an orgasm? We can be pretty certain the bull does. But does he enjoy it on a spiritual level, or is it just "release" in the same way that a person gets a release after having had to hold one's coffee/beer for too long before finally getting to rebalance fluid levels in the loo?
Since we don't know the answer to that, not the orgasmic cow, but the "is it a dual purpose functional design" we have to explore a bit more. I lean for dual purpose, but I admit to a bias in that regard, and really want to keep this a bit more objective, since I can't prove it. :)
Slots: Functionally, this boils down to three. The original, which both functionally and sensorily appears to fit all bills, and the two most popular options: the mouth and the rectum. But slots are not designed equally! That much we do know. :)
(As to non bodily surrogate slots, such as apple pies, we will leave that to an equivalent of the practice via zucchini.)
Slot functionality can be described in terms of the check valve. Is it a one way check valve, or a two way check valve?
The mouth is a two way check valve, by design. Food in, puke up the poisons by reverse parastalsis out, as well as spitting for out. That is allows "oh baby oh baby" utterances as well as the "oh God, I'm--" well, you get the picture. (This thought strengthens our "multipurpose" overall design principle, by the way, so hurrah for zucchinis! No jokes about "as American as apple pie" please. Oops, just made one!)
The original orifice, is a two way check valve: tab and seed in, baby out.
The rectum is by functional design a one way check valve: waste out, no basic function for in. (Note: proctologists are all violators of nature, blast them, even if they are trying to save your life!) The motive muscle tissues are not designed to pull anything up and in, though the check valve part does allow deliberate "stoppage" of the process now and again. (Else we'd all still wear diapers.) On the other hand, how did Papillon save his money? The supository depository, old school European banking on Devil's Isle . . . but back to our subject at hand.
One could conclude from a functional basis that the only illogical form of tab/slot is anal intercourse, but that does rely on the check valve model being the correct analogy. All others can, at least from the input output design frame of reference, be argued as being at least functionally appropriate, even if it is an alternative function.
This takes us back to what the genitals were designed for. They were, of course, dual purpose from the beginning, being both the path for the exchange of reproductive materials AND the path for liquid waste products leaving the body. No functional tool is equipped for ingesting solid or liquid waste (technically, poison) and indeed, a whole array of sensors are provided for preventing the accidental ingestion of solid or liquid waste:
Eyes Hands(touch) Ears Nose Brain (decisions on whether or not to eat the buffalo chip) -- The risk that the mouth or nose can be used as a waste ingestion orifice requires the higher sensory functions, the brain, to use those sensory pathways to prevent that self destructive act. (Hmmm, where does Guinness fit into this? Ah, yes, Guinness is a surrogate for Mother's Milk, all is well! :D Lte's have another, each of us, before we proceed.
*Drinks* *Sighs with sensory pleasure* *Belches* *wipes lips* Where were we? Right, back we to go science and sex.
My conclusion? Wait, this is hardly science! :D My punch line? The Lesbian is on far stronger "functionally moral" ground than the gay male, since the typical pleasure pathways fit into pre existing functional roles, and the only sodomy functionally illegal is the term as applied narrowly. (Yeah, I am talking to the proctologists too!) Once again, biology is completely unfair, only this time, it is against rather than for the (gay) male. (The old "uterine unfairness" of the fem libbers being what I am lampooning here.)
But any functional discussion of the validity of sodomy statures is moot until we re examine the root cause (bad pun, again!) of this discussion:
Is sex designed for function, for pleasure, or for both? If both, then is it by definition aimed at pleasure for one or the other partner, or both? How multi purpose is multi purpose?
While my view is that "it" is designed as a two way physical and emotional pathway/interaction (you make love with some one, not TO someone) that point of view is hardly universal.
But luckily, even the zucchini is dual purpose, as it can be sauteed, grilled, steamed, or curried, so one need not toss them into the dust bin even if one takes the "functional only" approach! A recent teen angst film showed me that apple pies were, little had I known, also multipurpose. Arent you all glad that "Portnoy's Complaint" was never a mainstream movie?
We live and learn, but sometime, it all seems to be Too Much Information. :o Sort of like this post.
Apologies for any bad visuals induced by this post. I blame the caffeine.
*No Guinness was actually consumed during the creation of this post, which is not to say that Guinness consumption over a period of years did not have an influence on the brainwaves that made it all possible. Thanks, Arthur.*
Cry 'Havoc' and let slip the Men 'O War!
In War, the outcome is never final. --Carl von Clausewitz--
Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum
John 11:35 - consider why.
In Memory of Pete
In War, the outcome is never final. --Carl von Clausewitz--
Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum
John 11:35 - consider why.
In Memory of Pete