Are There "Male" Instincts?
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Published:14 February 2023
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Updated:22 January 2025
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"Men have their own needs. They need to be satisfied" - unfortunately, you often hear this phrase. Even though it is already in the 21st century, many people still justify male cheating (and even violence) by saying that men need more sex and sexual partners than women. Let's try to find out if this is true.
In today’s culture, it is still believed that evolution has created men as the leading suppliers of biomaterials. Therefore, it is necessary to impregnate as many sexual partners as possible. This is referred to by men and women through them justifying cheating spouses and reacting aggressively to victims of sexualized violence with phrases like "it's your fault".
Natural Instincts
From an evolutionary point of view, the transmission of one's material is inherent. But in the case of human beings, it also laid down the absence of instinct and even monogamy.
Instinct is a built-in script that cannot be resisted. So some birds with a "maternal" instinct will feed any screaming chick. Even if he is a stranger, it will be to the detriment of his offspring. The program works so that the organism cannot act otherwise. In the case of mammals and primates in particular, a more complex nervous system with advanced intelligence emerges. This is necessary for new adaptive systems to improve - why use one instinctive scenario when intelligence can create many variations and find the best one? This is how evolution shapes the development of the genetic code.
For a long time, it was thought that we have one innate instinct: when we meet a pleasant person, we raise our eyebrows for a split second (an eyebrow flash). Even children who are blind from birth do this at the sound of a pleasant voice. Consider that we demonstrate a safe attitude towards each other in this way.
Do Men Have Instincts?
In 2017, an article was published in which researchers decided that the fear of dangerous animals is genetically embedded. Therefore, spiders, snakes, and other animals that we don't like very much can scare us even if we haven't seen them.
There are, of course, many opponents to this theory. However, they also believe that the above-described instincts are merely innate reflexes. And, if we follow the data of the scientific community, then a man, in any case, does not possess a "male" or "natural" instinct. It is tempting to justify one's impatience to get a new partner with an embedded program. Still, all the data indicate that it is merely an inability to control one's desires.
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