Comments on: He’s Climbing In Your Windows; He’s Snatching Your People Up

By: Jesse Marczyk

Jesse Marczyk — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 01:06:59 +0000

That sounds right. At least average age of first potential pregnancy, or slightly before.

By: Nuclear Wheelchair

Nuclear Wheelchair — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 01:01:14 +0000

What I’ve gathered is that the RV of a female is basically the number of future offspring she can be expected to contribute to the population and that this will peak at her first pregnancy.

Suppose if a women lives all the way the end of her reproductive life she can be expected to leave behind on average a total number T offspring and that the age she starts reproducing is F. If the probability of a female under age F surviving to F is p then her expected amount of future offspring will be pT which is less than T. The lowest value of p will be for newborns and it will rise to 1 at age F so a women’s RV peaks at the start of her reproductive life.

Peak reproductive value is just a fancy way of saying average age of first pregnancy, I think.

By: Nuclear Wheelchair

Nuclear Wheelchair — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 16:01:25 +0000

I've found a book that explains it. I have a good read of it tonight.

By: Jesse Marczyk

Jesse Marczyk — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 15:45:01 +0000

I believe it’s a theoretically-driven value, falling sometime after a woman is sexually mature but before she has had her first child, meaning she has the maximal number of reproductive years ahead of her. At least that’s what I just found looking over that section in his book.

By: Nuclear Wheelchair

Nuclear Wheelchair — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 15:25:06 +0000

I've just found this this paper on David Buss's site. It mentions that a women's RV peaks at about 17. Do you know how this was measured?

By: Jesse Marczyk

Jesse Marczyk — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 15:05:44 +0000

You could start here (paper), and the book by the same authors is good as well.

By: Bussicks

Bussicks — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 14:57:34 +0000

Do you know any studies or surveys about this you could link to? It’s something I’m interested in. Thanks.

By: Jesse Marczyk

Jesse Marczyk — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 14:38:30 +0000

Approximately, yes; I think it is, though the specifics vary as to the nature of the relationship (short vs. long term, for instance)

By: Bussicks

Bussicks — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 01:19:20 +0000

“…with the peak being within the 20-24 year old age range…”

Is the same peak seen in the age of women that men prefer for consensual sex?

By: Marmaloid

Marmaloid — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 11:25:40 +0000

I see what you’re getting at. Maybe there doesn’t need to be a specific module for rape. Instead raping could be one specific way under certain circumstances of achieving the more general goal of impregnating females.

This doesn’t really mean that rape is just a byproduct and not an adaption, just that evolution has equipped men with more generalized sexual motivations that can result in rape under the appropriate conditions.