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Sexual Selections: What We Can and Can't Learn About Sex from Animals

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Marlene Zuk is a biologist, and has specialized in studying insects, especially crickets. Part of the reason she had picked insects for her field is that they are very much unlike humans; she knows that studying primates, dolphins, or other mammals would be harder for her because of a human tendency to anthropomorphize. She says that with insects "it is harder to see myself reflected in their behavior." That sort of recognition of how all of us react to animals informs her remarkable book, _Sexual Selections: What We Can and Can't Learn about Sex from Animals_ (University of California Press), which is full of information about the sex lives of our fellow creatures on the planet, what we have to learn from them, and why we can't apply what we learn to ourselves. She shows that animals have incredibly varied versions of sex, and "... if we try to use animal behavior in a simplistic manner to reflect on human behavior, we will, in myriad ways, misperceive both."

Zuk is a feminist as well as scientist, and is dismayed by the use of examples in biology to represent either feminism or "traditional family values." As a feminist, Zuk was initially heartened by the merging of environmental concern and women's rights into "ecofeminism." "Mother Nature" or some other Earth goddess is frequently invoked, but Zuk demonstrates her doubts that biological lessons show that females tend to be more caring, less aggressive, or more empathetic. She gives examples of, say, reed warbler females who practice infanticide on rivals' eggs, or female wasps that battle fiercely to take control of a colony. There is nothing wrong with showing that females do not have to be passive, but insisting that nature reinforces stereotypes of any sort will not only be futile, it will keep us from learning what animals are really doing. Birds look so industrious and caring in their efforts to make nests and nurture their young that we tend to picture them as examples of propriety, and sermons have been written on the theme. Especially with the advent of easy DNA testing, however, we are learning that males roam around to the territories of other males to intrude upon their females, and that the females were receptive of such attention. Even in the scientific literature, judgmental terms such as "adultery" and "fooling around" have been used for such behavior; perhaps these are simply more fun to say than "extra-pair copulations."

There are surprising revelations here on many areas of animal and human sexuality, homosexuality, male and female orgasms, menstruation, and much more. Zuk knows a wide range of peculiar and completely natural animal behaviors, and her persuasive book shows that we habitually look at such behaviors through our own lenses. We will have to learn our morals elsewhere than from creatures produced by amoral evolution. In a typical humorous aside (this is a witty book that is a pleasure to read), Zuk points out that female snakes may mate with numerous males, even in writhing balls of mating snakes, and this "... must imply what? Orgies are natural? Sexually voracious females are to be applauded?" Skip the morals and object lessons, she demonstrates; intelligent watching of what evolution has produced is far more important.

University of California, Riverside biology professor Marlene Zuk, whose specialty is insects, especially crickets, makes two main points in this modest volume. One, what is "natural" as observed in nature is not necessary right and should not be used as a guide for human society; and two, how we interpret the behavior of animals is colored by our biases, both anthropomorphic and male-gendered.

Professor Zuk writes from the avowed position of a feminist, although she makes it clear that she is not an "ecofeminist" nor does she agree with those feminists who believe that the exercise of science and "attempts to study the world are just culturally derived exercises relevant only in a certain social context." (p. 16)

In other words, Zuk wants to reconcile the ways of science, especially evolutionary biology, to feminists while pointing out to biologists that many of their preconceptions contain a male bias. She recalls a poem from A.E. Housman that includes the phrase "witless nature" which she takes as a cornerstone for her position. Nature "is not kind, not cruel, not red in tooth and claw, nor benign in its ministrations. It is utterly, absolutely impartial." (p. 15)

From this it follows (for most of us anyway) that we should not draw moral conclusions about how people should behave, nor should we form notions of what is "right" or "wrong" from observations of nature. This is a position that most professionals in evolutionary biology today appreciate, although this was not always the case, as Zuk is quick to remind us. She sees the antiquated notion of scala naturae (from Aristotle) which puts humans at the pinnacle of evolution as part of the reason for the errors of the past. Humans were seen as the positive norm, and to the extent that the behavior of other animals deviated from that they were inferior. Zuk also points to a "male model in biology" assumed by biologists (consciously or unconsciously), as an addition source of bias. She points to the idea that males are more aggressive than females as an example of an unwarranted preconception.

My experience (for what it's worth--I coached girl's basketball some years ago, and believe me the girls were VERY aggressive), and from what I know of aggressiveness theoretically, suggests that females are indeed just as aggressive as males in going after what they want. The reason that women use violence (a kind of aggressiveness) less than men do has to do with social conditioning of course, but also with the fact that a woman's reproductive capability is seldom if ever enhanced by the use of physical force while a male may use force to his reproductive advantage. In the case of non-human animals I am thinking especially of male lions killing the cubs of another male to bring the female into estrus. In the case of humans I am thinking of human males using the spoils of war to gain access to females and to nurture their offspring. (I am NOT thinking of rape since that sort of unsocial, high-risk behavior seldom leads to successful reproduction; more often it leads to ostracization and an early demise for the rapist, a state of affairs that is not adaptive.)

Zuk writes in a witty style that is easy to read. Her target readership is the non-specialist; indeed one gets the sense that she is addressing her undergraduate students. Politically speaking, she steers a middle course between the extremes of the sociobiological right and the socialist left, a fact underscored by the appearance on the cover of endorsements from Matt Ridley on the right, Patricia Adair Gowaty from the left, and Sarah Blaffer Hrdy from somewhere in the middle.

I would give a more ringing endorsement of this book were it not for the fact that there is virtually nothing new in Zuk's very agreeable presentation, and my lingering sense that a person who identifies herself as "feminist" biologist (instead of merely a biologist) is not entirely objective any more than the old guys from the patriarchy were. However, to be fair, at no place in the book does Zuk espouse anything close to a preference for the politically correct at the expense of scientific inquiry, as feminists sometimes do when the conclusions are not what they want. Zuk knows that to make science subordinate to what is politically and socially agreeable is to sacrifice science completely. Indeed, I see this as the profound central message of her book, and a reason to hope this book receives a wide readership.

So, what can and can't we learn about sex from animals? Marlene Zuk has written an easy read that actually makes important points about our human-biased and, especially, male-biased interpretations of nature. She points out that nature is 'witless' - the world comes without an agenda - and that selection has produced an enormous diversity of behaviour including that of the sexes.

When we look objectively at other animals there is no universal way of being 'male' or 'female' regarding, for example, aggression, parental care or multiple sexual partners. In the last four chapters Zuk looks at menstruation, orgasm, homosexuality and spatial ability and discusses how looking at a wide variety of other species may shed more light on our own behaviour than ignoring other species or limiting our attention to only a few species.

An important point Zuk makes is that we cannot regard evolution as hierarchical and when we stop ranking species we can then simply look at how selection works to create enormous diversity. By looking objectively at all species our assumptions are challenged about what it means to be 'female' or 'male'. There is no reason for feminists to either oppose science nor to use 'nature' to assert some sort of female superiority. There is nothing in nature that tells us about relative values of the sexes or how we should or should not behave. And there is much in nature that can horrify us, such as parasitioids, so the 'naturalistic fallacy' needs to be avoided by us all.

Animals can show us how selection has worked to create enormous diversity and that humans have also been a part of this process. They can challenge our assumptions of what we believe to be natural, normal or even possible. Women's involvement in science can show up our biases in how we interpret various animal behaviours (eg female 'promiscuity' or 'adultery' or aggression compared to the same behaviour in the male). Any particular animal behaviour cannot be used to impose or justify the same behaviour in humans.

Marlene Zuk is making very important points about how we study ourselves and how we relate this to other species including the errors we are susceptible to on both fronts. For me the book misses five stars because it lacks enough examples of animal behaviours and enough depth of discussion and I am not sure that anti-science or eco-feminists, whom the book seems to be mainly aimed at, will be totally convinced by the argument.

I read the original hard cover edition of 2002. The 256 page book contains 212 regular text pages. Author Marlene Zuk defines herself by some other people's term of "liberal feminism". As that she distances herself from "ecofeminists" who shape their interpretation of the animal world to fit contemporary feminist doctrine. Well... it is very necessary to get a biologist's perspective that is not patriarchal. In rare instances, I find some remarks not really that blatantly feminist either. Though after surfing the net for one Dr. Susan Block's dresscode made me think about the idea of maybe forgiving Zuk for making a sqibbing insinuation about the good doctor's choice of attire - or lack of it. In principle that is every individual woman's choice, of course. At least I have never heard anything similar about some male media expert's choice of clothing.

As a "liberal feminist" Zuk isn't actively set to discriminate homosexuals. However, she isn't exactly unbiased either, when it comes to interpretations. On the one hand, she's self-critically musing about her former ignorance on witnessing male crickets (her animal of expertise) love singing to other male crickets without her thinking of anything obvious before reading Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity (Stonewall Inn Editions) on some 450 species of scientifically witnessed homosexual behavior. One the other hand, she is nullifying that statement in the same breath by claiming this wouldn't necessarily mean anything as she also witnessed some crickets singing to twigs and leaves. Well, there was an Asian prince once (for real!), who only fell in love with ducks. Does that mean, there aren't any homosexual men on this planet? Speaking of which, later she writes about sexual imprinting of mallards, averring that they are sexually imprinted on their mother - and that this is a good idea. Shortly later it becomes clear that she means in opposition to the bad idea of getting sexually imprinted on a red balloon or a human, as some ever-wicked scientists experimented. Meaning probably not that straightforward in opposition to male-male imprinting. Nevertheless, exactly this impression is made on the reader. However, "Natural Exuberance" should have taught her that mallards can become quite homosexual, especially in large bachelor groups. That mother('s sex) imprint doesn's seem to be that strong after all. Or, obviously, Zuk (and the scientists she is quoting) failed to get the idea that not only the mother was around during the critical time of sexual imprinting, but also the male siblings. Which may still be considered a good idea, depending on the personal bias. All I am saying is: We have to be extra careful about thinking that our objectivity isn't biased, even if we attempt not to mean so. I recommend reading Evolution's Rainbow: Diversity, Gender, and Sexuality in Nature and People, which elaborates in that direction and which is written from a transsexual biologist's point of view.

Another criticism before I compliment Zuk on this book: She is writing about sexperts, but most certainly she isn't one herself. Nobody has to be, but multiplied sex myths get scientific blessing when they come from a biologist. Reading this book, one can get the impression that females are able to get an orgasm via the clitoris only, males via the penis only. Such a male orgasm (supposedly automatic) would make up for prostate cancer. Well, the jury is still out as far as I know, but some studies claim that NEGLECTING prostate-orgasms CAUSES prostate problems, such as cancer. For sure, males can get such an orgasm, which usually dwarfs the penile one, and yes, they can become multiple. Something Zuk thinks isn't possible in males. She is also not correcting a quote that women can't ejaculate. Let ME quote a sexpert, named Annie: "They don't call me Sprinkle for nothing." Thinking about that potential, Zuk is wrong in claiming that males can't judge wether a female's orgasm really was one in EVERY case. By the way, not all women do, but only a woman can assume that men can't successfully fake an orgasm. The difference to female fakes is: The male fake is less talked about for reasons of gender-based performance expectations. Ironically, Zuk references the Pacific people of the Mangaians, in which supposedly the men know more about female anatomy than European physicians. Well, let's include US-feminist biologists in this comparison...

All of the above explains the subtraction of a star. In reality, it is a five star book in the sense that some criticism is in place, but shouldn't deter from reading the otherwise excellent and oftentimes humorously written book. It may be a bit more about the human perception of animals than about the animals themselves, but that doesn't mean that the book isn't worth the reading time any less. On the contrary. And there are many obscure animal behaviors described still. One of the central issues is the abandoning of the "scala naturae", the systematic classification of the animal world according to perfectionism - and according to past human arrogant thinking. More people should read this book. Such as filmmakers. Zuk laments about some CGI-animated ant flicks, in which in reality female-only workers are turned male in Hollywood. Well, at least, that reality isn't that well-known. But in 2007 Hollywood made a similar movie about bees (Bee Movie (Widescreen Edition)), in which the workers are male (wannabe) super heroes. And everybody knows that the bees we usually see are all female... Which keeps this book fresh and necessary.

Also read Riddled with Life: Friendly Worms, Ladybug Sex, and the Parasites That Make Us Who We Are by the same author. It's on evolution from an entirely different perspective and even better than this one.

An eye opener for male and female readers alike.

An eye opener for male and female readers alike.

if you think you might learn something from the animals, you will be very disappointed.