Arranged marriages and natural/sexual selection

[Forreigner]

Some people on the internet argue that free mariage systems where men and women have complete freedom to choose their wive/spouse (thereby allowing natural/sexual selection to take full effect) as one of the main reasons for European advancement over the rest of the world. Another factor is inbreeding (marriages within closer family structure, ei. Cousin marriages, I would like to know how prevalent its in Afghanistan, Pakistan and India...)

I think its an interesting discussion...what would happen if Afghans Pakis and Indians discarded arranged marriages and adopted a more free system like westerners with both genders having their own say in who they want to marry and produce child with.

Too many times I have seen some really unattractive looking dudes with extremely beautiful women from our region (i have seen Indian, pakis and afghan couples)...and I cant help but think would these couples really choose each other if it wasnt arranged marriage (with other factors suchs income, status and family ties (some people still practise in family marriages ei. cousins or distant cousins at play instead of complete natural/sexual selection)

[DaZahroJaam.]

first of all, cousin marriages are not "inbreeding" and secondly, they were pretty common in the west until mid 19th century. when it comes to "advancements" being ugly is not as bad as having mental illnesses. as a matter of fact, physical appearance has nothing to do with success in life. compare the amount of children born with down syndrome in the west to the one's affected in asian countries. compare mental health statistics, rapists and serial killers and then tell me about "advancements".

nita chose to marry mukish ambani. he is successful, she is beautiful. they compliment each other.

[Aryana]

"Natural selection" is almost non existent in this society. It doesn't even matter how ugly, weak, or sick you are, as long as you're rich you're going to do fine.

However, a free marriage system should have some limitations, otherwise it will lead to widespread promiscuity (fornication is accepted in this society, even encouraged). No one however should be forced into an arranged marriage.

[khushal]

Some people on the internet argue that free mariage systems where men and women have complete freedom to choose their wive/spouse (thereby allowing natural/sexual selection to take full effect) as one of the main reasons for European advancement over the rest of the world. Another factor is inbreeding (marriages within closer family structure, ei. Cousin marriages, I would like to know how prevalent its in Afghanistan, Pakistan and India...)

I think its an interesting discussion...what would happen if Afghans Pakis and Indians discarded arranged marriages and adopted a more free system like westerners with both genders having their own say in who they want to marry and produce child with.

Too many times I have seen some really unattractive looking dudes with extremely beautiful women from our region (i have seen Indian, pakis and afghan couples)...and I cant help but think would these couples really choose each other if it wasnt arranged marriage (with other factors suchs income, status and family ties (some people still practise in family marriages ei. cousins or distant cousins at play instead of complete natural/sexual selection)

Your knowledge of history is weak. Cousin marriages have been prevalent throughout human history including Europe until recently. Europe's domination started when Europeans started building powerful navies and used those navies to pillage resources and wealth from the rest of the World. The ones that figured out powerful navies are going to own the future prevailed which is why small coastal societies ie Spain, Britian, France, Netherland, Portugal built powerful rich Empires that reached far from their centers throughout the Globe.

[khushal]

"Natural selection" is almost non existent in this society. It doesn't even matter how ugly, weak, or sick you are, as long as you're rich you're going to do fine.

However, a free marriage system should have some limitations, otherwise it will lead to widespread promiscuity (fornication is accepted in this society, even encouraged). No one however should be forced into an arranged marriage.

There is no correlations between promiscuity and the freedom to choose ones mate.

[torkham]

As long as you follow islamic guidance, nothing wrong with custom of arranging cousins to marry.
We are not bovine that natural selection has to animate us seasonally to reproduce. On the contrary we choose a purpose.

[Khostai]

We simply dont have the culture of dating or even talking to a female classmate, and also Islam does not allow interaction between the two diffrent genders, our society needs arranged marriage becuas otherwise we cannot make babies :P

And Afghans used to have quite strict norms in the past when it was about marrieng, man and women who were handicaped or slightly deformed would never marry. A guy in our village who walked bad due to his one leg being shorter than the other never married becuase nobody wanted their daughter to be married with a man who could not even walk straight...In free western society that guy would have been married and passed his genes on due to healtcare that would have given him an operation to fix his leg..

[Iblis_Efreetzai]

Some people on the internet argue that free mariage systems where men and women have complete freedom to choose their wive/spouse (thereby allowing natural/sexual selection to take full effect) as one of the main reasons for European advancement over the rest of the world. Another factor is inbreeding (marriages within closer family structure, ei. Cousin marriages, I would like to know how prevalent its in Afghanistan, Pakistan and India...)

This is a flawed argument because free mate selection in European societies is a very very very recent phenomenon, even 50 years ago, parents had strong control over the spouses their children could select. Yet Europeans had colonized and ravaged through most of the known world since 1650 or so. They conquered South American peoples who did not have as rigid structures for marriage and mate selection and were for the most part backwards.

Also on the flipside, Muslims were once a dominant force in world society, during a time when they probably had more rigid mate selection than now. Even Europeans were squabbling compared to Muslims. Secondly, it's not necessarily true that free mate selection produces better outcomes via natural selection. Natural selection is a system where environmental pressures bottleneck who are more viable for survival. So if we apply Natural selection in Societal Norms, then predicively there would be more rigid strictures such as controlled mate selection to minimize undesired being able to reproduce.

As Aryana pointed out, we're no longer in a world where natural selection plays much of a role, we're not struggling to survive and the potential to mate and have offspring is reasonably secure. In Nature the attractiveness of females is a determinant of their Fitness, the same doesn't hold true for men, because Male role is essentially to provide and acquire resources to support the species. So attractiveness is a not a determinant of fitness.

So your Super Model Guy you see today, may actually be a liability as far as Natural selection is concerned, because there's a strong chance that he spends more time in activities that don't improve his ability to acquire resources. If a man happens to be attractive and capable of acquiring resources, Then that's just icing on the cake. Where as for a woman her entire survival depends on whether she's worth having sex with.

Cousin marriages have several reasons, #1 historically large populations of people didn't travel to places where population diversity was significant. #2. Since families acquired resources and pooled them together, cousin marriages introduced a way to secure those resources for the future. One must realize this was before people knew things about autosomal defects and such. In rural cultures that information is limited to non-existent. as Khushal commented, Europeans grew because they became more industrious, and we just got complacent and lazy.

Also another thing to note, East Asia, China especially is once again arising to being a super power, They still have predominantly arranged marriages.

[Iblis_Efreetzai]

And Afghans used to have quite strict norms in the past when it was about marrieng, man and women who were handicaped or slightly deformed would never marry. .

Exactly, actually in many cases, a child born with a defect was often left for dead or euthanized. There were stories of handicapped children often being abandoned because people believed they were Jinn.

[Iblis_Efreetzai]

[MENTION=19462]Forreigner[/MENTION]

Another point is the matter of Optimization; having free marriages nor having very tightly bound rigid marriages would necessarily make better mating strategies. You'd have to learn how to maneuver both together to some degree if you want to optimize.

[Forreigner]

As long as you follow islamic guidance, nothing wrong with custom of arranging cousins to marry.
We are not bovine that natural selection has to animate us seasonally to reproduce. On the contrary we choose a purpose.

cousins are too close to each other genetically though. but I understand now why it was so popular in ancient times, and still is some places. it's about keeping resources closer to family than spreading it out which is what would happen if cousins didn't marry one another.


Though I will say this, it's a well known fact that a brother and sister producing off-spring will not end well for 99% of the cases. With cousin marriage, you probably get just a little less incestual, and chances of defect child is only slightly lower than if a brother and sister had children, perhaps 50-75%. it's still extremely high though.

German brother and sister practice incest - YouTube

[khushal]

cousins are too close to each other genetically though. but I understand now why it was so popular in ancient times, and still is some places. it's about keeping resources closer to family than spreading it out which is what would happen if cousins didn't marry one another.


Though I will say this, it's a well known fact that a brother and sister producing off-spring will not end well for 99% of the cases. With cousin marriage, you probably get just a little less incestual, and chances of defect child is only slightly lower than if a brother and sister had children, perhaps 50-75%. it's still extremely high though.

German brother and sister practice incest - YouTube

you committed
personal incredulity fallacy.

You lack the basic understanding of genetics but more importantly you foolishly think you know more than the people that actually spend their whole life studying this stuff.