How is the balance between boys and girls maintained?

[giblets]

So that's what you mean by God doesn't leave things to "chance." You mean that we exxist by chance, and we could cease to exist by chance. Or do you mean that I'm a boy by chance. That I'm an american by chance, that God didn't create me in the sense that He thought of me and then created me. You're saying that He created a system of laws, and because of that system I came into being?

So God deliberately put you on this earth for the purpose of making American Christian men look stupid?

[Kidlicious]

Yes, He intends for me to look stupid to you. But you're the stupid one. Just like NYE, you think elok doesn't believe what I said in the OP.

I was talking with a group of methodists, and a minister was among them. I implied that God heals sickness, and she rolled her eyes at me. I didn't say anything at the time, but I confronted her later to convince her that God heals sickness. She denied rolling her eyes at me, and said that she believed that God heals.

If elok and I were to sit down for coffee, just the two of us, we would disagree on very little regarding christianity, but how to talk in front of nonbelievers would probably be one of them. I'll give it to you directly. I'll tell you straight up, and won't mix words. You atheists are dead wrong. Your beliefs are stupid. God created the universe and He's with us everyday helping us. No if you prefer that I tell you how our beliefs are so similar, too bad they aren't. If I were an atheist I would think elok was a stupid ass that talks out of the side of his mouth. He never convinced me of anything with his crocked talk. Maybe he convinced Imran, but that's another matter.

[Kuciwalker]

This thread is amazing.

[Dauphin]

The OP is fairly inane, but it got me thinking: in a normally polygynous animal "society," such as lions, would the sex ratio be skewed in favor of females, since a few males tend to hog a relatively large number of females? I haven't found much, except this first page of something from JSTOR: http://www.jstor.org/pss/2461708 . I can't view the rest, since I'm not accessing it via a university, etc.

Anyway, it says that male lions tend to form coalitions to take over a pride, and larger coalitions, unsurprisingly, are more successful at gaining and maintaining control of a pride. And the sex ratio actually skews toward the male "when those males enhance each other's expected chances of reproductive success." What that specifically refers to, I don't know. Anyway, is there a biologist/ecologist in here who can tell me if lions, or other polygynous animals, normally bear more female than male young?

I'd written a long explanation, then it got eaten by the internet. I now instead refer you to the Fisher ratio on wikipedia:

Basic explanation

W.D. Hamilton gave the following basic explanation in his 1967 paper on "Extraordinary sex ratios",[4] given the condition that males and females cost equal amounts to produce:

Suppose male births are less common than female.
A newborn male then has better mating prospects than a newborn female, and therefore can expect to have more offspring.
Therefore parents genetically disposed to produce males tend to have more than average numbers of grandchildren born to them.
Therefore the genes for male-producing tendencies spread, and male births become more common.
As the 1:1 sex ratio is approached, the advantage associated with producing males dies away.
The same reasoning holds if females are substituted for males through-out. Therefore 1:1 is the equilibrium ratio.

Strictly speaking, this is not an evolutionarily stable strategy (ESS), since all strategies have equal fitness when the sex ratio is 1:1 (i.e. an individual who produces strictly sons has just as many offspring as an individual producing sons and daughters with equal probability), and thus can invade the population.[5]

[N35t0r]

Males are more likely to be born than females (in humans at least) because the Y chromosome, in lacking a 'leg' is lighter than the X chromosome, and thus 'male' sperm have a slight advantage in weight WRT 'female' sperm. There's all sorts of other things that affect this, though, like pH and temperature and whatnot, which I don't know much about.

[Kuciwalker]

I'm almost certain that explanation is false, because the proportion of DNA mass in a typical human cell is far south of 1%. The explanation I know, and that is actually plausible, is that male fetuses are less likely to come to term because they are more likely to be missing a functional version of any essential gene on the X chromosome.

[N35t0r]

I don't know about human fetuses, but cow male fetuses are indeed less likely to come to term, so I wouldn't be surprised if it was so in humans as well. Now, despite this, there's still more males being born than females.

[edit:] IIRC, the difference in mass was less than 2%.

[C0ckney]

Of course I can't quote the Bible when debating christianity with elok. Nice, elok can say christianity is whatever he wants it to be.

that would be the bible you haven't read?

this is another amazing implosion by kid.

[Elok]

For the record, I never wanted to be the "Christian Lord of Apolyton." I did, at one point, aspire to being "Lord of the Rings," but that was mostly because the current holder of the title got to wear that cool helmet. Then I saw the rest of the movies where he was stuck being a stationary burning eyeball. No thanks.

Dauphin, thanks for the info. So, a polygynous or polyandrous society wouldn't have a marked effect on this?

[BlackCat]

Ben leaves the building and Kid takes over the vacant niche - fine example of evolution at work.

[giblets]

Yes, He intends for me to look stupid to you. But you're the stupid one. Just like NYE, you think elok doesn't believe what I said in the OP.

I was talking with a group of methodists, and a minister was among them. I implied that God heals sickness, and she rolled her eyes at me. I didn't say anything at the time, but I confronted her later to convince her that God heals sickness. She denied rolling her eyes at me, and said that she believed that God heals.

If elok and I were to sit down for coffee, just the two of us, we would disagree on very little regarding christianity, but how to talk in front of nonbelievers would probably be one of them. I'll give it to you directly. I'll tell you straight up, and won't mix words. You atheists are dead wrong. Your beliefs are stupid. God created the universe and He's with us everyday helping us. No if you prefer that I tell you how our beliefs are so similar, too bad they aren't. If I were an atheist I would think elok was a stupid ass that talks out of the side of his mouth. He never convinced me of anything with his crocked talk. Maybe he convinced Imran, but that's another matter.

1. I never said anything about whether Elok thinks an invisible being controls the universe. Unlike you he manages to not look like a stupid jackass.
2. If God heals sickness then I guess you won't bother going to the doctor next time you're coughing up blood because ultimately God decides if you get better so you should just pray...?
3. Somehow, I'm an atheist yet I don't think Elok is a stupid ass who talks out of the side of his mouth! Amazing...

[Kidlicious]

God will judge you elok. He will judge us all.

[Elok]

Me, and every other person who ever lived, including yourself. You might worry about yourself instead of threatening me.

[Kidlicious]

Take your own advice. I fear the Lord everyday. I'm going to church right now to repent and ask forgiveness for my sins.

It appears that you think you don't need to do so since you are above us all.

[Elok]

I've not said I'm above anybody.