Quo, you are committing an ad ignorantiam argument, a logical fallacy. And despite what was said earlier regarding proving a negative, in some cases it is actually trivial. Simply prove to be true that which is mutually exclusive. In this case the probability of being gay (as a function of a relative being gay) being greater than random will do nicely. In other words, any significant percentage greater than random chance does prove that it is not a choice of free will.

As far as the “ex-gay” argument goes, wasn’t the historical basis of that idea (Homosexuality in Perspective) pretty much debunked earlier this year (see boxturtlebulletin, 4/23/09)?

If sexual orientation is so easily changed, where’s all the ex-straights? Surely we’d have some advocacy groups promoting people willfully change into a gays for benefits like greater mate compatibility.

Silly Burr, don’t you realize the answer is all around you? According to some Dominionists — ALL gay people are really “ex-straight” and we just need to become “ex-gay”

I’ve had to explain this time and again, I’m not a straight house covered in gay paint. I’m a gay house, if you removed my homosexuality — I’d have no sexuality left.

It’s an understandable social bias, there being around 3-4x as many exclusively homosexual men than exclusively homosexual women. There’s also AIDS, getting many more gay men to volunteer for and get interested in biomedical studies than lesbian women.

In short: as a person working in that mix of developmental biology, genetics, and biomedicine, I think the scientific research path will be that the genetic/molecular basis of homosexuality in woman will be figured out first. And then that of men will not be difficult to figure out- it will involve the same set of genes and molecules, just perturbed in the other direction mostly by some environmental factor.

Because its inherently obvious – there is no other reason for you to be harping on the lie that science hasn’t proven orientation is not a choice other than your desire to create the impression that it is a choice. Your childish attempts to deny the obvious aren’t fooling anyone.

Quo said “You don’t seem to be willing to consider the possibility that different people have different experiences, and that the apparent fact that I can’t choose my sexual orientation does not mean that other people cannot.”.

That’s a rather foolish statement. I’ve considered the possibility and rejected it because despite thousands of people trying none have been able to choose their orientation. This isn’t just about you. Science has demonstrated that its much more likely than not that orientation is biologically determined and the various studies on “ex-gays” have demonstrated that its virtually impossible for anyone to change orienatation.

In light of your own total inability to choose your orientation its apparent that you don’t come here attempting to convince people orientation can be chosen out of any sincere belief, but you do it merely because you want to annoy people. You are simply a troll out to be an a**hole for the sheer pleasure of it.

The plain answer is that it can’t. Similarly, IF sexual orientation is also genetically determined, then it can’t be changed by force of will either. If someone like Quo objects that we don’t absolutely know with 100% certainty that it can’t, then it’s for him to demonstrate otherwise.

However, even if sexual orientation is NOT genetically determined, that still doesn’t necessarily imply that it can be changed by force of will – or by any other means. Perhaps it can; perhaps it can’t. The evidence strongly suggests that it can’t. As the late Rev. Sylvia Pennington (a heterosexual woman who was once involved in “ex-gay” ministry) observed, for anyone who attempts to change their sexual orientation, disappointment is the only realistic expectation.

The proposition that something that had a genetic cause CAN be changed by force of will is plainly contrary to common sense. Must common sense have the last word? No. After all, common sense changes as our knowledge and understanding increase; the common sense of the 21st century is not that of the 13th or even the 19th century.

When Du Moncel introduced Edison’s phonograph to the French Academy of Sciences, Monsieur Bouillaud rushed at Du Moncel and seized him by the collar, shouting: “Wretch! We are not to be made dupes of by a ventriloquist!” Bouillaud’s common sense told him “that it was impossible to admit that mere vile metal could perform the work of human phonation.”

Philippe Lebon discovered how to use gas for lighting purposes in 1797, but it was not use for street lighting until 1805, in Birmingham, and it was not used in Paris until 1818. Why the delay? Because a lamp without a wick could not possibly burn; people’s common sense told them so.

But in such cases common sense was overcome by FACTS. If anyone is postulating something that is contrary to common sense, it is up to him or her to produce the facts to prove it; there is NO burden of DISPROOF lying on his or her opponents.

You wrote, “If you weren’t trying to create the impression that orientation is chosen you wouldn’t be making the absurd statment that science is unable to prove it is not a choice.”

Why, because you say so? You don’t seem to be willing to consider the possibility that different people have different experiences, and that the apparent fact that I can’t choose my sexual orientation does not mean that other people cannot.

It’s revealing that you would suggest that I am being childish because you are, after all, the most childish and immature commentator on this website. I don’t think that you have the excuse of stupidity; it’s more that you’ve chosen not to grow up. Your juvenile behaviour, along with that of Emily K and a number of other commentators simply goes to support the old claim that homosexuals are stuck in some kind of state of arrested development.

You remind me of Christian fundamentalists, with their “God said it, I believed, that settles it” approach. Replace “God” with gay dogma and political correctness and that describes your reasoning perfectly.