German incest couple lose European Court case

[CCIP]

Originally Posted by Krauter

Just a quick question, point to ask. I can't remember where/when I read or saw this but I remember reading or seeing in a documentary on ancient cultures and such that incestuous relations were looked down upon not only because it is socially unacceptable, but because it is a natural instinct imbedded in us to not view family members as potential partners. From what I believe this was an instinctive countermeasure to ensure that a species gene pool does not become contaminated or reliant on solely one groups DNA.

Oh there is definitely a measure of aversion that most people have. But it's the same as the aversion to, you know, homosexual relations. And yet many people do not have this aversion - just as there are many people who are instinctively homosexual. I think it's dangerous to assume that a majority aversion is the "natural" thing, and a minority deviation is "unnatural". The fact is that deviations from the norm are also part of nature.

I don't dispute that there is a natural element to the taboo on incest - there is definitely that. But that's not the whole story. I don't think you can make an argument about 'unnaturalness' based on that alone. The nature of the aversion is also not entirely clear. In many cases, animal populations (and indeed human populations) rely on incest to survive. In some cases, preservation of same DNA is no less important than the drive for genetic diversity, and we in fact see this expressed in many people's preference for particular genotypes that are more similar than different to them (or, to put it less politically correctly, people's pickiness about the race and appearance of their partners). It's not simply an A vs. B thing going on here in terms of genetics.