I don’t even have to read the article to know that it’s wrong. Dead wrong. One-hundred percent wrong. In science, if you ask the wrong question, you always get the wrong answer.

 

All I need is to read the headline of this wrong article: “Men think about sex more because some part of their brain is bigger.” To me, it doesn’t matter what part of the brain. It doesn’t matter if that part of the brain really is bigger in men. It doesn’t matter if that part of the brain that is bigger, specifically exists just to think about sex every eight seconds, giving men spontaneous erections on the subway. I don’t care. 

 

The science is wrong.

 

Think of eating. Think of stuffing a greasy bacon cheeseburger deluxe down your mouth because you are hungry.

 

Do you eat because you’re hungry? Well, yes. Yes, you do. What if someone published an article about eating that read: “People eat because they get hungry.” Would the article be groundbreaking? Would you send the scientist a letter telling them that they’re your hero? Of course not. Because it’s a stupid statement.

 

The real question of why people eat isn’t answered with the statement, ‘because they get hungry.’

 

The real question is why do people get hungry in the first place?

 

 

The real answer to why we eat isn't because we have a tongue and teeth and esophagus and stomach and gastro-intestinal tract and a poop shute. The real reason is why were all these things built into our bodies in the first place.

Think of it another way. A couple of hours after you eat, you have to use the bathroom. Why do you use the bathroom?

 

Well, to get rid of what you eat. 

 

Imagine an article on the internet finally solving the mystery of why people use the bathroom. The headline reads: “People use the bathroom because of pain in their crotch area.” Would you think this is some sort of scientific breakthrough? 

 

What would be next, linking the relationship between getting poked in the eye with a carrot and sudden blindness?

 

You don’t use the bathroom because you have a pain in your pants and you don’t eat because you feel hungry.

 

What’s the real truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth is that you are, and this is true of all animals, a thermodynamic device that must take in high energy food and expel it as low energy waste, lest it returns to equilibrium, also known as dying. This is called, in biology talk, an Ultimate Causation.

 

We eat to collect energy which we use to fuel our bodies (Ultimate Causation). In order to regulate eating, our bodies have developed a psychological system of pain, called hunger. This is called a Proximate Mechanism.

Our bodies must expel the waste (Ultimate Causation.) Our bodies have built a pain trigger in our pants to tell us when to do this (Proximate Mechanism.)

 

Now, do people go around thinking about these concepts all day? Of course not. We never think about them. Not even I do. I just eat my damn food because I'm hungry and it tastes good, even though I know that the reason I get hungry and have taste buds is for these ultimate reasons of me being a thermodynamic device.

 

We have sex in the first place because we are vehicles built by design information for the purpose of replicating that design information (Ultimate Causation.) Our brains are built to like sex a lot, and to make sure sex feels really, really good so we do it more often (Proximate Mechanism.)

 

So when I read the headline about the part of the brain that thinks about sex being bigger, I didn’t bother to read it, because I already knew the logic was wrong. It’s not interesting to say that the male brain is different, just like it’s not interesting to say that pain in your stomach leads to eating and pain in your pants leads to peeing. 

 

The real question is why is the male brain different?

 

And that’s the question that must always be asked whenever there is an article like that. OK, men think about sex more, but why do men think about sex more? OK, men care about cheating women a lot, but why do they care?

 

OK, people like sex a lot, but why do they like it?

 

What’s the Ultimate Causation that has built the Proximate Mechanism. That’s the real scientific question, and if you ever want an answer to anything in your life—why do I eat when I’m sad, why do I sleep at night, why do I fall in love—then that’s the question you have to ask.

 

Ask any other question and you just guarantee that your answer will be wrong.