As far as I can tell from a brief look at the paper, it makes no attempt to estimate whether the increased fecundity of the female relative is enough to compensate for the reduced fecundity of the homosexuals. In fact, I didn’t see it give any estimate for the latter. They merely do a p-test and pronounce the differences “significant”. This is a situation where we are primarily interested in the magnitude of the effect, not merely finding evidence that it is positive.
Right—as well, the standard complaint about extending this logic to humans is that the most credible increased fertility effect for female relatives is desire-based. But it’s easy for women to get pregnant more frequently and have more children—the hard part is keeping those children fed until they’re self-sufficient, and dividing your wealth among all your children, neither of which it seems gay uncles help with enough to explain the effect.
As far as I can tell from a brief look at the paper, it makes no attempt to estimate whether the increased fecundity of the female relative is enough to compensate for the reduced fecundity of the homosexuals. In fact, I didn’t see it give any estimate for the latter. They merely do a p-test and pronounce the differences “significant”. This is a situation where we are primarily interested in the magnitude of the effect, not merely finding evidence that it is positive.
Right—as well, the standard complaint about extending this logic to humans is that the most credible increased fertility effect for female relatives is desire-based. But it’s easy for women to get pregnant more frequently and have more children—the hard part is keeping those children fed until they’re self-sufficient, and dividing your wealth among all your children, neither of which it seems gay uncles help with enough to explain the effect.