suppose that women had a natural ability to control ovulation

I think the artifical uterus / uterine replicator / call-it-what-you-want would be even better, transhumanists need to get working on that

and like I said if that ability would have been develop before men could comprehend the idea of forcing a woman to do an invisible internal thingy it is possible that they would have lost the ability to be aggressive to women at all

Sure, it may even cause humans to develop a completely matriarchal society, but speculating this far back along our evolutionary history makes it very difficult to say anything with any degree of certainty.

Perhaps it would be more constructive to talk about if women suddenly got this ability today?

If women gained this today?
Well, any social moral we have about marriage that predates the condom would die in a firey pit.
A lot of things that came after the condom would also have died.

: Why do you assume "morals about marriage" equals "marriage itself"?

edited 29th May '11 12:49:36 PM by del_diablo

Nah, marriage would stick around because people like me just simply like the concept, plus, this doesn't eliminate sexually transmitted diseases so even more the population would get infected.

What 'morals about marriage' do you mean? I don't think they would die. I don't think that much of anything would change, other than maybe more cheating (not by everyone but by people who are already cheaters) and cocktrapping (again, already by cocktrappers)

Um, what's a cocktrap? Google isn't helping me much.

And DD, one, just reply to a post, editing with a down arrow means I may go without seeing it. Two, define morals of marriage please.

'Cocktrapper' is slang term for a woman who wants to get pregnant so that her partner will stay with her

I can start with a example:
One must be pure to marry.
Another one:
Defiled Forever
Both of these are "social morals" and might even "equal to marriage".
Even A Man Is Not A Virgin is a moral related to marriage.

Marriage is nothing more than "moving together and doing stuff together as a couple."
Anything that is related to marriage that is more than that, or is a concept, is a "social construct about marriage".
Comprende?

If women were to fully and flawlessly control pregnancy at will, the applicability of child support laws for unwanted babies would become very, very shaky.

I didn't want that kid. She knew, and she had it anyway. Why the Hell should I be responsible? would suddenly become a very persuasive argument. After all, pregnancy would always be a deliberate decision.

I think those would be better called common expectations, DD. And I'd probably agree that a lot of that would change. However, the general idea of faithfulness to your partner and such? I have a harder time believing that would be shaken if this sort of thing suddenly appeared today.

And Heathen, it is now apparent that men must also gain the ability to readily produce semen that can't impregnate women! It's an evolutionary war to not reproduce!

Well, we have come to a agreement. I will lay down my battleaxe over there then

^^^ That's an excellent point.

By the same token, a huge part of the argument for abortion -on-demand would change. She chose to get pregnant. That means the abortion-on-demand can only be justified by "she changed her mind", not "she didn't have any choice". The "Pro-choice" side would have to find a new name. Maybe to "Pro-Second-Thoughts"

edited 29th May '11 1:13:25 PM by Madrugada

In the face of perfect, at-will, convenient and gratis birth control... Wouldn't abortion for non-medical reasons be sort of obsolete anyway?

Odds are, women aren't going to decide to get pregnant at a fit of fancy. It'd take a conscious and deliberate decision to do so. Getting pregnant is inconvenient enough that I assume it'd take a damn very good reason to do so.

edited 29th May '11 1:18:25 PM by SavageHeathen

Humans Are Morons, which leads to other things.

edited 29th May '11 2:48:38 PM by Ekuran

First of all, how much control do you mean here? I mean, for example, we can control when we pee, but if we hold it off too long it becomes damn hard, and can lead to health problems. We also control when and what we eat, but if we don't give our body what it needs on a regular basis, it will break down.

On and off switch.

It would definitely change certain societies views and affect their laws and such.

I think quite a few animals do have this ability, sadly we are not one of them.

edited 30th May '11 1:24:14 AM by joeyjojo

Really? That's quite interesting. Which ones do?

^ and ^^ Well, there are a number of examples of animals (eg. rats) who can modify their mating behaviour or fecundity under different external factors (eg. population density) but I don't know of any who has an on/off switch type of ovulation control being discussed here. Of course, in many species the females can require the males to do something to drive them into heat etc., but that also isn't the on/off switch model either. The on/off model being discussed here (and being applied to humans) implies a certain degree of free will in the females which isn't the usual way we think of organisms when researching their behaviour. We tend to reduce most "decision making" in non-human organisms to stimulus/response type of behaviour, and maybe work some probability calculations into it.

edited 29th May '11 8:25:21 PM by nightwyrm_zero

By the same token, a huge part of the argument for abortion -on-demand would change. She chose to get pregnant. That means the abortion-on-demand can only be justified by "she changed her mind", not "she didn't have any choice"

...So? A choice is a choice, no matter when one decides. If you bracket it to a short period of time, then it stops being a choice. What if, for example, a woman decided she wanted to get pregnant, but then lost her source of income, or separated from her partner and no longer wanted to carry his child?

I highly doubt it would be as simple as 'I don't want to get pregnant, so I'll put off ovulating for today'. Ovulation could take place before the intercourse that fertilised the egg, so you'd have to plan your sex with a wide margin around the period of ovulation. And what's to stop some unscrupulous partner from casually asking "hey honey, when did you decide to ovulate next?" and waiting until she's already done it?

Not quite the same thing, but some animals, like cats, are induced ovulators - the act of sex is what stimulates them to ovulate. So they can get pregnant pretty much any time.

edited 30th May '11 12:11:31 AM by LoniJay

Humanity would be a collection of scattered tribes people. There would be a lot more sex, and less humans.