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EvC Forum ⇒ Science Forums ⇒ Human Origins and Evolution ⇒

What bothers me about the evolution of Man

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Author Topic:   What bothers me about the evolution of Man
Straggler
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Message 19 of 142 (642881)
12-02-2011 12:46 PM 		Reply to: Message 18 by New Cat's Eye
12-02-2011 12:39 PM

The human brain uses a lot of energy. It requires a lot of feeding.
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Without any positive selection pressure it seems unlikely that such an "expensive" organ would evolve purely as a side product of other factors in the way I think you are suggesting.
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That might be how it started out. But some sort of selection for bigger and bigger brains does seem to be required to explain the result we have ended up with.
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Sexual selection seems a viable candidate. Big brains are sexy.
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Straggler
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Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006

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Message 22 of 142 (642891)
12-02-2011 1:40 PM 		Reply to: Message 21 by Percy
12-02-2011 1:37 PM

Re: Size Matters
Percy writes:
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There are several areas of human anatomy that are larger than average for mammals (proportional to our size), and I believe they're all primarily due to sexual selection.
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Such as?
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Breasts? Testicles? I'm not sure what you are thinking of here.
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Straggler
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Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006

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Message 24 of 142 (642895)
12-02-2011 1:56 PM 		Reply to: Message 23 by Moon-Ra
12-02-2011 1:48 PM

Re: Size Matters
Looking this stuff up. Apparently the human penis is the biggest of all the ape species in length and girth, both in absolute terms and as a proportion of body size.
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So it seems creativity, funniness and other such brain related issues (that this thread is directly about) are a way of adding metaphorical inches.....
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Straggler
Member
Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006

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Message 26 of 142 (642899)
12-02-2011 2:15 PM 		Reply to: Message 25 by Moon-Ra
12-02-2011 2:02 PM

Re: Size Matters
MR writes:
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Or maybe we have a big brain to try to convince them that size is not all that matters!
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And "they" have evolved big brains to see through these futile deceptions.
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Let the cock waving begin.....
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