Posted on 03/24/2007 9:12:40 AM PDT by aculeus
A prize-winning paper suggests that humans are hairless apes because Stone-Age mothers regarded furry babies as unattractive
Medical Hypotheses, an Elsevier publication, has announced the winner of the 2006 David Horrobin Prize for medical theory. Written by Judith Rich-Harris, author of The Nurture Assumption and No Two Alike, the article, "Parental selection: a third selection process in the evolution of human hairlessness and skin color" was judged to best embody the spirit of the journal. The £1,000 prize, launched in 2004, is awarded annually and named in honour of Dr. David Horrobin, the renowned researcher, biotechnology expert and founder of Medical Hypotheses, who died in 2003.
Harris' paper describes Stone Age societies in which the mother of a newborn had to decide whether she had the resources to nurture her baby. The newborn's appearance probably influenced whether the mother kept or abandoned it. An attractive baby was more likely to be kept and reared.
Harris' theory is that this kind of parental selection may have been an important force in evolution. If Stone Age people believed that hairless babies were more attractive than hairy ones, this could explain why humans are the only apes lacking a coat of fur. Harris suggests that Neanderthals must have been furry in order to survive the Ice Age. Our species would have seen them as "animals" and potential prey. Harris' hypothesis continues that Neanderthals went extinct because human ancestors ate them.
This year's prize judge was Professor Jonathan Rees FMedSci of Edinburgh University, Scotland - co-discoverer of the 'red hair gene'. Professor Rees said: "This paper is an excellent example of the kind of bold thinking and theorizing which David Horrobin intended to encourage when he began Medical Hypotheses. I hope that Judith Rich Harris' idea provokes debate and further investigation of this topic."
In theory I'm a theorist as well you know.
He's the missing link?
And if Stone Age people believed that babies which spit up were more attractive than ones who didn't, this could explain why babies never spit up.
It's probably because Rebecca had compassion on the ugly, hairy Esau. And the rest, as they say, is history.
It was a combination of socialization and bugs. Hairless people could have their ticks picked off more easily and were therefore less susceptible to insect-borne disease. Over time the hairless ones came to dominate the population.
See, I spun that "theory" out of whole cloth right here and now, and it's just as credible and well-supported as most published ones.
...or Michael Moore
As men today still do.
There, all fixed.
Cheers!
A gene splicing experiment gone terribly wrong.
I think it's because humans, being damned smart, could guarantee themselves a consistent food supply comprised of high-energy, highly-digestible meat. They didn't need to hoard body heat the way some species do.
I didn't know that NARAL went back that far.
But it does tend to expose the affinities between NARAL and Darwin.
"I beg your pardon...?"
I think it was more likely to be a sexual selection process. Women (or Men) with less hair were probably considered to be more attractive.
That just doesn't hold up. It doesn't matter how ugly a woman is there is someone out there who will jump at the chance to breed with her.
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