"Not only are human females compelled to compete for mates, something uncommon in most species, they appear also to have been the sex most changed (at least in outward appearance) by runaway sexual selection in Homo sapiens, making women the least primate-looking of all higher primates. In comparison, males have been left relatively untouched [16].
Moreover, there is a predictable and tragic consequence to the development of neoteny as an emblem of adult female attractiveness. Consider it this way. Sexual selection requires two partners in order to work, first the sex under competitive stress (normally males, but in this case women) among whom a certain fraction are "chosen." If some trait has a high correlation with reproductive success, the prevalence of that trait will increase in the next generation. And true runaway will accelerate even faster if the choosers change as well — becoming ever more critical and demanding of that trait. So if paedomorphism was women's runaway trait, there's every reason to picture men growing ever more attracted to paedomorphism in women, at a matching pace. Obvious enough, so far.
But paedomorphism means resemblance to children! Consider the bizarre dilemma, then. In order to attract quality mates — protector types — women began taking on the external features of the objects of the protective impulse — children. This was rewarded, presumably, with reproductive success. But it also meant that men began associating with sexual desirability the very outward traits which are most directly associated with childhood!
The calamitous sickness of sex with pre-pubescents is one of the nastier features of our species. It is denounced by the majority, yet persists at low levels in all cultures, posing a dilemma for those contemplating a better tomorrow for our descendants. But now we might suggest one possible explanation of the origin of this dysfunction. It may derive, at least in part, as an aberrant offshoot from the two-way cycle of runaway sexual selection just described. If ever there was proof that evolution is not planned, this is it. An undergraduate could have predicted the tragic consequences.
Fecundity, health, neoteny... these are superficial signs which human males came to associate with feminine sexual attractiveness. Unfortunately, this boat-load of attributes was without a tiller, headed on a collision course with the best interests of the very children the whole game is about in the first place! What was needed was an emergency adaptation to help sane human males tell children apart from adult, fecund women. It is at this point, I contend, that human females developed a secondary set of exaggerated physical traits, not to elicit sex from males but in order to help high-end males across this tragic trap. One of the most pronounced of these secondary traits was the ballooning of women's breasts."
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01-18-2020, 01:46 AM
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