Re: Why don't male nipples work?


Guy A Hoelzer <hoelzer@xxxxxxx> wrote:-

I find Bill's question very interesting, and this is another response that
I
think misses the target. My response here is to ask, if it is so simple,
why don't male mammals produce a pulse of female hormones to make
functionally mature breasts? It would seem that the ability to breast
feed
by males would be quite an advantage in at least some mammalian systems.

I think that the ongoing increased specialization of both male and female
roles (selected via the Baldwin effect ) has became so great that
functioning breasts in males would be disadvantage/neutral to the Darwinian
fitness of BOTH sexes. Just as it is disadvantageous to the fitness of both
sexes to allow the female (specialized in carrying the foetus for both
sexes ) to defend with equal vigour with the male their shared
territory/status position (which remains so critical to the interdependent
fitness of both sexes) lactating males would be disadvantaged/neutral in
their high risk specialized role of territory defence minimally allowing
lactation in males to drift (in the same way that vitamin C drifted to
inevitable inaction within vegetarian species like ours). Also, the mass
social confusion produced by males broadcasting an inappropriate
social/sexual signal (enlarged breasts and nipples) would require the
evolution of a major psychological correction.

I think this question underscores the critical nature of ever increasing
mutualised Darwinian fitness _interdependence_ (not dependence) evolving
within our species which is not understood by the gene centric Neo Darwinian
establishment. Birds evolved the foetus to develop outside of the body using
the egg. Predictably, they demonstrate much more flexibility in both
territory defence and feeding of the young because the female does not have
to carry a foetus inside the body. Recent discoveries re: the articulation
of the primate sphenoid bone providing 5 quantum increases in cranial
capacity (a sixth is predicted in the near future) while at the same time
allowing the upright posture appears to have put major selective pressure on
the human female birth canal because of the increasing size of the emerging
babies head. This has resulted in a jaw reduction producing wisdom teeth
eruption.This would point to our species re-evolving the egg in the near
future, probably via reproductive technology. This would free up females to
compete more equally with males allowing the evolving increased size of the
human brain without the limitation of the female birth canal.

Regards,

John Edser
Independent Researcher

edser@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx



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