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from the am-I-going-to-regret-releasing-this? dept.
EurekAlert have just published an article: Yale researchers shed light on evolutionary mystery: Origins of the female orgasm
The role of female orgasm, which plays no obvious role in human reproduction, has intrigued scholars as far back as Aristotle. Numerous theories have tried to explain the origins of the trait, but most have concentrated on its role in human and primate biology.
[...] Since there is no apparent association between orgasm and number of offspring or successful reproduction in humans, the scientists focused on a specific physiological trait that accompanies human female orgasm -- the neuro-endocrine discharge of prolactin and oxytocin -- and looked for this activity in other placental mammals. They found that in many mammals this reflex plays a role in ovulation.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Monday August 01 2016, @06:55PM
Sexual differentiation is a secondary expression on top of a common bio/neurological matrix?
Men and women aren't different species.
Sexual differentiation in tissue development occurs very late in fetal tissue development.
We lose our gills and beaks, before we grow penises or mammalia.
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 5, Funny) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Monday August 01 2016, @06:57PM
It played a BLOODY OBVIOUS ROLE, in the reproduction resulting in the birth of MY children, I give you that!
Of course, with respect to the published literature, this is purely anecdotal.
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by frojack on Monday August 01 2016, @07:28PM
Exactly/
Why else would she ever do it again?
Nature has its ways of rewarding what is good for the species. We avoid shit but are attracted to food. So we shit away from others and eating is a social event.
Lush lands produce more food and support more people. So humans enjoy the beauty of lush countryside landscapes and find deserts boring.
It goes on and on?
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by mendax on Monday August 01 2016, @07:34PM
Speak for yourself. I prefer the stark beauty of the desert. Death Valley is my favorite place on earth, well 8 months out of the year. I'm not going to endure another 125F (52C) day there again.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday August 01 2016, @10:39PM
But back on topic, the summary's retarded. The article's probably retarded too. Evolutionarily, our bodies still think we need to drop up to a dozen sprogs, we've not had a time to adapt to modern things like germ theory and hand-washing. Not gonna happen without some incentive.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by frojack on Monday August 01 2016, @10:50PM
I knew someone would chirp in with that, but the point is you eat what came from elsewhere.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Monday August 01 2016, @11:17PM
I think the pinnacle of human evolution and social development has been making the entire conception "out-of-doors" as something one may dismiss from daily life.
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 2) by art guerrilla on Tuesday August 02 2016, @11:18AM
um, so you don't recognize you are an outlier, or refuse to accept it ? ? ?
*most* of us prefer the lushness compared to the desiccated landscape...
while the desert is certainly 'alive', it ain't got nowhere near the amount of edible plants and critters a savanna/forest type environment has...
only so many ants and horn frogs you can scare up in the sand (not to mention derive water from), then you die...
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 01 2016, @07:07PM
The fundamental error is in thinking that sex is purely about reproduction.
Reproduction is only a tiny part of human sexuality.
Sex is primarily a social function. If it were no fun for half the race, that would be a severe impediment to all of it. That's why most animals do not have female orgasms, they aren't doing anything more than reproducing, Its one of the ways we are different from animals.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Monday August 01 2016, @11:20PM
BONOBO!!
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 2) by black6host on Tuesday August 02 2016, @06:27AM
Well, tell all that to my old (dead going on 30+ years now) cat. Mind you, cats don't listen much. Much less dead cats. Nevermind that though. She was alive at the time. Now when she got laid, that cat made more noise than any woman I've been with. So I'd not be so quick to say what is and what isn't so. :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2016, @02:40PM
Those were not exclamations of pleasure.
Cat dicks have literal spines. [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 1) by mobydisk on Monday August 01 2016, @08:49PM
There is no stage of human fetal development in which the human fetus has gills or a beak. This is a very old theory that seems to have caught on in pop culture. You might have, at some point, been exposed to the diagram in this Wikipedia article: Recapitulation theory. [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 1) by Francis on Monday August 01 2016, @09:19PM
I'd never heard that myth that embryos go through those stages. I assume that the misunderstanding comes from the fact that when the hands and feet are forming that there's webbing between the fingers and toes prior to those cells dying off during the later stages of development on those appendages. Occasionally a baby would be born with webbed feet if things didn't go as they were supposed to, leading to that myth.
Or, it could just be some old school trolls going after the folks that believe in evolution.
(Score: 5, Informative) by rleigh on Monday August 01 2016, @11:45PM
We don't have beaks at any point in development. Organisms with beaks are not ancestors of mammals, and we don't have the genes for a beak. (However, organisms with beaks do have organisms with teeth as ancestors, retain the genes for teeth since they are needed during development for other purposes, and they can under some circumstances grow teeth instead of a beak; this is possibly where the expression "rare as hen's teeth" comes from. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B9780123971906000110) [sciencedirect.com]
Mammals do have gills, or at least an approximation of their structure, transiently during development. Fish are a common ancestor of mammals and birds. The pharyngeal arches are in mammals the source of special cell types which go on to form specific structures and organs. For example cells of the the third pharyngeal pouch migrate down to the top of the thorassic cavity, where they become the thymus, the organ used for T cell development and selection. Also, the repeated muscle blocks found in fish (somites) are also found in developing mammalian embroyos; but rather than staying put in the pattern found in the fish, they migrate around the embryo in a highly regulated fashion to form the musculature of the body, as well as bones, tendons and other tissues. http://www.embryology.ch/anglais/mmuskel/skelett01.html [embryology.ch] There are also other examples of this sort. The plan of something approximating a fish does exist transiently during the early stages of development, and is part of the first steps in the complex patterning of the mammalian body plan.
The above are are long-established developmental biology facts; you can see this stuff simply through observation of the growing embryo. I was taught this in my undergraduate and studied the development of the vascular system in lymphatic organs for my PhD. The most common model organism used to study mammalian vascular development is the zebrafish (Danio rerio). More evolved organisms augment the developmental pattern of their more primitive ancestors rather than replacing it. And most of the growth factors, inhibitors and signalling molecules are the same and can be used across species. And this makes evolutionary sense. A gene might mutate or be copied, but the need for the original function remains. More evolved organisms tend to conserve the function of genes found in their evolutionary ancestors since they are often critical to their viability, and this extends to development. It's easier to add new (copied) genes, and refine developmental processes by subtly adding to the process, than it is to change them wholesale. And this is where the "developmental hourglass" concept comes from. http://10e.devbio.com/article.php?id=343 [devbio.com]
Webbing as you say is due to a lack of cell death between fingers and toes. A single FGFR2 gene mutation can make the difference between webbed and not webbed. https://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/condition/apert-syndrome [nih.gov] so it's likely some modulation of FGF activity here was the cause of the loss of webbing in our amphibian ancestors.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2016, @09:29AM
I assume that the misunderstanding comes from the fact that when the hands and feet are forming that there's webbing between the fingers and toes prior to those cells dying off during the later stages of development on those appendages.
Now it becomes clear how Francis ended up in the situation he has. A basic ignorance of mammalian reproductive biology could end up with an unexpected offspring. Let me guess, you can't get pregnant the first time? Now if only there was some larger, need we say, more Scientific? understanding of the mechanisms involved.
Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny, the process of the creation of the individual is a recreation of the process of he creation of the phylum. Or the species. So it is not a mere matter of webs. Try endrocrinatic cell differention, or tachyon particle beams. You are way over your head, Francis!
(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Monday August 01 2016, @11:23PM
ibid.:
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/1f/6a/d5/1f6ad5151fb618e0d793c0d402c5fe23.jpg [pinimg.com]
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 01 2016, @09:19PM
> We lose our gills and beaks
Squawk for yourself, parrot boy.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 01 2016, @10:04PM
I'd never heard that myth that embryos go through those stages.
Francis
Once again we are amazed at all the things Francis has never heard of. It's called "learning". Try some.
> We lose our gills and beaks
Squawk for yourself, parrot boy.
I begin to suspect that there is a greater than statistically normal occurence of vestigial tails amongst Soylentils, along with the "beaks" and "giles".
(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Tuesday August 02 2016, @02:26AM
Giles?
Giles and Fripp.
Cheerful insanity.
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2016, @03:34AM
Yes, you seem to have lost one Giles. Now about the tail. . . .