– And yet what became decisive in the formation of man?
– When about 6 million years ago, African forests, which were previously very large, began to decrease due to climate change, for the monkeys this turned out to be an unpleasant surprise. They had to adapt to life in open spaces, in forest-savannah conditions. They had upright walking and the ability to carry something with the help of their forelimbs. For example, food for the female. There are many ways to get a female’s benevolence. Male gorillas act by direct violence without asking for consent. And you can agree by entering into some more complex relationships, for example, using the bribery method. Sex in exchange for food. Bribery is not such a simple matter, it is a kind of diplomacy. Gradually, the selection was won not by aggressive and capable of resisting, but by those who know how to negotiate.
– Competition between males due to a shortage of females takes place not only through duels, it can take hidden forms such as sperm wars. This phenomenon is common in both invertebrates and mammals. How not to remember the phenomenon: prostitutes who have many partners rarely get pregnant.
– Sperm wars are in chimpanzees who practice promiscuity – open relationships. The female has contacts with several males in the group. This means that inside the female is a seed from different males. Sperm fights against sperm. Most of the sperm is aimed at eliminating other people’s sperm. People don’t have it.
“But the problem is that the female only needs sex when she ovulates. And women can do this all their lives.
– If a dog is in heat, everyone knows about it. The females of our ancestors, they were called ardipithecus, tried to stretch out the signs of ovulation for as much time as possible. So there was a change in the cycle from estrous to menstrual. It turned out that the female must be fed all year round, because you never know exactly when ovulation will come. You can recognize ovulation with a good sense of smell. Those of our ancestors who could not really feel it got an advantage. There was a strange complex: small fangs, low aggression, hypersexuality, hidden ovulation, poor sense of smell – with this we went further into evolution. These were not people at all. If these creatures survived to the present, then they would sit in a zoo next to chimpanzees and we would be surprised at them.
– Lush female breasts are the mystery of evolution. In the same monkeys, the mammary glands are poorly developed and swell only during the feeding period.
“Our ancestors had to hide the signs of ovulation. They are easier to hide among other, false signs. Since we cannot remove the breast, we must make it constantly visible, and then it will not be clear whether the woman is feeding or not. For most animals, the presence of a breast is an asexual sign: if a mouse or dog is feeding, she cannot conceive at that time, so a female with protruding nipples is asexual. People have broken this connection.
– Males in nature are often brighter than females. This means they are more vulnerable. Junk goods … In the world of people, as a rule, the opposite is true. Women love clothes, cosmetics, jewelry.
– Bright males are only in those species where the female takes full care of the offspring, for example, in peacocks, hens, roosters. The male only fertilizes, and the female does the rest. People are characterized by a common concern for offspring. The man went hunting, the woman kept the hearth. The chances of survival were higher for a child with both parents rather than one mother. Now the situation has changed. We have mutual sexual selection. Men choose women based on appearance, which should be attractive, and for a woman, the social success of a partner is more important: position in society, certain skills and achievements.
“Loyalty is a rarity in animal behavior. Both vertebrates and invertebrates do not gravitate toward monogamous marriage. In order for the population to survive, betrayals are needed. The mixing of genes, their combinations give “fresh” blood, ensure survival.
– There are monogamous species, there are many of them among birds. There are species with not very stable monogamy, like sparrows, for example, sometimes the male can fly away “to the left.” The standard of fidelity is the example of prairie voles, which, unlike meadow voles, undergo a brain restructuring: they do not see other males and females, they completely close on each other. These rodents form pairs for life.
– An unattainable sample! Such fidelity is rare in the human population…
– People do not have one clearly defined type of marriage relationship. One woman has several husbands, there are couples who have been together for 50 years. The most common type of marriage is serial monogamy, when people live together for 5-7 years, then enter into a new union, then into the next. And so several series. If only marriages within a certain group are welcome in a population, then infidelity will help maintain genetic diversity and preserve the population. For example, among the Chukchi, traditionally, the owner offered his wife to the traveler. But the Koryaks, their close relatives, did not have this. And somehow they existed and survived.
– In the animal world, acquaintance begins with sniffing. After all, smell is one of the factors that trigger sexual behavior. But for a person, the smell means a lot. Sometimes we subconsciously “sniff out” a partner. Smell is one of the components of the notorious love formula.
– Our sense of smell has become weak, which is why we do not feel ovulation, so smells do not play such a strong role as in animals. An experiment is known when men were put on exercise bikes to pedal and sweat heavily, after which women were offered to sniff their T-shirts. The same smell of some of the participants seemed nasty, some – attractive. This is due to the histocompatibility complex. The right partner, who will produce healthy children, can be found by smell.
– For animals, the smell is also a marker of the sexual maturity of the partner. Therefore, such a deviation as pedophilia is unusual for our smaller brothers.
– Under the word “pedophilia” we mean different things. Animals do not react to the passport, but to the presence of certain signs. If a girl has reached puberty, but has not crossed the age of consent, we call it pedophilia. It used to be 14 years, now it’s 16. But try to explain to a dog or a tiger that a change in legal norms leads to criminal liability. People also focus on certain signs of the onset of puberty, but adjust their behavior in accordance with the norms of society and the law.
– Do animals have a “candy-bouquet” period, a stage of courtship?
– Certainly. You have to understand that this is the same animal with which you are ready to create a couple. The cost of a mistake is very high. Imagine that you will create a couple with someone who will not have children, because this is a creature of a different kind. The wrong crane was caught. Therefore, it is necessary to observe the movements, sounds that the future partner makes. If they understand each other, you can create a couple. Courtship is a mutual attunement.
– You also need to correctly assess the gender, which is often not so obvious. Who is in front of you – a man or a woman? In addition, in nature there is the phenomenon of protogeny – sex change. In humans, this manifests itself at the level of behavior.
There are different ways to determine gender. People have a chromosomal sex determination: which ones got – this will be the sex. With some variations and deviations. And in crocodiles, sex is determined by the temperature at which the eggs in the clutch ripen. At a temperature of about 30 degrees Celsius, only “girls” appear, and at temperatures above 34 degrees, only “boys” appear.
And in some fish, sex is determined by substances that are contained in the water. The male secretes certain substances that inhibit the development of other males. In a flock of fish there will always be one male and many females. It seems to prevent females from becoming males. If the male dies, all females try to become males. The first one that succeeds begins to produce these substances. If you get such a fish in your aquarium, it will certainly become a male. This option has nothing to do with humans.
– People are very sophisticated in the ways of sexual intimacy. Sex in the animal world does not differ in variety, because the meaning of “marriage” is to procreate and preserve the species.
– How can I tell you … In this regard, the closest thing to a person is pygmy bonobo chimpanzees. They solve any problems and conflicts with the help of sex. And quite varied. Their arsenal of love games has everything you can imagine and more.
“But this is still a relationship for the purpose of having offspring, and not a human version for the sake of pleasure, sex in its purest form. Animals don’t have it!
– Why? There is. Animals don’t think if they’re having sex for the sake of sex or for procreation. They just do what they want. If a lion indulges in this occupation 40 times a day, this does not mean that 28 are for the sake of reproduction, and 12 are for pleasure.
– There is a hypothesis that animals do not experience orgasm.
– They test it, how! At least the male orgasm definitely exists, but with the female – the question is more complicated. There are animals in which orgasm triggers ovulation. In females, it became an optional thing, but then it was recruited in order to strengthen the bond between male and female or male and female.
– In the animal world, quick sex is a guarantee of safety. Enemies will not have time to attack and devour! And men make an appointment with a sex therapist with complaints of a short sexual intercourse.
“Animals are different too. Some have sex for a very long time, literally for hours, because this is a guarantee that as long as the partner is nearby, the female will not allow others to come near her. This increases the chance that the children will be his. Those who do not have such a task, in particular many birds, have a very short sexual intercourse. And with us, sex serves to strengthen bonds between people. Prolonged sexual intercourse strengthens relationships.
Why are sex crimes almost always committed by men?
– First of all, this is not entirely true. When it comes to rape, it is usually done by men. It’s hard for a woman to rape a man. A woman, as a rule, is weaker, moreover, it is more difficult to force a man to have sex against his will than a woman. He has more room for violence. The habit of acting as the initiator of sex plays a bad joke on some men when they do not understand the line between what is allowed and what is not.
– To calm the aggressor, it is enough for the animal to lie on its back – to take an unprotected pose. And only a person can not stop …
“There are little turtles that can afford to fight to the death, they don’t have any brakes. They run and push. But it is difficult for them to hurt each other – everyone knows how “fast” turtles run! And wolves or poisonous snakes, which are very well armed, can kill each other. But if two wolves fight to the death, then the third one, who does not participate in this battle, will win. As a result, there is a selection for lower aggression. Poisonous snakes stand opposite each other: whoever is higher wins. There are clear ritual postures. As soon as the wolf exposes his neck for a blow or lies down, he admits his defeat, and the battle immediately ends. Combat deaths are an exception. Wolves end their fights amicably, because the goal of their confrontation is not to kill, but to defeat the enemy. The best option: one showed fangs, the other got scared and ran away.
And we do not have stupors, like snakes, but there is a culture that does not allow strikes, being a restraining center; but sometimes the brakes can fail.
– Patterns of sexual behavior lie deep in the brain. When aggression and rage, located in the lower parts of the nervous system, rise, sexual crimes occur. It turns out that the higher primates do not cope well with instincts.
– A slippery topic, because the word “instinct” is understood by different people in different meanings. In a narrow sense, instinct is a program: do “A”, do “B”. In insects, a sequence of actions occurs, for example, when laying eggs. As a programmer writes: if action C fails, go back to action B. In mammals, many things are regulated, there are instinctive programs, and there is a powerful regulation from the higher parts of the nervous system. Give the dog food and command “no!” And she won’t take it, even though she wants to. The higher the animal in intellectual terms, the lower the share of instinct and the higher the share of intelligence. And we have succeeded in this. We have instinctive programs, but they are so strongly subordinated to our cognitive functions that they mean much more than what was originally laid down.