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Original poster

How did people work out that sex can = baby???

146 replies

TweeBee · 12/08/2022 21:41

Just pondering this with DH and thought some wise MNers might know.
So presumably in early human history, not everyone who had unprotected sex became pregnant, like now. However the earliest sign of pregnancy is missing a period which would be maybe 2 weeks after sex during a fertile period and how aware were early humans of the regularities of the menstrual cycle? I'm guessing it was perhaps less regular due to variable nutritional intake etc.
And then it's say 8-9 months after sex you may have a baby.
So how did people work out that you can't have a baby without sex but you don't always get a baby from sex?
Does anyone know?

OP posts:
bellac11 · 12/08/2022 21:49

I often wonder this about a whole host of things.

Some humans are so stupid that its hard to understand how we recognised lots of things, like certain health issues, weather, physics

Things like potatoes or rice, how on earth did we know that if you do something to those they are edible. What about kidney beans that you have to soak or boil otherwise they make you ill, why would you get ill and then think 'oh I'll try it another way'

How would people know that you take a grain from a plant that you dont even have a name for yet, grind it up, mix it with water and some yeast (how do you know what yeast is or what it does), then not only do you mix it, you knead it, then you rest it, then you knead it again, then you cook it and then you eat it

I know flat breads came first but still the concept of making things out of other things without knowing whats going to be created at the end

sittingonacornflake · 12/08/2022 21:51

THIS SORT OF THING BAFFLES ME.

who saw an egg come out of chicken's bum and decide to cook it and eat it??

Babyboomtastic · 12/08/2022 21:53

Animals seem to understand it - those animals were the dads play an active role, or even if they just don't kill their own, must recognise a concept of fathering, even though it's crazy to think they would link the shag they had months before, with a cub, for example.

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Aquamarine1029 · 12/08/2022 21:53

The power of deduction, I suppose. For all of the daft people, there are intelligent ones. They would have also seen animals mating and having their young with a much quicker gestation than ours, so that would have helped put 2 and 2 together.

TiredYorkshireMam · 12/08/2022 21:54

bellac11 · 12/08/2022 21:49

I often wonder this about a whole host of things.

Some humans are so stupid that its hard to understand how we recognised lots of things, like certain health issues, weather, physics

Things like potatoes or rice, how on earth did we know that if you do something to those they are edible. What about kidney beans that you have to soak or boil otherwise they make you ill, why would you get ill and then think 'oh I'll try it another way'

How would people know that you take a grain from a plant that you dont even have a name for yet, grind it up, mix it with water and some yeast (how do you know what yeast is or what it does), then not only do you mix it, you knead it, then you rest it, then you knead it again, then you cook it and then you eat it

I know flat breads came first but still the concept of making things out of other things without knowing whats going to be created at the end

I think about the bread thing often.

GrannyAchingsShepherdsHut · 12/08/2022 21:54

Who the hell cut into an onion, got stinging eyes and nose, and thought 'oh, I'll eat this'?!?!

ABrotherWhoLooksLikeHellMugYou · 12/08/2022 21:54

One of the reasons I love the Jean Auel books because she hypothesises all these sort of things. Even if her main character is apparently responsible for several tens of thousands of 7ears of human development! 😁

Babyboomtastic · 12/08/2022 21:54

sittingonacornflake · 12/08/2022 21:51

THIS SORT OF THING BAFFLES ME.

who saw an egg come out of chicken's bum and decide to cook it and eat it??

🤢

And how many times did they get the experiment wrong...

ShirleyPhallus · 12/08/2022 21:55

Or squeezed a cow’s teat and thought to drink what came out

Changemaname1 · 12/08/2022 21:57

😂😂 this thread has made me smile . These are the type of things I ponder at 2am !!

Discovereads · 12/08/2022 21:57

Babyboomtastic · 12/08/2022 21:54

🤢

And how many times did they get the experiment wrong...

Show quote history

Any egg is safely edible and you don’t need to cook them to eat them.
Im more baffled by mushrooms as there are more that will kill you than are safe to eat…

Aquamarine1029 · 12/08/2022 21:58

ShirleyPhallus · 12/08/2022 21:55

Or squeezed a cow’s teat and thought to drink what came out

They would have seen the cow's young nursing, and then thought, "why not me?"

Numbat2022 · 12/08/2022 21:58

They tried to eat everything - through necessity. The stuff that killed people didn't get eaten again.

Babyboomtastic · 12/08/2022 21:59

ShirleyPhallus · 12/08/2022 21:55

Or squeezed a cow’s teat and thought to drink what came out

Tbf, people know that women can providew milk to breastfeed a baby, and see a cow producing milk for her calf. It's not that crazy to try it.

There are a lot of things (like bread), that I wonder about, but milk isn't one of them.

MooPointCowsOpinion · 12/08/2022 21:59

Yes exactly!
I’m glad it’s not just me that thinks of these weird questions.
Who decided which animals to actively farm and which not to?!
How did someone work out cross pollination to create new vegetables?!

Athenajm80 · 12/08/2022 22:00

@ABrotherWhoLooksLikeHellMugYou I agree. I love the books but FFS, that damn poem or song that she kept repeating annoyed me as well. Although it was reminiscent of the Homeric tradition where the storytellers would have parts that they could say without thinking which would allow them time to plan the next bit. I'm not sure if her song was a nod to that or just a way of filling up pages!

tenbob · 12/08/2022 22:00

I have wondered this so many times!

And do animals have any comprehension of the link between mating and babies? I’m guessing not, but i would love to know if dogs and cats realise they are pregnant, or just go into labour and have a ‘wtf are those things coming out of me’ moment

FilePhoto · 12/08/2022 22:01

I wonder this kind of thing all the time! Usually at 3am when I should be asleep.

JustKeepLookingWithYourEyes · 12/08/2022 22:01

ABrotherWhoLooksLikeHellMugYou · 12/08/2022 21:54

One of the reasons I love the Jean Auel books because she hypothesises all these sort of things. Even if her main character is apparently responsible for several tens of thousands of 7ears of human development! 😁

I came onto the thread to say exactly the same thing! Not believable that one person could be responsible for it all of course 😁but gives a good idea of how it might have been discovered

tenbob · 12/08/2022 22:04

I remember seeing a programme ages ago about bread and how they thought it was invented

The theory was that flatbreads were made by leaving them out in the sun (in Egypt, iirc) and that natural yeast spores in the air would have settled on some and caused they to rise

and because yeast has such a distinctive smell, people would have worked out that the bread that smelt yeasty was the fluffy one, and worked out a way of adding yeast to make it rise

3luckystars · 12/08/2022 22:04

My boss was talking to me about this before, it’s really interesting alright. How and when did they join the dots that this baby belongs to who, and also were there people not believing this information for a long time?

Thelnebriati · 12/08/2022 22:05

I think people first used animal milk to keep human babies alive. Maybe the mother didn't produce enough milk, or had died.

Discovereads · 12/08/2022 22:06

My DC with significant autism was going on about this the other day, but in the context of how humanity NEEDS autistic people with obsessive hobbies. They said that the human who went around banging different rocks together until they banged two together and created sparks, and thus invented fire had to have been ND. Because a NT human would get bored and give up, or probably not even notice small differences in rocks. Only a ND human who felt an obsession for banging different rocks together to see what would happen would devote their life to such a task. Actually find a bit of iron pyrite and flint and eureka, fire!

minou123 · 12/08/2022 22:06

Numbat2022 · 12/08/2022 21:58

They tried to eat everything - through necessity. The stuff that killed people didn't get eaten again.

That was going to be my answer.

It terms of things making you ill, like the kidney beans. Perhaps, I don't know just theorising, but maybe thier digestive system was different to ours.
Fundamentally, we probably haven't evolved biology much, but I can imagine our immune systems etc are very different.

dehloh · 12/08/2022 22:07

Chester zoo just had a baby giraffe and I was watching the video of its first steps and feed and completely baffled as to how this baby giraffe knows what to do

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