to ponder that evolutionary women may well were chosen to look after their off spring

[FairLadyRantALot]

in the way they do....i.e. often more close and full on parent.....
just thinking this of other debates, not just on mn, so, not a thread about a thread.....because men can have baby's whatever age, and are meant to die younger than women, but women have a biological cut off date....?
personally I do believe we all have the same human rights, but that we are generally wired differently depending on many things, such as race, sex....but I do think that women are evolutionary and biologically more geared up to parenting, as in remembering everything, to some extent

Snorbs "So if we as humans had already evolved the menopause long before we got to the point where (intellect-driven) altruism was possible, we could well be stuck with it."

There is no evolutionary reason for it to change is there? The current human "model" is extremely successful, there are 6 billion of us.

Too many of us, I fear.

Whether we are stuck with it or not doesn't mean that we shouldn't use our intellect to over-ride it on the basis of nature not intending women to have children past a certain age. It might have been of benefit in the long distant past when we weren't that different from the great apes but maybe of no benefit now. The baby is no longer more likely to die now if the mother does.

Although maybe we're not so different. It would appear that primates will look after other babies according to this

"..primate infants being separated from their mothers and adopted by other females shortly after birth,"

I seriously doubt whether we will be allowed to breed to the point where the planet itself is in danger.

Humans are as part of the cycle as any other animal, we like to think we are outside of it but we aren't. The problem as I see it, is we are intelligent enough now to hurt when nature reasserts itself. I also think we are seeing that start to happen, there are many people choosing not to have children, there are many people going through infertility, earthquakes, wars, tsunamis etc.

Who is evolutionary woman? I don't recognise the term.

I suspect that there is both an elementof 'nature' here and also 'culture' going on and the two interact.

We know the nature part quite well. Men being physically stronger in prehistory tened to asked with hunting. Strong fact running men are better hnters than women. Women are the only sex tat can have a baby and suckle it. Women carrying babies before birth as wel as suckling them after birth and looking after toddlers and young in hunter gatherer socities can still browse for fruits, nuts, grubs and perhaps small game. Men hunting wild animals would put any children in physical danger that were with them.

Hence women in huter gatherer societies looked after children because the sex roles of hunter gatherer socities required it.

However, in modern socity those roles are not set at all. Men can look after children except perhaps in the frst 6 months of breast feeding but after that can providing bottle feeding is available. Our 'nature' determination of sex roles has disappeared.

I find it no harder to look after DSs than DW. Men and women are no more geared up for parenting than each other. Society until very recently did not accept that fact though - and to some extent still find it hard to come to terms with.

Being a little bit controversial here, but I find some women on MN talk as if they are actually reluctant to give up the traditional 'mother' childcare role. Perhaps it is not always about men not wanting to look after DCs. Perhaps in some cases it is also women not wanting men to look after DCs either?

I think it's often about not wanting to look after children AND men.

I am evolutionary woman!

Aw my post would have been so much better after nkf's

nkf some women really do seem to enjoy the martyr role though.

You don't actually have to look after a grown man, if you choose to then don't complain about it. It is your choice.

(general you obviously)

I tend to agree with abetadad's post that these roles are now driven by societal norms rather than necessity.

Personally I happily palm my young off onto DH and he is more than happy with that.

But I have friends who do the whole "you can't do it you're a man" stuff which I find very sad as ultimately it makes life very hard work for the mother and IMO and IME leads to a less close relationship between the dad and the DC.

I know you don't have to (general you again) but look at how many women do. And they do because...

It's expected.
The men create like mad if it doesn't happen
They feel guilty.

In theory, you can resist but it's not a no brainer. Not for many women and couples.

lol...you lot...
nfk...I think my heading should have been evolutionarily not evolutionary

Thank you for all that interesting input....it is really interesting to read, and looked at the link to the book and that looks brill

I think I envy those kangoroos...now that is the way forward, birthwise....never a need for a C-section again

Apparently, human females reach menopause at about the time you would expect for an ape of our size - although it's hard to assess menopause in apes since they generally die before then. It's our long post-reproductive life that is curious - leading to the grnadmother hypothesis - selection for longer lives in order to increase grandchild survival. Stil a lot of depbate on this issue though.

Some very interesting research on human maternal bonding. I just got this book: Mother and others (Sarah Blaffer Hrdy) which you might find interesting. Part of it is about the development of alloparenting (care by others) in humans which may mean that we actually tend to bond less intensely with our offspring compared to other mammals e.g. chimps, who never put their babies down for at least 6 months.

She also takes the view that father-involvement is facultative and highly context dependent, which I think makes sense.

Don't you think the fact that women hav boobs might be a bit of a giveaway too?

Katie that just shows that women are the ones ment to nourish the Baby they birth though....nothing to do with long term care and being there for them, iykwim

Acinonyx, it's interesting that other apes tend to die before menopause.

Maybe that's another explanation - women run out of viable eggs at 50-odd not because there's some evolutionary benefit in doing so, but more because humans never lived long enough (until relatively recently, at least) for it to make any noticeable difference.

The grandmother hypothesis is an interesting one but I'm not sure that older women would've lived long enough in ancient times post-menopause for that to have an effect on genes.

I think there's a lot of evidence that suggests our longevity (particularly in the West) is to do with good diet, powerful medical care and absence of predators. Again, I see that as humans supplanting evolution-driven benefits with those gained by intellect.

In some senses you could say we're evolution's next big idea after the whole recombinant DNA thing. DNA is great
for finding out what happens to a species when their genes randomly mutate and then seeing what benefits those mutations might confer given the environment at the time. But it's slooooow. Instead, our intelligence allows us to change the environment to suit us which is a lot faster. I wonder if we're living longer not because we've got DNA that selects for long life, but because we've adapted our lifestyles and environment to allow us to circumvent the limitations of our genes.

what is your field of expertise, Snorbs....just you seem to know a lot about this...really interesting...

We can't really know how long prehistoric women survived in general but there are skeletons indicating that some were old. Life expectancy statistics usually include child mortality - when you take that out, mean age at death in even the worst of places tends to increase dramatically.

There are s number of studies showing that maternal grandmother survival correlates with grandchild survival in preindustrial societies. Of course that can't prove the link, but it indicates that selection could act in that way.

As for running out of eggs - it's not that selection is thought to have selected for that - that ocurs naturally.

Of course higher western modern life expectencies are the outcome of modern living - but that is very recent. We are behaviourally flexible and create our own niche - but personally I don't think that accounts for all of our behaviour, even in modern times.

Um, I'm not sure I have a field of expertise. I'm more of a generalist procrastinator so I read a lot of random crap when I should be doing something useful

I will hold my hand up to being a lifelong New Scientist fan and someone who's fascinated by evolution and genetics among other science topics. Dawkins' "The Blind Watchmaker", for instance, is well worth reading and explains some of the deeper implications of genetic selection very well.

well...you impressed me.......
acinonyx...so do you....
am pretty clueless myself, got my theories and all that...but...just clueless about he nitty gritty bits...

I know society does rreally have a big influence on behavciours...but menopUSE IS SUCH A PHYSICAL THING...THERE HAS GOT TO BE A REASOON FOR IT... ooop caps sorry...wasn't shouing at anyone, sorry...so, just wondered if there is that deeper reason, that scientific one...

On the side issue of suckling, I am doubtful about Snorbs' comment that:

"From a genetic/evolutionary point of view, a mother suckling any child other than its own confers little if any advantage to that mother. The mother would have to obtain and consume enough calories to produce the milk which would then be given to a child bearing genes other than her own. I can't quite see how a gene that promoted such behaviour in the mother would make that mother's children be successful enough to out-reproduce the children of mothers who save their milk for their own kids."

This has particularly interested me as we recently had two stray cats give birth to litters in the alley at the back of our garden. I saw all the kittens feeding from both mothers quite indiscriminately, and the mothers raising no objections.

The mother's part in the breastfeeding relationship is pretty passive compared to that of her offspring (obviously after the initial newborn period in humans/primates). There is a great evolutionary advantage in a baby getting its milk where it can, whether from its own mother or not, and no great disadvantage in a mother letting a child that is not her own latch on, given that (a)the mother does not have a fixed supply of milk but one that responds to demand so "saving milk" is not an issue, and (b) all of the babies in the group will share most of the mother's genes whether or not they are actually the offspring of the mother.

also in humans historically feeding another baby not all that unusual, before the days of formula, and in 3.world coubtry still the norm now....however now in this society frowned upon...

however....if we are historcally way back were apes and apes don't bf other baby's, than the intelligence/survival thing might well have happened and that is why humans MAY JUST do feed another baby

1 handed typing bf

what has been missed is with apes early humans they are related in same group so would feed other child as same dad/mum relatve/tribe style thing

get beyond the apes as individuals we r like them but tribal we still prefer to live in groups as do they. what u do for own group different thAN FOR OTHERS.

It's possible that menopause was just a side-trait that coincided with a more valueable trait.

i.e Perhaps the women who ran out of eggs early were more able at something else which gave them an evolutionary advantage.

Maybe it got tagged on and is of no real importance just that the trait it was alongside was important.