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How did mankind ever work out 'where babies come from'???

199 replies

RememberToPlaywiththeKids · 31/03/2011 20:21

Seriously - 9 months from sex to bubs - how did anyone ever work out the cause and effect??

OP posts:
Melty · 01/04/2011 21:53

I forgot about this.

fastedwina · 01/04/2011 21:56

This is a great question, one i have never thought of before, it's nice to have new things to think about at my age.

BrokenBananaTantrum · 01/04/2011 22:16

I feel quite Sad now about cats being scared when giving birth. I always assumed that it was instinctive and that they were ok.
I like the butter invention story. I bet loads of stuff happened by accident

CheerfulYank · 02/04/2011 08:24

Pmsl at this thread. As mardy says, it was Aylah who figured it out, of course.

MrsTittleMouse · 02/04/2011 09:00

Doesn't lightening produce glass if it strikes sand?
Blush
That would have been a very good clue. :)

What I don't understand is how so many cultures have theorised that the baby comes only from the father (or mother). Surely it's quite obvious that the baby has features from both parents. So it couldn't have grown from a tiny baby inside the sperm (like <a class="break-all" href="http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=www.websters-online-dictionary.org/images/wiki/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/94/Preformation.GIF/180px-Preformation.GIF&imgrefurl=www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definitions/Homunculus&usg=__Kpl72Mn3v66LEzENjqgrH7Gp5HY=&h=236&w=180&sz=10&hl=en&start=0&zoom=1&tbnid=qSowkqypGoUulM:&tbnh=133&tbnw=102&ei=TNeWTYCUCYOX4gaM5aS1DA&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dhomuncule%2Bin%2Bsperm%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26biw%3D1264%26bih%3D581%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=132&vpy=122&dur=347&hovh=188&hovw=144&tx=101&ty=89&oei=TNeWTYCUCYOX4gaM5aS1DA&page=1&ndsp=20&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">this)

And, as others have said, there was a lot of selective breeding in agriculture at that time.

Melty · 02/04/2011 09:23

Ohh Ohh yes it does: (Sweet Home Alabama? Awful yet I watched it to the end! Smile )
Lightning that strikes sandy beaches can make the grains of sand fuse together like glass, producing tunnel shaped shards of a material called Fulgurite. These shards are extremely rare and can come in different colours depending on the type of sand.

confuddledDOTcom · 02/04/2011 11:35

Who said women "knew" to cut the cord? Cutting the cord, apart from in emergency situations when you need to get baby to help, is not necessary, it's possible they just left it.

confuddledDOTcom · 02/04/2011 11:49

I think the problem domestic animals have - whether pets or captive animals - is they don't have the benefit of the experience of other animals. A pet cat hasn't seen another cat give birth, pregnant animals in zoos and farms are often separated from the others, in the wild they'd have seen it regularly.

Unless a cavewoman was living on her own and never met another person other than her mate, she would have the benefit of the women around her. It's bit of a chicken and egg really, isn't it? She's not the first woman to give birth so others around her have and can support her and she may have supported other women.

Sex is different though. I've had images of David Tennant (not about sex this time) on Derren Brown's show where he's proving superstition on this group of people and they're running around trying different ways to make the clock change. What they don't know is that it's a random event determined by when two goldfish cross a line, so every time they do something and the clock changes they try repeating it to see if it works again. Sometimes it does so they keep doing it, sometimes it doesn't but they still keep doing it because it worked before.

So a cavecouple have sex and there's no baby, so they try some ritual and then do it again, maybe they get pregnant, maybe they never do. They might have realised that periods stop when you're pregnant and they go a few months without one then have a big one so they think they're doing something wrong and try another ritual... I can imagine that the idea that it's as simple as sex=baby was totally lost on humans for a very long time. Lets face it, even today our doctors aren't teaching us it's that simple. We have all these things we have to do or not do, the fate of our baby is in our hands, we do it wrong and the baby could be miscarried or die - then they tell us it wasn't our fault and nothing we could have done... This is one of my pet peeves, I think we're told too much "superstition" when it comes to pregnancy.

Jacksmania · 03/04/2011 16:32

RE: domestic animals being frightened when giving birth because they haven't seen other animals giving birth, the same applies to humans though --- we are no longer the kind of society where women rally around other women to support them while giving birth. I mean, we may get advice from friends or family who have given birth before, but we really don't commonly see another woman giving birth so really have no idea what to expect in nitty-gritty details.

(Disclaimer: it may not necessarily help to see other women give birth :o - I did labour coaching for four girlfriends before having Jackbaby and OMG his birth was a complete shit storm. So I'm disproving my own theory :o)

SummerRain · 03/04/2011 17:00

confuddled... most wild animals would never see another of their species giving birth!

Many animals live solitary lives, and even many of those that don't will remove themselves from the group when the time to give birth comes (lions, wolves, gorillas to name a few) so there would be no previous knowledge of the event before the female had to go through it herself.

RobynLou · 03/04/2011 17:11

embarrassing admission...I didn't realise you had to move to make things happen when you had sex until I saw 4 weddings and a funeral when I was about 16 Blush

all the diagrams at school showed where things went but not that you had to move them once they were there!

BonzoDooDah · 03/04/2011 22:08

The thread made Classic status!!! Grin

Jacksmania · 04/04/2011 04:04

What? How? Who nominated it?

Awesome :o

RememberToPlaywiththeKids · 04/04/2011 07:41

crikey. How did that happen?
Must have been the badger cheese....

OP posts:
confuddledDOTcom · 04/04/2011 15:55

They may not witness it but they're around other animals all the time, they'll see others going off and coming back with babies so they at least know it's not going to kill them.

It's true Jacks, girls would be involved in helping labouring women from early on in many cultures. You've only seen three births but imagine if you'd been at hundreds since you were a girl. I know we hear of obstetricians who would only have a medical birth for them or their wives but they get a jaded view of birth. If they'd only ever seen powerful women getting on with it and no painrelief they'd have a far more positive view of birth.

LindyHemming · 04/04/2011 18:02

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

CheerfulYank · 04/04/2011 19:08

Yeah! like in clan of the cave bear

So ner, blinder. :o

Jacksmania · 04/04/2011 20:00

Now now, play nice!
:o

CheerfulYank · 04/04/2011 20:08
Jacksmania · 04/04/2011 21:16
caramelwaffle · 05/04/2011 11:43

Classics - nice.

Melty · 07/04/2011 22:42

I found This wonderful website. People have been asking this question for years. This guy has a good answer!

caramelwaffle · 08/04/2011 02:40

"waddya mean she's pregnant? We only did it once!"

Grin
spiderslegs · 08/04/2011 03:01

Melty strangely enough I have been reading some Abyssinian & Hittite texts today & have a daughter called Cecily........so his answers are pertinent in the extreme.....

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