Evolutionary Monogamy

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I saw an interesting show last night. It proposed a theory as to why humans might tend to be monogamous from an evolutionary standpoint, and I'd like to see what fellow SPers think about the likelihood of this.

Humans are much different from other animals in many ways to be sure, but one rather unique attribute is that women do not show any outward signs as to when they are ovulating. Many animals go into heat and release pheremones (scents triggered by hormones), or have something visibly change on their bodies to signal they are ovulating. As a result, with most animal species, the males know exactly when the best time to mate with the females is.

With women, their bodies do take on some subtle physiological changes when they are ovulating, including slight change in body temperature, and increased vascularization (blood flow) in the face (giving the face a "glow" so to speak). However, these physiological changes are not so overt that men know exactly when women are ovulating. Biologists term this process "silent ovulation".

So during the prehistoric age of humans, the theory is as follows: Since men do not know when the woman is ovulating, they must spend more time with that one woman because A.) they have to have sex frequently because they don't know when the right time is and B.) they don't want other would-be suitors to have sex with that woman when they aren't around. As a result, the men are more likely that stay with that one woman all the time, which also helps the children in that there are two people who are getting resources such as food, shelter, etc. for the children.

I'm not sure I'm sold on the whole idea. Yes, it would make sense that men would not want to aid in the raising of children if they were not fairly sure they were the fathers, but I question if they really helped out at all. Sure, they might protect the women for certain periods if they are trying to get them pregnant, but I don't see it as monogamy of today. For example, I think men would also drop said woman for another woman if they found one with better qualities. I suppose that happens to an extent today too with the divorce rate being what it is, but in prehistoric times I imagine it was done without a second thought. Plus, as men retain the ability to reporduce thier entire lives, while women do not, I fully would expect men in their 40s to ditch their now aging partners who may not be able to reproduce as readily for younger alternatives.

What's everyone else's opinion on this?

 

We have enough trouble knowing what they're thinking

Oh yes, sex is such a chore.

OK, now that I've got my smart-ass comments out of the way, I'm pretty sure that other animals are monogamous too, so unless those animals have similar trouble determining when the female is "ready", the theory falls apart.

Personally, I think we're monogamous because one woman is trouble enough; two (or more) would be suicide.

 

Men are monogamous? There are animals that are monogamous but not human type males. I wish I had seen that show. What was their basis for saying humans are monogamous? Some societies did become monogamous in the sense of "one man-one wife" but that was probably economic.


We need Chev on this one.

 

Nakia, I really would like to add a powerful comment to that one. I really would.

Would that I could shape into words my disappointment of discovering that at least in the case of females, most 20-23 yearolds here have had at least 5-10 sex partners. Some even 3 times that much.

It's prostitution for fame and experience, all around the country here in Finland. Not just women of course. But then I don't look at men that way and go far enough to discover the whole damn town has been on them already.

As for the theory, would that I had more facts and information of my own to add or contradict to it. Seems logical enough, but considering how things are these days, I believe the monogamy of human beings is based more on practicality and culture rather than an instinct. Though an instinct might have a part in it, it obviously isn't too strong considering what the "practicality" and culture have made of these people today.

 

Logically, the reason would seem to be a more or less even division between men and women and the benefits of having a steady partner rather than random sexual activity and joint ubringing of children or moving on from one partner to another.

As I see it, it would probably come down to some sort of security and confidence. That in a primitive environment a human female couldn't really (as a rule) take on raising the youth until they become self-sufficient doesn't mean the pack couldn't achieve that. And still, we don't have the pack bringing kids up after group orgies. Guess it doesn't all contain in child raising then. Also, the random sex and joint upbringing could give some security and certainty, as to the fate of the offspring at least. Guess security and confidence don't make it alone, either.

The even division could be "fixed" as well. It would be enough if males started fighting for females. Males would drop in number and polygamy would become the logical solution. Notice that monogamy flourishes in cultures where men tend to die fast and often. Doesn't mean they necessarily have to fight for females. It's enough if they just fight.

Perhaps the existence of a more reasonable process of selection of partners than simple fight like between animals ensured an even division where it existed? Notice that even in monogamous cultures men would fight for women like animal males fight for females. Only they used swords instead of horns and fancy clothing instead of colourful feathers, for example.

 

Some may have heard of a phenomenon known as Love. It happens to some; but it is often mistaken for something else. Yet is a very real and potent force to those who have experienced it. It can make one monogamous - among other things. Love is something that all those would be scientific eggheads have yet to quantify. So, you probably won't find the answer there. Instead, consult a poet, or even a good novelist, for a fuller explaination. Plumage and feathers, indeed.

 

This may sound stupid or even funny. I wonder if prehistoric people even really understood where babies came from or did they think it was more of a wonderful occurrence?

 

Early Myths indicate that our ancient ancestors had no idea exactly where babies came from. There are a variety of stories. The Mayans had one where babies came from a woman walking under a certain tree. IIRC it was a gourd tree.

Aldeth-what was this show? If it is repeated I would love to see it. I find the premise so far fetched that I can't imagine any scientist being serious about it. By any chance was it on Mad TV?
No, you wouldn't have posted it as a serious subject. I'm glad you did because otherwise I might never of heard of this. I do love learning new things even when I think they are nutty. It makes for great casual conversation.

Roughly 90% of birds are monogamous. Some even mate for life. On the other hand, mammals have a low % of monogamy.

 

I think that the most common and acceptable theory is that monogamy became a social necessity when the nomadic human tribes started to live in permanent settlements and agriculture became their main supply of food. Agriculture created property, property created inheritance issues and since the father of the children had to be identifiable because of the inheritance issues, it seems that monogamy was the only way to achieve this.

 

Actually, polygamy can achieve that pretty well. It worked for the ancient Hebrews and has worked for the Arabs until now. They herded animals rather than ploughed fields, granted, but herds can be inherited about as much as land.

However, there really seems to be some tie between agriculture and monogamy. The ancient Greeks and Romans favoured monogamy and they were farmers rather than shepherds. However, in some regions there was practically no agriculture and there still was monogamy.

 

I think monogamy is linked to agriculture. But not for heriance-reasons, but farmers are poorer than hunter-gatherers or people that live from keeping a lot of animals. Because the productivity of farming isn't so high and you get less out of the work you put in. Or in other words, a farmer is a hunter-gatherer turned poor and resources become scarse, that's why having more than one woman is simply not affordable.

The more important agriculture is to a society, the harsher are the laws against divorce. Because a farmer needs all hands to work the fields. And farmers live(d) in many places from their hands to their mouth. If two split up, both loose the economical base of existence and starve. Divorce equals suicide. That was more or less the situation of many places in Europe in the 19th century. That of course would be different in some regions of ancient times, that either live on very fertile soil or have managed to find ways to rise productivity of their farming land. Like societies that used aequaducts.

And the farming land can't support a multi-female family. While the hands of children a family has equals the wealth of a family in an agricultural society, I think for more than one female, the land needed would be hard to get, as farming land gets densly populated and distributed into mini-fields.

On the other hand, farming means being settled and that means that a woman can have a child every two years. One woman can give birth to enough children.

I don't know. I've once read some article, making a case that it's the best to always presume that the knowledge of prehistoric people of their environment was huge and equals today someone who has an university degree in biology. As the knowledge gathered and passed on about plants, animals and human biology was propably enormous.

And I want to add, women are made to live longer than males, but in earlier times, the usually died in the childbed (so 150 years ago, before someone invented sterilisation of medical instruments). That's why there are more of them. They're meant to die sooner. Less divorce but more widows and widowers getting remarried.

And to secure that the children of male are his own, I think the innovation of some funny customs and even funnier punishments for unfaithul females in monogamy or polygamy does that job well.

Dam, that's a ridiculous long post. I only wanted to say that there is no evolution, there is only degeneration.
And did I mention that I hate all languages that have "past tense" and such kind of weird stuff in their grammar ?

 

It depends on how monogamy is defined. If we are to define it entirely by marriage than that could be very true. Let's take the High Middle Ages as an example. There was a great desire for the advantages you cite. Yet, with the rise of courtly love, adultery became quite popular. It was not uncommon for the aristocracy to marry off at a young age for reasons of power and wealth (i.e., no love). But such relationships are empty in most ways.

A cult of adultery grew around the aristocratic notion of the fulfillment of love. Landed aristocrats of western Europe (knights) desired other men's wives and went through great lengths to gain favors and affections from married women. While there was no divorce, can we say that such a culture is monogamous?

Let's complicate the issue even more. Dante wrote the most lofty poetry of love. He spent a lifetime in which he drew the highest insipration from Beatrice's "figure." He is considered a Christian writer. Yet, he had a wife and children. One could go on endlessly in the complications implied by Dante's interest in Beatrice. But we could say that his own marriage remained monogamous because he is never thought to have engaged her in real life. But we can not say that for a number of the landed aristocrats during Dante's lifetime.

Fast forward to America in the 18th Century. None other than the illustrious Ben Franklin fathered a child outside his marriage, with whom he traveled all over Europe. He sought the same advantages for his bastard son as any other father would in an entirely monogamous marriage. He left his wife at home for years while he "dallied" with French aristocratic women in the French court. But he remained married to a woman with whom he apparently had little love. We could say he had a monogamous marriage, but that was actually not the reality.

What I am attempting to prove is that social and cultural forces have often worked against monogamy in a "real sense" of the word (only one love interest/partner/mate), while promoting monogamy at the same time; so how it is defined can be misleading.

[ August 11, 2004, 03:45: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

 

@Chandos

Indeed it depends on how monogamy is defined. The word monogamy is originated from the ancient greek words monos (unique, only) and gamos (original meaning marriage), which is also the origin of the words that describe the sexual act (you know, the F*** word in english). Considering the fact that the word monogamy comes from a culture that it has never been monogamous (meaning having just one sexual partner, true love etc.), IMO the real sense of monogamy is the one of marriage.

Also, I want to add that the inheritance issues, which led to monogamy, raised when the primitive societies abandoned the matriarchic system and became patriarchic, because before this change the inheritance rights originated from the mother and her identification has never been a problem.

 

Reading these posts I get the feeling that monogamy is considered the norm. I am going to quote Billy Graham (out of context):

"Christian countries make a great show of monogamy, but actually they practice polygamy."

The original post by Aldeth assumes that monogamy is natural to human beings based on the absence of women showing obvious signs of ovulating.

I have been doing a search on monogamy/polygamy and so far have not found any proof that humans are monogamous by nature. Quite the contrary.

Monogamous relationships exist for the variety of reasons stated. I agree with Chev (if I understand him correctly) that in societies with more or less equal ratio of men/women monogamy would evolve. In societies where the number of women was/is significantly greater than men polygamy would be accepted.

 

The show was on the Science Channel, but unfortunately five days after the fact, I don't remember the name. It's a BBC production as well, so it's probably been shown in Europe as well.

One thing I probably should have made clear was the definition of monogamy. Perhaps it would have been better to say pair bonding. They aren't talking about marriages here. They aren't taking about the start of argriculture or established settlements. We are literally talking about pre-history.

The major leap of faith is not the theory itself, but rather the assumption that because humans pair bond today, and have pair bonded back to the earliest recorded history, that they also pair bonded in prehistory as well. They have no evidence to support this supposition, but make it nonetheless.

 

I think the general assumption being made in such attempts at explaining "bonding behaviour" of humans is that mating has to ensure the passing on of ones genes. Typically, throughout the last decades two basic strategies have been campaigned, one for females, one for males:

Male: Spread your genes by mating with any available female to secure the highest possibility of passing on your genes. This is, because theoretically every time you mate you can reproduce.

Female: Bind a male to stay by your side, feed you, and support you in raising the offspring. This is, because you can just reproduce once (in a given time) regardless of how often you mate.

Obviously, those two theories are quite contradictory. It seems logical that the people supporting the above theories (something I don't do) have to come up with a missing link. This link could well be what Aldeth has seen on television: the clever hiding of ovulation would force the male to abandon his strategy in favour of the female one.

Of course, this whole theory relies heavily on us being nothing more than animals in coats...

 

I may be shouted down for this comment, but I honestly don't believe humans are intended to be Monogomous. Otherwise, why are there practically no humans out there who have sex with just one person and stay with them for the rest of their lives? And why is cheating such a common cause of relationship break-up? IMO we all make an atempt at monogamy to fit in the the socially acceptable template for one's life. On top of this, society is practically built entirely around the Romantic concept of "Love" in which people become completely incapacitated by an infatuation for one person, and therefore bind themselves to an entire life of slavery to sed idol. Since nearly every song ever written and every film ever made revolves around this concept, people have accepted it as the way we should live our lives and forced themselves into the same mould they believe everybody else fits into, when really, everybody else is doing the same.

 

Slavery?!

There's something wrong with your relationships if you consider it to be slavery.

And what is "sed idol"? Is that some sort of reality TV contest?

 

Having lived a few more years than most of you who post here (including Splunge) I think I can speak from experience that "pair-bonding" is rare. In fact I can think of only two relationships I would call true "pair-bonding" - maybe three. Bonding to me is a strong word. I am sorry I missed that show.

 

Really? I know a bunch of people who are married, have stayed married, and presumably have been loyal to one another. I would call that pair bonding. If you're around Splunge's age, I would imagine you would have seen numerous occurances of this too.