The Mating Mind - Load of crap?

Miggle Kop

Something that always bothers me with evo-psych theories about women's preferences is how much choice did prehistoric women really have? The amount of reproductive choice women have today is only a modern phenomenon made possible by our modern peaceful societies. In the savage prehistoric societies in which we evolved, women and girls were probably treated like property by the men, didn't have say in who they got married to at a young age and were frequently raped if they didn't have male protectors. In many popular evo-psych books I've read the authors seem to imagine that prehistoric people behaved and chose mates like middle class people do today but just happened to live out in the jungle.

In his book "The Mating Mind", Geoffrey Miller paints a picture of prehistoric mate choice as being similar to the female choice dominated system seen in many bird species. He imagines that men would display to the women who would then choose which men to mate with. As a result, he supposes, men have evolved sexual ornaments analogous to the brightly coloured feathers and singing talents of many male birds.

Now, this is complete fantasy. If men have been heavily sexually selected for hundreds of thousands of years then by now we'd all be tall, handsome, super sexy Casanovas with big willies and silver tongues. Sure, some men are like that but that level of sexual attractiveness should have become the default. There's really little evidence that female choice has been a big driving force in recent human evolution. Although it makes perfect sense for women to try to act as gatekeepers to their eggs, the extent to which they were actually able to do so in prehistoric societies has probably been greatly overestimated by many people and most of mate choice in prehistory was probably men choosing women not the other way round.

Teenage girls especially would've been chosen by men because they would've had the highest "long term reproductive potential" and because of this women have evolved to be at their most attractive at that age. It is women that have evolved the sexual ornaments such as perky boobs, fresh faces* and bright eyes in their teenage years as a result of male choice. The extreme attractiveness of teenage girls is exactly the kind of thing we'd expect to see if they have been heavily sexually selected but an equivalent doesn't seem to have happened in men as a result of female sexual selection.

* The evidence is that female facial attractiveness peaks at about 14 which would've approximately been the age of peak nubility in caveman times.

kc90

It's still supposition though. Personally, I think it's far more likely that prehistoric females chose. It's much less commons for male mammals to have the choice. And women would have (still do) a huge responsibility when mating. Our long gestation, and the lengthy time until offspring would become independent and of a reproductive age, makes it very unlikely that women would not have put a significant effort into mate choice. As far as women being able to enforce this choice, females in many species manage to do so, humans are no different. There are some instances where copulation may be forced, or where the female relents to avoid aggression.
Sexual attraction is a very subjective area. You can't reasonably argue that because your opinion of what makes a man attractive hasn't become the absolute norm, that women didn't have a choice. Neither can you say teenage girls were heavily selected for as age is not a trait. Did women evolve fresh faces or perky boobs? Or, are these characteristics of youth? It's also worth bearing in mind that in a male choice situation, women would not have had to compete in the same way men do. Men choose mates for very different reasons, most importantly, never for genetic cues, and male input is tiny.
Also, lifespan was much shorter, probably less than 30yrs, so a reasonable amount of the population would have been teenage.

ScumLord

I don't think love would have been high on the list of priorities in the past, people dis know that having children was essential to the survival of their group and as much as the men probably didn't like risking their lives in battles women maybe didn't like getting stuck with older men but both knew it was necessary for the survival of their community.

In Spartan society a woman that died during childbirth got similar accolades in death to a warrior would get dying on the battle field.

Men have always had responsibilities too, often life threatening responsibilities and marriage was a contract to have children for the community, often it's the community as a whole the children would belong to rather than just the parents that made the baby.

I think the idea that women have always been docile baby makers though is something promoted by the Catholic church.