The “reproductive suppression hypothesis” states that the strong desire of adolescent girls in our culture to control their weight may reflect the operation of an adaptive mechanism by which ancestral women controlled the timing of their sexual maturation and hence first reproduction, in response to cues about the probable success of reproduction in the current situation. We develop a model based on this hypothesis and explore its behavior and evolutionary and psychological implications across a range of parameter values. We use (...) the process of model development to identify assumptions implicit in the reproductive suppression hypothesis and variables that need to be measured in order to investigate it more fully. In addition, because costs were probably associated with weight control, an important part of this analysis is the specification of situations in which the benefits of adaptive adjustment of the maturation schedule could have outweighed the costs of achieving that adjustment by slowing adolescent weight gain. (shrink)

Darwin discusses why different muscles are brought into action under different emotions and how particular animals have adapted for association with man.

The next time you get sick, consider this before picking up the aspirin: your body may be doing exactly what it's supposed to. In this ground-breaking book, two pioneers of the science of Darwinian medicine argue that illness as well as the factors that predispose us toward it are subject to the same laws of natural selection that otherwise make our bodies such miracles of design. Among the concerns they raise: When may a fever be beneficial? Why do pregnant women (...) get morning sickness? How do certain viruses "manipulate" their hosts into infecting others? What evolutionary factors may be responsible for depression and panic disorder? Deftly summarizing research on disorders ranging from allergies to Alzheimer's, and form cancer to Huntington's chorea, Why We Get Sick, answers these questions and more. The result is a book that will revolutionize our attitudes toward illness and will intrigue and instruct lay person and medical practitioners alike. (shrink)

A provocative assessment of human thought and behavior, reissued with a new afterword, explores a range of conundrums from the ability of the mind to perceive three dimensions to the nature of consciousness, in an account that draws on ...