Why Women Have Breasts

Sure, this "evolution-x.com" stuff is just someone's personal writings, but the academic and peer-reviewed study of how human features were produced by evolution is definitely a valid field. Yeah, it's hard to arrive at any definite conclusions since we can't make direct observations of our own evolution, but it's still the right paradigm to use in thinking about these questions.

Where does he claim that this is a scientific theory? I think he just makes an hypothesis.

Unlike you, I greatly enjoy articles such as this one.

Let me begin with the caveat that I agree that it is more speculation than science, and it is unfortunate that the author presents it as if it were a scientific paper rather than a blog post. But note that it hasn't been published anywhere, so it is not as if the scientific community is accepting it as science.

You seem to have the opinion that anything that is not science is at best not worth doing, and at worst evil. I urge you to re-examine that assumption.

Now, if there were a scientific way of answering the question that the article considers, that would be a very different situation. In the absence of one, it is ridiculous to suggest that no one should think about it. And if people think about it, they will present their attempted answers to the world. Hopefully, their arguments will rest on logic, even if not empirically verifiable. This is an expression of human curiosity, and I think it is natural and wonderful.

I say we should continue to discuss articles like this, but doing our best to keep in mind that they are not proven theories. As our experimental abilities improve, it might turn out that today's speculation is fertile ground for tomorrow's experimentation as a bed of hypothesis to test and accept or discard.

Finally, even if one's sole concern is the dissemination of scientific knowledge, I contend that the article is still useful if it makes people think and learn more about the fascinating, fascinating phenomenon of Fischerian runaway (to give just one example).

I suppose you think that maths is no science, then?

After all, there's no empirical proof that any mathematical statement is true. Even simple statements like, for example, C/r = Pi cannot be verified empirically. Following your argument, maths is just "pseudo science".

But, of course, you would not say that, would you?

However, if you accept maths to be a science, why not any other field that uses deductive logic? For biological evolution -- at least, the part you seem to find disgusting -- basically uses deductive logic: It makes a few basic assumptions, and then deduces its conclusions, using logical arguments. There's quite a lot of game theory in evolutionary biology.

Your argument, on the other hand, is based on a false assumption. Namely, that there are no empirical proofs for statements in evolutionary biology.

Because there is, sometimes.

Yes, we cannot make experiments with humans, especially not with ones we consider extinct.

We can, however, argue "by analogy". And guess what? Arguments by analogy are made all the time in empirical science. Whenever you use a bridge, you bet your life that the mathematical model of the bridge correctly reflected all the important attributes of the real bridge. All sciences using mathematical models are based on the argument by analogy.

You complain about "pseudo science". Your comment, however, lacks signs of quality as well. You seem to be ignorant about scientific reasoning and yet you dare to judge someone else's article. Why not start by fixing your own ignorance, first?

What is your proposed way of doing things then, just never think about anything at all? What about those people who wondered if the earth is flat? Doesn't it always start with a theory, that people then try to disprove or validate?

Also I don't understand why you think there is no empirical evidence? There is a lot of empirical evidence, namely, there are billions of people to observe, as well as lots and lots of animals.

So people create models that they think explain things - then they can compare those models to reality. That they are not perfect does not make them 100% wrong (is Newtonian physics wrong? Kind of, but would you say it is stupid? At least it lead the way in the right direction).

OK, trying agin: "We have absolutely no way of ever empirically confirming what the real picture on the box is, yet we continue to find and force only the pieces that fit our conjectured "picture on the box"."

What do you mean by that? If you have an observation that contradicts the theory exposed in the article, then publish it, and the theory will have to be amended/discarded/whatever. Before you chuckle, present the observation/evidence.

The way the author phrased this is unfortunate. However, there are very good reasons to believe that even small mutations could have resulted in large changes in morphology or behavior. A mutation in even a single base-pair could result in cascading effects. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeobox

I just tried that search, and your comment is already the second result. If that's a real scientist, he/she is certainly not a very prominent one!

I found him by searching for "wroclaw Pawlowski". Sometimes you get different results by reordering the words.

His home page: http://www.antro.pan.wroc.pl/pracownicy/boguslaw_pawlowski/

Interestingly enough you are arguing that breasts evolved to make women more honest - makes it harder for them to lie about their age. The author argued that breasts allowed the women to be less honest - removed indication of infertility.

But in either case, the rest of the argument of how men evolved to like breasts could still be true.

All this really tells us is that the range of possibilities are large. I think the question of how one could prove, or at least narrow down the possibilities is an interesting one.

For example, if one could demonstrate that our ancestors had an aversion to breasts, and that the change to liking them was in a reasonable probability of occurring in the way the author describes, then his explanation is reasonable.

But, given the random nature of evolution, finding the precise answer may not be possible and the best we can hope for is a set of weighted possible explanations.

>He's wrong for a simple reason: Breasts are expensive. They are expensive to maintain, and no other animal maintains them.

Your argument is not valid. It's not the cost alone that count, but the benefits minus the costs. Imagine your argument against human intelligence instead: Human intelligence could not have evolved for a simple reason: brains that produce intelligent behaviour are expensive. They are expensive to maintain, and no other animal maintains them.

Also: please read up on the unit of selection http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_of_selection. Selection on the level of groups (let alone "society") is very, very unlikely (to say the least) and has long been abonded as theory http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Group_selection.

Well, here is the thing: no, there does not have to be a reason.

Nearly all of the problems "accepting" or understanding evolution stem from the mistaken assumption that evolution has "goals", or "reasons" or even that it is the "survival of the fittest." Essentially, from conceptualising it as an active force.

Mutations happen. Some will cause fewer offspring in the same genetic line, some will cause relatively more. Some just stick around because they are not actively harmful.

Your question has many facets: at its simplest, it could be asserted that the benefit outweighs the hazards. You are already making one assumption, though: that they are external because they need to be cooler than body temperature -- but that relationship could be inverse (and in my opinion actually makes more sense if it is.) And so on and so on.

Cetaceans (whales and dolphins) have internal testicles. It's easy to guess why: they would incur a significant decrease in hydrodynamic efficiency if they had external testicles like other mammals. However, they risk not having viable sperm due to the warmer internal environment--even worse than in most land animals since cetaceans have a thick layer of insulating blubber. As a result, they have developed an alternative cooling system where blood that has been cooled in capillaries close to the skin converges on the testicles, effectively cooling them.

All of this is to say that being in an easy-to-hit place apparently does not lead to as much evolutionary pressure as contributing to poor hydrodynamics.

    There would have to be a complete image recognizer
    implemented in the genes?

We have such patterns for detecting spiders and snakes from slight movements, so much so that you will sometimes pick it up when a leaf blows just so.

  > There would have to be a complete image recognizer
  > implemented in the genes?

Are you questioning the fact that humans and animals have image recognizers? Or do you doubt that genes play a major role in their development?

What do you find weak about the reasoning, specifically?

The differene to the "god created it" theory is that one can be falsified, the other can't. "God made it" is a useless statement with no practical value whatsoever.