Post: #1

Quote:No, this isn’t some jab at dudes. According to a study published in Current Anthropology, our transition into modern civilization might have coincided with our species’ drop in testosterone.

The hormone, associated with both biologically male characteristics and aggression, makes skulls grow those heavy brows we associate with our evolutionary ancestors. Lead author Robert Cieri, a graduate student of biology at the University of Utah, said in a news release that a study of 1,400 modern and ancient skulls provided insight into how these changes might have overlapped with cultural shifts.

While the modern human — species Homo sapiens — appears in the fossil record around 200,000 years ago, evidence of the kind of “modernity” we associate with our species (like advanced tools and symbolic artifacts) took an additional 150,000 years to appear.

The key, the researchers claim, could be found in the feminized skulls that became more prevalent around that time. A rounder face in humans is associated with less testosterone, and less testosterone can mean better cooperation between individuals. Less head clubbing and more community building, basically.

One study isn’t quite enough to pin the origin of humanity on. But studying how humans and apes responded to evolutionary hormonal shifts can give us insights into the origins of culture and modernity.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speak...id=rssfeed

It has sparked an intense discussion on reddit:

http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments...civilized/

Post: #2

Trying to discuss this in light of more academic writing about the subject, I started a thread on this too /thread-38789.html

It seems like a fine hypothesis. Testosterone is linked to aggression, would society work well if people were more likely to just start fights and kill each other more often?

Post: #3

I probably made the title a bit too sensationalist, as the argument is actually quite scientific, versus the way the article words it. The top comment on reddit puts it nicely:

Quote:"Low testosterone could be what made us civilized humans" - Written like a Journalist

"Our transition into modern civilization might have coincided with our species’ drop in testosterone." - Written like a Scientist

Post: #4

Exactly. It's wishful thinking on the author's part.

Why was her "No, this isn't some jab at dudes" caveat even necessary if it wasn't?

Post: #5

except testosterone *isn't* linked to aggression in humans...

Post: #6

also, doesn't it make more sense that as we became more civilized, we as a society became better protected and safe, which doesn't require as much testosterone, which made it easier for low T guys to compete? should't it instead be that low T is a result of civilization?

Post: #7

(08-03-2014 01:08 AM)Muk Wrote:  except testosterone *isn't* linked to aggression in humans...

Interesting...

A quick google search shows very mixed results on this question.

Regardless of whether Testosterone or some other thing causes aggression, I think the point that humans have become less violent over time still stands, whatever the mechanism for that may be.

Post: #8

"less testosterone can mean better cooperation between individuals"

Hmm. Who cooperates better? Men or women?

High-T men (in the military, police, professional sports, etc.) or low-T men?

Post: #9

(08-03-2014 12:37 AM)Sonsowey Wrote:  Trying to discuss this in light of more academic writing about the subject, I started a thread on this too /thread-38789.html

It seems like a fine hypothesis. Testosterone is linked to aggression, would society work well if people were more likely to just start fights and kill each other more often?

First off, her first sentence is a dead give-away. Female readers are supposed to feel morally superior to men as women are the ones who don't murder and rape one another and have nice things. Bullshit. Women didn't invent the concept of heterosexual love.

Still, to say testosterone is linked to (outright) aggressiveness isn't describing the whole situation.

Estrogen leads to more emotion-based, arbitrary decision-making. So, you get needlessly sympathetic or weak decisions and needlessly aggressive and over-the-top decisions - all the while less direct and more passive-aggressive behavior. Testosterone leads to more predictable and judicious behavior or decisions that is more direct. Yes, it is linked to aggression, but it isn't as arbitrary and leads to more direct displays of aggression. There is a quote from Seinfeld on point here by Elaine, but I forget it.

Further, the idea that feminization of humanity is what leads to civilization smacks of the idea that women civilize men. No, men civilize other men. Women do often domesticate men, but they never civilize a brutish or violent men. That's a female fantasy: he's half bad but half good. Violent men are subdued and stamped out by other men.

A quote from an ROK article of mine:

Quote:Some years back, a South African game reserve was faced with a problem: they could no longer support all the elephants on the reserve. As such, they decided to move some of the elephants to another reserve. Given the enormous size of elephants, only helicopters could safely transport them. Since adult male elephants are much heavier than females, the reserve decided to only transport female adult elephants and young males to another reserve.

After a few weeks at the new reserve, the rangers started to find the bodies of rhinoceros’ violently gored to death. The rangers couldn’t suspect poachers, as their tusks were intact. So, they found out it was the juvenile male elephants who had killed the rhinos. Further, it wasn’t just the rhinos who had been stomped on and gored to death, as other animals on the reserve had been attacked by the young male elephants. This sort of behavior bewildered the rangers, as such violent behavior is unheard among male elephants.

The rangers realized that the problem was the lack of adult male elephants. They decided to find a way to helicopter adult male elephants to the reserve. Within weeks, the young males had stopped goring other animals and began to comport themselves as male elephants generally do.

Then consider this quote of hers:

Quote:A rounder face in humans is associated with less testosterone, and less testosterone can mean better cooperation between individuals. Less head clubbing and more community building, basically.

If she means hierarchy-based cooperation based out of social standing, then yes. But she doesn't mean that. She thinks women cooperate and men rebel, riot and generally do whatever they want. When men are around to raise boys into men, violence as an issue seems to dry up quickly.

TL;DR: Men civilize other men

Post: #10

(08-03-2014 01:28 AM)2Wycked Wrote:  First off, her first sentence is a dead give-away. Female readers are supposed to feel morally superior to men as women are the ones who don't murder and rape one another and have nice things. Bullshit. Women didn't invent the concept of heterosexual love.

They are worst. They kill children's souls...

Post: #11

Sounds plausible to me.

Post: #12

Fucking bullshit, low testosterone contributes to prostate cancer, depression, a general wasting of manliness and bitch-like behaviour. It is not a good thing.

Post: #13

High testosterone gave us the American and French Revolutions. It has created societies of honor where men must cooperate in order to survive. And look at where that got America in the late 18th and early 19th society. Its an empire in its own right today because of a Society of Honor that was based on high-T.

Now look at what low-T has gotten us. Record levels of thirst, women free to do as they please, general decadence. If you want proof, compare the Deep South to the Northeast.

Contrary to the first sentence, this article is just a jab at men trying to replenish their testosterone level through diet, exercise and supplements. Nothing more. Testosterone is indeed dangerous to rulers without principle.

Post: #14

There is a healthy level of testosterone. It has positive and negative sides. Too much and it destroys civilization, too little and civilization collapses without it. High testosterone creates violent warriors, low testosterone creates slaves. Neither is good, but slaves never build civilization, but warriors do.

Post: #15

Post: #16

The Post definitely has an agenda, and one study doesn't make for fact, but I'm definitely more work productive when I'm not horny, or at least not thinking of sex.

Post: #17

The Washington Post is a shadow of its former self. Who cares what it thinks? It's not like people actually read it.

Post: #18

It's easy to say that shit from the comfort of an Ikea desk and high-speed Wifi connection invented and designed (and probably assembled and installed) by men, but low testosterone doesn't:

-Pave and the light the streets
-Patrol the waters and ports of entry for criminals
-Drag a hysterical woman out of a house fire
-Invent countless facile diversions for their iPhones
-Pick their produce at rock-bottom prices

Testosterone is the get-shit-done hormone. Excessive horniness might be a lamentable side-effect, but I can't think of a less productive time in my life than when I'm not exercising regularly and have my balls empty from jerking it (lowest T).

Everytime I see some mighty accomplishment, and I'm around women, I'm going to start saying:

"Testosterone built that."

Post: #19

Total quackery. Here's a fact: humans evolved from apes. The further back you go in time, the more ape-like humans&hominids looked. The Occam's razor explanation of why human skulls today have less developed brows and other ape-like features than humans of 200,000 years ago is that we're further removed from apes than those archaic humans. To say that it's gotta be lower testosterone causing this type of changed morphology is asinine. Might as well argue that if human testosterone spiked 1000% we'd all of a sudden sprout a tail and morph into a fuking T-Rex.

To wit: brow ridges and huge jaws evolved to support the massive facial musculature needed to grind down heavy plant matter that forms the bulk of the diet of herbivorous animals. Once the diet starts to change-less grass more ass-the need for these heavy muscle-attachment points starts to wane and they gradually wither away over the eons. That explains the changing facial shapes throughout human evolution, not testosterone levels.

Post: #20

I move for #nopatriarchalproducts.

NO: iPhones, automobiles, radios, televisions, electricity, indoor plumbing.

YES: Windshield wipers, circular saws

Oh wait, neither of those work without electricity. Sorry.

Post: #21

i dont know why everyone is attributing civilization with oozing levels of T. Off the top of my head, both Newton and Tesla never expressed an interest in sex.Couple this with the Zuckerberg thread of successful men with meh women and Roissy saying that betas built civilization and this is completely plausible

Post: #22

Correlation doesn't equal causation. Interesting hypothesis, but the article has way too much of an agenda to be taken seriously.

Post: #23

Who do you think laid the foundation for civilization to be built?

Was it scrawny, androgynous, low-T beta males who held the line? Who hunted and killed wild animals? Who went to war against hostile tribes? Who physically built shelter?

No. It was hyper-masculine, high-T, alpha males who did those things. It was their strength that made society a safe and comfortable place to live to allow civilization to be built.

Once modernity collapses, it will be the high-T alpha males who rebuild civilization, not the low-T wimps.

Post: #24

(08-03-2014 01:19 PM)clever alias Wrote:  i dont know why everyone is attributing civilization with oozing levels of T. Off the top of my head, both Newton and Tesla never expressed an interest in sex.Couple this with the Zuckerberg thread of successful men with meh women and Roissy saying that betas built civilization and this is completely plausible

maybe they were both gay and they had a promiscuous lifestyle hanging out with other queers or maybe they just channeled their sexual frustration into something else like science.
as I see it sex drive is a strong motivator that is often at the root of a successful career. you need to find the right balance between focus and motivation.

Post: #25

The Washington Post is a worthless rag. It's a shame they had good journalism at one point.