sullster

I heard the sound of a car crashing on the road in front of my house for the fourth time in as many years. It is a bad corner, but natural selection came to my mind as I went out again to see the accident. Next to the smashed car was a young male ,who escaped death and serious injury because of his seat belt and airbag. The thought occurred to me that he was the fourth young male who had driven like a fool and had crashed like all the others and had survived. Never has there been a female, but that is another issue.

I decided to look at these accidents from a natural selection perspective. First, the reckless driving and risk taking was a male behaviour exclusively. These four young males were acting out male behaviours which seem innate to many males.

All these young males survived, what would in the past have been fatal accidents because of the seat belts and airbags they had used ,and a large dose of luck I must admit. Are airbags and seatbelts preseving aggressive male behaviours that would otherwise have been brutally selected? I am not arguing against the use of seatbelts, far from it. I am just looking at the selective aspects of modern times and the idea that the automobile and its use can be exerting an influence on human evolution, particularly male aggressiveness.

Coragyps

Hmm. Interesting thesis. I wonder if these aggressive males have an edge over less-aggressive ones in passing on their genes in the back seats of these same cars?
I think this might be a good analogy to explain NS, whether it really has any heritable part or not. I just read of a new survey that shows a very strong correlation (no causality implied?) between boys watching lots of television and later being involved in aggressive/violent behavior, so possibly "nurture" is at least as strong as "nature" in determining aggressive behavior. (Can you call The Three Stooges "nurture?)

sullster

Coragyps, You make a good point about the back-seat aspect of these aggressive males,( although the last car I saw had no back seat but we know genes can be passed in the front seat too.) I feel that young females are innately attracted to aggressive/ risk taking males. The choices made for sexual partners by late adolescent females are far different than the choices made by older mature females. The seat belt and air bag may be giving the male aggressive genes a helping hand.

On the nurture side, it is still interesting that males are allegedly turned more violent by crazy TV. A nature-nurture combination which female-nature does not respond to as much to.

Oh yes, it has been my experience that males like the Three Stooges far more than females.