3 upvotes, 1 direct replies (showing 1)
View submission: …excuse me sir?
I mean it’s really about interpretation and the story you choose to tell about it. You can talk about it through parental investment like you have and I did above or you could make a “good genes” argument for it. That one would go like “in a species that regularly kills sexual rivals for territory or mating access, it is better to have your genetic fitness tied with winner males rather than the males they killed.”
The only story that is objectively true is “genes for this behavior spread in the gene pool of certain species”. The genes weren’t narrativizing, they were just replicating.
I’m personally not aware of any species that has like a quality meter for sperm and aborts her current babies if she detects better sperm. If you were looking for it, I think you’d be most likely to find it in a species where males are highly sexually selected and females only reproduce once in their lifetimes. There are male spiders that actually eject their “penis” into the female as a plug to prevent future matings so I imagine that female strategy must at least be under some selective pressure if males are going through such extreme lengths to prevent it. I can’t find any papers that suggests spiders do this, but it would make perfect sense for some of them to. It even would explain why males have to present a nuptial gift (food) and she makes a decision whether to mate. She could use the gift to make a new set of eggs if it contained enough energy.
Comment by Kiri_serval at 26/04/2022 at 14:09 UTC
1 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Oh, so when you said "This does happen in a lot of animals (a few vertebrates and a lot of invertebrates) but I’ve never seen a study that says it happens in humans or anything closely related to us."[1] can you clarify what "this" you are referring to?
1: https://old.reddit.com/r/NotHowGirlsWork/comments/uc37f7/excuse_me_sir/i68wxxq/
Cause it sounds like "this" is referring to the pictured tweet, but you don't know of any species that actually does miscarry for a "better" mate. And that's pretty misleading to lay people, as you should well know as a grad student.