Cuckoldry Hypothesis
Schroder in his review writes that Benshoof and Thornhill hypothesized that estrus became hidden after monogamous relationships became the norm in Homo erectus. Concealed ovulation allowed the female to mate with genetically superior males and thus gain the benefit of their genes for her offspring while still maintaining the pair bond with her lesser male partner. The bonded male would have little reason to doubt her fidelity because of the concealed ovulation and would have high, albeit unfounded, paternity confidence in his offspring. His confidence would encourage him to invest in the child even though it was not his own. Again, the idea of paternal investment being vital to the offspring’s survival, and thus vital to the male and female partner’s fitness, is a central fixture of a hypothesis regarding concealed ovulation.
Read more about this topic: Concealed Ovulation
Famous quotes containing the words cuckoldry and/or hypothesis:
“Every married man is in danger of being cuckolded. Cuckoldry is naturally one of the prerogatives of marriage.”
—François Rabelais (1494–1553)
“The hypothesis I wish to advance is that ... the language of morality is in ... grave disorder.... What we possess, if this is true, are the fragments of a conceptual scheme, parts of which now lack those contexts from which their significance derived. We possess indeed simulacra of morality, we continue to use many of the key expressions. But we have—very largely if not entirely—lost our comprehension, both theoretical and practical, of morality.”
—Alasdair Chalmers MacIntyre (b. 1929)