[extropy-chat] Eyes ... interesting article

Keith Henson hkhenson at rogers.com
Sun Jan 14 22:39:23 UTC 2007


At 06:44 PM 1/13/2007 -0800, you wrote:
>From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org on behalf of Keith Henson
>For Human Eyes Only
>By MICHAEL TOMASELLO
>Trying to explain why the whites of human eyes are larger
>than those of other primates leads to one of the deepest
>and most controversial topics in the modern study of human
>evolution: the evolution of cooperation.
>http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/13/opinion/13tomasello.html?th&emc=th
>
>Interesting article, but throughout I kept wondering how such an 
>adaptation could have evolved, being more likely to be exploited by 
>competitors than cooperators among humans.  Perhaps because we can so 
>easily deceive with those same eyes?

In the stone age most of the time those close enough for us to see whites 
of our eyes were relatives.

That's one of the key things to remember during the long period of human 
evolution as hunter gatherers.

However, the same is true of chimp bands.

So why didn't they develop eyes like we have?

No idea.

Keith 




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