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When two drunken men fight over a woman, alcohol and stupidity may not be the only things at work. Sadly, evolution may have sha

admin2022-11-05  51
问题     When two drunken men fight over a woman, alcohol and stupidity may not be the only things at work. Sadly, evolution may have shaped men to behave this way. Almost all of the traits considered to be masculine—big muscles, facial hair, square jaws, deep voices and a propensity to violence—evolved, it now seems, specifically for their usefulness in fighting off or intimidating other men, allowing the winner to get the girl.
    That, at least, is the contention of David Puts, an anthropologist at Pennsylvania State University, in an upcoming paper in Evolution and Human Behavior. Dr Puts is looking at how sexual selection gave rise to certain human traits. A trait is sexually selected if it evolved specifically to enhance mating success. They come in two main forms: weapons, such as an elk’s horns, which are used to fight off competitors; and ornaments, like a peacock’s tail, which are used to advertise genetic fitness to attract the opposite sex.
    Researchers have tended to consider human sexual selection through the lens of the female’s choice of her mate. But human males look a lot more like animals designed to battle with one another for access to females, says Dr Puts. On average, men have 40％ more fat-free mass than women, which is similar to the difference in gorillas, a species in which males unquestionably compete with other males for exclusive sexual access to females. In species whose males do not fight for access to females, males are generally the same size as, or smaller than, females.
    The heavier brow and jaw of males might have developed to withstand blows from other males. Heavy eyebrows, facial hair and deep voices all could serve to make a man more imposing to other men. Dr Puts does not dismiss mate selection outright. Women are attracted to some of the same traits that are good for dominating other men because they signal that the man will sire sons who will also be successful at mating. But female choice probably is not the primary cause of the traits.
    It is a disturbing idea to modern minds, harking back to old stereotypes about violent cavemen battling with clubs while a passive woman, fetching in furs, waits helplessly to see who will win her. But Dr Puts emphasizes that evolutionary biology is not destiny. Regardless of our evolutionary past, in modern societies men and women freely choose their mates. However, understanding the evolutionary pressures that made men the way they are could help us better understand male violence, including murder, domestic abuse, gang violence and perhaps even warfare.
We can learn from the text that men’s traits ________.
选项 A、exclude their tendency to violence
B、are reasons for their fight over females
C、are the result of female choice in evolution
D、evolved to facilitate access to females
答案D
解析 根据题干的men’s traits定位到第一段。该段第八句说，几乎所有公认的男性特征都是专为击败或威吓其他男性以赢得女性而进化的，即男性特征的进化是为了有利于男性赢得女性，D项所述与此相符。第一段第三句说，公认的男性特征包括tendency to violence“暴力倾向”，A项“不包括他们的暴力倾向”与文意相反，故错误。男性特征具有击败或威吓其他男性以赢得女性的“作用”(usefulness)，而不是作为争夺女性的reasons“原因”，B项不正确。第四段第四五句说，女性可能被男性身上的一些特征所吸引，但是女性的择偶选择很可能并不是男性发展这些特征的主要原因，所以C项“是进化中女性选择的结果”错误。
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