O MACACO CAPRICHOSO

«... the psychologist David P Barash is even bolder in embracing the unknown: his latest book, Homo Mysterious: Evolutionary Puzzles of Human Nature, is a catalogue of the many unresolved riddles of our history. A surprising number of these mysteries concern female sexuality. The male orgasm, for example, serves a rather obvious seed-sowing function – but what is the point of its female equivalent? The popular hypothesis that such ecstasy enhances the likelihood of a subsequent pregnancy is, Barash informs us, entirely without evidence. The idea that it might motivate reluctant ladies also seems flawed: other animals don’t require an eruption of bliss in order to continue the family line. Perhaps it is simply a “non-adaptive by-product” – an incidental development to which evolution is indifferent?» Stephen Cave