Raises lots of questions I think. Did boys not survive to adulthood.. Did they die in wars? Once upon a time, 4,000 to 8,000 years after humanity invented agriculture, something very strange happened to human reproduction. Across the globe, for every 17 women who were reproducing, passing on genes that are still around today  only one man did the same. It wasnt like there was a mass death of males. They were there, so what were they doing? asks Melissa Wilson Sayres, a computational biologist at Arizona State University, and a member of a group of scientists who uncovered this moment in prehistory by analyzing modern genes. Another member of the research team, a biological anthropologist, hypothesizes that somehow, only a few men accumulated lots of wealth and power, leaving nothing for others. These men could then pass their wealth on to their sons, perpetuating this pattern of elitist reproductive success. Then, as more thousands of years passed, the numbers of men reproducing, compared to women, rose again. Maybe more and more people started being successful, Wilson Sayres says. In more recent history, as a global average, about four or five women reproduced for every one man. Physically driven natural selection shaped many human traits. Ethnic Africans and Europeans had to evolve to digest milk, for example, while most ethnic Tibetans have adaptations to deal with the lower oxygen levels at high altitudes. But if Wilson Sayres teams hypothesis is correct, it would be one of the first instances that scientists have found of culture affecting human evolution. The team uncovered this dip-and-rise in the male-to-female reproductive ratio by looking at DNA from more than 450 volunteers from seven world regions. Geneticists analyzed two parts of the DNA, Y-chromosome DNA and mitochondrial DNA. These dont make up a large portion of a persons genetics, but theyre special because people inherit Y-chromosome DNA exclusively from their male ancestors and mitochondrial DNA exclusively from their female ancestors. By analyzing diversity in these parts, scientists are able to deduce the numbers of female and male ancestors a population has. Its always more female. It wasnt like there was a mass death of males. They were there, so what were they doing? contin ued https://psmag.com/8-000-years-ago-17-women-reproduced-for-every-one-man-6d41445ae73d#.ycqff496p
There's a pretty easy explanation for why so many more women reproduced than men, but you're not going to like the explanation. Just like all the other social animals, females select alpha males as mates. There's a reason rockstars have groupies and garbage men don't...
The whole Alpha Male thing is a myth. You see in the 1940's, Rudolph Schenkel started studying captive wolves and noticed that when wolves from different areas were brought together, they would fight for dominance. The male that won, he called the Alpha Male. However, it is now known that the research was wrong. In the wild, wolves actually live in nuclear families, not randomly assembled units, in which the mother and father are the pack leaders and their offspring's status is based on birth order. Despite this, there are those that continue to believe in the myth of the Alpha Male.
I watched a video of Guns and Roses the other day with Axle Rose jumping up and down in his little red shorts. I think I would prefer the garbage man, or even the man who cleans out septic tanks--the poop-truck driver as he is known in our house. Plumber would be nice. How about a ditch digger. Oh, I know--a landscaper. Where have all the Alpha males gone, long time passing. . .
In just about every species that has male - female pairs for breeding, sometimes the female will go off somewhere with a male that is not her partner and have sex. Result - a % of children are not the children of the mother's partner.
Many possibilities: In a primitive tribal society, and given human nature, sometimes only the dominant male was allowed to have children. I have no doubt this rule was sometimes broken, but the punishment could have been death of the male if caught in the act, death of the infant if realized/suspected after the fact. At a minimum, the dominant male could mate with most women while the non-dominant males could not. And if a woman was having sex with multiple men, there is competiton among sperm between men and the dominant men would have stronger sperm, in addition to mating more often. In tribal warfare the men are killed and women are kept. Thus these women still reproduce and the men don't. Another possibility is serial monogamy could be the norm in some tribes given how infatuation comes and fades after a few years. The babies of less successful men died. The babies of more successful men lived. The women had to be involved either way, and they will spontaneously abort or stop producing milk when under duress. And overall given a lack of having the luxury to marry for love. Better to be a cowife and well fed than the only wife and starving.
Naw, that's not it. It is highly unlikely women has any choice whatsoever. The most likely is that leaders took control of the women and enslaving both most men and most women to their own usage. - - - Updated - - - "Dominate men would have stronger sperm" is a nonsensical claim.
Well apparently you don't know much about sperm. They definitely do compete and cooperate against the sperm of other males, but the notion that dominant males have better sperm is just a hypothesis as far as I know. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sperm_competition
Explain why rockstars have groupies but garbage men, poop truck drivers, plumbers, ditch diggers, and landscapers don't...
I'm not an expert or anything close. But besides war with other tribes, men were the hunters. Easy to have an accident or get killed by the animal one is hunting. Also in war with other tribes, the warriors would kill most of the other men, the ones they didn't want as slaves and keep the females. 8,000 years ago I would imagine polygamy was more the norm. There probably were tons of reasons, just some I could think of off the bat.
I think it's a lot more complicated than that, but I think in simple terms, you have it mostly right. 8000 years ago was still before the age of agriculture so it was mostly hunter/gather groups. I imagine, just like with chimps and gorillas, the head alpha got all the chicks until he was finally taken out by someone new.
