On Tuesday 07 Apr 2009 12:17:36 am Kiran K Karthikeyan wrote: > If females had lower life expectancy and infant mortality was high, > society as such would move to polygamy. Once female and male life > expectancy got closer, and infant mortality rate was lower, given the > need for a proper home for the child, society as a whole would have > encouraged monogamy.
I am guessing that it is exactly the opposite. Societies with high maternal and infant mortalities would be "normal human societies" until about 100 years ago, and about 50% of the human population today. Apart from disease, which affected every segment of society, malnutrition as a cause of maternal and infant mortality affected the poor more than the wealthy, and obviously women far more than men. In a Dawkinsian sense the highest payoff for a human female in such a society would come from a faithful partner who would support her in times of vulnerability, while simultaneously supporting older but vulnerable children that she has. I suspect this has skewed things towards monogamy. Marriage is a human social construct in which monogamy is forced. As I have stated earlier I believe it has social benefits that are unrecognised by randy men and women who have access to birth control. In the absence of birth control, the human female gets to pay a higher price for polygamy than the male. shiv
