You are a curious creature!

2009/09/19 Galarraga Aiestaran, Ana - Elhuyar Zientzia

• Biologia
• Eboluzioa
• Anatomia/Fisiologia

I find it weird, very weird, what appears in the last place on the list. I have found the rest in other works on the same topic, not always all together, but most or similar. However, it does not count nasal mining.

Once you read the explanation, but it is not so surprising that it appears on the list, even in the last place. Because it has more background than it seems: In 2001, two researchers from the Bangalore Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences won an IgNobel Prize for their research into nostrils.

In fact, the researchers investigated 200 students from four schools in Bangalore and showed that almost everyone put their fingers in the nostrils. On average, they acted four times a day. However, only 9 indicate that later they ate mucus, that is, only 4.5%.

Although few recognized it, researchers who sensed that the percentage of “� was by nature greater, they found the custom significant. And they also proposed an explanation. According to them, the intake of mucus can be beneficial for the immune system. The hypothesis coincides with the theory that relates the increase of allergies to excessive hygiene.

More curiosities

The rest of curiosities are better known. For example, Charles Darwin himself wondered why we were golden, as it does not seem to be very beneficial for the survival of our species. However, people from all corners of the world go crazy in certain circumstances, so it must provide some advantage.

Darwin was not able to give an answer, but then many other researchers have analyzed the issue and it seems that it is related to trust among people. That is, we find it more reliable a person capable of redness than another who does not change face. And we prefer to join the first to be a couple or go hunting, for example.

Laughter has also long been the subject of research. Anthropologists give many explanations to laughter and, in the article, mention some as their function of strengthening the group and their evolution parallel to sexual selection. Laugther: Researcher Provine, author of the book A scientific investigation, has shown that women generally ask for humor from their partners and men offer humor.

The rest of the mysteries are explained similarly in the article. Why body hair is much more abundant in some places of our body than in others, why we pass this strange stage of being a child to maturity, why we dream, sometimes we benefit someone without hope of receiving anything, what pushes us to create works of art, why we believe in superstitions, and why we kiss each other, the latest theories, hypotheses or studies that they all explain from the evolutionary point of view.

You can find the article on the magazine's website (What a strange creature you are, 10 Mysteries of You). However, I wanted to know an explanation about one of our curiosities: Do you know why we find it so interesting, special and unique, and in general our species?

Published in Gara