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Our Skulls Didn’t Evolve to be Punched

phenomena.nationalgeographic.com

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Re: Our Skulls Didn’t Evolve to be Punched

#71

Post by gadders »

1stop wrote: post #68
aResponder52 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and that part about the right way to hit different parts of the body. a slap is almost as hard, and won't hurt the slapper.

A slap is no where near as hard. Surface area of an open hand vs surface area of 2-3 knuckles. Think hammer vs fly-swat.

It is still possible to knock someone out with a slap. Some bouncers in the UK recommend it as a) it doesn't hurt your hand so much and b) telling the police you just slapped someone doesn't sound so bad. Plenty of videos on youtube of people being knocked out with a slap.

Re: Our Skulls Didn’t Evolve to be Punched

#73

Post by 1stop »

gadders wrote: post #71
1stop wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A slap is no where near as hard. Surface area of an open hand vs surface area of 2-3 knuckles. Think hammer vs fly-swat.

It is still possible to knock someone out with a slap. Some bouncers in the UK recommend it as a) it doesn't hurt your hand so much and b) telling the police you just slapped someone doesn't sound so bad. Plenty of videos on youtube of people being knocked out with a slap.

being knocked out is related to the brain hitting the walls of the skull, it has very little to do with what caused that. Slap, Fist, head-butt, concrete, car crash etc.

But I was responding to the claim slapping is equivalent to punching.

Re: Our Skulls Didn’t Evolve to be Punched

#74

Post by cLeEOGPw »

azakai wrote: post #37
surrealize wrote: post #20

There's a point-by-point reply from one of the authors, David Carrier, in the comments: http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2014/06/10/our-skull...

Frankly, I have nothing but respect for the authors of that paper after reading that comment. Even if they're wrong, which they admit they might be, at least they're working hard to evaluate their hypothesis, and their opponents are a bunch of journalists and internet commenters using terms like "their article is just 'bro science'." Despite the critics' lack of respect, the authors response is polite and informative…

There is a culture of no respect of negative results in science. Although they are as important as positive, for some reason even scientists are actively avoiding to, for example, test old results to confirm them right or wrong, and instead they feel like they must do something absolutely new. After that there comes many contradicting studies and nobody putting much effort in resolving them.

Re: Our Skulls Didn’t Evolve to be Punched

#75

Post by khaki54 »

batmansbelt wrote: post #18
khaki54 wrote: post #12

Interesting article, but better for reddit than hackernews

The same content is always on both sites. Why are you making a distinction?

I know you're probably joking, but on hacker news I usually don't have to sort though a bunch of "interesting" articles to find relevant news. Another distinction is that I read hackernews on the clock, but not reddit.

Re: Our Skulls Didn’t Evolve to be Punched

#76

Post by Peaker »

monochr wrote: post #44
GenerocUsername wrote: post #6

This is dumb. If a single human survived a punch that otherwise would have killed them before breeding age than Yes, we did "evolve" to handle punches. Evolution is not driven, it is all the little things that worked over a long period of time. The sum of all factors. There will be no smoking gun that says we did this or that for this or that, only our modern form that says "this worked".

I sometimes think even most biologists don't understand how evolution works. Especially when I read about people taking the idea of spandrels seriously. Legs didn't evolve "for" walking, ancestors with leg like appendages survived better than those who didn't have them in the Savannah. It didn't matter if they did that by walking, swimming, running or kicking threats and opportunities as they came along. The same is…

Saying that "legs evolved for walking" is a completely legitimate statement.

Something can be said to have evolved for a purpose -- as a short-hand for saying that random changes that helped that purpose increased fitness and were selected for by natural selection.

Re: Our Skulls Didn’t Evolve to be Punched

#77

Post by hownottowrite »

I recently dismantled a human skull, cutting the entire mass into 2mm squares. The face is definitely one of the more delicate bits.

I suppose the argument could be made that it is a crumple zone designed to absorb shocks that might otherwise damage the brain. However, it seems far more likely that like the rest of the skull the face evolved to facilitate the birth of a bipedal creature with a ginormous brain.

Most studies of rapid human encephalization and obstetrics also seem to lean towards this conclusion.

Re: Our Skulls Didn’t Evolve to be Punched

#78

Post by peterwwillis »

ZenPro wrote: post #69
peterwwillis wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This, along with the fragility of the bones in the human hand and the hardness of the skull, make it pretty clear that we aren't evolved for punching or being punched. Boxing was developed specifically to get around the many problems with punching: protecting the hands from being broken, and developing defensive strategies to avoid blows from even padded fists. Barehanded boxing is worse. If you want to hurt someone…

Barehanded boxing is not worse. One of the reasons for the excellent track record of safety in Mixed Martial Arts is the lack of reliance on heavy padded gloves. A traditional boxing glove spreads the impact across a wider area resulting in greater likelihood of brain swelling and life-threatening injury. Lighter gloves or bare knuckle impacts result in less internal swelling but greater likelihood of skin tears, cut…

I meant barehanded is "worse" in terms of it being easier to break the tiny bones in your hands. Even if you strengthen your fists over years, they're still weaker than other body parts you could strike with. The skull is a lot more difficult to break (unless you hit the temple and your knuckles are calcified as fuck)

All the rest of your descriptions of fighting are based on the evolution of martial arts or a skilled practitioner. What i'm talking about is people who have zero formal training, save for perhaps getting in lots of fights. You seem to overlook the rest of what I wrote, where I describe how people are not built for straight-line strikes, how animals might kick with their hind legs but we don't find that to be natural, how kicks are more difficult to use against higher vulnerable targets, etc. We're basically agreeing, but with different words :)

I don't know why anyone goes for the ribs with a roundhouse if it can just be checked with shins or forearms (and takes more energy for the kicker). If you just make repeated blows to the IT band, even if they can stand the pain, very soon they won't be able to stand on that leg. Same for hooks to the radial so they can't lift their guard or keep their wrist straight. Close fighting is also a bit silly in terms of natural/practical fights; if you're close enough to connect with an elbow, you might as well go for the eyes or throat or work around to a rear naked choke, or something.

Re: Our Skulls Didn’t Evolve to be Punched

#79

Post by x86_64Ubuntu »

araes wrote: post #4

Honestly, this article just feels like an overreaction / rant the other direction. That there is No way that fist combat could have affected skull morphology. Like alot of evolution, it mostly comes down to a) does a trait make you more likely to have sex / better or more effective sex? b) does a trait make it more likely you'll survive to have sex? I find it hard with this amount of evidence to say that fistfights c…

The problem is that humans are woefully designed for combat. Our hands break, and our skulls are paper thin. Compare these aspects to animals that actually fight with horns, cushioned brains, fangs and so on, it's clear to see that fighting is a spectator sport for us.

Re: Our Skulls Didn’t Evolve to be Punched

#80

Post by ZenPro »

peterwwillis wrote: post #78
ZenPro wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Barehanded boxing is not worse. One of the reasons for the excellent track record of safety in Mixed Martial Arts is the lack of reliance on heavy padded gloves. A traditional boxing glove spreads the impact across a wider area resulting in greater likelihood of brain swelling and life-threatening injury. Lighter gloves or bare knuckle impacts result in less internal swelling but greater likelihood of skin tears, cut…

I meant barehanded is "worse" in terms of it being easier to break the tiny bones in your hands. Even if you strengthen your fists over years, they're still weaker than other body parts you could strike with. The skull is a lot more difficult to break (unless you hit the temple and your knuckles are calcified as fuck) All the rest of your descriptions of fighting are based on the evolution of martial arts or a skille…

It appears we are on the same page - apologies for the harshness of my reply. It was a legacy from another thread.

You know your fighting. :-)

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