eli5 Why aren’t animals that breed with only the strongest male complete freaks of nature.

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Like why aren’t lions total roid monsters if only the strongest male gets to breed the females?

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Anonymous 0 Comments

‘Survival of the fittest’ doesn’t mean strongest. It means a variation that is better at surviving in a given environment. An unusual amount of muscle mass might not give you an advantage in surviving and having kids.

If you are in a resource-poor environment, having tons of muscle and an extremely high metabolism will make it easier for you to starve. And it’s not just about that individual: If you have to overhunt prey in your territory to survive, the prey dies off and you also starve.

And that environment can change. There’s a reason why large dinosaurs didn’t survive the ice age, but smaller creatures did.

One of humanity’s adaptations is society, and it’s a pretty neat trick. Individuals don’t die because of injuries or chronic medical conditions — and differences in physical or cognitive abilities don’t stop people from contributing to society and personal relationships.

I recommend taking claims about evolutionary psychology with a grain of salt but we all rely on each other and have social needs, so we select partners that we enjoy being around. I think it’s safe to say that tends to strengthen bonds which hold us together and keep societies running.

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