Why are humans one of the only mammals that don’t have fur all over their skin. What’s the advantage?
In: 125
Originally, we are persistance hunters from the African savannah. Our method to get proteins is to run after an animal and track it until it falls from exhaustion. Now, if you have thick fur and you try to exercise for long periods of time in the middle of the savannah, you’ll likely overheat and die or pass out yourself: most other furry predators are either ambush or speed hunters.
We then lost most of our fur and developed a new way for temperature regulation: sweating. Then, since we have handled fire for around 1 million years, there was also little need for fur to keep warm. We then just kept a patch of fur on our head to prevent insolation and try to keep our brains away from direct sunlight.
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