The Evolution of Tears

[Naraoia]

Interestingly enough, crying is also often triggered by strange smells, like onions, etc.

I don't want to intrude into this debate very much, but I thought I'd raise my objection to this particular point. Onions hurt the eye like mad (they irritate mine, anyway). I don't think that has much to do with us smelling them, more with an urge to wash the irritating compounds from the eye (though the compounds might originally get there through the nose, I don't really know). Which is a useful adaptation, you don't want your eyes smoking away in some nasty chemical reaction.

(Apologies if I've misunderstood the rules and shouldn't be posting here at all.)

 

[NailsII]

I don't want to intrude into this debate very much, but I thought I'd raise my objection to this particular point. Onions hurt the eye like mad (they irritate mine, anyway). I don't think that has much to do with us smelling them, more with an urge to wash the irritating compounds from the eye (though the compounds might originally get there through the nose, I don't really know). Which is a useful adaptation, you don't want your eyes smoking away in some nasty chemical reaction.

(Apologies if I've misunderstood the rules and shouldn't be posting here at all.)

I think your post is fine here and makes perfect sense.
Just to further your point, tears secreted to flush the eye of such noxious odours is chemically different to those of pain or normal lubrication.....

 

[Inan3]

Children alone will cry so they are not all by themselves. My point! but they were by themselves. Adults doing it are probably following a learned pattern, it worked as a child so it could work as an adult.

This is pscho-babble baloney! Sorry Freud...NOT!!

Tears are known to produce hormone changes and relieve stress, so crying alone is not pointless.

This is more in line with what is true.

I'm sorry if it was too basic for you, given your previous posts about biology I assumed you don't have this basic knowledge.

Thank you for the thought, though.

Derived from the Greek Sardonios which means bitter or scornful laughter: the primary reference is to the effects of eating a Sardinian plant which was said to produce facial convulsions resembling horrible laughter, usually followed by death.
www.mountainvalleygrowers.com/definitions.htm

Very interesting. I like that kind of stuff.

You obviously don't have children or younger siblings then, or if you do then perhaps you are not very close to them. I wonder what Sigmund Freud would say about this.....

Who really cares? I surely don't. He's one of the reasons that their are so many screwed up people in this world today. And I have both children and siblings whom I love very much and vice versa. When I was growing up I didn't need to cry to get affection. As a matter of fact I probably wouldn't have gotten any sympathy if I was doing it for that reason. Children need to learn not to cry all the time it's called growing up. Although, I certainly think it's okay to cry as an adult, both male and female, I do think that we need to learn why we are and when it's good for us. But never to get the affection of other people.

Tears is a prmary tool for youngsters to gain affection even when they have done wrong. It is unfortunate that you have not experienced this.

Answered above

If crying was sufficient on its own to save lives, we would all be cry babies and there would be no war. Good chance there would be humans as well, as we would have struggled to avoid any kind of predation.

That was the point I was making!

Similarly, if we had stopped to pray when a predator approached, there would likely be no humans left.

No, I say whack their heads off in the Name of the Lord and thank God for delivering you!

i thought you refuted evolution?

Survival of the fittest was around before evolution!

 

[Naraoia]

If children don't cry to get attention, then I wonder why my brother used to go into bellowing fits with big crocodile tears for no particular reason all the time

 

[omarrocks]

Darwin struggled with the evolution of tears: what evolutionary advantage could come of secreting water from the eyes? I thought about this, and suggest the following answer.

Tears are both an expression of sorrow/grief—and also a grand visual display of grief—meant to be viewed by others. Think about what happens when you see someone crying: there is an immediate response from the gut; we feel great sympathy, and if we were angry before, our anger dissipates.

I think this explains why the display of tears evolved: to show resignation and submission to an opponent; to relieve tension between warring individuals—and therefore enhance the weaker one's chance of survival.

What do you think?

I think that your point is good. Yet, as tears are perceived as a sign of weakness by many, you would have to cover that aspect also.

Well done though.

Blessings and love.

Omar

 

[[serious]]

I'd have to look over the literature, but my guess is that tears began as part of a generalized arrousal response to prepare for fight or flight. From there it was adapted as a signaling mechanism to indicate arrousal level. Further specification and strengthening could then bring us to the current use.

 

[Joman]

All of Adam's children have three kinds of tears.
each of which has it's own fit, form and function.
There isn't any known mechanism that can produce the irreducibly complex tearing system of the human body.
Maybe some of you consider tears a simple thing but in reality it is complex and requires three totally different tear formulas which provide totally distinct functions.
And other animals do not have them.
I'm suprised that posters are so ready to discuss something they apparently know nothing about and yet they willy nilly theorize in an ad hoc manner while seeming to not bother with understanding the truth of things.
Evolutionism is simply storytelling without regard to witnesses or empirical science.
The AV Bible is an eyewitness account of what actually occurred before mankind existed and since.

Joman.

 

[Corey]

FUnny...I thought tears were just a mechanism to keep yours eyes from drying out (much like your skin). They also can help deliver nutrients and reduce the need for blood vessels (which would obscure vision--my wife had LASIK primarily because her contact were causing more blood vessels to grow--her contacts prevented nutrients in tears from reaching the cells).

Tears as a consequence of experienced emotions probably came from the advantage of outwards displays of emotion in communal settings.

Oh...and onions cause tears because they admit Hydrogen Sulfide gas when cut. The HS then combines with water in tears to form a weak concentration of sulfuric acid. MOre tears are produced to dilute the mixture.

 

[Naraoia]

Oh...and onions cause tears because they admit Hydrogen Sulfide gas when cut. The HS then combines with water in tears to form a weak concentration of sulfuric acid. MOre tears are produced to dilute the mixture.

H2S??? I didn't know that... all I knew it was something thoroughly irritating

It mustn't be very large amounts of hydrogen sulphide because onions don't really stink like the gas does. (On my first encounter with hydrogen sulphide in chemistry class, instead of a careful sniff I managed to take a deeeep breath of it... wasn't very nice )

 

[sinan90]

It's not H2S, from wiki:

As onions are sliced, cells are broken, allowing enzymes called alliinases to break down amino acid sulfoxides and generate sulfenic acids. Sulfenic acids are unstable and spontaneously rearrange into a volatile gas called syn-propanethial-S-oxide. The gas diffuses through the air and eventually reaches the eye, where it reacts with the water to form a diluted solution of sulfuric acid. This acid irritates the nerve endings in the eye, making them sting. Tear glands produce tears to dilute and flush out the irritant

 

[Naraoia]

It's not H2S, from wiki:

Sulphur this or sulphur that, who cares?

Just kidding, thanks for the correction

 

[Corey]

H2S??? I didn't know that... all I knew it was something thoroughly irritating

It mustn't be very large amounts of hydrogen sulphide because onions don't really stink like the gas does. (On my first encounter with hydrogen sulphide in chemistry class, instead of a careful sniff I managed to take a deeeep breath of it... wasn't very nice )

Dude! That's nothing! Guess what I did the first time I work with the super-acid combo of nitric and sulfuric.

I combined them together directly...not in solution-full strength. I cleared out the entire bottom floor of the science building.

 

[Corey]

Sulphur this or sulphur that, who cares?

Just kidding, thanks for the correction

Tankee...yeah...it's sulfuric acid...I thought it was Hydrogen Sulfide gas though.

 

[Naraoia]

Dude! That's nothing! Guess what I did the first time I work with the super-acid combo of nitric and sulfuric.

I combined them together directly...not in solution-full strength. I cleared out the entire bottom floor of the science building.

Oooops!

 

[Zyllem]

I respectfully disagree with your theory, as natural selection selects traits which make an organism more "fit", and I fail to see how crying to show grief would make an organism more fit. It's good that you are interested in this question, but I think there must be another answer.

 

[Naraoia]

I respectfully disagree with your theory, as natural selection selects traits which make an organism more "fit", and I fail to see how crying to show grief would make an organism more fit. It's good that you are interested in this question, but I think there must be another answer.

In social animals, fitness depends very much on how well you are integrated into your community. I think any display of emotion can serve to strengthen your social bonds. Off the top of my head, if you show your grief, you are probably more likely to have others help and support you emotionally and otherwise. Why the signal is crying - that's quite another matter. Perhaps just another paedomorphic feature of humans

 

[ranmaonehalf]

Darwin struggled with the evolution of tears: what evolutionary advantage could come of secreting water from the eyes? I thought about this, and suggest the following answer.

Tears are both an expression of sorrow/grief—and also a grand visual display of grief—meant to be viewed by others. Think about what happens when you see someone crying: there is an immediate response from the gut; we feel great sympathy, and if we were angry before, our anger dissipates.

I think this explains why the display of tears evolved: to show resignation and submission to an opponent; to relieve tension between warring individuals—and therefore enhance the weaker one's chance of survival.

What do you think?

id say it developed much more as a simple way to lubricate and clean the eyes.

 

[Veritas21]

I'd like to address a number of things I have read as I am new to this particular post:

Inan3:

Survival of the fittest was around before evolution!

The term survival of the fittest was coined by Herbert Spencer in 1864, five years AFTER Darwin explained evolution in terms of natural selection. You are simply speculating. Please know things before you post them.

Joman:

The AV Bible is an eyewitness account of what actually occurred before mankind existed and since.

How can it be an eyewitness acount without anyone around to witness it? Totally sending this to FSTDT!

Zyllem:

I respectfully disagree with your theory, as natural selection selects traits which make an organism more "fit", and I fail to see how crying to show grief would make an organism more fit. It's good that you are interested in this question, but I think there must be another answer.

You are assuming natural selection makes organisms more "fit" directly. This is not always the case. Crying would fall under the category of inclusive fitness, which means that the process might indirectly contribute to survival. If you saw a stranger crying the compassionate, nice thing to do would be to see if you can help them with anything. If you saw someone crying over a loved one that was just hit by a car, you certainly would feel bad and likely help that individual if it you could in any way. Acquiring the aid of others through this process would likely have benefitted anyone who exhibited the traits.

I have an article that goes into this in a bit more detail, but is a public article so it is digestible for those of you who are non-science types.

www . froes . dds . nl/ tears . htm
(for the record this is retarded how we cannot post URLs without over 50 posts)

 

[DJ_Ghost]

Imagine this....Warriors going to battle, full of anger and hatred, ready to kill, destroy and conqueor

Spoken like some one who has never gone into battle.

Believe me the overwhelming emotions are not anger and hatred, its fear.

and THEN...the opposing side breaks down and cries , so the other side stops...drops their weapons and gives them a great big hug! NOT!!!!!!![/COLOR]

Do you suppose that anyone cried during the holicaust? But they were still massacred! Do you think POW's may have cried? or children or women being abused and killed? Need I say more?

Yet in all the examples you gave there have been instances of humans taking pity on the enemy and sparing them. They are far from the overwhelming majority, but but it is disingenuous to imply they don’t exist at all.

Actually the OP has a point, although it needs to be developed a little. In infancy crying is a method by which we communicate a need to the adult members of the pack, which they will attempt to fulfil. Hence we are conditioned to respond favourably to the emotional displays of certain people. This does not meen we are conditioned to respond favourably to them when displayed by just anyone, but we certainly are when the person doing the display is one to which we feel an emotional connection.

The higher our own Empathy, the more likely we are to respond to the same cues in less familiar individuals. It is why people with high empathy tend to help strangers who are obviously in distress, whilst people with low empathy can easily shrug it off, or even, if their levels of empathy are particularly low, may respond negatively to another’s signs of distress.

As to the primitives it was survival of the fittest not the weakest. Unfortunately it still is.

However, in pack animals “fittest” indicates the pact that is most able to protect and assist the highest number of its members. Social animals are not going to be as successful if they can not recognise one another’s distress and do something about it, especially in their young.

Ghost

 

[maybenotcrazy]

Should I even post this? I feel like I'm speaking to myself, well, for what it is worth. Emotional Tears are a gift from god. They are consolation for a miserable circumstance, they are a companion in times of extreme happiness. In some religious people they are also a sign that God hears them, but I digress... You atheists will never know the true reason for all these things we humans experience (not saying I even do).

Sorry.
mBNC