Kissing - the Swiss army knife adaptation

renzoarg (68)in #science • 8 years ago

We all recall the first time we did something. We even tag it a a special, unique moment in our lives. But, actually we're a bit unfair and poorly loyal to the facts that effectively happened at our "first times", especially when those first times have someone involved. In my case, talking bout my first kiss would be extremely pretentious, since it had little of "mine". "We are an amazing species, we send spaceships to Mars"... Hold on a second! yeah, we are an amazing species, as an average; but if you leave me alone in a room with the Mars Rovers, the greatest thing I can do with it is play races while making sounds with my mouth in a rather childish way.

Lets just say that I tried my best to not ruin the situation, attempting to be at the height of the circumstances, this is, two steps above her in the stairs. I'm not saying that I did not care for her or anything similar, but she was not new in this "kissing" thing and I was trying to deal with my inexperience the best I could. The chat went on, with cheetos and coke... and my inability was becoming more evident at every possible moment; until she ran out of patience, crossed her fingers behind my head, and kissed me. Everything was so "aaaaaaawwwww!".

From a third eye perspective it may have looked like a marvelously cute scene, but lets stop for a second into reality and check what was going on: two infantile mouths full of remains of chips. Two mouths clashing against each other while the tongues kept moving saliva back and forward. Disgusting.

What is wrong with us?

If you stop to think about it you notice there's something wrong with us. Really wrong. Kissing is great, and probably because of that we do it every time we can. but it IS weird. Why when we like someone we have no better idea than getting our face near join our lips and try to invade that person's mouth with our tongue? How such horrid event is even considered legal, well seen and be one of the aspirations as we hug a pot of Ice Cream while watching a Sunday Movie? This disgusting behavior is so present among our species that there has to be a way to explain why are we so sick.

Kissing is an arbitrary , subjective and extremely hypocrite act, because Angelina Jolie's saliva is not radically different to Mary's, the old maiden that lives downstairs, 90 years old. I mean, Mary is a great woman, but If I've to pick one to kiss: give me Angelina.

Origin

For some reason, we love kissing. There's different explanations for this beautiful and disgusting act, some clearer than other more speculative ones, kissing is not an exact science. The Philematology is the science in charge of studying this dark art of kissing.

If kissing is weird, the origin could be worse. Making out is not an exclusively human thing. The thing could have started when we were more primitive. Several animals, including primates, feed their offspring by giving them food mouth to mouth, it is very likely that our hominid ancestors did the same. Considering that being fed is a clear act of unconditional love (the kind that makes some tattoo their arms with "Mom"), some evolutionist psychologists believe that this behavior could've extender into a way of displaying affection among mother and children in general, and later... we overdid it and converted it in a battlefield of "all vs all". (Neither is this a human exclusive behavior, Bonobos make out too. Yes, french kissing with tongue and everything).

Adaptive advantages

Kissing is an ideal moment to measure the other; for instance, through our sense of smell. Very few times you've the chance to smell someone so much as when you're kissing. The other person's breath can give us information about the subject's health. Not only that. During 1995 someone made a study where a group of females had to smell t-shirts that were used two nights in a row by different men, they had to chose which one was more appealing to them. Later they analyzed particular genes related to the immune system in both male and female groups. The result was the females felt attraction for the smell of the men that had a radical difference in these genes, in comparison to the women. The hypothesis is, somehow, through our sense of smell, women chose men that have a different immune system than theirs, this would imply potential children with a higher variability, an immune system able to identify more pathogens (something that makes a lot of sense if we consider that our genetic pool is VERY limited).

Lips, a whole Universe. This part of our body is one of the most sensitive in our bodies, the region of our brain cortex in charge of managing that information is even larger than the part in charge of managing the info coming from the genitals (so, there you've the scientific reason why a kiss can turn you on, in no time). During a kiss, different neurotransmitters and hormones are released all related to the feeling "making out" gives: there's an increase of activity at the levels of dopamine in the areas of the brain related with motivation, pleasure and addictions; adrenaline levels skyrocket (increasing sudoration and hearth rate); endorphins are also everywhere... A frikking partaaaaaayyyy!!! Besides, the levels of oxytocin also go up; a hormone related, among others, to social attachment, that increases during orgasm and (female) lactancy. On the other hand, cortisol goes down, a hormone directly related to stress. When you see your beloved one in a stressed mood, you've the perfect excuse to kiss in the name of science.

How to kiss?

Kid, if I have to explain this to you, then you'll never understand.

Knowing the why of kissing is not the only interesting part, the how is also pretty cool. Think in all your kisses (If you can recall them all, you need to go out a bit more...). To which side do you lean your head to? A majority of times (2 out of 3) we do it to the right (even left handed people, or British). Onur Güntürkün, a German Neuroscientist spent 2 years stalking people while they kiss in public places (a very special fellow), he believes that this has something to do with the laterality. Generally speaking, for either hands, feet, ears or eyes, a great majority prefers to use the right side of their body. Yet, the development of this trend to lean our heads to one side is even previous to this laterality, 80% of women hold their babies to breast feed in a way that they need to turn their head to the right. The idea is that, leaning our head to the right is associated to love, care an feeding... Hard-coded in our brain. Ironies of nature.

The evolutive origin and adaptive value of kissing is not fully clear. We know more about where is it going that from where it comes from. Yet, it is not crazy to consider that it's not only a way of showing affection, but a great way to pack a LOT of personal information and present it to the potential couple, in a single, beautiful act.

Knowing how to chose someone for a "touch and go" or the rest of our lives is not a topic worthy of disregard (dammit, I still haven't figured it out). We know little about the other (and even after 6 years, you'll get awful surprises, believe me); and sometimes by seeing and listening is just not enough. When those doubts come afloat, perhaps kissing is the most beautiful, disgusting, and effective way of getting the answers we need.

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#kissing #evolution #anthropology #philematology