What is the point of pubic hair?

I do not understand what it's use for our bodies.....meh....

Check it.

Or the hair on our heads. Bleh.

The only hair that makes any sense is the hair in our noses.

And our pubes are the only places left that we don't cover with deodorant, hair spray or perfume. Interesting.

Everybody, let's sniff crotches!

Well, you lose most of your heat through your head, so I'm fairly sure that keeps you warm. Or it would if we didn't cut it short.

But in The Modern World, we barely get to smell each other until we've already decided we want to get it on down there ...which is one reason why pubic hair is so expendable these days ...

Okay now that I've read the thing...though the article doesn't mention it, I'm not convinced with the explanation of hair remaining there because of sex. We lost our ability to detect phermones a long time ago, so they really should be useless. I guess the glands still exist, but it seems odd. Also, if the hair on your head stays on because of sex...well that doesn't really make sense, evolution-wise. I can understand the glands thing if the logic is that our bodies don't know we can't detect phermones anymore, but there's no way anyone's body could know that we find hair on the head pleasing to the eye.

I think we just need a sense of smell for the theory to have some relevance. That is, we've arrived at a point now where most body hair is pointless and redundant. Hence, many of us tend to get rid of a lot of it.

Head hair may be different -- it has the practical purpose of helping keep body heat, and it has the visual purpose of being attractive and symbolic of youthful vigour.

I don't know what "sense", evolution-wise, you refer to. Peacocks have fancy feathers that have no practical purpose except to attract mates. And, evolutionarily speaking, that's a very practical purpose.

You're right about the hair thing, I guess. I wasn't thinking that way because I'm sort of an idiot. But the smell thing I'm still not buying. I may not be understanding this correctly, but basically the idea is that hair spreads a scent that turns us on. My understanding was that that was more what phermones did, and that that method of choosing a mate has become so antiquated that we've lost our ability to detect them. If it is now simply a universal scent put out when you're horny and/or fertile, I'd think we'd all be pretty familiar with it.

I've got to be misunderstanding something, though, as this guy is an olfactory specialist and obviously has more of an idea of what's going on with your nose than I. But it still doesn't seem to me to be something that would make any difference.

I don't think the argument is that the pubic hair helps spread pheremones long distances. I think it's simpler -- that in more primitive times, sex was driven by smell as much as by other things, and that sexual smell was "trapped" by the pubic hair.

(Particularly since the sexual smell had to compete with all the other smells of what would have been a rather unhygenic lifestyle by modern standards.)

After looking at this picture of the lovely DebraJean, does it really matter?

Still evolution in action. Nature providing the best dental floss.

It was funny to me that that wasn't mentioned as a reason one might get a bikini wax.

And I really don't want to continue breaking this into further tedium, so if I'm still curious tomorrow and remember, I'll look up a bit more on the scent thing.

just be glad it's curly. Otherwise you'd poke your eyes out!

fully agree

to keep ya stuff warm

though sorta pointless at this point with the invention of underwear and clothes.

eventually we will evolve into hairless 20 finger weaklings.
damn internet

[Edited on Dec 28, 2004 by fiendish]

to prevent chaffing of the penis on warm sweaty days

i think it gives us something extra to shave into cool little designs

If i had holes in my pockets, i'd definately run my fingers threw my hair

I creeped you're page in hopes of finding that secret

it's hard to believe men and women even considered hooking up 100, 500, 1000 years ago...scabrious, unwashed, dreadlocked pubes... it had to be a labor of love.

we are talking about pubes not goatee's...

oh wait....