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Unlike our closest cousins the chimpanzees, we don’t live in groups in which the males share (and fight over) females–instead, we tend to pair up. How did this happen?

A new study shows that weak males who were inferior fighters chanced upon a winning solution: Pick one female out of the group and treat her especially well, so she’ll stay with you. It was the beginning of monogamy.

In the May 28th edition of the Los Angeles Times, Rosie Mestel quotes biomathematician Sergey Gavrilets as saying that this mating strategy may "have triggered a key step in the very long process of the evolution of the family. Without it, we wouldn’t have the modern family."
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Is email evil? People are doing so much texting that they’re getting arthritis in their thumbs. One French internet executive has banned internal email, starting in 2014.

In BBC News, Tom Chatfield quotes author Kevin Kelly as saying that the idea of "wanting is not just for humans. Your dog wants to play Frisbee. Your cat wants to be scratched, Birds want mates. Worms want moisture. Bacteria want food." And, he says, email wants your time and thought, as it demands a reply.
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We always assume that humans are getting smarter all the time, but we may really be getting dumber. In fact, human brains are actually SHRINKING, despite the fact that our heads are actually getting LARGER. And why do so many people do two–or more–things at once, like read a book while watch TV (or–and this is dangerous–text while driving). Studies show that the brain can’t fully focus on more than one task at a time, but it turns out it makes us FEEL good.
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When we hear news about Iran’s nuclear ambitions, we think of it as a prosperous country, but some people there are desperately poor and some of them are selling their kidneys to make money, since you can survive with just one.

Iran is the only country where the selling and buying of kidneys is legal. In the Guardian, Saeed Kamali Dehghan describes the case of a widow selling her kidney in order to pay for her daughter’s dowry, so she can marry. He quotes her as saying, "It is getting too late for my daughter to marry–her moment has already passed."
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