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suzie
Joined: Thu May 13, 2010 9:20 am Posts: 14
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Why do we have eyebrows?
Eyebrows are a very significant aspect of our appearance. They are one of the most distinctive features that make up our faces, and we pay a lot of attention to them. We think of some types of eyebrows as attractive and some as unattractive, and many people spend as much time preening their eyebrows as they do applying makeup to their eyelashes or lips. Eyebrows are also one of our most expressive facial features. One of the clearest ways to tell somebody what you're thinking is to simply move your eyebrows up or down -- we all know what different eyebrow positions mean.
So, eyebrows obviously serve a lot of functions in our culture today -- beauty, nonverbal communication, distinctive appearance. But why are they there in the first place? As we evolved and lost most of the thick hair on our bodies, why did we keep that little bit over the eyes? Scientists aren't entirely sure why we kept this hair, but they have a pretty good guess. We know that eyebrows help keep moisture out of our eyes when we sweat or walk around in the rain. The arch shape diverts the rain or sweat around to the sides of our face, keeping our eyes relatively dry. The most obvious advantage of this is that it lets us see clearly when we're sweating a lot or out in the rain. Without eyebrows, getting around in these conditions is a little more difficult. The shape of your brow itself diverts a certain amount of moisture, but eyebrows make a significant difference in your ability to see. Diverting the sweat away is also good because the salt in sweat irritates the eyes, making them sting a little.
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Thu May 13, 2010 12:15 pm |
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aldwin47
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Re: Why do we have eyebrows?
Hi guys
I don't know if there is a direct physical reason (e.g. they may help protect our eyes from falling detritus - maybe someone else knows better on that matter), but they are useful for conveying emotion, and so help in interpersonal communication (a little like a crude voice box, but they don't create sound but rather create a visual image of what the other person is thinking or feeling).They are also just part of what makes us human (i.e. some things are there simply because people who don't have them are thought be abnormal, so they find it more difficult to find a mate with whom to have children, so the one's who have children are the one's with the particular characteristic, and so the characteristic perpetuates to the next generation).
Have a nice day
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Mon May 24, 2010 2:23 pm |
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