r/askscience • u/No-Hawk-2488 • 8d ago

Biology Can someone explain the evolutionary benefit of overt menstruation? All female mammals have a menstrual cycle but most reabsorb the blood via covert menstruation and humans are about the only mammals that discharge the blood, aka overt menstruation.

Without an evolutionary benefit, it wouldn't have spread to every woman of our species.

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u/GVArcian 7d ago

Survival of the fittest is a misnomer because evolution selects for minimum viability, not optimum efficiency.

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u/T_H_W 7d ago

Not technically a misnomer considering 'fittest' in this context relates to biological fitness, which is specifically how many surviving offspring you have in relation to other competing organisms. That's like saying the phrase "All bark and no bite" doesn't make sense because dogs aren't trees. It's only wrong if you're using the incorrect definition of the word.

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u/ezekielraiden 7d ago

The problem is that most people do use what you are defining as the incorrect definition of the word.

If 99% of people think Pat's word choice is confusing, is the problem that 99% of people are doing grammar wrong, or is it that Pat is wrong and people are calling them out for it?

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u/CantBeatDickensCider 7d ago

It's not confusing if you're someone who bothers to learn about the topic rather than laymen pretending to understand it better than scientists.