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From: wfi@rti-sel.UUCP (William Ingogly)
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: Cold blooded cuteness
Message-ID: <304@rti-sel.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 23-Jul-85 09:43:02 EDT
Article-I.D.: rti-sel.304
Posted: Tue Jul 23 09:43:02 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 26-Jul-85 02:50:27 EDT
References: <2810@topaz.ARPA> <15880@watmath.UUCP>
Reply-To: wfi@rti-sel.UUCP (William Ingogly)
Organization: Research Triangle Institute, NC
Lines: 24

In article <15880@watmath.UUCP> jagardner@watmath.UUCP (Jim Gardner) writes:

>because humans find them cute.  Over millions of years of evolution,
>cuteness proved to be an important survival trait, because
>the meanest nastiest most successful predator of them all was
>reluctant to kill cute animals.  Of course there are good physical
>reasons why most mammalian young resemble human babies, but I think
>there's a strong "selection" factor there as well.

The treasuring of cute little animals is hardly a cultural universal.
For example: a rather decadent Chinese banquet delicacy was live
baby mice dipped in honey and rolled in sesame seeds. Yum. (No, I'm
not cross-posting this to net.cooks :-) Another for example: the
fellows up in the Great White North who make their living clubbing
baby seals probably don't shed any tears over the 'cute' baby seals
with their 'cute' big eyes. I suspect the 'cute' reaction is primarily
a fairly recent Anglo-American cultural tradition, since I've never 
seen it mentioned in any other cultural contexts. Anyone else out 
there have any ideas about this?

I suggest anyone interested in this topic check out the title essay in
a book called 'The Great Cat Massacre,' published (I think) last year.

                               -- Cheers, Bill Ingogly