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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
 Posted - 10/03/2007 : 20:57:08
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This is news to me: A three-way sex struggle resembling the game rock-paper-scissors may have existed for 175 million years or more in lizards, research now suggests.
Researchers found three-way struggle for sex, and markings that
reveal which reptile plays what part, in European common lizards
(Lacerta vivipara). Credit: Barry Sinervo
The reptilian triads may be far more common than previously recognized—and may even shape the way humans behave, the scientists said
"You either cooperate, or take by force, or take by deception," said researcher Barry Sinervo, a behavioral geneticist at the University of California, Santa Cruz. "It's one of those basic games that structures life."
. . .
Sinervo and his colleagues found males adopt one of those three strategies when pursuing females. A quick look at their gaudy-colored bellies reveals which line of attack they will pursue.
Orange-bellied males are brutes that invade other lizards' territories to mate with any female they can hold. But while they're gone, yellow-bellied males sneak deceptively onto the vacant territory and mate with undefended females. White-bellied males guard their mates closely and ally with other white-bellied lizards to keep the yellows at bay. Thus the analogy to rock-paper-scissors—orange force defeats white cooperation, cooperation defeats yellow deception and deception defeats force. |
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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filthy
SFN Die Hard
USA
14408 Posts |
 Posted - 10/04/2007 : 02:46:35 [Permalink]
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Upon occasion I have wasted a lot of time watching a very belligerent, male fence swift defend his territry. His belly was as irridecent blue as you could ask for and he'd flash it at any other lizard that came by, ready for for a fight or a frolic.
In swifts, the brighter the belly, the more dominant the male, and the more lady friends he'd entice into his tiny empire. And the more lurking pretenders to his throne hanging about hoping a hawk or something would get him, as well.
Interesting article.
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"What luck for rulers that men do not think." -- Adolf Hitler (1889 - 1945)
"If only we could impeach on the basis of criminal stupidity, 90% of the Rethuglicans and half of the Democrats would be thrown out of office." ~~ P.Z. Myres
"The default position of human nature is to punch the other guy in the face and take his stuff." ~~ Dude
Brother Boot Knife of Warm Humanitarianism,
and Crypto-Communist! 
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Lizards play "Rock, Scissors, Paper" mating game
