No kids? No worries! Not a biological failure. | Kristen Sadler | TEDxNTU
[Applause] life what's the point this is why we're here today I want to offer you a biological proposition for you to consider that the sole purpose of us being here on this Earth is to preserve and to pass on our genetic material this Gene centered view of life is not a A New Concept by any means in fact it was popularized perhaps most recently by Richard Dawkins in 1976 possibly before a lot of your genetic mixers were uh selected at the core of this story is DNA and as we just heard from David Christian DNA is a wonderful molecule that contains information about how to make a living organism it's also a able to copy itself so in the words of Richard Dawkins DNA is a replicator he goes on to describe our organism our body as simply a vehicle a vehicle a machine to transfer our genetic material through time and space of course over time our bodies have developed certain physical characteristics and behaviors to give our genes a better chance of being passed from one generation to the next but in biological terms the idea is that we only exist because of our genes and to pass our genes onto the Next Generation so of course being a curious young woman if I am to accept this particular train of thought that my only purpose in life is to pass on my genetic material and maybe some of these same questions are forming in your mind now as well how do I individually fit into this grand scheme into this big history this information Network that we have been thrust into what is my biological Destiny me me me not anybody else not the big history what about me I guess this is something that hopefully everybody here is also starting to consider so I want to take a look from three different perspectives from the individual the family and from our species perspective so we'll start firstly at the individual level what can I do to find the ideal mate how can I give my genes the best chance of survival and getting passed on to the next Generation to H to start to answer this we need to know what men and women find attractive in the opposite gender and not only what they find attractive but why why are these things important there are now eight commonly agreed on aspects of physical Beauty which is shown um up here behind me if you are fortunate enough to possess all eight perhaps like me thank you then then you will have a long line of potential Partners knocking at your door but I must admit I'm not perfect my nose is a little bit crooked and I do have a blister my foot at the moment by having a look at these you can see that our genes do influence most if not all of these different aspects but there is a bit of good news there's some wiggle room for those of us that want to maybe tip the odds in our favor as well when we look at these eight we also can see in some cases that it's more obvious of the biological reasons why these are important in in attraction so for example youthfulness is appealing because it is a good indicator of overall health symmetry counts as well uh symmetrical face and body much like mine except for my crooked nose can indicate uh or infer uh less exposure to disease to malnutrition and perhaps also less chance of passing on genetic flaws to Future Generations others are a little bit more difficult to understand and I want to draw your attention to body odor so how you smell is important we are a wonderful organism in that we are able to sniff out we can sniff out good genes in potential Partners so let me just explain this one a little bit further say we do an experiment and we take a group of men which is probably a good experiment within itself but in the name of science we have to go past just collecting our group of men if we collect a group of men and we ask them to wear identical t-shirts overnight we give the t-shirts to a woman and we ask her to smell the t-shirts hopefully this is a paid study not a voluntary one and that she will get paid to do this I don't know if I would do this voluntarily even in the name of some science as she's sniffing the t-shirt we ask her to rate which ones are more pleasant or more appealing and we we'll generally find that she will prefer some over others and in the example here uh the woman has indicated that the shirt number two has the most Pleasant odor now the fascinating part is that the shirt that the woman finds most appealing will from the man who has the greatest difference in his genes that determine his immunity so what this means is that if these two people got together and had children that together their combination of genes would give the child a great variation in their immune system and their ability to fight a wider range of infections so there is a benefit to the children from the recombination of the genes so this is really nice this body odor story I guess the lesson from this one is don't go on a date if you have a blocked nose make sure you have a nice clear nose the nose nose uh what about body shape I hear you ask body shape is something that of course is determined by our genes and also by our Behavior so for the ladies out there a couple of things to know oh everybody's waiting so we do know that there is uh men have different preferences across culture for a body size but most interestingly perhaps is that in large scale studies where more than 300 different cultures have been studied in over 80% 80 cases men are found to prefer or be more attracted to bodies of a more plump shape so this is good news perhaps for a lot of us including myself and the reason why that men are tend to be more attracted to a more plump body shape is because it is a really good indication again of overall health uh good access to good nutrition and the ability to store fat and these are important if you're looking for somebody to carry your child and raise your child so the men out there yes size does matter I don't know what you're all thinking size does matter women are looking for broad shoulders a v-shaped torso and narrow hips and so why are we looking for this because if I'm going to be carrying your baby for 9 months I want to know that you're out there hunting and providing for me and these are really good characteristics that can indicate a good Hunter and provider I don't know if it applies to keyboard Warriors as well perhaps not it's also interesting to note for all of you young men that women are attracted to different features at different times of their menstrual cycle so a woman who is ovulating tends to be more attracted to uh more defined facial features of broad forward uh strong jawline uh defined cheekbones more so than during her Menses or the Lal phases or if she's taking hormonal contraceptives so the next piece of advice is for the young men if you're trying to catch the eye of a lovely lady and you're not having any success at the moment just wait a couple of weeks and your luck might indeed change I've mentioned a few General points here about biological and physical attra ction but it's important to know as well that our personal ideas of physical attraction vary and are not only determined by our genes but uh there's some studies coming out now that are reporting that it may be even more so that they influenced by our individual life experiences okay moving on to my second point which is at the family level I don't have children I don't even have a strong desire to have children and some of my friends are not even attracted to the opposite gender so of course that makes me ask am I a biological failure I'm not passing on my individual genes how do I explain this to my grandma well all is not lost we have oh sorry about that we have a wonderful hypothesis called The Kin selection hypothesis and what this States is that we do have stronger Tendencies to nurture protect and generally look after those biological relatives that we have more so than other non-related people so even though I personally might not be I keep going like this passing on my biological individual jeans I am nurturing and supporting the jeans that I share with other members of my family by looking after my nieces and nephews so Grandma I'm not a biological failure the third part of the story is how we are all living and working together to protect our species as one of the roles of Our Lives we're all spending a lot of time not reproducing we're studying we're working we're interacting with people that are not necessarily potential reproductive Partners so why are we doing this or maybe we do know people that are just doing this all the time is there a biological purpose for this typee of behavior so one can argue that through our different activities and vocations that we are indeed increasing the chance of survival of our species overall we are increasing the level of Happiness making life more enjoyable uh reducing stress for other people for example we have diplomats who are maintaining peace we have Engineers who are actually useful because they are are inventing wonderful systems and cities for us we have artists like Ben who are creating a visually aesthetically beautiful world and of course we have our street performers who are making us laugh we are learning about history in Italy to add to our Collective memory these are a couple of my friends uh one day we went to visit see the Iceman the 5,000 year old Iceman this is not him this is a reproduction of him he's looking very good for 5,000 years old and we do need women playing rugby in Tennessee oh thank you to add to the social Fabric and growth in our in our society plus a whole not more so this genan centered view of life might not be for everybody but I would just like to remind you of a couple of the benefits perhaps of taking this approach first of all when you're swiping left and right it's okay to admit that physical appearance is important to you you can just blame biology secondly you don't need to feel guilty about not having children and going on fabulous vacations but you must just remember to take your nieces and nephews with you sometimes as well this is my niece and nephew squishing into my suitcase and thirdly this is coming from a scientist again we do need art to survive for the future of our species so what have I learned what is the point of my life why am I here honestly I'm still working on it and it does change over time and what I have learned is that life is different and means different things to all of us diversity is essential for life so let's Embrace diversity let's Embrace life thank you for listening