human and chimpanzze

It might
seem hard
to believe,
but we have
about the
same
number of
hairs on our
bodies as a
chimpanzee, it’s just that our
hairs are useless, so fine they
are almost invisible. We aren’t
sure quite why we lost our
protective fur. It has been
suggested that it may have
been to help early humans
sweat more easily, or to make
life harder for parasites such as
lice and ticks, or even because
our ancestors were partly
aquatic.
But perhaps the most
attractive idea is that early
humans needed to co-operate
more when they moved out of
the trees into the savanna.
When animals are bred for co-
operation, as we once did with
wolves to produce dogs, they
become more like their infants.
In a fascinating 40-year
experiment starting in the
1950s, Russian foxes were bred
for docility. Over the period,
adult foxes become more and
more like large cubs, spending
more time playing, and
developing drooping ears,
floppy tails and patterned coats.
Humans similarly have some
characteristics of infantile apes
– large heads, small mouths
and, significantly here, finer
body hair.