Hair and temperature

By now, you all know how the scientist in me lies dormant and itches to reach out to the common folk to enlighten their normal living.

So here's my next discovery.

I find that many friends of mine are actually thick skinned. What I mean to say is that, they cant stand the normal weather of cities like Chennai and feel more comfortable in the cooler climes of say a hill station.

Whenever we travel in the same car, they want the blower at near max speed, whereas I want it at near lowest speed. I invariably tend to push the vents towards them in such cases.

From what they tell me, I kinda get the impression that they have the A/C running like for nearly 11 months a year. The balance one month is probably the equivalent of the power cuts that happen.

Even at work, they complain about the lack of A/C whilst I think that its just about right. And I used to have a roomie who used to set the temperature to like 55 or 60 F and I would be freezing in some 30 minutes.

So, I finally started to analyse why some people have such a need for cooler temperatures when I don't.

My stand is simple. I live in a part of the world where it is perpetually hot. And not to forget, quite sultry too. And this is not like a recent phenomenon that can be attributed to Global Warming.

Next, my parents too have lived here for many many years. So have their parents and their parents and so on. So, basically, the weather gene in my system, is tuned more for warmer climates than colder ones.

But then, wont that be true for my other friends as well? It actually is.

So, whats the differentiator? What is it that those guys have that I don't? Think... think.... Yes, that's it. Its HAIR. And evolution of course.

I want you to refresh your memory and bring back all those pictures/drawings of the homo sapiens or the neanderthals etc. What is it that you can distinctly recollect. All of them had lots and lots of body hair.

You might attribute it to the lack of Gillette or BIC in those days, but even after human beings started making tools, invented the wheel etc., they never let go of their body hair.

Over the ages however, as man started evolving, he displayed one vital difference compared to his ancestors. He started losing hair.

So, not having much body hair is a sure sign of evolution. I am not a very hairy person. In fact, till date, my facial hair really doesn't go smoothly and there is still some barren real estate on my cheek.

If I take the sample of people I know, who prefer colder temperatures, they are relatively hair-ier than me.

My inference then is simple: The more hair a person has, more he can withstand colder climates and probably prefers it. Compare the Polar bear versus the Grizzly bear versus the normal bear. Definitely the Polar bear has more fur than a Grizzly which in turn has more fur than the "karadi".

To me, this in turn substantiates Darwin's theory of evolution - Survival of the fittest. I cannot live in a hot environment and have so much hair. Its counter-productive.

In fact, my adaptation is better than all the others to my environment. I am not carrying over any useless gene code from my fore-fore-fore-fathers till date.

And on a lighter note, whenever we talk of aliens, the picture that is presented is predominantly that of a specimen without hair. And we all think that aliens are more evolved than us and have far more intelligence.

In conclusion, people have this preference for colder or warmer temperatures purely based on how hairy they are. And in turn, the more body hair a person has, it only means a slower evolution and adaptation!!!

You think I should patent this finding of mine?