Symbiotic Relationship of Metabolic Heat Generation Differences of Sexes

The following text has been in one or more obscure and seldom visited directories of my computers for many years. The timestamp on the file is January 18, 1995 but most likely I put it on one of my computers shortly after it was posted in the UseNet newsgroup misc.kids. My kids were young then and I read the newsgroup regularly. Hence, this probably has been on my computers for over 20 years.

I’m posting it here because every once in a while I want to share it and I have difficulty finding it. I think this will be an easier place to find it and more likely to be permanent.

From: berkery@emsun1.crd.ge.com Wed Oct 17 05:33:39 1990
Newsgroups: misc.kids
Subject: Cold Feet
Organization: General Electric Corporate R&D Center

A few people have asked me to elaborate on that last statement in my previous posting. You know, the one about women and cold feet. So, ok, here’s yet another note from Jack’s compendium of little known scientific theories.
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“Symbiotic Relationship of Metabolic Heat Generation Differences of Sexes.”
by Berke Jackery

Darwin and his successors have tried to explain physiological traits in animal species as the result of adaptation to environmental effects. There is one such proof for a certain trait in the human species which is obvious to even the most casual observer. That no one has heretofore published this fact is quite amazing since it is so immediately obvious. I’m talking about COLD FEET in females of the species homo sapiens.

It is a fact that women’s metabolism levels are not sufficient to generate enough heat to keep all their extremities warm. Over the millennia they have found that the agony of de feet can be alleviated by finding a suitable male who’s heat generation capacity can satisfy their needs. Males of the same species have metabolic rates which produce an overabundance of energy in the form of radiated heat. (Often their bodies produce excesses which are not converted to energy but are expressed as large quantities of methane gas.) This uneven heat generative difference between the sexes has evolved a symbiotic relationship where those who require it will attempt to attract the services of those who can produce it. The result is that when the two get between the sheets, the female will contrive to move her icy toes (some have been measured at temperatures close to absolute zero) toward and even under some part of the male’s anatomy thereby stealing his heat.

The male however, seldom even notices this stealthy behavior since whenever any portion of the female anatomy rubs up against any portion of his, his temperature immediately rises several hundred degrees to balance the process. The procreation process of the species is likewise related to this need to exchange heat. When the female feels the need for some whole-body heat rather than a simple toe-job, or when the male on the other hand has such an excess of heat that he must have a receptive heat-sink to take it from him, the relationship requires that far more body parts be rubbed together. The symbiosis is then complete and the male – female bonding remains intact solely because of this need for an interchange of body heat.

The alternative would have been to evolve a system similar to many insects where the female gets some hapless male to satisfy her needs then summarily bites his head off thereby severing the relationship altogether. Luckily for human males, their mate still has that all-consuming need for warmth whether or not he has ever fully satisfied her. So he is kept around as long as he continues to provide some convenient spot to warm her toes.

That, at any rate is the theory, but I think it’s a very solid one. How else can you explain why women would want to sleep next to a large hairy beast that sweats and snores and farts and grinds its teeth all night. Let’s face it guys, we’re really nothing more than giant heating pads for these females. But, well, when one considers the payment for services rendered, I can live with that. I’ve got lots of excess body heat to spare.
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Jack Berkery, Computer Scientist, GE Research, Schenectady NY

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One thought on “Symbiotic Relationship of Metabolic Heat Generation Differences of Sexes

  1. Hmm. I don’t know; my wife tried to bite my head off just the other day, but I didn’t let her.

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