I became fascinated by the history of sexual selection during my second year of graduate work in biology. I was drafting a review paper on the evolution of internal reproduction in fishes. The two dominant theories at the time (worked out with insects) suggested that the insemination of females evolved either because of male-male competition for access to the time and place of fertilization, or because cryptic female choice drove increased competition between males. Who was in charge of the mating game, I wondered, males or females? The evidence for both claims was very similar: the tendency of sexual organs to become more complex over evolutionary time. What differed was the interpretation.
Audio: Milam reads from Looking for a Few Good Males
Read an extended excerpt from Looking for a Few Good Males
Around the same time, my advisor was consistently vexed by the university’s reluctance to support ...
