Photo/Illutration An elephant in Amboseli National Park in Kenya in 2017 (Hideyuki Miura)

Why are we humans attracted to alcohol? One theory has it that we owe it to our primate ancestors.

When fruit ripens and starts to ferment, it produces ethyl alcohol. Those among our ancestors who were attracted to the smell of fermentation ate well-ripened fruits that were highly nutritious, which enabled them to survive and procreate prolifically as a result.

That, according to American biologist Robert Dudley, is the gist of his "drunken monkey hypothesis." His theory is based on the concept of natural selection, the process by which living organisms pass down characteristics that better enable their offspring to survive and reproduce.

Perpetual evolution through natural selection is a topic that can stimulate the imagination.

However, sadness is the only emotion evoked by a theory posited by U.S. and other researchers in Mozambique.

Their studies found that the population of elephants without tusks is on the rise, and rampant poaching is said to be responsible for this alarming trend.

A civil war raged in Mozambique from 1977 to 1992, during which ivory became a lucrative source of wartime funding.

According to a U.S. scientific journal, tuskless females accounted for 18 percent of the local elephant population before the civil war but rose to 33 percent among those born after the war.

Presumably, the characteristics of pachyderms that were spared slaughter were passed onto their offspring.

It is quite unusual for such a visible sign of evolution to appear in so short a period. Did this indicate the extreme savagery of poachers?

This may come across as a rare case. But then, it may well be just another outcome of the hunting and development projects through which humans have driven innumerable species to extinction.

Elephant tusks help them dig into the ground and strip tree barks to obtain food.

I pray that the process of natural selection proper will kick in eventually to restore those animals to their original form.

--The Asahi Shimbun, Jan. 27

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Vox Populi, Vox Dei is a popular daily column that takes up a wide range of topics, including culture, arts and social trends and developments. Written by veteran Asahi Shimbun writers, the column provides useful perspectives on and insights into contemporary Japan and its culture.

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