# Old men, eyebrow and ear hair **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 10, 2002, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162 "2002-06-10T00:36:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![crypto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b3f665/32.png) [@crypto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crypto)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/1 "2002-06-10T00:36:36Z")
Apologies in advance if this has been asked. A quick search turned up nothing. I have just finished watching 60 Minutes. Andy Rooney’s eyebrows are out of control. From my brain to the message board… what causes eyebrow and ear hair growth to kick into overdrive the older men get? Can there be any evolutionary purpose? (Other than to make people sick to look at, I mean) It can’t just be years of ignored growth. I guess another question could be why don’t old guys trim their eyebrows and ear hair, but I assume the answer has somthing to do with not giving a shit anymore. Thanks, Max ---
**Author:** ![LolaCocaCola](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7cd45c/32.png) [@LolaCocaCola](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LolaCocaCola)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/2 "2002-06-10T00:59:17Z")
> [@](#): > > Ear Hair > > Without hair in your ear, you would be deaf. The vibration of tiny hairs in your inner ear stimulates the auditory nerve and carries the sensation of sound to your brain. Rampant growth of ear hair, however, can annoy others and interfere with your hearing. Little is known about this phenomenon; it is common in older men, and has been thought in the past to be associated with an increased risk of heart disease. An effective, low-tech approach to dealing with your ear hair problem is to purchase ear hair trimmers and use them. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/3 "2002-06-10T01:13:00Z")
[http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a4\_124.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a4_124.html) How could you think that an old fart like Cecil could have overlooked this? ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/4 "2002-06-10T01:13:01Z")
[http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a4\_124.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a4_124.html) How could you think that an old fart like Cecil could have overlooked this? ---
**Author:** ![medstar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f07891/32.png) [@medstar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/medstar)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/5 "2002-06-10T01:14:10Z")
Maybe due to their deteriorating eyesight, they can’t see it too well. My take on the situation is that blond men don’t need to worry about this, but dark-haired men need to check their eyebrows when they hit 50. On some men I see, their eyebrows start looking like pieces of steel wool. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/6 "2002-06-10T01:18:20Z")
Sorry, **lola** , but the ear hairs you cite as responsible for hearing are not the same as the ones which are visible on the external ear, and are not related. Both structurally & functionally they are quite different. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/7 "2002-06-10T01:19:43Z")
…and when you get old, you tend to repeat yourself.🙂 This fucking board. ---
**Author:** ![LolaCocaCola](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7cd45c/32.png) [@LolaCocaCola](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LolaCocaCola)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/8 "2002-06-10T01:26:59Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Qadgop the Mercotan \* > \*\*Sorry, **lola** , but the ear hairs you cite as responsible for hearing are not the same as the ones which are visible on the external ear, and are not related. Both structurally & functionally they are quite different. \*\* No worries, Qadgop 🙂 I just happened to find that on a website. I am more than pleased that I am no expert on hairy ear-holes. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![crypto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b3f665/32.png) [@crypto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crypto)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 6:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/9 "2002-06-10T06:45:14Z")
samclem: Thanks for the link. I would be interested to know when that article was written. Perhaps more studies have been done. Thanks, Max ---
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/10 "2002-06-10T07:40:13Z")
I’ll use my super-secret moderator superpowers to divine that the column first appeared on the 17[sup]th[/sup] of January, 1997. ---
**Author:** ![c-of-cyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@c-of-cyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/c-of-cyn)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/11 "2002-06-10T14:20:54Z")
Regarding a few points in this previously cited Cecil post: > [@](#): > > (4) The tragus is the pointy projection on the front side of your ear opening. Interestingly, tragus can also mean any of the hairs growing at the entrance to the ear. So I guess what you’ve got there, Ernest, is a bad case of tragus on the tragus. The tragus is specifically the projection on the front side of your ear opening - the one many people depress in order to block their ears. Any hair on the tragus should be referred to as tragus hair rather than just tragus. > [@](#): > > (5) The pinna, according to the dictionary, is the “external part of the ear,” but some medical authors figure it really means the external part of the ear except the tragus. Either he “medical authors” got it all wrong, or Cecil is reading something the wrong way. Considering that I’ve worked with a few inept medical people (people who thought that they knew everything about the human body when they might have only been a specialist in one particular part - they might have been very “ept” when it came to kidneys, but they probably didn’t know their tragus from their big toe) and have only known Cecil to be a wealth of accurate knowledge, I’ll go with the medical authors being a bit confused :). The pinna is the part of the ear van Gogh reportedly chopped off. It is made of skin and cartilage and acts as a “gatherer” of sound waves. The tragus is a certain projection of the pinna. One is a small part of a greater other. [/quote] c-of-cyn former audiologist (I leave the kidneys to the nephrologists) ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2002, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/12 "2002-06-10T14:24:24Z")
My Dad’s been a college professor for a number of years. His eyebrows look like what you’d get after putting two Zebco fishing spools into a spinning dryer. He actually likes them as they make his tweed jacket and “substituted for a bib” tie look somewhat classy. ---
**Author:** ![kniz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@kniz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kniz)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2002, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/13 "2002-06-11T22:52:15Z")
> [@](#): > > An effective, low-tech approach to dealing with your ear hair problem is to purchase ear hair trimmers and use them. I got one of those f\*\*\*\*\*s for a present. It pulled hairs and sounded like I had a mix-master in my ear. I use a razon (very carefully) and also trim my eyebrows. I think some people, especially senators, think thick eyebrows are distinctive. Why hasn’t anyone mentioned that damn hair growing out of the nose or those bastard hairs that pop up in strange places. Personnally, I’m really more worried about the hair I’m loosing. :o ---
**Author:** ![medstar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f07891/32.png) [@medstar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/medstar)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2002, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/14 "2002-06-11T22:54:47Z")
Thick eyebrows can be distinctive, but only if they’re groomed to reasonable proportions. ---
**Author:** ![bwildrose6234](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/f08c70/32.png) [@bwildrose6234](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bwildrose6234)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2013, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/15 "2013-07-22T21:18:37Z")
I am an old fart and I trim my ears and eyebrows. think the problem is the women in the bushy guy’s lives put up with the growth. Hard to have confidence in an old guy while wondering why he cannot look in a mirror. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2013, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/16 "2013-07-22T21:20:22Z")
> [@bwildrose6234](#): > > I am an old fart I wasn’t, when the thread was originally posted. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2013, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-men-eyebrow-and-ear-hair/113162/17 "2013-07-22T21:29:57Z")
Given that this thread is more than 11 years old, I’m going to close it. Those wishing to share experiences with eyebrow and nose hair may open a new thread in IMHO. Colibri General Questions Moderator