Why do we have fingernails?

[Silentgoldfish]

*Originally posted by smiling bandit *
**Plus fingernails are still useful, just in more refined fashion. **

Refined? scratch scratch burp

[Darwin_s_Finch]

Originally posted by Achernar
Well if a potential mate comes by, is he or she going to pick the person who’s already scratched and is standing around, or the one who went over to a tree to scratch their backside like a dog?

That would be an instance of sexual selection, not natural selection. And I don’t think it can be argued (successfully, anyway) that fingernails are the result of sexual selection.

[Teelo]

*Originally posted by Wearia *
**I had a teacher that told me that nails help to even out the pressure on your fingers. Plus there is the scratching aspect.
An odd thing is my index and middle finger nails constantly pop up off the skin. I have about 1/5 of the nail come up on a regular basis. Could this be the first sign of a loss of nails in the human species?
x-files theme **

What?! Damnit! I thought being brothers I would know something like that! Yuck!

My nails are fine, by the way.