You actually don’t need to “know” which offspring are yours. You just need to direct more resources towards them. In fact not knowing a child is yours in a fiercely egalitarian culture might help you find good excuses for why you treat him preferably to other children. One just needs to “like” that child more for some reason and then the rationalizing mind will find ways to justify or conceal this preferential treatment.
A more finely tuned subconscious kin recognition system based on visual appraisal of facial features (if I recall right men do prefer children that are more similar to themselves) or perhaps something like smell might do the trick.
You actually don’t need to “know” which offspring are yours. You just need to direct more resources towards them. In fact not knowing a child is yours in a fiercely egalitarian culture might help you find good excuses for why you treat him preferably to other children. One just needs to “like” that child more for some reason and then the rationalizing mind will find ways to justify or conceal this preferential treatment.
A more finely tuned subconscious kin recognition system based on visual appraisal of facial features (if I recall right men do prefer children that are more similar to themselves) or perhaps something like smell might do the trick.