Punching Power

Scientists from the University of Utah have concluded that the human hand was not alone evolved for manually dexterity as it has been thought.  The evolvement of opposable thumbs has separated us greatly from the other great apes.  It was thought the opposable thumb was only a development to assist in our dexterity but it also makes it physically possible for us to make a clenching fist.  The way our hands compact perfectly into a fist suggest they were developed to be our defense also.  The tight clench fist secures our own hand from injuring it’s bones and ligaments upon contact and tripling the force of an open-hand slap by lowering the impact surface.  Suggestions that our hands are how we always solved things would mean that those cavemen males with the strongest most adept punch would win in fights for females and thus mate.  This would accelerate the need for proper hand function amongst our early race as only those with the ability to fight would mostly mate. Primates are all violent creatures capable of attacking their own kind as well as different animals, and we humans are no different, just different in our abilities to combat.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/12/121219223158.htm