Human hair

[MattChrn]

My Mother showed me a short article she read today entitled "The Truth about Hair and Why Indians Would Keep Their Hair Long." After reading the article I was skeptical about what was stated. It was, after all, on a .com site. I have never heard of hair acting as a "sixth sense" to pick up environmental movements, noises, or disturbances of any kind. I would appreciate any input on this topic as I have not been able to locate any scholarly articles about it.

This is the URL to the site- http://www.sott.net/articles/show/23478 ... -Hair-Long

[Darby]

Hair as part of your sensory apparatus is well - established, but it's body hair. Short hair is more prone to be easily disturbed. Head hair isn't even wired in the same way - tug an arm hair, then a head hair. The sensitivity and localization is much less on the scalp than the arm.

And try looking around that site - it's just random anonymous uploaders, no reason to expect any kind of reliability.

Not to mention the first sentence, which screams crackpot theory...

[JorgeLobo]

I'm with Darby, hairs certainly are sensory organs - and there are lots of data to that point in other species. That doesn't mean the silly article your mother gave you has any substance - and it's not obvious that long unwashed hair would have a better sensory fuction than short hair that, as in other species, can mechanically stimulate the base cell.