It’s what you might call the “awwww factor” – that irresistible urge to go all mushy and start cooing at any tiny, defenseless creature.  We all know the advantages of being cute.  It keeps you safer on the playground, and, in the case of bear cubs and puppy dogs, might make your mother love you enough to forbid your father from having you for a cocktail snack.  Cute is as effective as claws and fangs when it comes to seeing that a species maintains its chance of survival.

Scientists tell us that it is a simple matter of physiognomy.  One of the reasons we melt at the sight of a baby, whether human, ursus or canine, is those wide googly eyes.  They’re designed to stare you down in the most adorable way until you happily give up that blueberry scone you just laid out five dollars for at Starbucks.  And how could you whack that little puppy with the rolled-up Wall Street Journal for piddling on your new carpet when he is staring up at you like he just brought home a valentine he made at school?  Just pull out the stock page and clean it up.

Survival might also be why so many baby mammals are covered with soft fur.  Sure, there may be the occasional ophidiophile who gets a warm fuzzy feeling from petting the dry scales of a baby rattlesnake, but nothing beats the experience of stroking the downy fluff of a frightened little chick.  An eventual Sunday dinner is the last thing on our minds at a time like that.

And it seems we humans don’t have opportunity to nurture as much we’d like.  In the past when there was a newborn in the house every year, our needs were satisfied.  Now, in the modern world, we substitute pets, and the most popular breeds are those in which the infant-like qualities have through selective breeding been encouraged.  Caring for pets helps us survive as well.  It is a scientific fact that stroking a pet lowers blood pressure and heart rate.  And you don’t have to mortgage the house to send it to college.

Of course, not all babies are beautiful.  The naked mole rat’s offspring isn’t a bit more adorable than its mother.  But for the most part, in the looks department, the offspring has it all over the parent for quite a while.  For stunning HD shots of adorable little babies of all breeds, click here.