I’m glad to say that they’re wrong: We use all of it, just in different ways at different times. in neuroscience and started working in science communication, I found out that 6 in 10 college-educated people believed they only used 10% of their brains. But then, I’m the one proposing that we humans revise the way we tell the story of how our species came to be.īack when I had just received my freshly minted Ph.D. You may even want to be thankful for another achievement of our neuron-crammed human cortices: all the technology that allows people spread over the globe to come together in person, on screens, or through words whispered directly into your ears long distance. With them come the extended childhood and the pushing century-long lifespan that together make human beings unique.Īll these bequests of your bigger brain cortex mean you can gather four generations around a meal to exchange banter and gossip, turn information into knowledge and even practice the art of what-not-to-say-when. Here’s something new to consider being thankful for at the dinner table: the long evolutionary journey that gave you your big brain and your long life.Ĭourtesy of our primate ancestors that invented cooking over a million years ago, you are a member of the one species able to afford so many cortical neurons in its brain. This piece originally appeared on The Conversation.
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