Ask A Genius 261 – Necessity of Long-Term Thinking (4)
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen and Rick Rosner
Publication (Outlet/Website): Ask A Genius
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2017/08/16
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Rick Rosner: Because our evolutionary tactic, the thing that helps us occupy our niche in the world is having a big brain. But brains can only be so big before they kill the mother during childbirth by getting caught in the birth canal.
So, you know, women, when they give birth, their pelvises split apart, the baby’s head gets forced out.
The baby’s head at the point of birth has overlapping plates that can kind of get compacted as the baby passes through the birth canal to make the skull just a little bit smaller. But anyway, human brains are as big as they can possibly be and not kill moms.
But that’s not big enough. So there’s still a lot of growth and wiring that needs to go on after birth. Which means that human babies take you know, at least ten years to raise. Nobody now would let 10-year-olds out into the world on their own.
You can argue that human babies now take 18 to 20—well Donald Trump was just talking about how Don Jr. really can’t be held that much responsible for meeting with Russian.
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