Tag Archives: Humans

Sign up for Big Think on Substack The most surprising and impactful new stories delivered to your inbox every week, for free. “Two souls, alas, dwell in my breast.” Like Goethe’s Doctor Faust, we all have an inner duality. Recent discoveries about the deep past of human evolution reveal that for more than a million years, humanity was divided into …

How farming may have reshaped the human face Ancient human skulls were strikingly different from our own. Early hunter-gatherers had large, powerful jaws built for the demanding work of chewing tough meats, fibrous vegetables, seeds, and nuts. But around 12,000 years ago, things began to change. As humans around the world traded hunting for farming, their diets changed too, incorporating …

For better or worse, the rise of ChatGPT as a writing tool, search engine, or conversational buddy has considerably changed how we communicate with each other and with technology. At the same time, ChatGPT’s widespread use has also sparked numerous online debates about whether it’s possible to spot AI-created content by looking at certain cues, like the em dash. But …

Braces, rubber bands, even jaw surgery—millions endure them in pursuit of a straighter smile. But were misaligned smiles always this common? Research suggests that might not be the case. While malocclusions—crowded or misaligned teeth—have been found among our hunter-gatherer ancestors, they appear to be more prevalent in modern populations. So what changed? Experts say the answer isn’t simple but point …

More than 37,000 years of infectious diseases in humans have been mapped by scientists, with academics pointing to one particular behaviour from our ancestors as playing a “key role” in their spread. Involving researchers linked to British; Danish; Swedish; German; Italian, and Australian universities, the study saw them analyse DNA from more than 1,300 prehistoric humans dating back as far …

Significant brain defects known as Chiari malformations could be down the genes some of us have inherited from Neanderthals, according to a new study, causing a mismatch between brain shape and skull shape. The study focuses on Chiari malformation type I (CM-I), where the lower part of the brain extends too far into the spinal cord – typically linked to …

Significant brain defects known as Chiari malformations could be down the genes some of us have inherited from Neanderthals, according to a new study, causing a mismatch between brain shape and skull shape. The study focuses on Chiari malformation type I (CM-I), where the lower part of the brain extends too far into the spinal cord – typically linked to …