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At Mind Matters News: Human brain shape hardly changed in 160,000 years

Denyse O'Leary
August 6, 2022
Human evolution
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Faces changed, yes, and researchers think diet may have played a role:

The changes in human heads over the past 160,000 years were not driven by a changing brain, researchers say. It was the human face that changed, according to a recent article at New Scientist

News, “Human brain shape hardly changed in 160,000 years” at Mind Matters News (August 5, 2022)

Takehome: The human brain reaches 95% of adult size at six years of age. Interestingly seven years of age is commonly held to be the “age of reason.”

You may also wish to read: You may also wish to read: Researchers still puzzled: Why did human brains shrink? Human brain volumes decreased by 10% in the last 40,000 years, coinciding with spectacular intellectual achievements. Examples of brain shrinkage among animals are fascinating but have not provided much insight. But perhaps we should ask, how much does brain size even matter?

Comments
CD at 4, There is no evolutionary anything, just made up stories. Where do you get your information about the brain? And why does it matter? Who cares how much energy the brain uses? Your point being what? Blah, blah, blah followed by more blah, blah, blah. relatd
On a related note https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/08/220807102043.htm AaronS1978
160K years isn't even a drop in the bucket in the evolutionary timeline to notice any significant anatomical changes in shape. As to brain "shrinkage" it must be remembered that the brain is an energy hog; it consumes about 20% of the body's total available energy. To the extent that the brain has become more efficient with less volume is a good thing, similar to development of transistors..... chuckdarwin
Seversky at 2, Unsupported nonsense. How fast? Do you know? https://scienceline.ucsb.edu/getkey.php?key=1950 relatd
I seem to remember it being argued that increasing brain size would not necessarily be an advantage given the relatively slow rate at which signals propagate across our neural nets. Seversky
Hardly changed could refer to more than just the brain. Every species every discovered that remains alive has hardly changed. Adaptation exists; speciation does not. One has evidence the other lacks. Adaptation shows design, along with everything else in the universe. BobRyan

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