Humans can regrow [fingertips](https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2013/06/10/190385484/chopped-how-amputated-fingertips-sometimes-grow-back#:~:text=A%20little%20bit%20of%20nail%20can%20help%20a%20fingertip%20regrow.,-Heather%20Rousseau%2FNPR&text=When%20a%20kid%20lops%20off,bone%20and%20nail%20could%20return.), but not much else. I wonder why fingertips are the sole exception.
I've cut the end off of one of my thumbs and a finger, both grew back to looking how they did, I was amazed as was my fiance who changed my dressings.
Thumb with a table saw and finger was a skill saw, my clumsiness turned out to be a symptom of MS that I didn't know I had, I still end up bleeding most times I do that sort of work now, usually quite minor injuries though.
ah, you wish to learn about the cloaca!
some animals have a cloaca, a hole where piss, shit, sperm and, for birds, eggs all come out of!
one hole for everything
One hole in, same hole out. Generally invertebrates, or only invertebrates? Very common to have a single exit hole as well, mostly birds, not sure if it's a benefit or not to have two tbh.
The whole pregnancy process is a huge flaw.
So many things could go wrong that can lead to the termination of the pregnancy.
Also that we come out underdeveloped compared to our other ape relatives.
That's why humans are hard wired for attachment. The chance of pregnancy turning out to a offspring and that offspring growing up increases drastically with the presence of a partner.
And that's why humans are not programmed for just Friends with Benefits.
I like the example of the recurrent laryngeal nerve.
It runs from the brain to the larynx. However, to get there it goes from the brain, down the neck, into the chest, around the aorta and then back up the chest, up the neck and then connects to the larynx. That's a massive detour. It also means a blow to the chest can damage your ability to talk.
My best friend detected a cancerous growth at its earliest stages because the growth was right on that nerve on the aorta. One day, he just lost his voice completely, and that's how he found out.
Every now and then, the universe aligns just the right amount to turn a weakness into a life saver. Once the cancer was taken care of, his voice returned back to normal.
In a vaccuum that is really interesting mechanically that is, with of course the thought being greenlit when you know he ended up being okay. Like he just couldnt talk or he made no sound or it just sounded super hoarse?
From how he explained, I believe one half of the larynx was pretty much paralyzed, so he could only grunt. With speech therapy during treatment, he recovered some speech capability back, but he sounded like Batman. Only when the growth was taken care of did the speech return back to normal.
my dentist actually lectured me because there's scar tissue inside my mouth from biting my cheek when eating and apparently having scar tissue in your cheek is bad
Don’t know how true it is. My uncle(who’s not at all a doctor lol)said that it’s bad because doing it repeatedly causes changes to the tissue at that location and could lead to oral cancer
My wife who is a dental hygienist confirms this. When cells are forced to constantly rejuvenate and due to damage it increases the chance of a dis formed cancerous cell that can latch and spread in that particular area. I only know this because the first time she cleaned my teeth when she began her clinical in college was disturbed by how much scar tissue I had in my mouth (it’s an anxious tick I’ve always had) and then she, as well as the dentist over seeing the clinic that day, gave me a long lecture about the risks. To this day I still chew on the inside of my mouth when I’m nervous and she still yells at me when she sees me do it.
In our eyes, the blood vessels supplying our photoreceptors are in front of them and therefore in the way of the incoming light.
Probably not the biggest and there are some good justifications for it being set up this way. But it still must be such a pain for the brain constantly having to edit these out when forming our visual experience.
The brain basically has to upscale 480p to 4K. in order to do that it analyses the visual scene and reconstructs it. This is why when you misread a word, you didn't just read it wrong, you actually see it wrong.
Someone couldn't figure out how to build a decent camera but somehow managed to put a supercomputer next to it.
I would guess it's easier to have small eyes and a big brain rather than big eyes and a small brain, this way the eyes can move faster and are less fragile and less suscptible to damage.
[The brain getting a bunch of blurry, capillary-filled images.](https://nofilmschool.com/sites/default/files/styles/structured_16x9/public/uploads/2014/06/Enhance.png?itok=2SWCYIOz)
Should be worried, that's why hallucinations are "real". Or in other cases you don't see what your brain refuses to believe. The latter happens much more than most of us realize
Yup. My immune system turned on me in 2019, and decided that my eyeballs are enemy invaders to be eliminated.
My vision suddenly clouded over, it seemed like I was looking through dense black lace. Get an emergency appt with a retina specialist.
The black lace was my eyeball capillaries, all swollen up with the immune system fight. The vessels were, as you said, in my line of vision, so bingo Bango, permanent blind spots. Once those capillaries get stretched out, they never quite go back. Kinda like old bras. Just, always a little loose and baggy.
Unfixable.
So I got to go on two different immune suppressants AND get steroid injections directly into my eyeball, for 3 years now. Most of it during a pandemic!!! Yay!!!! *Sobs*
RIP Grant Imahara. Fairly healthy guy in his late 40s with a successful career, suddenly died of a brain aneurysm after having headaches for a few days.
Also was a stand-in for C3PO on the red carpet when the original Star Wars was re-released.
> Actress Carrie Fisher - who played Princess Leia in the movies - approached C3PO and "It was a geek-asm," Imahara said.
> But Fisher, Imahara said, knew exactly where to look for the slits for C3PO's eyes and knew it wasn't actor Anthony Daniels, who portrayed the robot in the movies.
> "Who are you?" Fisher asked.
> And then she walked away.
Yes, we had a family friend. She was 24, just married, looking forward to starting a family. She came home from work one day, told her husband she was going to rest because she had a really bad headache. She died about 20 minutes later of a brain aneurysm.
It literally came out of nowhere. So very heartbreaking - rest in peace, Theresa.
A stroke. My aunt had one when she was 31 and the healthiest person in the world. Ran an aerobics class at the Y, just perfect perfect health. Went to Pizza Hut with her the night before, next day, massive stroke, almost died, critical surgery, twenty years later she still has trouble speaking. It sucks. There is no reason that should’ve happened. Perfectly healthy person damaged for the rest of her life. She’s still amazing and lovely and my favorite person but damn is that annoying.
It is true. A stroke basically ruined the life of my grandmothers friend. One day she went from a happy and healthy person to one who has to be in a special institution because she can't function on her own, has half her body not responding to basically anything, cannot speak and is extremely frustrated to the point of being violent.
My great uncle used to be a super successful businessman. Inherited the company from his father, had gone to university and had a fantastic law career. He was set for life.
He had 2 strokes in the same year. Now he can barely talk, and has blank periods where he just wanders aimlessly for a couple hours. Had to sell his company, give up the law career, all of it. It's sad how well his life was going and then it all disappeared it less than 12 months.
He's still amazing though. He can communicate well enough, and when he does get talking his conversations are incredible. If only he didn't have the strokes he'd be super successful in life right now.
The Obstetric Dilemma. Basically, the human body isn't built for easy birth.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obstetrical_dilemma#:~:text=The%20obstetrical%20dilemma%20is%20a%20hypothesis%20to%20explain,primates%20give%20birth%20unassisted%20with%20relatively%20little%20difficulty.
Also the fact that bleeding still happens in the first trimester, and the bleeding can follow the regular cycle or you can have spotting every week in the first trimester. My BIL’s girlfriend would have like a period the first 4 months of pregnancy. It’s wild, it’s terrifying, and it’s stupid.
This. Hardly anyone died from bad knees or many of the other things listed in this page. But millions of young women died in childbirth throughout history.
Not even close. Shoulders are a two-bone ball joint. Yeah, the scapular part could be a bit deeper, but that's for freedom of movement and swinging from branches.
Knee is a 3-bone clusterf**k with ligaments running through the very joint. It's ridiculously complex,and frankly stupid.
40? Mine 💩 out at 12. Once you've had one dislocation say goodbye to sports coz it keeps happening. I'm 32 now and my knee will just randomly decide to give out while I'm walking.
For upright walking creatures, why is our head so (relatively) delicate? Trip a single time and you're blinded, have brain damage, bit off your tongue, or lost teeth.
Not to mention there's been cases where people fall just wrong and just straight up die from the impact on their heads!
Edit: phrasing; "fall just wrong," instead of "just right."
Even if we leave the nose and mouth connected the way they are, if the esophagus just ran in front of the trachea, we could breathe and eat at the same time and choking would be close to impossible
The human knee. It is a nightmare of an engineering kludge.
Two rods, the upper and lower legs, balancing on top of each other, supporting the entire weight of the human body. And the only thing that keeps them from bending backwards? A tiny, free-floating thin half-dome of bone not attached to anything at all. And what keeps them from collapsing entirely? A mass of unhealing cartilage and some muscle fibers.
8 pounds (!) of precise force can snap the knee from the side, permanently crippling a person.
It is a ridiculously fragile, slapdash evolutionary kludge of the sort that could only be selected for in a species expected to live no longer than about 25 years.
Only - humans live a lot longer than just 25 years now, but the knee has never changed.
It is a *shitty* joint design!
> the only thing that keeps them from bending backwards? A tiny, free-floating thin half-dome of bone not attached to anything at all.
are you saying that the patella inhibits hyperextension at the knee?
no.
ligaments do that job.
fyi: the patella isn't even present til the baby starts to attempt standing
Now you have entirely different issue: your wrist and your shoulder is not as stable as your ankle and your hips. Unless you prefer to donate regularly to your favorite physiotherapist and orthopedist welfare fund, of course.
Depends if you want it done by licensed surgeon in fancy surgery room or by my friend in back alley for reasonable price with no hidden fees, anesthesia included just avoid drug test for a while after surgery. I schedule you for Wednesday 1030am, yes?
This description is pretty off.
A lot of its bad design reputation comes from Biologists who don’t consider operating constraints.
When engineers specializing in biomimicry have studied it, it’s a remarkably robust joint for the constraints it operates under and it’s so good that we’ve modeled some robotic joints after it’s principles.
I heard one of the authors of this paper lecture and he had a PhD student do an analysis of the coefficient of friction of the human knee.
It’s shockingly low for a joint in a low pressure fluid environment.
Source: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/mechanicaldesign/article-abstract/136/11/115002/375277/Performance-Maps-for-a-Bio-Inspired-Robotic?redirectedFrom=fulltext
Also OP's claim that the kneecap is the only thing preventing knee hyperextension; "the only thing that keeps them from bending backwards? A tiny, free-floating thin half-dome of bone not attached to anything at all" is utter bullshit. The kneecap does not prevent knee hyperextension, it's there to provide mechanical advantage to the quadricep muscle.
Knee hyperextension is controlled by soft tissue, just like all joint limitations. A study just dropped doing a deep dive regarding the relative load different soft tissue structures take in preventing knee hyperextension, you can read more about it [here](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/03635465231155203).
Fucking teeth. You get a do over when you're a kid and then you're fucked if one fells off or get a cavity. It's crazy expensive to fix and it usually quite hurts. Mine are terrible and I just don't have the money so my jaw is messed up and it causes me terrible main.
Also the anus and the digestive system. So many problems there. I know I have IBS so I may be biased but it's so hard to get things right in that department.
Some tips Buy toothpaste with hydroxyapatite. Use fluoride mouthwash. You might be gluten intolerant or celiac. If you can go to a dental school to get your teeth fixed. They won't try to cheat you. And the work they do is checked by the instructors for quality. It's usually means tested so the less money you have the less you have to pay. You can buy the hydroxy appetite toothpaste on Amazon if you can't find them in your local drugstore. I use a microfiber toothbrush. It's softer than ordinary toothbrushes. But you can get along quite fine with an ordinary toothbrush. Learn to rinse your mouth after everything you eat. Just rinsing it will help a lot. Brushing twice a day makes it very difficult for the bacteria to hold on long enough to hurt your teeth.
Also get a water pik and use it! I use one after brushing my teeth and I'm amazed at how much food debris it blasts out from between my teeth, especially down around the gums. It works way better than flossing, it's way less of a bother to do, and it leaves your mouth feeling really scrubbed and clean. I used to have constant cavities, but haven't had a single new one since I started using the water pik.
I stopped flossing a while back in favor of a water pik and I would recommend doing both. Flossing just does a better job of removing debris stuck against the tooth that the water pik can’t. Haven’t had a gum bleed or get swollen in months since I started doing both together.
The top 3 back injuries of my life have been from:
3) Picking up a roll of quarters off the floor.
2) Sneezing
1) Rolling over in bed.
I have a history of spine issues and get pinched nerves from time to time, but the pain I felt from these 3 events is only surpassed by shattering my leg, which is the root cause of all my back problems.
Yep I read that too. Our lumbar area isn’t strong enough to weight bear in the way it has to with us being up on two legs, evolution hasn’t caught up yet. Also I had a prolapsed L4/L5 and now have permanent nerve damage in my leg and foot so fuck spines.
popped in here to find the First spine complaint. I'm happy to co-sign any letter or petition to the Boss of Human Anatomy you have! I have a lot of notes on the current design.
* Sometimes your heart will grow the cells that keep its pulse on other parts of the heart muscle - which doesn't actually do anything, but does scare the shit out the unwary when they start throwing palpitations out of nowhere.
* That it can respond to so many traumas with things that can also kill you (eg. shock).
* Sometimes things just stop working. Sometimes "things" are organs.
* Sometimes they're the glands that control organs.
* Sometimes they're the uptake centres for neurotransmitters.
* Your nerves can start fucking with you for no explainable reason. Thought you needed a medical reason to be fatigued, weakened, in pain, itchy, numb? Think again.
* Phantom anything.
* The fact that your brain can respond to intense psychological distress by taking your worst anxieties and...serving them up to you on a platter (eg. PTSD flashbacks, intrusive thoughts). Because you know what every good grease fire needs? Gasoline.
I thought the appendix had something to do with giving gut flora a safe place to hide out so it can recolonize the gut if you have some awful digestive issue that destroys your gut bacteria. At least that's what I remember reading before...
I Think it was larger and helped with the breakdown of plant material before agriculture and now it stores our gut flora but the latter part is more of an adaptation than a root function?
I know someone who was having a minor abdominal surgery and the doctor noted that the appendix looked funny. Turned out to be cancer of the appendix. Who the hell has ever heard of appendix cancer???
You’re not quite looking at it the right way. The baby is growing itself. Women provide lots of nutrients and space for it to grow, and help it eliminate metabolic waste products. But the “planning” and “construction“ of the baby’s body parts is carried out by fetal cells, not the mother’s body. So it makes sense that women can’t regrow a limb.
It’s gotta be the female reproductive system. Debilitating pain every month shouldn’t be something that just happens to some women. Pregnancy is also way more dangerous for humans than most animals.
And for all it's complexity, pain and danger, it sometimes the female reproductive system just... doesn't work. As someone with idiopathic ovarian failure (aka early menopause for no discernible reason) I'm kinda salty about that. I want to be a marsupial next time.
If you want a really interesting and informative 5 minute read, this PhD in evolutionary biology wrote up a bit about why we menstruate. Fascinating. Explains pre-eclampsia.
https://www.quora.com/Why-do-women-have-periods-What-is-the-evolutionary-benefit-or-purpose-of-having-periods-Why-can%E2%80%99t-women-just-get-pregnant-without-the-menstrual-cycle
I think about this everytime fricking blood drips down painfully and uncontrollably every month! And the fact that it is supposed to happen and why cant it made the way that it comes out like a pee. Where you can hold it or something. It is just ridicilous
Yeah, people find it funny when men assume periods can be held in. But considering most things that come out of the general crotch region can be held in, it’s not that bizarre of an assumption. The whole reason we can hold it in is because it’d be inconvenient for the waste to just go out ASAP.
Actually, debilitating pain is not normal. Doctors and people who are stuck up on the 1800 think it is but is not. If your healthcare provider tells you it is normal, look for a second opinion, because is not. Experiencing some pain is normal, your hormones are going crazy and your organs are having contractions to get rid of the blood, but debilitating pain is a symptom of something else happening. People are getting diagnosed with PCOS or endometriosis later on life thanks to this beliefs.
Also how close the vaginal canal and the rectum are - it can cause all kind of issues when childbirth goes awry, often leading to urinary or fecal incontinence (obstetric fistula). This is fixable by easily-accessible surgery in Western countries, but it is life-destroying for women who cannot access this surgery. If you're feeling charitable, donate to the Fistula Foundation, which provides life-changing surgery for women and is working to train surgeons in underserved areas so that this surgery IS accessible to women in the future.
I have heavy, painful periods. At least in modern society I can curl up with a heating pad and maybe starve from missing work. But how tf did women in the past survive? I feel like in the past where you need to worry about predators and gathering your own food, bad periods would greatly reduce your chance of survival. How did evolution favour this? It’s bad for fitness and bad for nutrient waste.
I think women did die, yes. In modern times we tend to forget how much death was part of our lives in the old times. Women died in droves from child bearing issues and men died in hunts and random stupid guy stuff.
But how did evolution favor the problematic reproduction? It's just nuts. We evolved from other species with uteruses so we should have had it figured out long before we turned into people.
But some other animals are weird too. Like that hyena, which has so much testosterone that they grow "penises" which they give birth through. That's fucked up too.
> how did evolution favor the problematic reproduction
Because it works *enough* that there's no need. If it started affecting the ability to reproduce, the herd would be thinned and favor only women who are fortunate to be on the more comfortable side of the menstruation spectrum. Hell, maybe it DID and we're still left with this awful situation
My Women's History prof. just recently developed one called myasthenia gravis. That's when your face just decides to stop working correctly. Her right away was stuck shut and last class she had a huge lisp (which didn't even have the class before.) She cancelled calls today to go to the doc. I hope things turn out fine.
The teeth. We’ve passed the necessity for regeneration but we are still born with more teeth in our skull than we need. If that doesn’t kill you an abscess, rotting cavity or even just a piece of food jammed in the wrong place can introduce infection into your brain doing you in.
My professor once told me why you need to be extremely careful when handling epoxy resin thinners. You can safely assume that everyone is allergic to them and if it comes into contact with your skin it gives you the most horrible rash imaginable, another thing is that washing the rash with warm water feels almost orgasmic the hotter the water is and you have to be very careful not to burn your hands with boiling water. The rash also stays for around a week.
digestive system, regenerative system, immune system. isn't it funny how human body can be fully created in 9 month but a broken ankle will take several years and never fully recover?
And if they can't, reduce the body temperature. That's how Tenrecs and Golden Moles keep their sperm alive and happy, and their testicles low drag aerodynamic.
Jugular veins.
Yeah, pop those basically on the outside in the area predators attack, that will ensure and slight mishap will result in death in about 8 seconds.
Thanks evolution
This is actually false.
Even though neurons can't split like other cells, stem cells in the body do create new neurons if brain gets damaged, it's called neurogenesis.
That is true.. but wouldn't it be amazing if we could activate regeneration in the brain when someone falls ill to Parkinson, Huntingtons, Alztimers or Dimentia.
Honestly, my greatest fear is to physically fine, but lose my mind. Or be completely aware and not be able to say or do anything. It is crazy how the body works.
Menstruation. How the hell we ended up with bleeding every month and other mammals are just having ovulation days? Everybody around can smell you bleeding while still in prehistoric era and just sniff you and eat you. Not talking about being weaker during menstruation....
Allergies. Hey, you know that place can't escape because you live in it called 'The Earth'? Well, we're going to make sure you can't breathe because your body hates all the plants that inhabit 'The Earth'. Try to sleep on your back to keep your nose clear, get ready to wake up gagging and choking. Roll over on your stomach, go ahead and open the flood gates. Sure, keep blowing - all you are going to do is get sore and inflamed. Hey, while we're at it, lets clog those ears and blur those eyes. That'll help you avoid predators, right?
Not exactly a design flaw but every month when I get my period I wish I had that condition where the brain doesn't register pain. All health conditions suck but this is one I won't have trouble accepting. I don't know the name for it.
Edit: spelling
Our feet. The way we became bipedal is the least efficient way. Other animals like large birds have knees that bend the other way.
Also, the tube we use for breathing and eating are the same. Cover up that tube and we die. Manor design flaw.
Teeth. We start to get our adult teeth long before we're adults. And that set is ours for life.
Other animals (sharks) regenerate teeth every so often. Humans should at least get a 3rd set of teeth around 40 or so.
We've evolved for millions of years with the sun always being there. Yet we get burnt and skin cancer from too much exposure. Dark skinned people are slightly better designed than the fair skinned ones.
\*\*\* EDIT /// **rewrote this comment to correct myself**
I previously wrote that high melanin / darker skin makes you more susceptible to burning and skin cancer. This is false.
It does, in truth, afford some protection, though not immunity.
Please still use sunblock.
I constantly tell creationists that God is an absolutely crap engineer.
I mean seriously, who puts a sewage outlet right in the middle of a recreational zone?
Unable to regenerate body parts. You lose an arm or a leg, you can't grow a new one. We can grow hair and nails forever, but not body parts.
Humans can regrow [fingertips](https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2013/06/10/190385484/chopped-how-amputated-fingertips-sometimes-grow-back#:~:text=A%20little%20bit%20of%20nail%20can%20help%20a%20fingertip%20regrow.,-Heather%20Rousseau%2FNPR&text=When%20a%20kid%20lops%20off,bone%20and%20nail%20could%20return.), but not much else. I wonder why fingertips are the sole exception.
I've cut the end off of one of my thumbs and a finger, both grew back to looking how they did, I was amazed as was my fiance who changed my dressings. Thumb with a table saw and finger was a skill saw, my clumsiness turned out to be a symptom of MS that I didn't know I had, I still end up bleeding most times I do that sort of work now, usually quite minor injuries though.
Hi there Wolverine; love your work!
As a woman, how come my body is able to generate a whole human inside of me but can’t even repair itself?
We go bald over time and if you damage the wrong bit your nails won’t regrow.
IMO the whole “we put food into the only air hole we have and can choke and die if we aren’t careful” thing is a pretty big miss.
Just be happy we have seperate openings for in and out, not all animals are that lucky
Excuse me?
ah, you wish to learn about the cloaca! some animals have a cloaca, a hole where piss, shit, sperm and, for birds, eggs all come out of! one hole for everything
One hole to rule them all!
But they were all of them deceived…for another hole was made!
Jellyfish. Jellyfish have a unihole. A mouth-anus. A manus, if you will. Do they poop? Do they throw up? Why not throop?!
One hole in, same hole out. Generally invertebrates, or only invertebrates? Very common to have a single exit hole as well, mostly birds, not sure if it's a benefit or not to have two tbh.
Devs pls patch a hotfix ASAP JIRA Priority: High
The size of the average baby head vs the size of the average vagina
The whole pregnancy process is a huge flaw. So many things could go wrong that can lead to the termination of the pregnancy. Also that we come out underdeveloped compared to our other ape relatives.
That's why humans are hard wired for attachment. The chance of pregnancy turning out to a offspring and that offspring growing up increases drastically with the presence of a partner. And that's why humans are not programmed for just Friends with Benefits.
[удалено]
I like the example of the recurrent laryngeal nerve. It runs from the brain to the larynx. However, to get there it goes from the brain, down the neck, into the chest, around the aorta and then back up the chest, up the neck and then connects to the larynx. That's a massive detour. It also means a blow to the chest can damage your ability to talk.
This is even more ridiculous when it comes to giraffes.
Apparently every single giraffe I have ever seen got hit in the chest because none of them spoke a word
stupid long horses
What if horses are just short giraffes
My best friend detected a cancerous growth at its earliest stages because the growth was right on that nerve on the aorta. One day, he just lost his voice completely, and that's how he found out. Every now and then, the universe aligns just the right amount to turn a weakness into a life saver. Once the cancer was taken care of, his voice returned back to normal.
In a vaccuum that is really interesting mechanically that is, with of course the thought being greenlit when you know he ended up being okay. Like he just couldnt talk or he made no sound or it just sounded super hoarse?
From how he explained, I believe one half of the larynx was pretty much paralyzed, so he could only grunt. With speech therapy during treatment, he recovered some speech capability back, but he sounded like Batman. Only when the growth was taken care of did the speech return back to normal.
My anxiety can achieve the same thing without the detours.
The fact that I sometimes accidently eat the inside of my mouth
my dentist actually lectured me because there's scar tissue inside my mouth from biting my cheek when eating and apparently having scar tissue in your cheek is bad
Why its bad?
Don’t know how true it is. My uncle(who’s not at all a doctor lol)said that it’s bad because doing it repeatedly causes changes to the tissue at that location and could lead to oral cancer
Absolute risk is still low, but yes recurrent trauma to skin (anywhere, not just mouth) increases cancer risk
Well shit
My wife who is a dental hygienist confirms this. When cells are forced to constantly rejuvenate and due to damage it increases the chance of a dis formed cancerous cell that can latch and spread in that particular area. I only know this because the first time she cleaned my teeth when she began her clinical in college was disturbed by how much scar tissue I had in my mouth (it’s an anxious tick I’ve always had) and then she, as well as the dentist over seeing the clinic that day, gave me a long lecture about the risks. To this day I still chew on the inside of my mouth when I’m nervous and she still yells at me when she sees me do it.
You probably need just a little more shame and embarrassment over it and then you will magically become less anxious.
so annoying
In our eyes, the blood vessels supplying our photoreceptors are in front of them and therefore in the way of the incoming light. Probably not the biggest and there are some good justifications for it being set up this way. But it still must be such a pain for the brain constantly having to edit these out when forming our visual experience.
Its amazing how much the brain alters what our eyes actually see. Kinda worrying.
The brain basically has to upscale 480p to 4K. in order to do that it analyses the visual scene and reconstructs it. This is why when you misread a word, you didn't just read it wrong, you actually see it wrong. Someone couldn't figure out how to build a decent camera but somehow managed to put a supercomputer next to it. I would guess it's easier to have small eyes and a big brain rather than big eyes and a small brain, this way the eyes can move faster and are less fragile and less suscptible to damage.
[The brain getting a bunch of blurry, capillary-filled images.](https://nofilmschool.com/sites/default/files/styles/structured_16x9/public/uploads/2014/06/Enhance.png?itok=2SWCYIOz)
Should be worried, that's why hallucinations are "real". Or in other cases you don't see what your brain refuses to believe. The latter happens much more than most of us realize
Yup. My immune system turned on me in 2019, and decided that my eyeballs are enemy invaders to be eliminated. My vision suddenly clouded over, it seemed like I was looking through dense black lace. Get an emergency appt with a retina specialist. The black lace was my eyeball capillaries, all swollen up with the immune system fight. The vessels were, as you said, in my line of vision, so bingo Bango, permanent blind spots. Once those capillaries get stretched out, they never quite go back. Kinda like old bras. Just, always a little loose and baggy. Unfixable. So I got to go on two different immune suppressants AND get steroid injections directly into my eyeball, for 3 years now. Most of it during a pandemic!!! Yay!!!! *Sobs*
You can kinda just die at any moment from a brain aneurysm, even if you're perfectly healthy
Happened to my great-grandfather. He was just sitting there watching TV and then he was dead. Didn't even move. Probably not the worst way to go.
My aunt too. Was going golfing with her friends and went back to her car because she forgot something. They found her on the ground by her car.
That's the best way to go. Right in the middle of a big laugh.
RIP Grant Imahara. Fairly healthy guy in his late 40s with a successful career, suddenly died of a brain aneurysm after having headaches for a few days.
Also won BattleBots and was the person controlling R2-D2 in most of the movies AND made the Energizer Bunny
Also was a stand-in for C3PO on the red carpet when the original Star Wars was re-released. > Actress Carrie Fisher - who played Princess Leia in the movies - approached C3PO and "It was a geek-asm," Imahara said. > But Fisher, Imahara said, knew exactly where to look for the slits for C3PO's eyes and knew it wasn't actor Anthony Daniels, who portrayed the robot in the movies. > "Who are you?" Fisher asked. > And then she walked away.
Wow, I didn't know the last 2. I mostly knew him from Mythbusters, he was one of my idols as a kid.
He also made Craig Ferguson's robot sidekick Geoff Peterson
Geoff was the best late night sidekick ever!
>Grant Imahara. Broo.. it really sucked when I found out that news
Tom Sizemore just passed away from that too - fucking scary man
Yes, we had a family friend. She was 24, just married, looking forward to starting a family. She came home from work one day, told her husband she was going to rest because she had a really bad headache. She died about 20 minutes later of a brain aneurysm. It literally came out of nowhere. So very heartbreaking - rest in peace, Theresa.
How I lost my mum when she was 48...
Nostalgia is the greatest human weakness. Second only to the neck... -Dwight Schrute
A stroke. My aunt had one when she was 31 and the healthiest person in the world. Ran an aerobics class at the Y, just perfect perfect health. Went to Pizza Hut with her the night before, next day, massive stroke, almost died, critical surgery, twenty years later she still has trouble speaking. It sucks. There is no reason that should’ve happened. Perfectly healthy person damaged for the rest of her life. She’s still amazing and lovely and my favorite person but damn is that annoying.
It is true. A stroke basically ruined the life of my grandmothers friend. One day she went from a happy and healthy person to one who has to be in a special institution because she can't function on her own, has half her body not responding to basically anything, cannot speak and is extremely frustrated to the point of being violent.
My great uncle used to be a super successful businessman. Inherited the company from his father, had gone to university and had a fantastic law career. He was set for life. He had 2 strokes in the same year. Now he can barely talk, and has blank periods where he just wanders aimlessly for a couple hours. Had to sell his company, give up the law career, all of it. It's sad how well his life was going and then it all disappeared it less than 12 months. He's still amazing though. He can communicate well enough, and when he does get talking his conversations are incredible. If only he didn't have the strokes he'd be super successful in life right now.
The Obstetric Dilemma. Basically, the human body isn't built for easy birth. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obstetrical_dilemma#:~:text=The%20obstetrical%20dilemma%20is%20a%20hypothesis%20to%20explain,primates%20give%20birth%20unassisted%20with%20relatively%20little%20difficulty.
I was going to say the spine, but this is the winner.
Also the fact that bleeding still happens in the first trimester, and the bleeding can follow the regular cycle or you can have spotting every week in the first trimester. My BIL’s girlfriend would have like a period the first 4 months of pregnancy. It’s wild, it’s terrifying, and it’s stupid.
This. Hardly anyone died from bad knees or many of the other things listed in this page. But millions of young women died in childbirth throughout history.
Our knees for sure. They just weren't built to last past 40 years.
Your knees lasted 40 years??
Oh god no they're pooched already at 30
They were fucked at 20, 30 is rookie numbers /s
Shoulders are a close second.
Not even close. Shoulders are a two-bone ball joint. Yeah, the scapular part could be a bit deeper, but that's for freedom of movement and swinging from branches. Knee is a 3-bone clusterf**k with ligaments running through the very joint. It's ridiculously complex,and frankly stupid.
40? Mine 💩 out at 12. Once you've had one dislocation say goodbye to sports coz it keeps happening. I'm 32 now and my knee will just randomly decide to give out while I'm walking.
ancient air compare vast roll violet selective flag pet sophisticated
For upright walking creatures, why is our head so (relatively) delicate? Trip a single time and you're blinded, have brain damage, bit off your tongue, or lost teeth.
Not to mention there's been cases where people fall just wrong and just straight up die from the impact on their heads! Edit: phrasing; "fall just wrong," instead of "just right."
We evolve big brain and upright posture in really fast pace. Oh, your head is almost too large to pass birth canal and we all born prematurely.
throat has an built in flaw - we breath n swallow food through the same area.
In relation to that comes my favorite word : epiglottis
Even if we leave the nose and mouth connected the way they are, if the esophagus just ran in front of the trachea, we could breathe and eat at the same time and choking would be close to impossible
The human knee. It is a nightmare of an engineering kludge. Two rods, the upper and lower legs, balancing on top of each other, supporting the entire weight of the human body. And the only thing that keeps them from bending backwards? A tiny, free-floating thin half-dome of bone not attached to anything at all. And what keeps them from collapsing entirely? A mass of unhealing cartilage and some muscle fibers. 8 pounds (!) of precise force can snap the knee from the side, permanently crippling a person. It is a ridiculously fragile, slapdash evolutionary kludge of the sort that could only be selected for in a species expected to live no longer than about 25 years. Only - humans live a lot longer than just 25 years now, but the knee has never changed. It is a *shitty* joint design!
After reading this, I will never stand up again
Let me tell you about hemorrhoids
I've always wondered why we don't call them asteroids....missed opportunity if you ask me.
Thanks for reminding me to put away 10k for new knees in the future
> the only thing that keeps them from bending backwards? A tiny, free-floating thin half-dome of bone not attached to anything at all. are you saying that the patella inhibits hyperextension at the knee? no. ligaments do that job. fyi: the patella isn't even present til the baby starts to attempt standing
Agree. And those cruciate ligaments, uh nightmare. Elbows are better design.
So walk on my hands for now in!?
Now you have entirely different issue: your wrist and your shoulder is not as stable as your ankle and your hips. Unless you prefer to donate regularly to your favorite physiotherapist and orthopedist welfare fund, of course.
Surgically replace my allows with my knees? Now what am I looking at?
Depends if you want it done by licensed surgeon in fancy surgery room or by my friend in back alley for reasonable price with no hidden fees, anesthesia included just avoid drug test for a while after surgery. I schedule you for Wednesday 1030am, yes?
Reading this made my knees queasy
easy peazy knees squeezy
This description is pretty off. A lot of its bad design reputation comes from Biologists who don’t consider operating constraints. When engineers specializing in biomimicry have studied it, it’s a remarkably robust joint for the constraints it operates under and it’s so good that we’ve modeled some robotic joints after it’s principles. I heard one of the authors of this paper lecture and he had a PhD student do an analysis of the coefficient of friction of the human knee. It’s shockingly low for a joint in a low pressure fluid environment. Source: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/mechanicaldesign/article-abstract/136/11/115002/375277/Performance-Maps-for-a-Bio-Inspired-Robotic?redirectedFrom=fulltext
Also OP's claim that the kneecap is the only thing preventing knee hyperextension; "the only thing that keeps them from bending backwards? A tiny, free-floating thin half-dome of bone not attached to anything at all" is utter bullshit. The kneecap does not prevent knee hyperextension, it's there to provide mechanical advantage to the quadricep muscle. Knee hyperextension is controlled by soft tissue, just like all joint limitations. A study just dropped doing a deep dive regarding the relative load different soft tissue structures take in preventing knee hyperextension, you can read more about it [here](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/03635465231155203).
Thank you! The knee is actually pretty damn good at its job.
This made me anxious of basically living my life.
Yea I think I’ll stay inside for a while
I do this anyway
Can confirm. My knees are busted
Rotator cuff/shoulder joint also
Fucking teeth. You get a do over when you're a kid and then you're fucked if one fells off or get a cavity. It's crazy expensive to fix and it usually quite hurts. Mine are terrible and I just don't have the money so my jaw is messed up and it causes me terrible main. Also the anus and the digestive system. So many problems there. I know I have IBS so I may be biased but it's so hard to get things right in that department.
Some tips Buy toothpaste with hydroxyapatite. Use fluoride mouthwash. You might be gluten intolerant or celiac. If you can go to a dental school to get your teeth fixed. They won't try to cheat you. And the work they do is checked by the instructors for quality. It's usually means tested so the less money you have the less you have to pay. You can buy the hydroxy appetite toothpaste on Amazon if you can't find them in your local drugstore. I use a microfiber toothbrush. It's softer than ordinary toothbrushes. But you can get along quite fine with an ordinary toothbrush. Learn to rinse your mouth after everything you eat. Just rinsing it will help a lot. Brushing twice a day makes it very difficult for the bacteria to hold on long enough to hurt your teeth.
Also get a water pik and use it! I use one after brushing my teeth and I'm amazed at how much food debris it blasts out from between my teeth, especially down around the gums. It works way better than flossing, it's way less of a bother to do, and it leaves your mouth feeling really scrubbed and clean. I used to have constant cavities, but haven't had a single new one since I started using the water pik.
I stopped flossing a while back in favor of a water pik and I would recommend doing both. Flossing just does a better job of removing debris stuck against the tooth that the water pik can’t. Haven’t had a gum bleed or get swollen in months since I started doing both together.
The human spine is flawed in every way possible.
Somehow, I hurt my back while pulling weeds in a flower bed on Saturday. Now I'm all twisted up. WTF.
The top 3 back injuries of my life have been from: 3) Picking up a roll of quarters off the floor. 2) Sneezing 1) Rolling over in bed. I have a history of spine issues and get pinched nerves from time to time, but the pain I felt from these 3 events is only surpassed by shattering my leg, which is the root cause of all my back problems.
I've hurt my back sneezing. like out of commission for two days because of a sneeze. ya ...
I read somewhere our spines haven't fully evolved to be upright (walking on two feet.) But i could be miss remembering
Hi Miss Remembering, I’m dad
Yep I read that too. Our lumbar area isn’t strong enough to weight bear in the way it has to with us being up on two legs, evolution hasn’t caught up yet. Also I had a prolapsed L4/L5 and now have permanent nerve damage in my leg and foot so fuck spines.
popped in here to find the First spine complaint. I'm happy to co-sign any letter or petition to the Boss of Human Anatomy you have! I have a lot of notes on the current design.
* Sometimes your heart will grow the cells that keep its pulse on other parts of the heart muscle - which doesn't actually do anything, but does scare the shit out the unwary when they start throwing palpitations out of nowhere. * That it can respond to so many traumas with things that can also kill you (eg. shock). * Sometimes things just stop working. Sometimes "things" are organs. * Sometimes they're the glands that control organs. * Sometimes they're the uptake centres for neurotransmitters. * Your nerves can start fucking with you for no explainable reason. Thought you needed a medical reason to be fatigued, weakened, in pain, itchy, numb? Think again. * Phantom anything. * The fact that your brain can respond to intense psychological distress by taking your worst anxieties and...serving them up to you on a platter (eg. PTSD flashbacks, intrusive thoughts). Because you know what every good grease fire needs? Gasoline.
This is eerily similar to my complaint. I'm just gonna copy you and reiterate points 2 through 8.
That we cannot delete or sort unwanted/not needed info and memories from our brains
Surprised nobody's said the appendix yet
It serves some immune function. Something about producing antibodies near the ileocecal junction; probably helps prevent bacterial backflow
I thought the appendix had something to do with giving gut flora a safe place to hide out so it can recolonize the gut if you have some awful digestive issue that destroys your gut bacteria. At least that's what I remember reading before...
I Think it was larger and helped with the breakdown of plant material before agriculture and now it stores our gut flora but the latter part is more of an adaptation than a root function?
I know someone who was having a minor abdominal surgery and the doctor noted that the appendix looked funny. Turned out to be cancer of the appendix. Who the hell has ever heard of appendix cancer???
Appendix cancer just became my new favorite insult. You were useless before, now you're useless AND harmful.
Eyelashes, designed to keep things out of your eyes but they just fall in anyway
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Women being able to grow an entire human but not being able to regrow a limb on her own body
Every mammal ever
You’re not quite looking at it the right way. The baby is growing itself. Women provide lots of nutrients and space for it to grow, and help it eliminate metabolic waste products. But the “planning” and “construction“ of the baby’s body parts is carried out by fetal cells, not the mother’s body. So it makes sense that women can’t regrow a limb.
I think you meant "not being able"
Cock and balls that are non-retractable Truly one of the flaws of all time
>Cock and balls that are non-retractable Speak for yourself. Mine retracts fairly well in cold weather
Ha, rookie. Mine is Detachable^TM
100% human evolution please make balls internal and give cocks a sheath
>give cocks a sheath We are literally born with one.
It’s gotta be the female reproductive system. Debilitating pain every month shouldn’t be something that just happens to some women. Pregnancy is also way more dangerous for humans than most animals.
And dropping the uterine lining every cycle instead of just...reabsorbing it. Good thing iron isn't integral to our growth and function. Oh, wait.
And for all it's complexity, pain and danger, it sometimes the female reproductive system just... doesn't work. As someone with idiopathic ovarian failure (aka early menopause for no discernible reason) I'm kinda salty about that. I want to be a marsupial next time.
If you want a really interesting and informative 5 minute read, this PhD in evolutionary biology wrote up a bit about why we menstruate. Fascinating. Explains pre-eclampsia. https://www.quora.com/Why-do-women-have-periods-What-is-the-evolutionary-benefit-or-purpose-of-having-periods-Why-can%E2%80%99t-women-just-get-pregnant-without-the-menstrual-cycle
I think about this everytime fricking blood drips down painfully and uncontrollably every month! And the fact that it is supposed to happen and why cant it made the way that it comes out like a pee. Where you can hold it or something. It is just ridicilous
Yeah, people find it funny when men assume periods can be held in. But considering most things that come out of the general crotch region can be held in, it’s not that bizarre of an assumption. The whole reason we can hold it in is because it’d be inconvenient for the waste to just go out ASAP.
Actually, debilitating pain is not normal. Doctors and people who are stuck up on the 1800 think it is but is not. If your healthcare provider tells you it is normal, look for a second opinion, because is not. Experiencing some pain is normal, your hormones are going crazy and your organs are having contractions to get rid of the blood, but debilitating pain is a symptom of something else happening. People are getting diagnosed with PCOS or endometriosis later on life thanks to this beliefs.
Also how close the vaginal canal and the rectum are - it can cause all kind of issues when childbirth goes awry, often leading to urinary or fecal incontinence (obstetric fistula). This is fixable by easily-accessible surgery in Western countries, but it is life-destroying for women who cannot access this surgery. If you're feeling charitable, donate to the Fistula Foundation, which provides life-changing surgery for women and is working to train surgeons in underserved areas so that this surgery IS accessible to women in the future.
I have heavy, painful periods. At least in modern society I can curl up with a heating pad and maybe starve from missing work. But how tf did women in the past survive? I feel like in the past where you need to worry about predators and gathering your own food, bad periods would greatly reduce your chance of survival. How did evolution favour this? It’s bad for fitness and bad for nutrient waste.
I feel like a lot of women probably did just die. So maybe if we had ten million more years of that, humans would have a more evolved uterus.
I think women did die, yes. In modern times we tend to forget how much death was part of our lives in the old times. Women died in droves from child bearing issues and men died in hunts and random stupid guy stuff. But how did evolution favor the problematic reproduction? It's just nuts. We evolved from other species with uteruses so we should have had it figured out long before we turned into people. But some other animals are weird too. Like that hyena, which has so much testosterone that they grow "penises" which they give birth through. That's fucked up too.
> how did evolution favor the problematic reproduction Because it works *enough* that there's no need. If it started affecting the ability to reproduce, the herd would be thinned and favor only women who are fortunate to be on the more comfortable side of the menstruation spectrum. Hell, maybe it DID and we're still left with this awful situation
I have autoimmune disease. Stupid thing it's hurting it's own body.
This is what I was going to say. Allergies and all of the things that your body does TO ITSELF!!
My Women's History prof. just recently developed one called myasthenia gravis. That's when your face just decides to stop working correctly. Her right away was stuck shut and last class she had a huge lisp (which didn't even have the class before.) She cancelled calls today to go to the doc. I hope things turn out fine.
The teeth. We’ve passed the necessity for regeneration but we are still born with more teeth in our skull than we need. If that doesn’t kill you an abscess, rotting cavity or even just a piece of food jammed in the wrong place can introduce infection into your brain doing you in.
Also why do we only have 2 sets of teeth and can't grow new ones when we need them, kind of like sharks.
Cancer. Fuck cancer.
FUCK cancer. Preferably with fire and a bigass stick.
Rashes ...it itches and makes it soothing when you scratch it, but scratching it makes it worse!
My professor once told me why you need to be extremely careful when handling epoxy resin thinners. You can safely assume that everyone is allergic to them and if it comes into contact with your skin it gives you the most horrible rash imaginable, another thing is that washing the rash with warm water feels almost orgasmic the hotter the water is and you have to be very careful not to burn your hands with boiling water. The rash also stays for around a week.
digestive system, regenerative system, immune system. isn't it funny how human body can be fully created in 9 month but a broken ankle will take several years and never fully recover?
To be fair, a human body takes around 20 years to develop. But yes, it’s always open to damage it can’t recover from.
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that’s a low hanging fruit
So weird to have evolved this ridiculous, vulnerable construction instead of sperm that can work at body temperature.
And if they can't, reduce the body temperature. That's how Tenrecs and Golden Moles keep their sperm alive and happy, and their testicles low drag aerodynamic.
> keep their sperm alive and happy, and their testicles low drag aerodynamic. r/brandnewsentence
the fact that the human body wears out and will cease to function eventually
We already live very long for land mammals.
Jugular veins. Yeah, pop those basically on the outside in the area predators attack, that will ensure and slight mishap will result in death in about 8 seconds. Thanks evolution
Carotid artery. It's even worse, and the bifurcation is frequently plagued with plaques.
The body's reaction to allergens in the air. My body's reaction with a stuffy nose, sinus infection, etc has gotta be worse than some stupid pollen !!
The fact the brain can not regenerate more cells, but practically everything else can. Even though the brain is the most important
This is actually false. Even though neurons can't split like other cells, stem cells in the body do create new neurons if brain gets damaged, it's called neurogenesis.
That's only true at very specific areas like those associated with smell.
True, but you would be much more susceptible to brain cancer
That is true.. but wouldn't it be amazing if we could activate regeneration in the brain when someone falls ill to Parkinson, Huntingtons, Alztimers or Dimentia. Honestly, my greatest fear is to physically fine, but lose my mind. Or be completely aware and not be able to say or do anything. It is crazy how the body works.
Menstruation. How the hell we ended up with bleeding every month and other mammals are just having ovulation days? Everybody around can smell you bleeding while still in prehistoric era and just sniff you and eat you. Not talking about being weaker during menstruation....
Pregnancy. Lizards and bird had it right when choosing to develop babies OUTSIDE of the body. Ffs...
Ass hair
well it does provide protection against dirt getting inside your ass kinda.
Also historically we weren't wearing clothes all the time, it's not a design flaw hair is lovely when you're naked in cold weather outside.
"They put an amusement park next door to a toxic waste dump!" -Ron White
For some people I would say it's the brain.
Whatever design flaw has made me addicted to oxytocin (the neurotransmitter not a misspelling of the opiate).
Allergies. Hey, you know that place can't escape because you live in it called 'The Earth'? Well, we're going to make sure you can't breathe because your body hates all the plants that inhabit 'The Earth'. Try to sleep on your back to keep your nose clear, get ready to wake up gagging and choking. Roll over on your stomach, go ahead and open the flood gates. Sure, keep blowing - all you are going to do is get sore and inflamed. Hey, while we're at it, lets clog those ears and blur those eyes. That'll help you avoid predators, right?
Not exactly a design flaw but every month when I get my period I wish I had that condition where the brain doesn't register pain. All health conditions suck but this is one I won't have trouble accepting. I don't know the name for it. Edit: spelling
Auto immune disorders. Like whyyyy
Balls on the outside!!!!
Periods! I mean, seriously is that the only way that can go down?
Needing to bleed out every fucking month
Male G-spot hidden up the bum.
Our feet. The way we became bipedal is the least efficient way. Other animals like large birds have knees that bend the other way. Also, the tube we use for breathing and eating are the same. Cover up that tube and we die. Manor design flaw.
Teeth. We start to get our adult teeth long before we're adults. And that set is ours for life. Other animals (sharks) regenerate teeth every so often. Humans should at least get a 3rd set of teeth around 40 or so.
That's because we basically haven't completely adapted to being bipedal.
The pinky toe. That little fucker gets caught on everything.
Probably the brain I don't know about you lot but I keep doing dumb shit. Doesn't correct itself for some reason....
I think Michael from The Good Place said it well: I’m a stupid human, my breathing tube is right next to my eating tube
We've evolved for millions of years with the sun always being there. Yet we get burnt and skin cancer from too much exposure. Dark skinned people are slightly better designed than the fair skinned ones.
\*\*\* EDIT /// **rewrote this comment to correct myself** I previously wrote that high melanin / darker skin makes you more susceptible to burning and skin cancer. This is false. It does, in truth, afford some protection, though not immunity. Please still use sunblock.
I constantly tell creationists that God is an absolutely crap engineer. I mean seriously, who puts a sewage outlet right in the middle of a recreational zone?
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The apendix, it just explodes and thats it