What Makes Us Human

I chose to study the scientific article "The remarkable, yet not extraordinary human brain as a scaled-up primate brain and its associated cost" by Suzana Herculano-Houzel and its National Geographic conterpart "What Makes Us Human? Cooking, Study Says" by Nicholas Mott. The scientific article examines the differences between human brains and the brains of other primates as well as offering an explanation as to how human brains were able to develop into such sophisticated tools. The popular press report concerns the article's findings and delivers them in a concise, entertaining way, engaging and educating the general public.

The purpose behind "The remarkable, yet not extraordinary, human brain as a scaled-up primate brain and its associated cost" is to uncover the distinction between human brains and the brains of other primates, as well as to find out how and why human brains developed to the extent that they did. The researchers studied different animal brains and compared them to each others' relative size to judge whether or not the human brain was exceptionally large or developed. To test the way primate brains evolved, the researchers determined the numbers of cells that compose the brain of over 30 species belonging to three mammalian orders. It was found that neuron count relative to brain mass differed exponentially across species, whereas the noneuronal cell count relative to brain mass was found to be far more similar. Based on the relative sizes of other primate brains, the human brain has no more or less neurons than expected for a primate our size; however, the cerebral cortex and cerebellum are larger and denser than normal. The study suggests that consuming cooked foods led to better nutrition and lessened the time normally needed for primates to find, chew, and process tough raw foods.The better nutrition sustained human primate bodies and allowed the brain to develop larger faster, and our increased free time led to more opportunities for cognitive development through things like tool use.

I believe that the popular press report did a very good job of simplifying the research article. In the press report titled "What Makes Us Human? Cooking, Study Says", Nicholas Mott explores the study's theory that fire and therefore cooking was what allowed human brains to develop