The story of human evolution is inextricable from the story of gynaecology.
Research shows that sleep deprivation impairs communication between brain regions and brain blood flow, damages brain wiring and makes a young brain look like an aged brain.
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Ancient humans chose to sleep less, which had evolutionary benefits. For modern humans, sleeping less is futile and detrimental, but fitness may be a powerful ally in today’s epidemic of sleep loss.
Human evolution is typically depicted with a progressive whitening of the skin, despite a lack of evidence to support it.
Viktor Mikhailovich Vasnetsov/Wikimedia Commons
From Aristotle to Darwin, inaccurate and biased narratives in science not only reproduce these biases in future generations but also perpetuate the discrimination they are used to justify.
New genetic research shows humans’ famed ability to adapt our behaviour and develop new tools and techniques has not always been enough to survive when times have grown tough.
Tibetan monks at a monastry in Gansu province in China. New research shows sending a child to a monastery can have surprising evolutionary advantages for a family.
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Listen to the first episode of Discovery, a new series available via The Conversation Weekly podcast, telling the stories of fascinating new research discoveries from around the world.
Early humans called Denisovans lived in a remote mountain cave between 100,000 and 60,000 years ago, and possibly longer still, raising intriguing questions about their relationship to modern humans.
Capuchin monkeys in Brazil use big stones to crush the shells of nuts they want to eat. An experiment in the field investigated how these monkeys prepare to use new, unfamiliar tools.
Scientists don’t know for sure why this happens - but we have some theories.
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The truth is scientists aren’t exactly sure why our fingers and toes get wrinkly in the bath. But here’s what we know, and what we suspect.
Examining chicken intestines, reading the tea leaves, watching the markets – people turn to experts for insight into the mysteries that surround them.
Manvir Singh
Hidden forces are always at work in the world, and people always want to control them, a cognitive anthropologist explains. Enter the human universal of shamanism.