Practice question · Multiple choice
Brains are metabolically expensive and ours consumes about a fifth of our energy at rest. What made that bill payable?
Hints
- Ask what other expensive tissue got smaller as the brain got bigger.
- Cooking is external digestion. What does that let the body stop paying for?
Show the answer
D. A higher-quality diet and external processing
Why
Aiello and Wheeler's expensive-tissue hypothesis pairs the growing brain with a shrinking gut, and cooking is what makes a smaller gut viable, energy released rather than found. It also reframes fire as a metabolic technology rather than merely a comfort.
Practise Human Evolution and Hominization
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More questions on Human Evolution and Hominization
- Lucy walked upright with a brain of about 400 cc, roughly a chimpanzee’s. Why does that ordering matter for…
- What plausibly paid the energy bill for a brain that burns ~20% of resting metabolism?
- Order the milestones of hominization.
- A human brain is about 2% of body weight. What share of resting energy does it burn?
- Complete the statement about our species’ situation.