So I built a stegosaurus model kit, which included some factoids in the instructions. One of these factoids was that stegosaurs are not believed to have had a secondary brain in the hips to help them control their rear half after all. That was wild to me, since the whole stegosaurs and sauropods with their tiny heads needing a secondary brain for their huge bodies was commonly accepted back when I was a kid. So I looked it up, and indeed, the current hypothesis is that the cavity that the second brain was thought to occupy is used for a thing called a glycogen body. But what exactly does a glycogen body do? We’ll get back to you on that, apparently.
TIL people used to think that dinosaurs had a 2nd brain
I’m 54 and had a life-changing hippy teacher teach us elementary science. I believed this.
Blow your mind? In the 80s, not every geologist was onboard with plate tectonics.
Man i’m only 40 and the shit i learned in school is actually kind of crazy. When i was around 8, the ozone hole was kind of a big deal. FCKW was everywhere and it was the number one threat, next to climate change itself. One day it was really cold and i made a joke like: “the ozone hole is supposed to burn us, but it’s so cold outside.” My teacher heard that and fraked out. He said that we have no idea how lucky we are, in New Zealand, children can’t even go on the streets without special suits, because they are right under the ozone hole.
I was 8, i heard New Zealand for the first time, i had no idea where or what it was, i was to scared to even ask what happened to old Zealand, but i always imagined it’s literally scorched. I kinda stopped thinking about it unitl some years later when i watched a movie that was filmed in new Zealand and i was like:“motherfucker, it’s beautiful out there.”
In the summer our weather reports also include a “burn time” or a UV index. 15 minutes is typical.
I need to put sun screen on if I’m going to be outside for more than about 30 minutes at a time.
We’re melanoma capital of the world.
There’s no where else I’d rather be.
When I was a kid I didn’t read about a “2nd brain” but a series of ganglions that acted like relays down the spine. Supposedly the belief was the size of dinosaurs made it impossible for nerve signals to reach the brain from distant parts of the body in a timely manner so they had these relays that made it easier to have reflex responses while the signal was being passed on to the brain.
i mean, that is true in so much as all animals have them, that’s precisely why reflexes happen before we even realize it
i’d imagine even the tiniest field mice work like this, because it’s something the first animals evolved and it’s highly useful regardless of how long it takes signals to reach the brain.
This was more than just simple reflexes though, like minibrains.