Simple Concepts Humans Developed Surprisingly Recently

Nowadays, there's a huge emphasis on eating natural foods. Staying away from GMOs, pesticides, and processed sugars is generally thought of as a good thing. Some call it the paleo diet and it's a way to harken back to a simpler time, when our ancestors ate gathered fruits and hunted animals.

Going paleo is very noble and all, but the problem is: the plants and animals we eat are nothing like they were thousands of years ago, let a hundred years ago. Before test tubes were ever a part of the equation, we selectively bred everything from cows and chickens to apples and bananas. You'd barf in your mouth just looking at an OG banana, let alone trying to eat it. And cows? They were bred from their ancestors, cattle-like animals called aurochs, who would fuck you up if you tried milking them.

The food we eat today and think of as normal is just one example of a historical blindspot we have where we think commonplace objects and concepts have been around forever. But in this week's episode, Jack O'Brien is joined by Michael Swaim and Teresa Lee to discuss how things like food, love, racism and mourning dead children are all surprisingly recent developments.

Throw on your headphones and click "Play" above, go here to subscribe on iTunes, or download it here.

Footnotes:

Article: Cracked: 7 Concepts We Totally Take For Granted, Like White People

Article: Cracked: 6 Man-Made Things You Totally Thought Were Natural

Article: Cracked: 5 Simple Things You Won't Believe Are Recent Inventions

Article: Seeker: Cows Almost Impossible to Domesticate, DNA Reveals

Article: Pacific Standard: How Lobster Got Fancy

Article: Gawker: 'Breathtaking' Document Reveals Pepsi's Logo is Pinnacle of Entire Universe

Article: Time: The Invention of Teenagers

Article: The New York Times: Who's White?

Podcast: Duke University Center for Documentary Studies: Seeing White, Part 1

Text: Ralph Waldo Emerson: English Traits