full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Suzana Herculano-Houzel: What is so special about the human brain?

Unscramble the Blue Letters


So this brings us to a very itnarpomt conclusion already, which is that we are not rodents. The human brain is not a lrgae rat brain. Compared to a rat, we might seem scipael, yes, but that's not a fair comparison to make, given that we know that we are not rodents. We are primates, so the creorct comparison is to other primates. And there, if you do the math, you find that a generic primate with 86 blilion neurons would have a brain of about 1.2 kilos, which seems just right, in a body of some 66 kilos, which in my case is exactly right, which brings us to a very unsurprising but still incredibly important conclusion: I am a primate. And all of you are primates.

Open Cloze


So this brings us to a very _________ conclusion already, which is that we are not rodents. The human brain is not a _____ rat brain. Compared to a rat, we might seem _______, yes, but that's not a fair comparison to make, given that we know that we are not rodents. We are primates, so the _______ comparison is to other primates. And there, if you do the math, you find that a generic primate with 86 _______ neurons would have a brain of about 1.2 kilos, which seems just right, in a body of some 66 kilos, which in my case is exactly right, which brings us to a very unsurprising but still incredibly important conclusion: I am a primate. And all of you are primates.

Solution


  1. billion
  2. large
  3. correct
  4. important
  5. special

Original Text


So this brings us to a very important conclusion already, which is that we are not rodents. The human brain is not a large rat brain. Compared to a rat, we might seem special, yes, but that's not a fair comparison to make, given that we know that we are not rodents. We are primates, so the correct comparison is to other primates. And there, if you do the math, you find that a generic primate with 86 billion neurons would have a brain of about 1.2 kilos, which seems just right, in a body of some 66 kilos, which in my case is exactly right, which brings us to a very unsurprising but still incredibly important conclusion: I am a primate. And all of you are primates.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
human brain 13
billion neurons 6
cognitive abilities 4
cerebral cortex 3
primate brain 3
rodent brain 3
brain costs 3
body size 3
scientists thought 2
great apes 2
times larger 2
large brain 2
primate brains 2
simplest explanation 2
remarkable cognitive 2
large body 2
large number 2
largest number 2

ngrams of length 3

collocation frequency
remarkable cognitive abilities 2
human brain costs 2

Important Words


  1. billion
  2. body
  3. brain
  4. brings
  5. case
  6. compared
  7. comparison
  8. conclusion
  9. correct
  10. fair
  11. find
  12. generic
  13. human
  14. important
  15. incredibly
  16. kilos
  17. large
  18. math
  19. neurons
  20. primate
  21. primates
  22. rat
  23. rodents
  24. special
  25. unsurprising