Ch.5: Getting Ahead

I think it was me instead of the heat that made this chapter confusing and then amazing. Like being bipolar, throughout the chapter, I liked this part and hated that maybebecause the simplicity was within the complexity of the text. The twisted paths of the nervous system and the 4 arches that tormented college students also tormented me because the complexity was greatly reduced that it took me a long time to realize that something looks complex can be deceiving.
The human brain is a big mass of nerves that connects to every part of the body from head to toe which is covered by a vertebrae which holds the brain and sense organs together. Everything that defines humans are held up by a vertebrate! The development of the brain in the fetus was interesting, from a single cell embryo to the most remarkable piece of organ in the world.
The human focus in this chapter was something new so far and something that made a difference in understanding the rest of the chapter. The foundation or basics of the human brain was down with the 4 arches of the trigeminal and facial nerves and functions, now, the big picture comes in:
The connection with fishes-sharks. The embryos developed similarly except for the gill production, but the rest such as the jaws were very similar giving us insight to how we and the fishes share the same ancestor deep deep down. In addition, the similarity of fishes to humans can also mean that the same simple stencil for the brain can be used for many other animals, even invertebrates.
This is the part that caught my attention the most, how could invertebrates have ancestral connections to humans? Not only are humans descentants from fishes, but also from maybe worms. Come to think of it, billions of years ago, only simple organisms thrived on Earth and so worms could have been the first insects that had somewhat of a brain and then evolved to more intricate creatures which could have soon branched out to become humans. So many possibilities overwhelmed my thoughts. Who could have known that humans who are at the top of the food chain is connected to one of the first consumers of that food chain and that thing that connects them is the reason why humans are on top. The Brain.