Speaker 1: Okad a. Welcome to Healthy Ish. I hope you are
Speaker 1: feeling well healthy today, not the ish. I am your
Speaker 1: host of Felicity Hawlen, of course, this is the daily
Speaker 1: podcast from Body and Soul. I'm joined today by award
Speaker 1: winning science journalist and author of new book Why Are
Speaker 1: We Like This? Zoe Keane. We're discussing how evolutionary history
Speaker 1: shapes our current health behaviors and why understanding it all
Speaker 1: can help boost well, not only your health, but also
Speaker 1: your wellbeing. Now, we keep our Healthiest episodes quite short,
Speaker 1: so if you want to hear a longer chat with
Speaker 1: Zoe where we take a deep dive into aging, search
Speaker 1: for our sister pod, Extra Healthy Ish, where we get
Speaker 1: your podcasts. Hey Zoey, thanks for coming on healthy Is today.
Speaker 2: Gooday, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: And well done on your I'm calling it fascinating new book.
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 1: Now talk to us, how can evolutionary biology, well, what
Speaker 1: can it teach us about our health today?
Speaker 2: Well, there's a bit of a saying among evolutionary biologists,
Speaker 2: and I spoke to a lot of them for this book,
Speaker 2: that nothing in biology makes sense outside of the light
Speaker 2: of evolution, and essentially that's because we all got here
Speaker 2: with an evolutionary story. Every single thing that is alive
Speaker 2: on this planet has this amazing legacy of generations going
Speaker 2: back and back and back and surviving in different contexts,
Speaker 2: and that history changes the way in which we turn
Speaker 2: up in the world today and changes the way our
Speaker 2: body works and influences everything from how we sleep, how
Speaker 2: we eat, how we experience emotions and love. Everything that
Speaker 2: we experience as living being things is a consequence of
Speaker 2: this history. And that doesn't take away from our own
Speaker 2: individual experience or how important important our lives are to us,
Speaker 2: but it is this incredible legacy, and it really helps
Speaker 2: us untangle some of the trickier questions we've faced in life.
Speaker 1: I think when you, I mean I've delved into it
Speaker 1: a bit too, you know, the past couple of years,
Speaker 1: into how we've evolved and you know as to who
Speaker 1: we are today, and it really does help you appreciate
Speaker 1: how well not just your body functions, but how we
Speaker 1: relate in the world. Your book is cut up into
Speaker 1: different chapters, you know, sleep, care, sex, lives. Talk to
Speaker 1: us a bit about sleep, you know, and where how
Speaker 1: that has perhaps developed over the years, and well how
Speaker 1: we can sleep better today, That's what I want to know. Yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: so every chapter kind of focuses on this, this crunchy
Speaker 1: issue in evolutionary biology that doesn't quite make sense with
Speaker 1: a kind of first pass idea of you know, traits
Speaker 1: that are selected for that help us survive and then
Speaker 1: have more offspring, and those offsprings. Sleeps a bit of
Speaker 1: a weird one because it's strange to completely lose consciousness
Speaker 1: in a dangerous world. Right when we go to sleep,
Speaker 1: we're vulnerable, And so how has.
Speaker 2: Something that has made us vulnerable continued? And of course
Speaker 2: it's continued because it's incredibly healthy for us, or we've
Speaker 2: kind of offloaded a lot of biological functions into the
Speaker 2: sleep time that we need to survive and we can't
Speaker 2: survive without sleep. Interestingly, one of the things I found
Speaker 2: when I was researching this book and this kind of
Speaker 2: bucks the trend a little bit is that modern humans
Speaker 2: are probably sleeping better than we ever have.
Speaker 1: Oh and I know, actually that is lovely to hear.
Speaker 2: It is, isn't it, because we've got so much anxiety
Speaker 2: around sleep. I spoke to this wonderful researcher, David Sinclair,
Speaker 2: and he's been doing a lot of research around this
Speaker 2: is based in Canada and Toronto, and he was saying,
Speaker 2: in our culture, one of the things that we do
Speaker 2: is really problematize sleep. And of course, you know, I've
Speaker 2: just enturing my book I'll sleep deprived for a bit
Speaker 2: of that. And it's horrible when you're sleep deprived, and
Speaker 2: there are periods in your life, say when you're raising
Speaker 2: up kids, that you are sleep deprived, and it's awful
Speaker 2: and it impacts you physically, it impacts your health. But
Speaker 2: compared to the history of life on Earth, we're probably
Speaker 2: doing okay. And that can be a really comforting thing
Speaker 2: to know because we kind of hear these dire headlines
Speaker 2: about sleep loss, epidemic and all this type of thing.
Speaker 2: But essentially, you know, I did also encounter some things
Speaker 2: that we can do to make our sleep better, and
Speaker 2: that is really get in touch with our circadian rhythm.
Speaker 2: So it's like really the basic stuff. You know, make
Speaker 2: sure that you're seeing the light in the morning, seeing
Speaker 2: the light in midday if you're working in an office block,
Speaker 2: you know, just trying to get out for lunch and
Speaker 2: then seeing the light at the end of the day.
Speaker 2: So you know, actually going outside can be really helpful.
Speaker 2: And of course, one of the big things that we
Speaker 2: can do to help sleep is to help each other
Speaker 2: live better, less stressful lives. So a huge impact on
Speaker 2: everybody's sleep is you know, we might have heard the
Speaker 2: term social determinants of health, but if your life is hard,
Speaker 2: if you're living in danger, so you know, if you're
Speaker 2: living in a dangerous neighborhood, you have worse sleep compared
Speaker 2: to someone who's living in a safe neighborhood. And if
Speaker 2: you're living in, say a situation where you know there's
Speaker 2: worry and anxiety around, then that obviously affects your sleep.
Speaker 2: And we feel that on a personal level when we're stressed,
Speaker 2: it's harder to sleep. But also that's a larger cultural thing.
Speaker 2: So you know, you can help people sleep by just
Speaker 2: checking in on a mate and making sure that your
Speaker 2: friends and family are safe. And we often get individual advice,
Speaker 2: but community advice is a really big one for sleep,
Speaker 2: because just community safety can really help with our sleep.
Speaker 2: One chapter that I've found perhaps reassuring more than ever
Speaker 2: right now with all that's going on in the world
Speaker 2: is why we care and.
Speaker 1: Whales and wolves and humans. You know, you link these
Speaker 1: two and you talk about the survival depending on acts
Speaker 1: of kindness.
Speaker 2: Talk to us about this, yeah, I mean, one of
Speaker 2: the kind of frustrations I have about evolutionary biology is
Speaker 2: often when people talk about it, they emphasize this kind
Speaker 2: of raw and rugged individualism where everybody's out for themselves.
Speaker 2: Dog eat dog, the dog eat dog. It's that kind
Speaker 2: of world. And actually, one of the beautiful things about
Speaker 2: us as humans and animals like dogs, elephants, and whales
Speaker 2: especially is that our survival is completely dependent on our community,
Speaker 2: and so we have evolved to be incredibly caring and
Speaker 2: incredibly altruistic, and this means that we will sacrifice ourselves
Speaker 2: to help out our neighbors, our friends, our offspring. And
Speaker 2: I investigated this looking at human baby but also looking
Speaker 2: at different species, so mainly pilot and sperm whales, because
Speaker 2: they're incredible examples of very caring communities. So pilot whales
Speaker 2: and sperm whales they babysit for each other, so they'll
Speaker 2: look after each other's kids when they're you know, off
Speaker 2: diving hunting for squeeeds, I know, and in some sperm
Speaker 2: whale groups, because sperm whales, like humans, they have different
Speaker 2: cultures and so some sperm whales have some babysitting arrangements
Speaker 2: that differ to other sperm whales, which is incredible. You know,
Speaker 2: some if you're in one community of sperm whales, you
Speaker 2: might be more likely to be looked after by a
Speaker 2: family member, whereas you might be more likely to be
Speaker 2: looked after by a more distant relation in another one.
Speaker 2: It's fascinating. And sperm whales will even suckle each other's young,
Speaker 2: so you know, they'll share real physical resources with each other.
Speaker 2: And this is an incredible way that helps them survive
Speaker 2: in the world, and it helps them live lives.
Speaker 1: That thrive and yeah, in a very.
Speaker 2: Dangerous place in the open ocean. But it does have
Speaker 2: this kind of other side effect, which means that sometimes
Speaker 2: their social relationships can make it hard when they're, say
Speaker 2: in a mass stranding event, because it can be very
Speaker 2: hard to get whales off the beach if they've got
Speaker 2: their loved ones still on the beach. Sense. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: with humans, you know, we're the same. We will, you know,
Speaker 2: go into danger to look after those that we love.
Speaker 2: And one of the really heartening things I found in
Speaker 2: the book found researching the book, and it's a fairly
Speaker 2: well known thing, but I think it's always worth repeating,
Speaker 2: is that in times of crisis, so say after a
Speaker 2: bush fire or you know, after some catastrophic event, levels
Speaker 2: of pro social behavior so people helping other people increase massively,
Speaker 2: And we're often told to kind of worry about things
Speaker 2: like looting or crime, but actually when things are tough,
Speaker 2: that's when our really, really good behavior comes out. And
Speaker 2: that's an incredible thing to know about humanity because things
Speaker 2: can look a bit dire sometimes, so it's I think
Speaker 2: really important to look at our legacy of care and
Speaker 2: how community care and caring for those that were related
Speaker 2: to and those that we're not related to has helped
Speaker 2: us survive and look to that past for inspiration, but
Speaker 2: also to understand ourselves as caring beings. And there are
Speaker 2: some fantastic researchers that are looking at that how that's
Speaker 2: operating now in species like whales, but also in human cultures,
Speaker 2: so you know, all the way from Massi warriors in
Speaker 2: Africa and Kenya to ranchers out in the US who
Speaker 2: are looking after their neighbors, and the kind of similarities
Speaker 2: in the way we care for each other that are
Speaker 2: very interesting cross culturally.
Speaker 1: So Thank you for coming on.
Speaker 2: Healthy Is No Worries.
Speaker 1: Well, if you want answers to some of life's big questions,
Speaker 1: like some of the ones we just chatted about, grab
Speaker 1: Zoe's book. It is called Why Are We Like This?
Speaker 1: It is out now. Make sure listening to her on
Speaker 1: Extra Healthy Ish anything else. Head to Body andsoul dot com.
Speaker 1: That are you can follow us on social media. You
Speaker 1: can grab me at Felicity Harley as well. Make sure
Speaker 1: you check out our print edition which is annually called
Speaker 1: Sunday Paper. Thanks again for tuning into this podcast, and
Speaker 1: of course stay healthy.