WEBVTT - Before You Could Remember, Part 1 0:00:02.960 --> 0:00:06.040 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, the production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:13.080 --> 0:00:14.800 Hey are you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind? 0:00:14.920 --> 0:00:17.560 My name is Robert Lamb, and I'm Joe McCormick, and 0:00:17.640 --> 0:00:20.439 today we're going to be talking about that hole in 0:00:20.560 --> 0:00:25.480 your memory before the earliest one you can produce, also 0:00:25.560 --> 0:00:29.960 known as infantile amnesia. And hey, listeners, you were promised 0:00:30.560 --> 0:00:33.720 you would be getting some baby looked at Me topics 0:00:33.880 --> 0:00:36.479 this year. My wife and I had a baby this 0:00:36.560 --> 0:00:39.080 past October, and I think many of you have been 0:00:39.080 --> 0:00:44.000 practically daring me to embark on indulgent dad topics. But 0:00:44.120 --> 0:00:48.879 here we've arrived at one because so I think the 0:00:48.920 --> 0:00:53.159 way I got here was recently we have started spending 0:00:53.240 --> 0:00:56.400 a lot of time trying to make a five month 0:00:56.440 --> 0:01:00.240 old baby laugh. Rob, I don't know how much experience 0:01:00.280 --> 0:01:05.000 you have with this, like the parent comedian routine. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, 0:01:05.000 --> 0:01:08.600 a lot of hours clocked on that particular stand up gig. Well, 0:01:08.720 --> 0:01:14.360 sometime recently Rachel figured out what our baby's favorite genre 0:01:14.480 --> 0:01:18.000 of comedy was, at least for that day, and it 0:01:18.120 --> 0:01:22.560 was a textile gravity comedy. It was the act was 0:01:22.680 --> 0:01:25.039 you hold a cloth up in the air and then 0:01:25.080 --> 0:01:28.080 you drop the cloth on the baby, and when the 0:01:28.160 --> 0:01:32.480 cloth falls down and hits the baby, this is hilarious. 0:01:32.520 --> 0:01:37.320 It was creating these storms of laughter from another dimension, 0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:42.840 truly riveting experience, at least for us. But I started 0:01:42.880 --> 0:01:46.160 to wonder, like, why is this funny? And of course 0:01:46.200 --> 0:01:48.360 I wanted to ask her, but she's a five month 0:01:48.360 --> 0:01:51.440 old baby, not talking yet. She can't explain why it's funny. 0:01:52.120 --> 0:01:55.160 And you know, I was thinking, one day, will I 0:01:55.280 --> 0:01:58.200 be able to ask her, you remember when we were 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:01.120 dropping the cloth on you and you thought this was 0:02:01.160 --> 0:02:03.840 so funny? Why was it funny? What was going through 0:02:03.840 --> 0:02:07.120 your mind? But I just know that's probably never a 0:02:07.120 --> 0:02:10.680 conversation that's going to go anywhere, because is she really 0:02:10.800 --> 0:02:13.560 going to even remember this by the time she can 0:02:13.600 --> 0:02:17.600 talk about it? Because I certainly don't have any memories 0:02:18.080 --> 0:02:21.600 that I can bring up now from being five months old, 0:02:21.720 --> 0:02:24.720 or even from being one year old, or even from 0:02:24.800 --> 0:02:28.840 being two years old. I'm not sure, honestly what my 0:02:28.919 --> 0:02:31.560 earliest memory is. But I know I don't have any 0:02:31.600 --> 0:02:35.760 memories I feel confident about from the first several years 0:02:35.800 --> 0:02:38.560 of my life. And it turns out this is not 0:02:38.760 --> 0:02:41.919 unique to me. This is pretty common most people feel 0:02:42.000 --> 0:02:45.760 this way, that they don't have any really solid memories 0:02:46.080 --> 0:02:49.200 from the first several years of their lives, and so 0:02:49.240 --> 0:02:51.600 I just got really interested in the question of why 0:02:51.680 --> 0:02:55.000 that is. Yeah, I mean, unless you are biological mother 0:02:55.120 --> 0:03:00.160 partook of the waters of life, she was pregnant, you're 0:03:00.200 --> 0:03:03.120 probably not preborn like that. You're you're not gonna You're 0:03:03.120 --> 0:03:06.360 not gonna remember these things. And we'll get into some 0:03:07.560 --> 0:03:12.000 There is a certain amount of subjectiveness to all of this, 0:03:12.120 --> 0:03:14.400 and we'll get into some of that, And certainly we'd 0:03:14.440 --> 0:03:16.359 love to hear from any listeners out there who are 0:03:16.680 --> 0:03:19.079 firm on this or feel firm on this and are like, yes, 0:03:19.120 --> 0:03:22.960 I do remember being under the age of two, that 0:03:23.080 --> 0:03:27.120 sort of thing. But most of the research seems to 0:03:27.120 --> 0:03:29.720 point in a different direction that most It seems like 0:03:29.800 --> 0:03:32.800 most of what we remember is after a certain point 0:03:32.800 --> 0:03:36.720 in our development, and that certainly your daughter has not 0:03:36.800 --> 0:03:39.800 quite reached that point. Which is not to say that 0:03:39.840 --> 0:03:45.360 she is not capable of memory, because I mean several 0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:49.160 things I can notice. She recognizes faces, and she is 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:53.400 forming associations and routines. There's learning going on at this 0:03:53.480 --> 0:03:56.200 point in a baby's development, and learning is to some 0:03:56.280 --> 0:03:58.840 extent based on memory. So it's not that the brain 0:03:59.000 --> 0:04:02.400 is not capable of any type of memory at this point, 0:04:02.440 --> 0:04:05.600 but it seems that most people's brains at this point 0:04:06.400 --> 0:04:11.640 are not producing episodic or autobiographical memories. Episodic memories meaning 0:04:11.960 --> 0:04:17.200 memories of specific events or experiences, not producing sort of 0:04:17.320 --> 0:04:21.320 narrative memories of that type that can be retrieved later 0:04:21.360 --> 0:04:23.800 in life. I guess it's a question whether memories of 0:04:23.839 --> 0:04:27.800 that type are formed at all. And so I don't 0:04:27.800 --> 0:04:31.160 have any memories like that from infancy. Most people report 0:04:31.200 --> 0:04:35.240 the same, and I cannot, honestly, from my memory, tell 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:37.760 you a story about anything that happened before I was 0:04:37.760 --> 0:04:41.880 probably like four or five or so. You do bring 0:04:41.960 --> 0:04:43.800 up the idea that there are a small number of 0:04:43.839 --> 0:04:46.279 people who claim they can remember like being born or 0:04:46.360 --> 0:04:49.440 being a baby. But even in those cases, while you can't, 0:04:49.520 --> 0:04:51.920 you say, well, you're just wrong, you don't remember that. 0:04:52.000 --> 0:04:54.840 I think it's reasonable to be skeptical about whether those 0:04:54.880 --> 0:04:58.919 are real memories or just later confabulations. Yeah. Yeah, And 0:04:59.040 --> 0:05:01.159 I on this note, I think it's important to remind 0:05:01.200 --> 0:05:05.520 listeners that fabricated memories are by no means necessarily intentional. 0:05:06.040 --> 0:05:08.599 They're numerous ways that we've discussed in the show before, 0:05:08.680 --> 0:05:11.840 numerous ways that false memories may be encoded. There are 0:05:11.839 --> 0:05:15.400 plenty of examples of cases where attested early childhood memories 0:05:15.440 --> 0:05:19.040 can ultimately be attributed to stories one is told about 0:05:19.120 --> 0:05:22.680 one's younger years and or something formed out of say 0:05:22.720 --> 0:05:25.919 longing or desire for a certain framework. A lot of 0:05:25.920 --> 0:05:28.840 stuff like that out there. And again we've touched on 0:05:28.960 --> 0:05:31.800 many times before, like we alter memories every time we 0:05:32.360 --> 0:05:34.360 draw them out, every time we get them out of 0:05:34.360 --> 0:05:37.440 the storage, we get our fingerprints all over them, and 0:05:37.480 --> 0:05:40.520 we change them. And then ultimately, the memories that are 0:05:40.560 --> 0:05:43.320 most dear to us, the ones that we pull out 0:05:43.360 --> 0:05:45.800 the most are the ones that are potentially the most altered, 0:05:46.120 --> 0:05:49.039 right because the form in which they are stored in 0:05:49.120 --> 0:05:51.920 memory is ultimately the form in which you rehearse them. 0:05:52.000 --> 0:05:54.440 You know, it's not a videotape. It is a it's 0:05:54.480 --> 0:05:59.000 a constant sort of like rewriting over the same document. Yeah. Yeah, 0:05:59.040 --> 0:06:01.440 And to your point, though, it is kind of ironic 0:06:01.480 --> 0:06:04.520 that when you have a young child in the house 0:06:04.600 --> 0:06:09.520 like this, for for parents, this is or even you know, 0:06:09.520 --> 0:06:12.600 other people in that uh, that infant's life, these are 0:06:12.640 --> 0:06:15.200 some of the dearest moments. You know, you're experiencing these 0:06:15.240 --> 0:06:17.640 moments and you're like, this, this is you can feel 0:06:17.680 --> 0:06:19.960 it embedding, you can you know this is something you're 0:06:20.000 --> 0:06:22.320 never going to forget. And then on the other hand, 0:06:23.080 --> 0:06:25.520 you have at least a very strong suspicion that the 0:06:25.600 --> 0:06:27.760 child is not going to remember it the way that 0:06:27.800 --> 0:06:31.320 you remember it. Uh and uh, and it's a it's 0:06:31.320 --> 0:06:33.240 so it's something that I know that we my wife 0:06:33.240 --> 0:06:34.920 and I talked a lot about with our son when 0:06:34.920 --> 0:06:38.000 he when he was much younger. And sometimes my son 0:06:38.040 --> 0:06:40.040 will comment on this because when your child gets over, 0:06:40.040 --> 0:06:41.720 you're always like, well do you remember this? Do you 0:06:41.720 --> 0:06:44.160 remember that? Or I remember when this happened, but I 0:06:44.200 --> 0:06:46.440 know you don't remember it. And so there are a 0:06:46.440 --> 0:06:49.360 lot of conversations like that. And then sometimes we'll be 0:06:49.400 --> 0:06:51.520 on a trip and our son, at this point, who's 0:06:51.839 --> 0:06:54.440 almost eleven, he'll comment like, oh, well, that baby's not 0:06:54.520 --> 0:06:57.280 even going to remember that vacation. Uh, seeing like a 0:06:57.400 --> 0:06:59.279 you know, another couple with an infant on a trip, 0:07:00.480 --> 0:07:03.800 but it might as well not even take it. Yeah, well, 0:07:03.839 --> 0:07:05.479 you know that's that's kind of the joke, right, like 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:07.120 just go ahead and put your baby in a closet 0:07:07.120 --> 0:07:08.760 for a few years because they're not going to remember 0:07:08.839 --> 0:07:11.320 these expensive trips. But of course you can't do that. 0:07:11.320 --> 0:07:13.160 That's not how it works. You have to have these 0:07:13.200 --> 0:07:16.400 moments in these trips. And and just because the baby's 0:07:16.480 --> 0:07:20.440 not recalling it the way an adult recalls something later 0:07:20.600 --> 0:07:24.960 doesn't mean that it's not quote unquote remembered. Right, those 0:07:25.000 --> 0:07:29.200 I mean those instead of say having autobiographical memories that 0:07:29.240 --> 0:07:33.240 can later be retrieved in narrative form. Instead, the effect 0:07:33.280 --> 0:07:36.280 of those experiences might be, say, structural impacts on the 0:07:36.320 --> 0:07:39.920 development of the brain. Right. There's a great quote that 0:07:40.000 --> 0:07:42.080 came up in a paper I'm going to source here 0:07:42.240 --> 0:07:45.120 in a bet where they said something that you know 0:07:45.240 --> 0:07:47.720 is quite simple. But I think is important to keep 0:07:47.760 --> 0:07:50.400 in mind in this context and in memory context in general. 0:07:50.960 --> 0:07:53.640 The brain remembers what it needs to remember, you know, 0:07:53.760 --> 0:07:57.600 and and the memory demands on say a five month 0:07:57.640 --> 0:07:59.560 old baby or a one year old child one and 0:07:59.560 --> 0:08:02.880 a half year child are different. And therefore again it's 0:08:02.880 --> 0:08:06.600 not there's nothing bad about not having not being able 0:08:06.640 --> 0:08:08.880 to recall when you are two or three, or four 0:08:08.920 --> 0:08:11.880 or five. It's just it's just what your brain needed 0:08:11.920 --> 0:08:13.760 to do. And as we'll get into there are different 0:08:13.760 --> 0:08:16.320 reasons for this. Yeah, so that's what we're going to 0:08:16.400 --> 0:08:20.640 be exploring in this series. Questions like why don't most 0:08:20.720 --> 0:08:25.760 people have specific autobiographical memories of being a baby? Do 0:08:25.840 --> 0:08:29.960 we have episodic memories of infancy which get like erased 0:08:30.040 --> 0:08:33.120 from the brain for some reason, or do we never 0:08:33.160 --> 0:08:36.400 form episodic memories of baby life in the first place. 0:08:36.440 --> 0:08:40.439 Obviously there's some kind of memory going on in very 0:08:40.480 --> 0:08:43.000 young childhood and infancy, but maybe it just like it 0:08:43.040 --> 0:08:46.080 doesn't have an episodic memory component. Maybe it can remember 0:08:46.080 --> 0:08:51.280 associations and images, but maybe not like sequences of events. 0:08:52.120 --> 0:08:55.520 Or maybe is there some weird third option, like we 0:08:55.600 --> 0:08:59.120 do form memories and they're not exactly erased later, but 0:08:59.200 --> 0:09:02.040 they're sort of fun or hard to retrieve for some reason. 0:09:03.120 --> 0:09:07.120 That that's what got me really interested in this exploration today. 0:09:07.160 --> 0:09:10.040 But of course I also got very interested in the 0:09:10.120 --> 0:09:14.000 question of before people could do experiments on this, they 0:09:14.080 --> 0:09:18.560 must have observed childhood development firsthand and had all kinds 0:09:18.559 --> 0:09:20.800 of questions of this sort and probably come up with 0:09:20.840 --> 0:09:25.800 answers whether or not those answers were accurate. Yeah, so yeah, 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:27.440 let's get in a little bit into just sort of 0:09:27.480 --> 0:09:29.800 some of the history of this, some of some sort 0:09:29.800 --> 0:09:33.240 of pre modern infant opinions, and also a little bit 0:09:33.240 --> 0:09:35.920 of cultural variation. I think one of the things to 0:09:36.000 --> 0:09:38.440 keep in mind about pre modern and pre scientific beliefs 0:09:38.440 --> 0:09:40.280 about infant memory is that a lot of it is 0:09:40.320 --> 0:09:42.960 going to come down to older beliefs about what human 0:09:43.040 --> 0:09:47.520 infants are and what they are not, And so this 0:09:47.600 --> 0:09:50.320 is all a mixture of things based on cultural tradition, 0:09:51.120 --> 0:09:54.040 but also based on observation. I think it goes without 0:09:54.040 --> 0:09:57.920 saying that that no matter what may have been ultimately 0:09:57.960 --> 0:10:01.800 recorded in literature ancient people, you know, they would have 0:10:01.840 --> 0:10:05.959 applied different insights and different ideas to the experience of babies, 0:10:06.000 --> 0:10:08.360 but some things were obviously going to be the same. 0:10:08.679 --> 0:10:11.520 Babies evoke strong emotions in us. That's just part of 0:10:11.559 --> 0:10:15.320 the way we're hardwired. Babies require a great deal of care. 0:10:15.880 --> 0:10:21.240 Babies cry baby is inherently can't communicate precisely. And also 0:10:21.360 --> 0:10:24.640 human memories of early childhood or the lack thereof, would 0:10:24.679 --> 0:10:27.720 have been identical more or less to what we have now, 0:10:27.840 --> 0:10:29.679 or at least any differences are not going to be 0:10:29.679 --> 0:10:35.120 based merely on say the the timeline, and we'll get 0:10:35.160 --> 0:10:37.520 into some of that in a bit. Right. For example, 0:10:37.559 --> 0:10:40.520 I would really not say that the current characteristics of 0:10:41.559 --> 0:10:45.640 infantile amnesia or memory formation and very young children are say, 0:10:45.679 --> 0:10:49.520 a result of the Internet or some other kind of 0:10:49.559 --> 0:10:53.160 like technological context, especially because we know people have been 0:10:53.360 --> 0:10:57.040 in the more modern era doing research on this going 0:10:57.080 --> 0:10:59.679 back more than a hundred years, so before a lot 0:10:59.720 --> 0:11:03.480 of the the sort of like communications and technology context 0:11:03.520 --> 0:11:05.920 we live in today, people were asking hey, when are 0:11:05.960 --> 0:11:09.880 people's first memories and what do they remember about childhood? 0:11:09.920 --> 0:11:12.480 And the answers were largely the same as what we 0:11:12.520 --> 0:11:15.400 get when we asked that today. Yeah. Yeah, So it 0:11:15.440 --> 0:11:18.199 doesn't seem like there's any expectation that there's been significant 0:11:18.240 --> 0:11:22.360 variation in this, aside from variation that occurs for cultural 0:11:22.400 --> 0:11:24.600 reasons and so forth. But again, a lot of this 0:11:24.679 --> 0:11:26.880 is going to come down to how we think about babies, 0:11:27.000 --> 0:11:30.079 and again it's it's it's interesting because on one hand, yes, 0:11:30.120 --> 0:11:33.280 we have this inherent draw towards our own young and 0:11:33.400 --> 0:11:36.880 to the young of our community, but at the same time, 0:11:36.960 --> 0:11:39.400 you know, you often hear people talk about older kids, 0:11:39.400 --> 0:11:41.360 and you'll hear them say, well, you remember what it 0:11:41.400 --> 0:11:43.120 was like when you were that age. You know, there's 0:11:43.120 --> 0:11:47.000 a certain relatability in that. But generally they're not saying 0:11:47.040 --> 0:11:51.480 this about infants or very young toddlers because by and 0:11:51.559 --> 0:11:54.120 large we don't remember what it was it was like 0:11:54.240 --> 0:11:56.400 to be that age. We only remember the stories of 0:11:56.400 --> 0:11:59.200 what we were like at that age and so forth. Now, 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:05.240 examining how people in ancient times, for example, thought about babies, 0:12:06.320 --> 0:12:09.520 thinking about pre modern and prescientific thinking into all of this, 0:12:10.160 --> 0:12:13.280 you also have to take into account infant mortality rates, 0:12:13.640 --> 0:12:16.960 which were often high in ancient times. And I realized 0:12:16.960 --> 0:12:20.840 that infant mortality is not exactly a fun topic. But 0:12:21.040 --> 0:12:23.280 some of the attitudes of the ancient world surrounding the 0:12:23.320 --> 0:12:26.840 nature of infants is more sharply expressed over the subject, 0:12:27.480 --> 0:12:29.640 or so it seems. So we are going to touch 0:12:29.640 --> 0:12:32.200 on it a little bit, at least in passing. Yeah, 0:12:32.200 --> 0:12:35.280 it's sort of unavoidable for most of human history, for 0:12:35.400 --> 0:12:39.000 most people, just a major fact of life. Yeah, So 0:12:39.280 --> 0:12:41.840 I looked at a few different sources about the understanding 0:12:41.840 --> 0:12:46.079 of infants in ancient Greek and ancient Rome. In Childbirth 0:12:46.080 --> 0:12:48.880 and infancy in Greek and Roman antiquity from twenty eleven 0:12:49.400 --> 0:12:53.040 author Varneck Dason points out a number of interesting things 0:12:53.080 --> 0:12:55.920 about how these ancient people seem to seem to have 0:12:55.920 --> 0:12:58.800 considered young children based on the evidence we have to 0:12:58.840 --> 0:13:01.440 go on today, and so I want to outline some 0:13:01.480 --> 0:13:04.760 interesting points that they bring up. First of all, most 0:13:04.760 --> 0:13:07.760 of what we know relates to elite children rather than 0:13:08.000 --> 0:13:10.640 the lives of those born into lower classes or two 0:13:10.760 --> 0:13:13.959 enslaved people. Also, we have to think about the terminology here. 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:17.160 This is fascinating, so you know, basically the infant toddler 0:13:18.000 --> 0:13:23.560 dynamic and duality. It's it's interesting and potentially telling in 0:13:23.720 --> 0:13:28.120 that changes in terminology may indicate changes in cultural understanding 0:13:28.160 --> 0:13:31.920 of young children. So you know, certainly there's a difference 0:13:31.960 --> 0:13:34.280 between an infant and a toddler, and we tend to 0:13:34.320 --> 0:13:38.600 sort of we tend to mark that transition point. But 0:13:39.040 --> 0:13:42.000 to what extent is that transition point born out in 0:13:42.520 --> 0:13:45.800 a people's language, and at what point does the language 0:13:45.800 --> 0:13:49.360 potentially shift, etc. Basically just sort of a larger background 0:13:49.360 --> 0:13:51.959 topic to keep in mind. But the big point here 0:13:52.040 --> 0:13:54.280 is that it's most helpful to think of childhood as 0:13:54.360 --> 0:13:58.480 a journey, one that hits different milestones, goes through different stages, 0:13:59.160 --> 0:14:01.720 and that and this in turn alters the way that 0:14:01.840 --> 0:14:05.120 adults view the child and the degree to which they 0:14:05.160 --> 0:14:10.040 can be integrated into society. Also, Dawson points out to quote, 0:14:10.040 --> 0:14:14.120 in times of high infant mortality, these stages represented steps 0:14:14.600 --> 0:14:19.000 for hope of survival and increasing parental bonding. We'll come 0:14:19.080 --> 0:14:21.720 back to exactly what is meant by that, but basically 0:14:21.760 --> 0:14:24.640 it comes down to, like, how does a culture deal 0:14:24.680 --> 0:14:27.680 with the fact that there is a high infant mortality rate. 0:14:28.160 --> 0:14:30.560 Is there more of a sort of pushing away of 0:14:30.720 --> 0:14:34.360 kind of like a ultimately a stoic reaction, sort of 0:14:34.400 --> 0:14:38.840 distancing of the infant from the society who are making 0:14:38.960 --> 0:14:42.400 kind of a marginal state, or is there indeed still 0:14:42.440 --> 0:14:55.240 a lot of bonding going on and so forth. Now, 0:14:55.360 --> 0:14:58.480 with the Greek and Roman viewpoints, specifically, what we think 0:14:58.520 --> 0:15:00.960 of as infancy would have probably ended at age two 0:15:01.040 --> 0:15:04.760 or three, with you full weaning, increased ability to speak, 0:15:04.960 --> 0:15:08.160 and at age three integration into practiced religion at least 0:15:08.160 --> 0:15:12.600 at some degree. Now, medically speaking, it was previously supposed 0:15:12.600 --> 0:15:15.520 that there was next to nothing in the literature of 0:15:15.760 --> 0:15:18.920 ancient Greek ancient Rome to suggest that physicians were concerned 0:15:18.920 --> 0:15:22.720 with babies, except in exceptional circumstances, it was thought that 0:15:22.800 --> 0:15:26.800 babies in general were left to the midwives and the mothers. However, 0:15:26.880 --> 0:15:30.000 Dawson stresses that this is no longer really a correct viewpoint, 0:15:30.040 --> 0:15:32.880 based on numerous examples of writings that have come up 0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:37.560 about say, essential diet and hygiene for babies. So I 0:15:37.560 --> 0:15:40.720 think that's interesting representing there like a shift in our 0:15:40.800 --> 0:15:45.280 modern understanding about ancient views on infants that they were 0:15:45.320 --> 0:15:50.880 actually sometimes a more relevant object of what was considered medicine. Yeah, 0:15:50.880 --> 0:15:53.880 there's sort of this, and we'll get into it more 0:15:53.880 --> 0:15:56.920 than just a second here, But there was this understanding 0:15:56.960 --> 0:16:02.119 of the ancient world based on somethingificant evidence that basically 0:16:02.160 --> 0:16:06.760 the ruling male elite we're saying, like babies that not 0:16:06.800 --> 0:16:09.520 even worth your time, not worth my time anyway, call 0:16:09.600 --> 0:16:11.560 me when it is old enough for me to care 0:16:11.600 --> 0:16:14.640 about it, or if there's if it's exploding, then yes, 0:16:14.640 --> 0:16:16.720 a physician may come and check out the child. That 0:16:16.840 --> 0:16:19.240 sort of thing, because without a doubt, there seemed to 0:16:19.280 --> 0:16:22.320 have been far less of a view of baby superiority 0:16:22.360 --> 0:16:26.080 in ancient Greek and ancient Rome. Dawson writes the following 0:16:26.320 --> 0:16:31.000 this is great quote from Hippocrates to late antiquity, babies 0:16:31.000 --> 0:16:34.040 and toddlers are defined as a category of beings with 0:16:34.080 --> 0:16:39.360 a special morphology and physiology. These characteristics are on the 0:16:39.400 --> 0:16:44.560 whole negative. Newborn babies are generally described as imperfect, weak, 0:16:45.040 --> 0:16:50.080 and ugly. Wow perfect yes, Oh no, this reminds me 0:16:50.120 --> 0:16:52.960 of the story you've shared many times of your son 0:16:53.120 --> 0:16:56.800 calling the cat a stupid baby or just a baby 0:16:56.800 --> 0:16:59.480 maybe when it was just baby like baby is an adjective, 0:17:00.040 --> 0:17:04.080 bemoji and just a solid burn. As a toddler, it's 0:17:04.119 --> 0:17:08.640 like peak insult, imperfect, weak, and ugly. Yeah. Yeah, they 0:17:09.000 --> 0:17:13.920 toddlers get it, and so did the grown learned men 0:17:14.440 --> 0:17:18.560 of ancient Greece. So Dawson points a few specific authors 0:17:18.560 --> 0:17:22.240 to underline these views. So m. Aristotle wrote that babies 0:17:22.840 --> 0:17:25.960 quote are born in a more imperfect condition than any 0:17:25.960 --> 0:17:29.160 other perfected animal, and also that they have poor eyesight. 0:17:29.359 --> 0:17:32.119 Oh well, it depends on what Aristotle means by that. 0:17:32.160 --> 0:17:35.080 I'm not sure the full context, But if he's making 0:17:35.080 --> 0:17:38.560 a distinction between human beings and other animals, I think 0:17:38.600 --> 0:17:44.159 that's a fair observation that human babies are more helpless 0:17:44.240 --> 0:17:48.200 than the newborns of most other animal species. Yeah, absolutely, 0:17:48.240 --> 0:17:50.120 I think I think that's what he's going for here. 0:17:50.640 --> 0:17:53.960 There is there's another work on colors that is sometimes 0:17:54.040 --> 0:17:56.919 attributed to Aristotle, and in this it's pointed out that 0:17:56.960 --> 0:18:00.440 babies are ugly because or well it's much it's as ugly, 0:18:00.480 --> 0:18:03.080 but it points out that there's essentially they're ugly because 0:18:03.119 --> 0:18:08.000 they have red faces and little hair. Do you ever 0:18:08.040 --> 0:18:10.440 get the feeling that like Aristotle might have been writing 0:18:10.480 --> 0:18:13.280 about human babies the same way he was writing about 0:18:13.320 --> 0:18:16.960 like sting rays. It's just like this is something he's 0:18:17.000 --> 0:18:20.760 observed a couple of times and made a few notes about. Yeah, 0:18:20.800 --> 0:18:23.399 I mean I've seen some pretty hairy little babies before, 0:18:23.520 --> 0:18:27.360 so I mean they think it varies, yeah, but yes, 0:18:27.480 --> 0:18:29.280 on the whole, they tend not die us half of 0:18:29.359 --> 0:18:32.400 like a full head of hair or certainly a proper beard. Now. 0:18:32.440 --> 0:18:34.840 Galen was one of numerous physicians to comment on the 0:18:34.880 --> 0:18:39.760 seeming wax like malleability and weakness of the baby. Weakness 0:18:39.800 --> 0:18:43.359 of the baby. Babies are so weak. They're they're weak, 0:18:43.600 --> 0:18:45.840 and they're they're basically made out of wax. Like if 0:18:45.840 --> 0:18:47.680 you don't handle them too much or you will change 0:18:47.720 --> 0:18:50.760 their form completely. They do tend to be Doughey, yeah, 0:18:50.840 --> 0:18:54.000 that's true. But also Galen, I can just tell this 0:18:54.040 --> 0:18:56.960 guy did not spend much time holding a baby because, 0:18:57.000 --> 0:19:00.560 like especially Galen probably had a beard. I've a beard. 0:19:01.240 --> 0:19:04.400 When you feel the baby grabbed the beard and just 0:19:04.600 --> 0:19:07.600 not leg this is the handle for the adult, and 0:19:07.720 --> 0:19:10.680 it will pull until it has a fistful of beard hair. 0:19:11.000 --> 0:19:13.120 You do not walk away with the impression of how 0:19:13.160 --> 0:19:19.360 weak babies are. Aristotle also recorded that many babies die 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:22.480 within the first week and are therefore not named before 0:19:22.520 --> 0:19:26.000 this period passes. And this is a kind of approach 0:19:26.640 --> 0:19:30.000 to the first week or so of a child's life 0:19:30.040 --> 0:19:35.200 that you see reflected in various cultures in various times. Meanwhile, 0:19:35.240 --> 0:19:38.640 Plutarch just wonders if babies are in fact animals, because 0:19:38.680 --> 0:19:42.480 they're more like vegetables. They're more like a plant. I mean, yeah, 0:19:42.560 --> 0:19:45.919 plants cry at midnight, plants poop where they want to. 0:19:46.320 --> 0:19:50.600 That's exactly what a plant is. Dason adds this line 0:19:50.640 --> 0:19:54.200 here quote a mineral metaphor substitutes for the vegetable one. 0:19:54.440 --> 0:19:57.639 And Chronosis myth who ate his children as soon as 0:19:57.640 --> 0:20:00.320 they were born and thought a stone to be a 0:20:00.400 --> 0:20:04.200 swaddled nursling. So you know, is it a baby? Is 0:20:04.240 --> 0:20:06.800 it a stone? Like anyone can tell the difference, I guess. Yeah. 0:20:06.880 --> 0:20:08.840 Is that supposed to be a comment on how like 0:20:09.280 --> 0:20:13.760 how featureless and uninteresting babies are? Or is that myth's 0:20:13.760 --> 0:20:17.680 supposed to be a like a joke about Chronos being stupid? Um? 0:20:17.800 --> 0:20:20.600 I always I mean, granted I was as a modern 0:20:21.520 --> 0:20:24.760 English speaking human. I'm not the the intended audience, I 0:20:24.760 --> 0:20:26.880 guess for the myth, But I always interpreted it as 0:20:26.880 --> 0:20:30.320 being like, he's just so consumed with this this need 0:20:30.400 --> 0:20:33.080 to destroy his young. You know that he's just like 0:20:33.119 --> 0:20:35.880 just gobbles him up without really tasting them, you know. Yeah, 0:20:36.080 --> 0:20:38.920 it's more like down he's more machine now than man, 0:20:39.040 --> 0:20:41.919 almost like a he's a baby eating machine. He barely 0:20:41.960 --> 0:20:44.919 notices or or or has cognizance of what's going in 0:20:44.960 --> 0:20:49.080 his mouth. Yeah. So, after expressing some of these again 0:20:50.000 --> 0:20:54.560 aristocratic male opinions on babies recorded in the literature, I 0:20:54.560 --> 0:20:56.879 think it's a good time to distress something that another 0:20:56.920 --> 0:21:00.639 author drives home as well. And this is from the 0:21:00.640 --> 0:21:03.760 work of Marine Carrol in Infant Death and Burial in 0:21:03.880 --> 0:21:07.480 Roman Italy from twenty fifteen. She points out that we 0:21:07.560 --> 0:21:09.560 base a lot of our understanding of this topic on 0:21:09.640 --> 0:21:13.840 the writings of Stoic male aristocratic literary elite, and also 0:21:13.880 --> 0:21:17.800 the arguments that the remains in Roman cemeteries seem to 0:21:17.840 --> 0:21:21.560 bear this out. The I think quote unquote invisibility of 0:21:21.600 --> 0:21:25.919 the young child in Roman cemeteries. Yeah, and unfortunately this 0:21:26.000 --> 0:21:28.639 is true about a lot of things in the ancient world. 0:21:28.920 --> 0:21:32.520 When you have to consult literary texts to get a 0:21:32.560 --> 0:21:35.639 flavor of ancient life, that's necessarily going to be leaving 0:21:35.640 --> 0:21:37.840 a lot of stuff out because of the sexism of 0:21:37.880 --> 0:21:41.920 like who could receive literary education and who was writing 0:21:41.960 --> 0:21:44.600 texts and stuff at the time. You're you're going to 0:21:44.640 --> 0:21:48.960 get a lot of aristocratic male perspective. Yeah, and and 0:21:49.160 --> 0:21:53.320 certainly manufactory in Stoicism. And then also the fact that 0:21:53.359 --> 0:21:55.280 maybe some of them did not know how much hair 0:21:55.440 --> 0:21:59.560 baby had on average. You know, it's a it's it's 0:22:00.080 --> 0:22:04.680 it's well worth taking into account. But on the other hand, 0:22:04.720 --> 0:22:07.600 you do have this this argument that lines up with 0:22:07.640 --> 0:22:10.159 things with the writings of say Plutarch, who said that 0:22:10.240 --> 0:22:13.080 infants quote have no part in earth or earthly things, 0:22:13.560 --> 0:22:16.920 and therefore they don't require any of the rights normally 0:22:16.960 --> 0:22:20.720 performed for the dead, So you know, there's just kind 0:22:20.720 --> 0:22:23.240 of this um push and pull over, like what is 0:22:23.280 --> 0:22:26.000 the status of the of the infant? And we can 0:22:26.080 --> 0:22:29.960 understand like this like stoic approach that's like, look, there's 0:22:30.160 --> 0:22:32.560 a chance that things aren't going to go well, and 0:22:32.600 --> 0:22:35.520 then therefore one should be prepared for that by not 0:22:35.800 --> 0:22:42.119 fully integrating them into into life essentially. But Carroll points 0:22:42.119 --> 0:22:44.600 out that these views do not necessarily represent those of 0:22:44.600 --> 0:22:47.560 of course other classes or certainly mothers during the time period. 0:22:48.480 --> 0:22:51.680 So the seeming invisibility of young children in Italian cemeteries 0:22:51.680 --> 0:22:54.119 of the time period is something that requires like further 0:22:54.240 --> 0:23:00.000 examination and perhaps a little more understanding, as opposed to 0:23:00.160 --> 0:23:03.000 just like well, they weren't considered real things. Also of note, 0:23:03.280 --> 0:23:06.240