Are human brains especially fragile?
As many as a quarter of people will experience mental illness at some point in their life ( over a third in any given year with more expansive definitions). At least 5% of the population suffer from lifelong brain-based disorders, including intellectual disability, autism spectrum disorders, schizophrenia, epilepsy and many others. Many of these conditions dramatically increase mortality rates and reduce fecundity (number of offspring), impacting heavily on evolutionary fitness. Faced with these numbers, we have to ask the question: are human brains especially fragile? Are we different from other species in this regard? Is the brain different from other organs? As all of the disorders listed above are highly heritable, these questions can be framed from a genetic perspective: is there something about the genetic program of human brain development that makes it especially sensitive to the effects of mutations? I have written lately ...