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The human body is an incredible machine. But it's far from perfect. For all our evolutionary brilliance, we're still stuck with joints that wear out, dandruff, and sinuses that seem designed for misery. And that's just the beginning!
In various places on the internet, people have been sharing the body's most frustrating design flaws, so we decided to compile their "reviews" of the not-so-user-friendly features. And who knows—if we're lucky, maybe we'll receive a patch upgrade. Something bionic would be nice.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
Ectopic Pregnancy
Ovaries are ovulatin and doing their things. Eggs and what not. An egg decides enough is enough, and with the help of a hormone surge, wants out of that s**t. Bigger and better things.
So the egg literally punches out, and is supposed to go straight into the Fallopian tubes, get fertilized while inside the tubes, and then plant in the uterus.
You would THINK that the entrance of the Fallopian tubes would connect right to the ovary?
Nah
The opening of the Fallopian tube has these little hairs (fimbriae) that are like wacky inflatable tube men in front of sketchy used car lots, and kind of guide the egg into the Fallopian tube. Sometimes, the eggs don’t feel like it going, and they venture off. And if fertilized, it’s considered an ectopic pregnancy. It can plant anywhere in the abdominal cavity at that point. Most of the time, it will die because it has to plant in a well vascularized region to be viable. Sometimes, it finds a good, bloody spot, and starts growing there. At that point it’s essentially a tumor, and of it can eat enough into a blood vessel, in can rupture and bleed like s**t.
You would think that millions of years of evolution would create a Fallopian tube that opens up right to the ovary, but that’s not the case.
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#2
Physician here.
1) testes only work when they are located outside the body at the junction of two limbs that converge, funneling many stray objects towards them.
2) the low back. OMG. Don’t get me started.
3) clotting is so complex it’s no wonder it messes up so often.
4) Sinuses. Like...why? And why do the holes leading into them need to be so small?
5) The immune system is really bad at stopping things it needs to stop and it’s really good at damaging the body.
6) we evolved on this planet, so why is the light of the sun too bright for us to tolerate?
7) Our bodies like to store fat...in our arteries?
8) Sometimes, the baby’s head wont fit through the pelvis.
8a) even by mammal standards, our newborns are remarkably ill-equipped. A newborn dog can crawl. A newborn horse can walk. We take a year to walk and almost two decades until we can fend for ourselves.
I’ll think of more.
#3
Pretty much any autoimmune disease. The body can literally k**l itself trying to protect itself.
Geoffrey Scott 5 months ago
My grandson nearly died this spring. Asymptomatic Covid, which devolved into Strep A, which then devolved into Sepsis. This was the diagnosis of the amazing team at CS Mott Ann Arbor (U of M) hospital when he was in their care at his lowest (heart capacity of 15%). His white count has subsided quite a bit. His grandpa (me) has Psoriasis, his Mom has an AI condition as well. 2 year olds, scare the c**p out of you and bounce back like it never happened.
#5
The pain and complications associated with giving birth. Giraffes can birth a whole tiny giraffe hooves and all and go about their day, yet women are still enduring massive amounts of pain (and/or death) during childbirth. It seems evolutionarily unproductive.
#6
Allergies, or said another way, your immune system flipping the f**k out because you bumped into a peanut, dust mite, shrimp, cat, etc...
"Disembodied voice" 5 months ago
Exactly, what do you mean you're gonna k**l me to protect me? Anaphylaxis is dumb
#7
The absolute randomness in its strengths vs vulnerabilities.
A person can jump from a plane, have their parachute not open & survive the impact.
Or you can slip in the shower, break your f*****g neck, and die on the spot.
#8
Teeth cannot repair themselves (I think?). If a bone can heal back together why the hell can't a tooth fill in a micro hole.
In a natural state, teeth are pretty dam important.
Mel in Georgia 5 months ago
I think teeth can do some self-repair, but they lack blood flow to do real healing. Yeah, without dental work and care, teeth can degrade to the point of not being able to chew. I think that's how a lot of animals eventually die. 🙁
#9
That we can bite the insides of our own cheeks. I'm sure plently of you know the pain of accidentally biting down on your cheek.
#10
Periods. Most other animals who have a menstruation cycle, or something like it, reabsorb the uterine lining rather than shedding it out and causing woman to suffer from painful bleeding out of their vaginas for 5-6 days once a month.
Edit: I think that if we have to shed it, it should be a voluntary sphincter (like controlling when you pee). So woman don’t have to spend so much money on pads & tampons, don’t have to worry about bleeding through, can stress free wear a bikini, etc.
#11
Cancer. Routine processes meant to repair the body create mistakes that in turn create tumors.
The Majestic Opossum 5 months ago
Again, our bodies are designed to kíll us. It's like someone gave a baby a blowtorch.
#12
There are many. But, notably to me is how easily damaged the Knee joints and the Spine are. They next to impossible completely repair. Once damage they are never really right again.
#13
If I wipe the wrong direction I could get an infection that could spread to my kidneys and k**l me.
#14
That thing our brains do where we walk into a room only to instantly forget why we went in there in the first place.
#16
You can kinda just die at any moment from a brain aneurysm, even if you're perfectly healthy.
Mel in Georgia 5 months ago
My young parents were visiting friends when the wife had an aneurysm and died right then and there. My middle name is her name. Thanks, I guess?
#17
Unable to regenerate body parts. You lose an arm or a leg, you can't grow a new one. We can grow hair and nails forever, but not body parts.
BewilderedBanana 5 months ago
Some people might disagree about the hair growing forever. Or at least, not all of it :)
#18
We've evolved for millions of years with the sun always being there. Yet we get burnt and skin cancer from too much exposure. Dark skinned people are slightly better designed than the fair skinned ones.
Forrest Hobbs 5 months ago
Dark skinned people are the original humans. Not designed but evolved. Humans evolved from the original black skinned type when they moved to regions with weaker sun. It turned out advantageous to produce insufficient melanin for full sun protection because that enabled production of sufficient vitamin D in weak sunlight. All you need is a bit of common sense if you've got light skin for strong sun not to be a problem - humans have had clothing probably longer than humans have had complex language.
#19
The amount of time it takes for us to grow and mature to a level where we are able to contribute and not be 100% dependent on our parents/family unit.
Or the fact we have a useless organ that randomly ruptures and will k**l you if you don't seek treatment for it.
#20
Getting tired and needing to sleep. I could have done so much s**t if I hadn't had to sleep.
Though really, I probably would have just still not done anything.
#21
You can control your bladder and sphincter. Why of why isn't there a mechanism to hold in your period?
#22
Eyelashes, designed to keep things out of your eyes but they just fall in anyway.
#23
Right now my skin is itchy for no g*****n reason. I think that's a pretty big flaw.
Chewie Baron 5 months ago
Get a tiger to lick you there. Yes, there’s no skin left, but it’s stopped itching now!
#24
Over-storing fat.
I mean, I get hanging onto 20 pounds of the stuff just in case you need to tap into that energy - but at 50, 100, 300 pounds our bodies are still like “well better still stock up, you never know if we’ll find any food this upcoming year”.
Colleen Glim 5 months ago
That is an evolutionary adaptation meant to help get us through times when food was scarce. We were never meant to be sitting all day.
#25
I like the example of the recurrent laryngeal nerve.
It runs from the brain to the larynx. However, to get there it goes from the brain, down the neck, into the chest, around the aorta and then back up the chest, up the neck and then connects to the larynx. That's a massive detour. It also means a blow to the chest can damage your ability to talk.
#26
That something as important as the brain can stop functioning properly because of chemical imbalances.
#27
The brain should be better secured in the head. Rattling the brain inside the skull can mess a person up, so if it was more secure it would be safer.
#28
That we cannot delete or sort unwanted/not needed info and memories from our brains.
Andrew Keir 5 months ago
To know what is "not needed" involves a crystal ball, or time travel. Better have memories that are not used, than forget something vital.
#29
The fact that there’s so many things you can do to the human body without k**ling it
But _oh f**k slept wrong and pinched a nerve now I’m f*****g paralyzed_
(Didn’t happen to me, but happened to a semi distant family member a year ago)
Edit: holy f**k this comment took off
Edit 2: To everybody getting paranoid in my replies, don’t worry:
He was sleeping in a crowded camper on a small couch
in a very, very awkward position
This isn’t a very common thing, but it does happen to people. So long as you sleep relatively well you shouldn’t have a problem.
Edit 3: apparently Reddit’s full of health experts who kNoW fOr a fAcT that you can’t do this. He pinched and severed something in his spinal cord from what I remember, I’m not 100% sure if it was a nerve but idk what else it would be tbh.
_Either way the point I was trying to convey was this man went from sleeping to paralyzed, so..._.
Beth Wheeler 5 months ago
Went to visit my aunt and uncle several years ago and he told us about it happening to 1 of his nephews HR went to bed 1 night, everything was fine. When he woke up he was a paraplegic. It WAS NOT a stroke, can't remember if they ever figured out what caused it.
#30
The size of the average baby head vs the size of the average v****a.
Colleen Glim 5 months ago
The v****a isn’t the issue. That bit stretches. The pelvis on the other hand…if it’s too small, it’s too small
#31
A stroke. My aunt had one when she was 31 and the healthiest person in the world. Ran an aerobics class at the Y, just perfect perfect health. Went to Pizza Hut with her the night before, next day, massive stroke, almost died, critical surgery, twenty years later she still has trouble speaking. It sucks. There is no reason that should’ve happened. Perfectly healthy person damaged for the rest of her life. She’s still amazing and lovely and my favorite person but d**n is that annoying.
Little Bit 5 months ago
I always thought strokes mainly happened to older people but I know three people, all in their early 50s, all reasonably fit and well who had a stroke. Two of them have never regained their mobility and the other one got his mobility back but it has robbed him of his speech.
#32
Jugular veins.
Yeah, pop those basically on the outside in the area predators attack, that will ensure and slight mishap will result in death in about 8 seconds.
Thanks evolution.
#33
Definitely motion sickness.
Colleen Glim 5 months ago
Getting worse as I get older. I get seasick in large puddles. Theme parks are kinda pointless now because the rides make me sick. Le sigh
#34
The fact the brain can not regenerate more cells, but practically everything else can. Even though the brain is the most important.
Andrew Keir 5 months ago
Regenerate more cells *with what memories*? We don't come with a backup disk ...
#35
Tumors.
Organ ruptures caused by typical functions going wrong.
Many things about pregnancy.
Periods and ovarian cysts.
Also, for women, that the urethra is so short and so close to the v****a and a**s.
#36
Not being able to hold our breath long (quick oxygen usage).
Andrew Keir 5 months ago
Lung volume x rate of using oxygen = survival time without breathing. But we often need a large rate of using oxygen - it's a function of our power output. Nature involves compromises.
#37
Peeing a little bit when you sneeze or cough. Wtf, nature?
Colleen Glim 5 months ago
Push a few c****h goblins out and tell me your bladder control is what it used to be
#38
We're physiologically built to have s*x with as many people as possible as soon as we hit puberty, but practically, socially, and psychologically, that's a *really* bad idea.
Colleen Glim 5 months ago
Again. Survival mechanism. The species will find a way to continue. A lot of these posts are survival seen through modern eyes. It doesn’t work like that
#39
Ears being so fragile and irreparable.
Kenny Kulbiski 5 months ago
That ridiculously itty bitty tube that so easily clogs up and makes the whole ear shoot craps. Also that single wussy nerve that doesn't just quietly fail but gives you tinnitus.
#40
Too many pain receptors on feet.
Colleen Glim 5 months ago
Ask most diabetics what happens when feet don’t hurt. It doesn’t usually end well. This seems like a survival thing
#41
Wisdom teeth. They were useful when we used to have bigger jaws, but now they often cause pain and infection.
Owen 5 months ago
My lower wisdom teeth came through with problems. They were brittle, sensitive and not fully formed. I pulled them out when drunk and it bloody hurt briefly, but now, no problems. I have been to the dentist since and all is ok, but she did give me a wierd look. I do not recommend doing this.
#42
The genitals arent protected by any bones and are utterly fragile.
#43
Our lumbar and a*s aren't really that great at holding us up and this is why everyone has back problems regardless of whether they spend their lives working out, sitting in a chair, or in between. Evolutionarily, we should have spent more time in trees waiting for our muscles and such to develop more to support the greater half of our bodies being held upright without destroying the system that's meant to do exactly that.
Andrew Keir 5 months ago
The muscles developed *after* we came down from the trees. Evolution is mainly reactive, and rarely pro-active.
#44
Digestive system, regenerative system, immune system. isn't it funny how human body can be fully created in 9 month but a broken ankle will take several years and never fully recover?
Caffeinated Ape 5 months ago
It's easier to assemble those things on the factory floor rather than your garage, so to speak. i.e. A developing foetus has its mothers biology supporting it, not to mention the undifferentiated cells that become every cell in the body don't habitually revert to their earlier state which would facilitate rebuilding on that scale. Also, matters of scale.
#45
Whatever design flaw has made me addicted to oxytocin (the neurotransmitter not a misspelling of the opiate).
Alex Schneider 5 months ago
dopamine is worse, get a kick at anytime in your relationship/ on substance etc. and your hormonsystem/reptil brain clings to this ,even if your logical brain teach you daily how bad it will mess up your health. Even rats will starve to get a further kick of dopamine
#47
The brain hardware has some compatibility issues with the software. I.e. patch random b****s, agression instinct, need for attention, staring at b***s and affection for shiny stuff then we can talk.
What do you think ?
The Darkest Timeline 5 months ago
All of this is to say that, if we’re “designed” by a being(s), they sure as shït are not intelligent. Because no truly intelligent being would come up with a design such as ours; if we can see all the flaws, surely a being more intelligent than us could have done a better job. It is clear that what evolution gave us is “good enough” to have survived this long, full stop.
Mel in Georgia 5 months ago
Humans aren't the hardiest animals out there, but at least we have big brains that can figure out solutions to many of these things. I don't think we were meant to live much past childbearing/raising age so our parts wearing out or malfunctioning is just natural. Doesn't make it suck any less, though!
reuben kift 5 months ago (edited)
That our eyes have separate immune systems to the rest of our bodies. Essentially, if your body's immune system detects your eyes, it'll identify them as threats, then attack them, potentially causing you to go blind. And it can happen randomly. I think this is due to autoimmune diseases, though. Edit: Clicked on the wrong comment section. That's why there's a deleted comment on #48.
5 months ago
How easily our brains can be misled/tricked. Ever try the 'what does p-o-p spell, what does t-o-p spell, what do you do at a green light?' trick on someone? (same with h-o-s-t, p-o-s-t, what do you put in a toaster?). Also, the brain 'should' be able to come up with better solutions to life than the whole depression/anxiety mess!
Fellfromthemoon 5 months ago
So, the tadpole has no limbs, and lives in the puddle. The development of the frog depends on the external temperature and available food. The energy intake and ambient tempeature is relayed by the thyroid gland. Frogs have four nimble legs. Therefore, thyroid hormones have an important role in the development of the central nervous system for a frog. Makes complete sense. A few hunder millions year later, mammals are born with all the limbs they'll ever have. Still, thyroid hormones play an important role in the development of the central nervous system. Now newborns are screened to check their thyroid status, as the lack of these hormones will lead to irreparable damages.
Annabelle 5 months ago
I mentioned this to someone recently, the fact that when we are lied to by a.busers, and believe things about ourselves and our lives that we later learn aren't true, it takes seemingly endless, intense brain work to stop believing something that we KNOW isn't true, and never was. I can learn something one time and know it forever (all my usual forgetfulness aside), but to unlearn something, especially a lie about our own existence and our own brains, is so d@mn difficult. I hope in generations to come there is significant improvement in people being held accountable for psychological and emotional a.buse, especially parents.
The Darkest Timeline 5 months ago
All of this is to say that, if we’re “designed” by a being(s), they sure as shït are not intelligent. Because no truly intelligent being would come up with a design such as ours; if we can see all the flaws, surely a being more intelligent than us could have done a better job. It is clear that what evolution gave us is “good enough” to have survived this long, full stop.
Mel in Georgia 5 months ago
Humans aren't the hardiest animals out there, but at least we have big brains that can figure out solutions to many of these things. I don't think we were meant to live much past childbearing/raising age so our parts wearing out or malfunctioning is just natural. Doesn't make it suck any less, though!
reuben kift 5 months ago (edited)
That our eyes have separate immune systems to the rest of our bodies. Essentially, if your body's immune system detects your eyes, it'll identify them as threats, then attack them, potentially causing you to go blind. And it can happen randomly. I think this is due to autoimmune diseases, though. Edit: Clicked on the wrong comment section. That's why there's a deleted comment on #48.
5 months ago
How easily our brains can be misled/tricked. Ever try the 'what does p-o-p spell, what does t-o-p spell, what do you do at a green light?' trick on someone? (same with h-o-s-t, p-o-s-t, what do you put in a toaster?). Also, the brain 'should' be able to come up with better solutions to life than the whole depression/anxiety mess!
Fellfromthemoon 5 months ago
So, the tadpole has no limbs, and lives in the puddle. The development of the frog depends on the external temperature and available food. The energy intake and ambient tempeature is relayed by the thyroid gland. Frogs have four nimble legs. Therefore, thyroid hormones have an important role in the development of the central nervous system for a frog. Makes complete sense. A few hunder millions year later, mammals are born with all the limbs they'll ever have. Still, thyroid hormones play an important role in the development of the central nervous system. Now newborns are screened to check their thyroid status, as the lack of these hormones will lead to irreparable damages.
Annabelle 5 months ago
I mentioned this to someone recently, the fact that when we are lied to by a.busers, and believe things about ourselves and our lives that we later learn aren't true, it takes seemingly endless, intense brain work to stop believing something that we KNOW isn't true, and never was. I can learn something one time and know it forever (all my usual forgetfulness aside), but to unlearn something, especially a lie about our own existence and our own brains, is so d@mn difficult. I hope in generations to come there is significant improvement in people being held accountable for psychological and emotional a.buse, especially parents.
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