To explain what is going on, we first need to take a bird’s eye view on the human and the Earth’s history.

This is the best illustration I could find.

If we compress the history of Earth into a 24-hour clock. The modern humans appeared in the last seconds of the last minute.

1. Formation of Earth: 00:00 (4.5 billion years ago)
2. First Life Forms (Prokaryotes): 05:20 (3.5 billion years ago)
3. Photosynthesizing Organisms: 08:00 (3 billion years ago)
4. Oxygenation of Atmosphere: 11:12 (2.4 billion years ago)
5. Complex Cells (First Eukaryotes): 13:20 (2 billion years ago)
6. Multicellular Life: 18:40 (1 billion years ago)
7. First Animals: 20:48 (600 million years ago)
8. Diverse Marine Life (Cambrian Explosion): 21:07 (540 million years ago)
9. First Land Plants: 21:30 (470 million years ago)
10. Dinosaurs: 22:46 (230 million years ago)
11. Dinosaurs Wiped Out: 23:39 (65 million years ago)
12. Early Human Ancestors: 23:58 (6-7 million years ago)
13. Modern Humans (Homo sapiens) Emerged: 23:59:54 (300,000 years ago)
14. The Last Ice Age: Ended around 11,700 years ago (23:59:59.8)

The last second on this clock started about 52,000 years ago — cave paintings, first tools. The whole of recorded human history fits into the last millisecond.

The dinosaurs were wiped out in under an hour. And we just got here. Right now you are at the very edge of the universe’s history — and this edge keeps moving, moment by moment.

The tree of Life

Look at this beautiful chart. There is also an interactive version.

Life on Earth is one big extended family! Every human being is related genealogically not just to all other humans, but to all other living things. And not only organisms living today, but to everything that has ever lived.

We don’t just have common ancestors. We’re related closer than you’d think. This applies to the brain too — common structures, common behaviors.

Unlike animals, a newborn doesn’t recognize a mother’s face or voice, or feel fear. A baby’s brain is far less developed at birth than an animal’s. Out of the vast number of nerve cells, very few are fully developed when a child is born. The majority are underdeveloped and not yet functioning. So here we are — brand new on a very old planet, carrying ancient hardware in a modern skull. How exactly is this thing wired?