It’s curious - we come into this world with the absolute highest form of technological development, the human body, and seemingly zero instruction on how to operate it. 

Why is that? Why don’t we come into this world with a body user manual? At first glance, it would seem obvious that evolutionarily, we should be optimized to survive by coming into this world with only the best instincts. Instincts for eating, for moving, for fighting… Why do I need to train to avoid the startle reflex when I get hit in the face? Why must I work on coordination, timing, distance management (as Ido puts it, installing the booster packs for our instincts)? 

One common answer is thatwe are “distracted” from the body user manual by our modern environment. But… maybe the answer is less based on an argument in favor of a lost past, and more… science. 

Why, from a neuroscience and evolutionary biology perspective, are we not optimized with a "body user manual” (“perfect” instincts)? 

The reason is… because not having a body user manual IS the most optimal. By sacrificing a user manual, we ended up with something much greater - the most neuro-flexibility of any animal.

Unlike other animals, we don’t have a “natural” way of being. Our natural way is to invent artifice at the first opportunity. This allows us to be the most complex creatures on this planet, the most anti-fragile, the most creative… We can pick and build our instincts, to create the vision of ourselves that we wish; that’s amazing enough that I could spend all day doing it…