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Why Can’t We Remember Being Babies? | Mind-Blowing Brain Science! · The Curious Kidcast | Fun Facts and Curious Questions

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Curious kid cast. Here we go.
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Questions poppin. Minds will blow.
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Big ideas. They're taking flight.
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Let's explore. Feel the light.
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Why, what, where and how. Big answers.
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We'll find them now. Curious minds.
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The world will come. Ask away.
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Let's bring it home. Hello, hello, hello, and welcome
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to the Curious Kid cast. I'm your host, Andy.
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And boy oh boy, do I have a mystery for you today.
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You know, a few weeks ago, I got the most brilliant question from
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a kid named Marcus. He's from Austin, TX.
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And here's the thing, Marcus had a really, really good reason for
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asking this question. You see, Marcus's baby sister
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just started to smile and recognize his face.
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And Marcus wondered if she would actually remember this time when
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she grew up. That's actually really sweet,
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right? So Marcus asked me this burning
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question, and I thought it was so good that we had to make a
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whole episode about it. The question was, why can't we
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remember being babies? And let me tell you, when Marcus
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asked me that, my brain did something funny.
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It went, wait, where are all my baby memories?
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And then I realized I don't have any.
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It's like someone went into my brain with a giant eraser and
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just went to town. So I decided to investigate like
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a brain detective. I put on a tiny detective hat.
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I got a magnifying glass. I started looking around in my
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own head, and what I found is absolutely wild.
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Stick around and we're going to figure this mystery out
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together. All right, so first question,
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what even is a memory? Imagine your brain is the
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biggest library in the entire world.
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We're talking bigger than any library you've ever seen.
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It's absolutely massive. Picture the biggest building you
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can think of, and then make it like 10 times bigger.
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And this library is full of shelves, books, journals, maps,
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secret tunnels, everything. It's got everything.
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Every single day you live, your brain is writing new books for
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this library. A book about the day you lost
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your first tooth. A book about the time your
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friend made you laugh so hard you actually snorted.
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A book about your trip to the zoo where you saw that hilarious
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monkey making faces at you. And yes, a book about the
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embarrassing time you slipped on the kitchen floor and landed
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flat on your bottom. That one gets a whole book.
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But here's where it gets interesting.
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Your brain doesn't store memories like a computer saves
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files on a hard drive. Instead, it builds these tiny
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bridges called connections between brain cells.
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And when you remember something, your brain actually recreates
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the pattern of those connections.
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It's like rewinding a film, except the film is made of
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electricity and tiny brain bits. Basically, your brain is a movie
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theater, and you're constantly watching reruns of your own
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life. But but wait, because here comes
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the twist. And this is where things get
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weird. When you were a baby, your brain
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library wasn't even close to being ready.
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The shelves were all wobbly like someone glued them together
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after drinking way too much juice.
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The lights were flickering on and off like a disco party gone
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wrong. The librarians were nowhere to
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be found, and honestly, half the building was still being painted
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pink. There were paint cans
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everywhere, Your baby brain was growing so incredibly fast, and
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memories just couldn't stick properly.
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It's like trying to glue stickers onto a bouncy ball.
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They just don't stick. And that's where our mystery
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really begins. OK, let's talk about the baby
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brain because this is where things get absolutely bonkers.
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When you were born, and I mean the very second you arrived into
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the world, your brain was already doing some pretty
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amazing stuff. Here are some wild facts that
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might blow your mind. At birth, your brain had around
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100 billion neurons. That's the same number an adult
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has, 100 billion. That's more than there are
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people on earth. Seriously, if every person on
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Earth had their own personal brain cell, we'd still run out
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of people before we ran out of brain cells.
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But babies have way fewer connections between those
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neurons. The connections were way less
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developed. It's like having 100 billion
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guests at a party, but nobody's talking to each other.
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They're just standing around in awkward silence.
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But then something insane happens.
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The moment you're born, your brain starts making new
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connections at speeds that would make a rocket jealous.
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A rocket in space going super fast.
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Your baby brain was going faster than that.
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It was like your brain was on Fast forward.
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Get this, By the time you were two years old, your brain had
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more connections than it would ever have again in your entire
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whole life. By age 3, your brain had double
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the number of connections an adult has right now.
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Double. You were basically a tiny genius
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and a nappy. That sounds good, right?
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More connections must mean more memories sticking around,
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surely? Logically, But Nope, not quite.
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The baby brain is doing so much learning all at the same time
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that it barely has time to organize anything properly.
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It's like trying to pack your entire bedroom into a backpack
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while you're also riding a skateboard and eating a a
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sandwich and texting your mate and doing your homework.
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Chaotic doesn't even begin to cover it.
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Your baby brain was trying to figure out how to move arms
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without smacking itself in the face.
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How to crawl without face planting into the carpet every 3
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seconds. How to balance without falling
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over constantly. How to recognize familiar faces.
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How to tell the difference between a cat meowing and a dog
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barking. How to hold on a food instead of
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dropping it on the floor because let's be honest, babies are
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absolutely terrible at keeping food in their hands.
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It goes everywhere. Spaghetti on the ceiling, yogurt
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in the hair, carrots under the sofa.
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It's bananas. Literally bananas everywhere.
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Your baby brain was also learning how to understand
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words, how to make sounds, how to figure out who to trust, how
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to literally stay alive, which is kind of important, and how to
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generally stop eating things that aren't actually food
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because babies put everything in their mouths.
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Sticks, dirt, socks, dog food, leaves.
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It's absolutely wild what babies will eat.
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If it looks remotely edible. Into the mouth it goes.
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Your brain during those early years was like a really, really
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busy building site. There are builders rushing
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around everywhere, walls being put up, wires being connected,
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scaffolding covering absolutely everything.
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There's noise, there's dust, there's people shouting
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instructions, and everything is changing every single second.
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There's simply no space for proper long term memory storage.
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When all that chaos is happening, your brain is
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basically going, look, I don't have time to file away memories,
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I'm too busy trying to stop you from eating the sofa.
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Now here's a weird bit, and I want you to pay attention to
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this because it's going to blow your mind a little bit.
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Babies can actually remember things.
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They totally can. I know, I know, plot twist, but
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not in the way you might think. There are two main types of
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memories and understanding the difference is like having the
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secret key to unlock this whole mystery.
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Type 1 is implicit memories. These are body memories.
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They're things you can actually do, but you don't really think
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about them. They just happen automatically.
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Like how did you learn how to suck?
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You were born knowing that. It's like an app that comes pre
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installed on your brain. How did you learn how to grab
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things? You figured it out without a
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manual. How did you learn to recognize
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your parents voice without anyone giving you a training
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course? You just knew.
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How did you learn to smile back at people who smiled at you?
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You worked it out on your own. These memories don't use words
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and they don't get stored like stories.
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They're more like built in habits or automatic skills.
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Like how you know how to walk without thinking about each
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individual step, or how you know how to ride a bike and suddenly
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you just do it. Type 2 is explicit memories.
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These are story style memories, the kind you can explain and
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talk about and bore your friends with.
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Like I remember my birthday party, or I remember going to
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the playground, or I remember dropping my ice cream and crying
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for approximately 17 hours, that kind of thing.
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And here's the secret that scientists discovered, and this
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is the big one. Explicit memories require a very
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special part of the brain called the hippocampus.
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Think of the hippocampus as the memory librarian.
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It's the part that organizes all your stories and keeps them safe
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on those library shelves we talked about.
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It's like the head librarian who knows exactly where everything
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is. And guess what the hippocampus
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is doing when you're a baby? It's still growing.
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It's there definitely showing up to work, trying its best, but
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it's not quite ready to do its job properly yet.
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It's like having a librarian who's still learning how to do
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the job. They're enthusiastic, but they
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drop things. They forget where books go, They
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accidentally alphabetize things by color instead of by title.
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Rookie mistakes. So the memories babies make
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don't actually get saved in the long term library.
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They're more like scribbles drawn on a chalkboard that get
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wiped completely clean every single night.
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Gone, vanished. Poof.
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Like they were never there at all.
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You did have memories as a baby, that's a fact.
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But they were just temporary. Here today, gone tomorrow.
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Like a memory ice lolly that melts in the sun.
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OK, I have a really fun question for you now and I want you to
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imagine this with me 'cause this is where it gets hilarious.
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What if you could actually remember being a baby?
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What if all those memories stuck around and didn't disappear?
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What if your brain was like a video recorder that never
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stopped recording? Oh my goodness.
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This would be absolute chaos. Total madness.
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I'm talking total breakdown of society as we know it.
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Scenario one, your first words would be absolutely ridiculous
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and your parents would be mortified.
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Most babies say Mama or Dada. Those are the usual first words
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you hear about. Everyone Coos over them, they
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take a million photos. But if babies could actually
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remember everything, their first sentences would be things like,
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why did you feed me mushy peas? Seriously, why would you do that
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to me? That's not food, that's texture.
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That's a crime scenario 2 toddlers would tell the most
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embarrassing stories ever and no parent wants that.
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Imagine you're in school one day and your teacher asked the class
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what's your earliest memory? And you raise your hand and say,
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my dad made these really weird singing sounds while changing my
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nappy, like really bad singing. And then he dropped the wipes
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everywhere. Wipes on the floor, on the
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furniture, everywhere. And then he sneezed really
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loudly and jumped like a scared cat.
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Like full panic mode. And your dad is sitting in the
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back of the classroom looking like total embarrassment.
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His face is going bright red. He's trying to disappear into
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his chair. He's hoping the ground will open
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up and swallow him whole. Scenario three babies would
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judge absolutely everyone constantly.
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And they'd remember every detail.
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Baby see everything. They watch people constantly.
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They're like tiny surveillance cameras and onesies.
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So if they could remember, they'd remember who made silly
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faces at them, who talked like a squeaky duck who dropped
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something on their head, who tried to make them wear
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ridiculous outfits. The awful hats, the weird
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pattern jumpers. Everything.
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And then later, at age 6, they'd confront you out of nowhere and
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say, why did you put me in that knitted pineapple outfit?
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Explain yourself immediately. I was a baby.
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I couldn't fight back. That was cruel.
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All right, we've had our fun with the silly scenarios.
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Now let's get back to the real science.
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Because honestly, the real explanation is just as
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fascinating, if not more so. Here's the part that scientists
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find most interesting. Your brain, during the first few
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years of your life is constantly rewriting itself.
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And I mean constantly, every single day, every single second.
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Because your brain is changing so incredibly quickly, memories
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can't settle or stick. They just get buried, rewritten,
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or lost completely. They don't have time to take
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root. Here's a simple way to
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understand it. Imagine you're writing a story
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in the sand on a beach. But here's the thing.
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The waves keep washing up every single minute.
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And every time they do, your story completely disappears.
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You have to start over again and again.
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That's baby memory. You're riding in the sand, but
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the ocean won't stop messing with you.
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Now here's an interesting question.
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Do any humans actually remember their early babyhood?
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A few rare people say they remember things from when they
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were two years old. Some of them claim they remember
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being in a cot. Others say they remember hearing
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a favorite lullaby. But here's the thing.
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Even those memories fade over time.
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They disappear. Scientists actually tested
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thousands of children and found something really surprising.
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Children age 3 can remember things very clearly, but by the
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time they're seven years old, half of those memories have
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completely disappeared. Poof.
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Gone. And by age 10, almost all
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memories from age 3 have totally vanished.
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This means your brain doesn't just forget, it actually
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replaces your early memories as it reorganizes itself.
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It's like your brain is constantly upgrading its filing
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system. Out with the old, in with the
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new. I have a quick, interesting fact
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for you. Not all animals remember the way
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we do elephants. Baby elephants can remember
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migration routes that take weeks to travel.
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They remember dangers. They remember family members for
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their entire lives. They're basically carrying a
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giant encyclopedia in their heads.
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Dolphins have such amazing memories that they can remember
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the whistles of other dolphins for more than 20 years.
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Some birds can remember specific sounds they heard when they were
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still inside their eggs, inside the egg, before they were even
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born, before they had a body, before they had ears.
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And they still remember. Dogs remember emotions and
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smells way more strongly than events.
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A dog will remember the smell of your house for years.
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They could leave and come back 20 years later and go, oh, yeah,
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I remember this place. That's Karen's house.
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But humans, we have the most powerful memory systems later in
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life. We're just not built for
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remembering the very beginning. We're built to forget.
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All right, before we finish up today, I have a special quiz for
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you. 3 fun questions about what we learned.
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Are you ready? Quiz question one.
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What is the special part of the brain that acts like a memory
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librarian and helps store your story style memories?
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The answer is the hippocampus. That's the memory librarian of
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your brain, the one in charge of filing everything away.
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Question 2. How many neurons does a baby
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have when it's born? The answer is about 100 billion
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neurons. That's the same number as an
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adult. Your baby brain was already
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fully stocked with brain cells, it just didn't know how to use
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them yet. Question three.
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What are the two types of memories we talked about today?
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The answer is implicit memories, which are body memories and
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habits like knowing how to smile, and explicit memories,
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which are story style memories you can actually explain, like
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that time you fell off your bike.
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So there you have it, the mystery of why we can't remember
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being babies is solved. Case closed.
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Even though you can't remember those early years, they still
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shaped you in ways that matter. They taught you to trust the
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people around you. They taught you to move and
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explore the world. They taught you to love.
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They taught you how the world works.
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And most importantly, they helped build the brilliant brain
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you have right now. You don't remember your baby
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days, but they helped create who you are.
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And that is a pretty magical thought.
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Thank you so much for joining me on The Curious Kid Cast.
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If you loved this episode, please share it with a friend
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and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts.
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Keep spreading curiosity. And remember, if you have any
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questions you'd like answered, visit us on our website at
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curiouskidcast.com. Ask away.
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We love your questions. Keep being curious, keep asking
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questions, and I'll see you next time on The Curious Kid Cast.