We've always banked calories in the form of fat, so that we would have a hedge again, starvation. Between 14 and 17 million years ago, there was a series of mutations in the genes that made an enzyme called uricase that breaks down uric acid. These genetic mutations turned off the production of this enzyme, so our uric cid levels increased. And now we know what that means. It means that higher levels of uric acid told our bodies that winter was coming,. That's how we would survive when we didn’t have food and we didn't have water.

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