Short Stuff: Wisdom Teeth

By all rights there should be three sets of molars in your mouth. But it turns out that our skulls aren’t really set up to accommodate that many anymore. Exactly why depends on who you ask. See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:04Josh Clark?

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• 1:10Josh Clark?

  Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry sitting in for Dave. So this is short stuff. The, uh, hurts edition.

• 1:20Speaker 02

  Did you have your wisdom teeth come in and did you have them removed?

• 1:24Josh Clark?

  I had them removed.

• 1:25Speaker 02

  Oh, okay. I had mine removed, um, kind of at the, now that I'm reading this, sort of a standard time, I was probably 17 years old.

• 1:36Josh Clark?

  Old enough to appreciate the sedation.

• 1:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, that was my first experience with that. And I was like, oh, wow.

• 1:43Josh Clark?

  Yeah.

• 1:43Speaker 02

  That was the gateway drug.

• 1:45Josh Clark?

  Yeah, I remember, um, like just kind of looking around, like trying to play it off because I, it wasn't connecting in my head that they were the ones who were making me feel this way, like, like I was in public or something.

• 1:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, very strange. Uh, but yeah, we're talking about wisdom teeth, uh, AKA the third molar, uh, which, um, sometimes start to pop in there. By the way, I'm very turned off by how many times you type the word erupt in this. Thing.

• 2:12Josh Clark?

  You don't like that, huh?

• 2:13Speaker 02

  I think there were like five or six erupts.

• 2:16Josh Clark?

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:17Speaker 02

  So, yeah, it was, uh, it was not pleasant to read that over and over. But, uh, I will use it once just to honor you.

• 2:23Josh Clark?

  Okay, thanks.

• 2:24Speaker 02

  They can erupt from the gums.

• 2:26Josh Clark?

  Hmm.

• 2:27Speaker 02

  Uh, well, they can start to come in as early as like five years old and as, um, old as 15. But when they actually erupt, ah, that's twice.

• 2:34Josh Clark?

  Hmm.

• 2:35Speaker 02

  Uh, that can usually come, that's usually like a later thing, like 17, maybe all the way up to mid twenties.

• 2:41Josh Clark?

  And that, friends, is why they call them wisdom teeth. Uh, that moniker, I hate that word, but it works.

• 2:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:48Josh Clark?

  It dates back to the Greeks. Um, I don't know if the Hellenic Greeks or the, um, post Bronze Age, Bronze Age Greeks, who knows? But their word for wisdom teeth was Odontius Sophias. Poof. And that is the teeth of wisdom is what that means. And the whole point is, is that these teeth come in much later than your other teeth. You've got some experience in life by the time your wisdom teeth come in. So that's why they call them wisdom teeth.

• 3:15Speaker 02

  That's right. And if you're wondering why we even have these teeth that are many times removed to begin with, uh, there's been a lot of debate and theories over the years, but it seems pretty clear to me, and I think most people basically agree, is that we needed them back then, uh, when Tuk Tuk was out and had a bigger, uh, jaw to fit these things and was gnawing on nuts and, and raw meat and stuff like that.

• 3:41Josh Clark?

  Hmm.

• 3:41Speaker 02

  Uh, not cooked food, in other words, not soft stuff, that you, they needed these things. They had larger jaws, they had bigger teeth, and they needed them to, to chew and grind all this stuff down to palatable sized, uh, swallowable stuff. And we just don't need that anymore.

• 3:58Josh Clark?

  No, because usually people place it around the, the time of agriculture. You can make a case it's much later than that, but say within the last like several thousand years, the human diet changed dramatically, so much so that our skulls changed shape. My question is this, Chuck. Didn't our skulls, the skulls of modern humans change shape much further back than just a few thousand years?

• 4:23Speaker 02

  Oh, buddy. You know, I don't know the answer to that.

• 4:25Josh Clark?

  Okay, but I feel like, yeah, I feel like it's definitely older than that the skulls are. But the people, when you start researching wisdom teeth, they're like, yeah, the human diet got soft, so our teeth got kind of wuss and our skulls got shorter and smaller. And hence, when we get wisdom teeth, there's just not enough room for them because we don't need them anymore. But stupid natural selection hasn't caught up yet and keeps producing wisdom teeth in modern Homo sapiens that don't need it because we eat a deviled ham.

• 5:00Speaker 02

  Right. I mean, that makes sense to me, right? You're just saying the timeline doesn't match up?

• 5:04Josh Clark?

  Yeah, the whole, yeah, it makes sense for sure. It's the timeline. Yeah.

• 5:08Speaker 02

  Okay. Yeah, I don't question the timeline. That's your first mistake.

• 5:12Josh Clark?

  You know what, though? When I was researching this, I found there's apparently a creationist argument. They use the wisdom teeth like as a vestigial thing, as an argument for creationism. Because apparently, a lot of people are like, well, it's clearly evolution. Explain that, creationists. And they're like, how about this? You're supposed to have three molars, but because of this modern human diet that we all agree is making the third molar superfluous, that's what did it. You're supposed to have it. But it's the human intervention that kept us from being able to use it. And that's the problem. So I thought that was kind of fascinating.

• 5:54Speaker 02

  Interesting. Take that, podcaster.

• 5:56Josh Clark?

  Yeah, because they took the argument that people who believe in natural selection use and turned it on them.

• 6:05Speaker 02

  They flipped the script.

• 6:06Josh Clark?

  That very well put.

• 6:09Speaker 02

  All right. So we have four of these. Not all of them are rough.

• 6:14Josh Clark?

  What else are you gonna say? Poke? Moist?

• 6:18Speaker 02

  Present themselves?

• 6:20Josh Clark?

  Okay.

• 6:21Speaker 02

  Have a coming out party?

• 6:22Josh Clark?

  No, that's good. Present themselves.

• 6:24Speaker 02

  Debutante ball?

• 6:25Josh Clark?

  Show up?

• 6:26Speaker 02

  Uh, yeah, show up. And about eight of 10 people, um, usually, uh, one tooth will not come in. And the teeth that don't come in are called impacted teeth. If you've ever heard like, oh, you have impacted wisdom teeth. Um, that's what they're talking about. Um, sometimes they don't develop at all in some people. That's called, uh, a genesis. Um, but the impaction is sort of the star of the show here because that is why you would, will generally have them removed. Um, e- either they're impacted or they're coming through and just crowding things and making life a problem for your other molars.

• 6:59Josh Clark?

  Like poor Lisa Simpson, when they showed that age progression of what she would look like if she didn't have dental insurance.

• 7:06Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's right.

• 7:07Josh Clark?

  Or braces. Uh, I say we take our break and then come back and talk about wisdom teeth.

• 7:13Speaker 02

  All right, let's do it.

• 7:30Speaker 03

  First thought is like, wow, how are we gonna do all this?

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• 9:42Speaker 02

  So, the main reason why they're impacted, to begin with, is kind of what we've been talking about. There's just not enough space back there for some people. And when they're developing, that space is like, you know, there's teeth there for most people. And so those teeth can get really, well, impacted by the wisdom teeth not being impacted.

• 10:05Josh Clark?

  Wow, that was great, man.

• 10:08Speaker 02

  Thanks.

• 10:08Josh Clark?

  Yeah, there's just not enough room because your other teeth have shown up, right? Another one, this is the thing that really kind of comes home to me. Your jaw might not actually be the size that it would be if you ate harder foods. And in fact, I saw it recommended to make sure that your kids have a nice set of chompers as they get older. Like, once they start eating solid foods, start giving them stuff that challenges their teeth.

• 10:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 10:38Josh Clark?

  Because as you're chewing, the more you chew... That promotes bone growth in your jaw and it can actually make your jaw a little longer so that if your jaw is just slightly longer, you're going to have that room for the third molar that you otherwise wouldn't. Well, again, we come back to the Western industrialized diet that is soft enough that the teeth aren't challenged quite as much. So the jaw doesn't grow quite as well to accommodate the third molar. I think I might have just, um, I think I might have just been born again, I guess.

• 11:11Speaker 02

  Did you square the timeline?

• 11:13Josh Clark?

  Yeah. And so you have room for the third molar after all.

• 11:19Speaker 02

  That's right. Uh, but space isn't like every bit of this. It's not just about space. There is some stuff about it that science really hasn't explained why they might become impacted because apes don't have impacted wisdom teeth, uh, which I don't think we mentioned. Some of our primate friends, you know, have wisdom teeth still.

• 11:36Josh Clark?

  Right.

• 11:37Speaker 02

  Uh, which is great. Good for them.

• 11:38Josh Clark?

  There's that natural selection thing.

• 11:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly. Um, the extraction has become a really common thing like, you know, I don't know about numbers, but I feel like most people these days, uh, at least in the United States will have their wisdom teeth removed, but you don't have to. It's not, um, like you really need to talk to your dentist and eventual oral surgeon, um, if it's really, really necessary because I don't know, I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but sometimes I get the feeling that they push this on people who don't necessarily need it because that's their business.

• 12:15Josh Clark?

  After our orthodonture episode, my eyes were kind of opened a little bit too.

• 12:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 12:21Josh Clark?

  Supposedly your dentist, um, should essentially tell you, let's take a wait and see approach to this, you know, like get your teeth checked every six months and we'll keep an eye on it. And if they start to come in wonky, we'll get rid of them. But wisdom teeth can come in, normal, healthy, can actually help, um, promote like further bone growth and stabilization and development, um, to help your teeth stay in your head better. And in those, that case. You shouldn't remove your wisdom teeth. You shouldn't also, I think prophylactically, remove them, just in case they come in wonky, right? So that's supposedly the consensus, or that should be the consensus, that you shouldn't

• 13:05Josh Clark?

  take them out proactively. And this University of Saskatchewan evolutionary anthropologist, Julia Bonner, she's basically comparing getting your wisdom teeth removed unnecessarily to what we used to do with kids getting their tonsils removed.

• 13:22Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, interesting. You know, part of the problem with my teeth that are no longer a part of my body was bone loss, so I'm wondering if I would have benefited by leaving those wisdom teeth in there.

• 13:34Josh Clark?

  Probably, sure. I mean, like, it definitely helps you keep generating bone, but also, like I was saying earlier, you have to also eat hard foods, too. Nothing but like rock candy.

• 13:47Speaker 02

  Yeah. I also don't remember my deal. I just remember they were like, you need your wisdom teeth out. Like, I don't remember if they were impacted or what the deal was. I feel like I remember them coming erupting a little bit, but I also don't trust my memory of that. The only thing I remember is coming out of the anesthesia and hallucinating. Did I ever tell this story?

• 14:14Josh Clark?

  It sounds vaguely familiar, but you should definitely tell it.

• 14:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, I came out when I was 17 of my first anesthetic experience and hallucinated a poster on the wall that said, "Locomotive lasagna."

• 14:28Josh Clark?

  I don't get told that.

• 14:29Speaker 02

  Then later on, obviously, it was a poster of whatever, like some sort of dental poster, but my theory is, is that they were screwing with me and switch out this weird poster for children coming off their first drug experience.

• 14:43Josh Clark?

  That's awesome. That would be a fun thing to do. I'll bet the cursing dentist does that.

• 14:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, and I don't know why, none of my bands that I've ever been in, or "Locomotive lasagna," that was just right there.

• 14:54Josh Clark?

  Yeah, I think that that's a, that's a, either a song name or an album name. I don't know about a band name.

• 14:58Speaker 02

  Okay. Oh, well, that's, it's not over then. I can just write a song.

• 15:01Josh Clark?

  For sure. I can't wait to hear that one.

• 15:05Speaker 02

  I already got a lyric. Local locomotive lasagna. What do you mean?

• 15:10Speaker 02

  That's the line one.

• 15:11Josh Clark?

  How about this? Let's write this together. I'm Bernie Toppin.

• 15:14Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 15:14Josh Clark?

  Locomotive lasagna. What's going on you?

• 15:19Speaker 02

  Oh, man. Genius.

• 15:21Josh Clark?

  This thing just writes itself.

• 15:22Speaker 02

  It really does.

• 15:23Josh Clark?

  We should say there's another reason besides the surgery being potentially unnecessary for why you should wait and see, keep an eye on your wisdom teeth rather than have them taken out. There's risks to having oral surgery. Like you can damage nerves and tissue and your jawbone. Like sometimes, I know Yumi, she said her oral surgeon was sweating. He was having so much trouble pulling hers out. She just got local anesthetic and she regretted it quite a bit.

• 15:51Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 15:51Josh Clark?

  And the guy was working hard. So it can actually cause damage to get your wisdom teeth removed, which is why they say if they're healthy and they're in, just leave them alone.

• 16:02Speaker 02

  Yeah. And she should have known this was coming because he had a baseball cap on that said, never let him see you sweat. And he just turned it around backwards when she got in the chair.

• 16:11Josh Clark?

  That's right. Man, can you imagine having your dentist sweat on you?

• 16:15Speaker 02

  No, that's not a good look.

• 16:17Josh Clark?

  No.

• 16:19Josh Clark?

  I guess short stuff's out. Don't you agree?

• 16:21Speaker 02

  I think so.

• 16:25Speaker 06

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