Altricious

In considering the young we must distinguish between the altricious and precocious species, and remember that between such extremes every shade of difference exists. The cedar waxwing which is born blind and naked may be taken as a type of the altricious group.

It was apparent even that in some lines of inquiry or of action a child might be altricious and in others precocious. The abilities to read well and to compute well, to remember geography and to do carpentry work do not develop synchronously.

Some birds start hopping around and looking for food within seconds of hatching. Humans, in stark contrast, are the most altricious species known, and helpless for a very long time after birth. As evolutionary scholars Peter Richerson and Rob Boyd put it, “We are the largest brained, slowest developing member of the largest brained, slowest developing mammalian order.”