Hiccups due to our fish ancestry
Here’s a lovely bit of evolutionary trivia: Apparently our hiccups are caused because we’re descended from fish.
That’s the argument that Neil Shubin, head of the University of Chicago’s anatomy school, makes in his new book Your Inner Fish. As a review of the book notes:
Spasms in our diaphragms, hiccups are triggered by electric signals generated in the brain stem. Amphibian brain stems emit similar signals, which control the regular motion of their gills….
