Through most of human history, our ancestors had children shortly after puberty, just as the members of all nonhuman species do to this day. Whether we like the idea or not, our young ancestors must have been capable of providing for their offspring, defending their families from predators, cooperating with others, and in most other respects functioning fully as adults. If they couldn't function as adults, their young could not have survived, which would have meant the swift demise of the human race. The fact that we're still here suggests that most young people are probably far more capable than we think they are. Somewhere along the line, we lost sight of — and buried — the potential of our teens. Robert Epstein
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The idea that we have lost the potential of our teens is not just a myth. There is a growing realisation that the human brain is extremely malleable and that we can move it in different ways. We often just don't know how to go about it, but we will know more and more as the years go on. Even so, we must acknowledge that we have lost something in our teens and we can no longer be content with what we had in the past.

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