Stephanie Sammann — The Rarest Trait Orcas Share With Us (It’s Not Intelligence)

Menopause is one of the strangest features of human biology. Almost every animal on Earth reproduces for as long as it lives — but humans stop decades before death. Even our closest relatives don’t share this trait. But somehow, a handful of toothed whales, including orcas, evolved the same extraordinary life history. So why would evolution favor an animal that stops reproducing? What are these older females doing with all those extra years? And what can orcas teach us about why humans evolved menopause in the first place?