Bones, of course, are all we have left from ancient humans
and we have to extract from them as much as we can.
Our skeleton is remodeled during our life, at least part of it,
and in other words, we can make, to be very simple, two groups of features:
some features which are mostly indicators of the individual life,
and some of the conditions surrounding this individual development,
and some other features which are much more indicative
of the whole history of the species itself.
To give you an example, if you play tennis a lot, you are going to have your right arm
with a stronger skeleton than your left arm, if you play with your right hand.
But this is not going to change the shape of your teeth,
because your teeth are formed partly even before you are born.
And so far, we don’t see how physical activity, for example,
could have an influence on the shape of the teeth.
The inner ear, a little organ which is at the bottom of our skull
and which allows us to keep our equilibrium and feel movement,
is shaped completely by six months of embryological development.
And again, whatever you do in your life is not going to change the shape of this organ.
So in other words, teeth, or skeleton parts like the inner ear are very important
because they tell us something about the genes that control the skeleton.