Your Brain Has a Friend Limit
Grammar: Conditionals
A Level 4 English lesson exploring science.
What's in this lesson
A Level 4 (upper intermediate) ESL lesson on science, practising conditionals. The worksheet has a reading, target vocabulary, a grammar reference with practice and discussion questions.
From the reading: Your Brain Has a Friend Limit
Here is a number that should bother you: 150. That is roughly how many people your brain can genuinely know at once. Not follow on social media. Not recognise in the street. Actually know — their habits, their loyalties, whether they would help you move a sofa. Robin Dunbar, an evolutionary anthropologist at the University of Oxford, spent decades comparing primate brain sizes to group sizes. His conclusion was both elegant and uncomfortable: the bigger the neocortex, the bigger the stable social group. For humans, the ceiling lands at around 150. We call it Dunbar's Number, and it has proven stubbornly difficult to disprove.
Vocabulary
- draw a line
- face the music
- follow the crowd
- stand your ground
Grammar: Conditionals
- Inverted mixed
- Had she grown up in Brazil, she might now feel differently. — past condition, present result
- Modal variation
- Had he studied linguistics, he could now explain this. — could/might = less certain than would
Discussion questions
- Imagine you could redesign your own brain — what social instinct would you remove?
- If you could belong to only one group for the rest of your life, which would you choose?
- Would you rather be universally liked or deeply known by a small number of people?
Your Brain Has a Friend Limit
Grammar: Conditionals
What's in this lesson:
Full lesson plan with reading, grammar, vocabulary, and discussion.
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