3 ms·

> because nerves are fast No they’re not. If your optic nerve had to travel from your stomach we’re talking a delay of 100s of milliseconds.

• Barrin92 4y ago
  they definitely are, about 300 mph (so that'd be about 10-20 ms). In fact one of your nerves, the laryngeal nerve enabling you to control your vocal cords wraps from your head around your heart back to your head, even in giraffes! Evolutionary it was apparently just more beneficial to make the thing longer.
  • fuckstick 4y ago
    That should be up to about 300 mph. There is wide variability depending on the structure of the nerve. Even so that maximum is tremendously slow compared to a wire.
  • hypertele-Xii 4y ago
    You're forgetting to account for response latency as well. It's not enough to see danger quickly, you also have to be able to move your body in response. If the brain was in the abdomen, the latency to move your head would be a roundtrip longer.