A while back during one of our discussions of all things important, it was mentioned that men have one less rib than women. Interestingly, just about everyone agreed that was true. A couple of us disagreed, but not much came of the discussion…. I suppose we moved on to more important topics. However I got to thinking about it and after some extensive research on my part I determined we (the minority in our discussion) were right.
In fact, men and women have precisely the same number of ribs — 12 (actually 12 pairs of ribs or 24 “individual” ribs.) The fallacy probably arose from the account of the Creation given in Genesis 2:21-22. God was said to have taken a rib from Adam while he was asleep and from that He made Eve.
These verses tell us how God made the first woman. Of course that doesn’t mean that from that point on women would have more ribs than men. If someone accidentally cut off a finger or lost a leg in an accident, we wouldn’t expect children he had after the accident to be missing a finger or a leg.
During my extensive research, I discovered that some people do have too many ribs or too few ribs, but this exception only occurs in people born with specific genetic anomalies. There is a disease known as cervical rib that produces a single extra rib at the base of the neck, but this is very rare and can occur in either sex.
So basically men and women have the same number of bones…. thank goodness for that. There are already enough differences in men and women.
— 30 —