The heart is a really simple contraption. The heart is broken down into 2 halves, and 2 more halves after that, for a total of 4 parts.
Focusing on one half, what most people would recognize as “the heart” and what it does. Blood enters the heart into a mini pump, that pump pushes blood into a second pump, making it a little extra full, so when that pump decides to squeeze, you get extra force leaving it to send blood to the rest of the body and back to the other half of the heart later.
Imagine filling a water balloon with half way some water and squeezing it out. It doesnt have as much “umph” as if you filled that same water balloon nearly to its popping point and squeezing.
The other half of the heart is the exact same, just weaker as it only sends blood a short distance to your lungs and back to the big half of the heart. Thats it, thats all the heart does. 2 pumps that load up the other 2 pumps with blood to be shot out to the rest of the body.
Sometimes things go wrong, youve very likely felt a small heart spasm before, but the heart is a mostly self correcting, fully autonomous system. I cannot see why adding in a 2nd heart would be a detriment, just makes blood go round and round more often.
I spent a few years studying as an EMT and Medical Assistant and I think I loved the circulatory system the most. However, Im no doctor and I simplified the heart a bit because I dont think needing to understand everything adds to the theoretical discussion of 2 hearts
Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafe 3 days ago
We already have synch issues with a single heart (things like arrythmias). I’m not sure two hearts in a mammal would even work, given the increase in distance for signaling - seems a lot of opportunity for error.