Oral Care
WHY IT IS CALLED A WISDOM TOOTH
Wisdom teeth have been given their name because of the time to which they grow. These third molars erupt and fully develop at a time when the person is either at the brink of or during the first stages of adulthood. Being adults, it is assumed that they know better, or that they have acquired a certain wisdom. That is to say, it is generally expected for an adult to have better sensibilities than children. While this is not always true for all adults, the name has stuck throughout the years. The slight toothache from a correctly growing wisdom tooth has become a right of passage. To put it simply, it is called the way it is because now that it is assumed that you have wisdom, you get your wisdom teeth.
The Koreans are more romantic about how they perceive these third molars, calling them “love teeth”, as in the first pains of adolescent love. The Japanese, on the other hand, have more familial sentiments about it, calling it the “teeth that the parents do not know of”, because by the time they grow and fully set in, the child would have reached adulthood and moved out of the house (ironically, not all of them move out of the house, but you can see the general belief that by 20, that should be the case).
Wisdom teeth are often removed as they grow before they can cause problems like gum swelling, infection and gum disease. While it is not always advised to pull out third molars if there is nothing wrong with them, this sort of practice has been carried on for a long time.