• atocci@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Wait what’s the deal with the horses? I want to feel good about myself today.

    Edit: Wow, those bastards have it rough.

        • merc@sh.itjust.works
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          2 months ago

          I mean, humans run around on something that birds would consider knees, and stupidly try to support their entire body weight using only half their legs.

      • merc@sh.itjust.works
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        2 months ago

        Humans have multiple toes because our ape ancestors used their toes like fingers. Having multiple, separate toes is probably bad for survival unless you’re using toes to manipulate tools.

        Animals that have distinct toes include apes, geckos, mice, raccoons and similar animals which need them to grip onto surfaces or to manipulate things. There are predators which have separate toes because they’re a place to mount claws: eagles, cats, etc. There are animals that have separate toes with webbing between for swimming. But, for a lot of animals, separate toes aren’t really useful, so they’ve evolved away: elephants, rhinos, giraffes, horses, cows, etc.

        • Seleni@lemmy.world
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          2 months ago

          Yeah, but at least most of those still have multiple toes to spread the weight around. Horses decided to get rid of that completely.

          • merc@sh.itjust.works
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            2 months ago

            Spreading the weight around using toes doesn’t seem to be a useful strategy. It’s also not something that humans do. Human toes are not at the weight-bearing part of the foot. And, while I’m sure toes are somewhat involved in agility, having individual toes doesn’t seem to be. In fact, if you look at apes like gorillas and chimps, it’s pretty clear that our toes have been getting shorter and less important as we’ve been evolving as upright-walking creatures who don’t live in trees. Instead, the sole of the foot, which used to be much more like the palm of a hand, has been getting longer and sturdier.

            If you have separate toes, you have multiple fragile things that can break or be torn off. If you have one mega-toe it’s going to be sturdy. That’s probably why the heaviest animals have the fewest / smallest toes.

  • Mango@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    The breathing and eating tubes gotta cross so you can blow with your mouth and choke on cock. Non-negotiable.

    • daltotron@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      You could still probably blow with your mouth if you didn’t have your lungs connected, I imagine it would involve a kind of burping type of action. I think the bigger problem would be that if your nostrils closed up, you wouldn’t be able to breathe, and probably also talking would be a lot harder if your vocal chords and mouth were separate from your main air sacs.

      I think the solution is probably just an easily opened and closed internal valve that separates the stomach and the lungs, rather than this bullshit we currently have with two separate valves that lead into both and open for one and then close for the other whenever it’s required. It’s still good to be able to close both when you want to, but you can already close your mouth on command, and another valve with the nose is a notable upgrade in that it keeps everyone from smelling bad smells they don’t wanna smell, and it also doesn’t take any more valves than we already have.

      There’s probably some way you could fix this all with enough surgical intervention, I bet…

  • over_clox@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Its only a valve. Topologically speaking, the passage from the mouth to the anus only constitutes one hole.

    The passage of air into the lungs is not a hole however, that is a cavity. Same difference with the vagina, that’s not a hole, that’s a cavity.

          • accideath@lemmy.world
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            2 months ago

            Tbh, I was kinda hoping for someone with better biology knowledge than me to correct me. Thanks.

            • coffee_whatever@lemmy.world
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              2 months ago

              Important note, if you take a straw that separates into two split straws (kinda in a “Y” shape) that from a topological point of view is two holes, because one is for one of these paths, and the other is an extruded hole on the side of the first path. In topology you can’t break or mend material, but you can pull, stretch, squeeze and move it all you want. So you can move one of the split straw “legs” to the bottom of the whole straw, getting a shape similar to a “V”, it would look pretty much like a pair of pants. And topologically speaking it would be exactly the same. So… One straight hole for your mouth all the way down to your anus. Another two are there for your nostrils, that’s 3 already. The rest are for your tear ducts, which have two holes on the edge of your eye, (so four in total) which merge and then connect to your nose.

              So a human, from a topological perspective, is just a seven holed doughnut. Also Vsauce made a great video about that, with pretty great animations.

        • over_clox@lemmy.world
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          2 months ago

          I am well aware that people have three topological holes. Matter of fact, I proved that years ago.

          In this case, I only referred to one topological hole, from mouth to anus.

          I never mentioned the nose, nor was that part of the topic in question.

    • merc@sh.itjust.works
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      2 months ago

      Depends on the state of your esophagus, doesn’t it? If it’s closed (which it mostly is) then your mouth and nose holes go to your lung cavity. Your anus is also part of a cavity that goes through your intestines all the way up your throat and stops at your esophagus.

  • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    THE APPENDIX HAS ENTERED THE CHAT.

    Being able to make our own Vitamin C aside, the fact that a vestigial organ can randomly decide to fucking kill you is asinine from a design perspective. Its the equivalent to building a pool in the sims and removing the ladder for the first person who wanders inside.

    • zhengman777@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      Yikes. That’s why I get a little worried about the high velocity neck stuff that some chiropractors do.

    • JayObey711@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      Or that sneesing / trying to hold back a sneeze can give you an aneurism. But I guess although it’s rare in animals it’s not exclusive to humans.

      • thevoidzero@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        Waiting both sneezing or trying to hold back is dangerous? What are we supposed to do half-ass it?

  • pH3ra@lemmy.ml
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    2 months ago

    We’re God’s creation but God is a lazy kid that rushed the science project for the whole semester in six days and barely half assed it hoping no one digs too deep into it

  • Nuke_the_whales@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    I feel like feet and ankles have a lot of responsibility. I had a really bad case of plantar fasciitis for like 2 years and it sucked. Every step you take was a stabbing pain

    • RedAggroBest@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      That’s really just a modern problem. If you were part of a tribe walking out of Africa, you’d never have that problem. Our feet are pretty impressive actually