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When Armor Met Lips
- vitiral 3y agoI really enjoyed this article, but I was really disappointed. For some reason I thought it was going to evolve into a Lovecraftian epic of how the grand and horrifying civilization of the ancient cephalopods and their relatives was thwarted by another species, one who paved the way for our own ignorant and doomed civilization to thrive. I kept this feeling until the very end [spoiler] even when it was revealed to be seals I held out hope they could be a Lovecraftian player in a grand epic saga.
- csours 3y agowho do you think is protecting us from the lovecraftian horrors?
- yencabulator 3y agoYou might enjoy knowing that the name of one of the oldest known gods in Finnish history, one with very Cthulhu-style looks, came to mean walrus: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iku-Turso_(creature) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iku-Turso_(creature)
- JKCalhoun 3y agoI wanted to go fossil hunting (and for ammonites in particular) after watching these guys just haul them out: https://youtu.be/9XWhdPL58is https://youtu.be/9XWhdPL58is
- Affric 3y agoGreat photo selection with the shifty looking seal (gotta love the whites of caniform eyes) and a nice little summary of the article. One thing about zoology and animal morphology is that we all know how important feeding is for animals but only real nerds love the digestive tract. Transport, skin, and reproduction are far more glamorous; but the mammalian sense of smell and mouth parts gave us such an advantage in the tertiary period. It’s interesting that this sort of feeding never arose in the sea. I wonder what the ancestors of the pinnipeds who first ventured back into water ate…
- 082349872349872 3y agoIf they're related to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustelidae https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustelidae , probably just about any catchable animals?
- Affric 3y agoProbably otter like to an extent. Would be interesting if the first thing they ventured into shallow seas for was ammonites though.
- vinnyvichy 3y agoParent was trying to make a joke about weasels being also shifty, but if ancestors of ppeds were like bears/otters, they would have gone for fish trapped in tidal pools then slowly acquired a taste for nautiloids which are easier to catch
- angiosperm 3y agoDo not neglect the Paper Nautilus, a kind of Mediterranean octopus. https://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/the-seamstress-and-the-secrets-of-the-argonaut-shell/ https://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/the-seamstress-and-th... https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/12/26/jeanne-villepreux-power-argonaut/ https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/12/26/jeanne-villepreux-... Jeanne Villepreux-Power invented marine biology, single-handed in the early 19th century. She observed them repairing a hole in their shell by gluing on a found patch.
- teruakohatu 3y agoThat is interesting. I looked it up on wikipedia and the Argonaut / Paper Nautilus "shell" is a thin walled eggcase and that males do not have. It does not provide protection.
- angiosperm 3y agoFemale argonauts have the shell their whole life long, and do not only construct it when they have eggs to put in it. We may reasonably assume that it has survival value even when there are no eggs. We know, for example, that they carry bubbles in it to tune their buoyancy.
- readyplayernull 3y ago> If you’re inclined to be pedantic about the nautilus’ limbs and say that /actually/ they are “arms” and not “tentacles” because tentacles have suckers on them, then (a) congratulations on remembering that long-ago biology class, and (b) see Footnote 1, above. Something tells me an arm is a mechanical limb composed of connected poles that turn at their joints. And a hose-like limb without suckers should have its own name. A foot is an "arm", a penis is something else.
- jrflowers 3y agoIt is a shame that this is not about when Armour Meats perfected their hot dog formulation
- alexey-salmin 3y ago"Ah! Love! The only thing my armor can't withstand!"
- a3w 3y agoSo the ideal tank buster is a carnivorous unicorn: penetrate that armor, then schlorp out the crew! Genetics will go too far, if we ever get these.
- h2odragon 3y agoThat's why the graceful, horse shaped unicorns of classical times died out; and what we have now is the up-armored, heavyweight rhinoceros version. Evolution is amazing innit.
- throwway120385 3y agoA fascinating case of how gunpowder has shaped biology.
- mec31 3y agoReminds me of one of my favorite Far Side cartoons https://www.reddit.com/r/TheFarSide/s/g5y9E0ZlmI https://www.reddit.com/r/TheFarSide/s/g5y9E0ZlmI
- CoolGuySteve 3y agoIf you find this evolutionary history interesting then I can't recommend PBS Eons enough. It's a great youtube series on the subject: well researched, a dense but breezy pace, and the paleo art + fossil images help convey information without being overly dry. Here's the one about this subject: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vQ55ToQeWI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vQ55ToQeWI
- jimkleiber 3y agoI thoroughly enjoyed the author's writing style. Anyone know where I can find more by him, Doug Muir?
- pizzalife 3y agoPersonally I can't stand it, yeah?
- HankB99 3y agoGoogle knows: https://crookedtimber.org/2024/01/03/welcome-to-doug-muir/ https://crookedtimber.org/2024/01/03/welcome-to-doug-muir/
- jimkleiber 3y agoNormally a blog just lets me click the author's name and see more by them, and even the link you posted doesn't really show more essays. This one did though: https://crookedtimber.org/author/doug-muir/ https://crookedtimber.org/author/doug-muir/
- daemonologist 3y agoThanks for the link, that's a worthwhile click - their previous article is great too: https://crookedtimber.org/2024/03/08/occasional-paper-the-iron-snow-beneath-your-feet/ https://crookedtimber.org/2024/03/08/occasional-paper-the-ir...
- themeiguoren 3y ago"The Iron Snow Beneath Your Feet" What a beautiful, poetic article. I learned something new, and saw the majesty of Earth's natural systems in a new light.
- HankB99 3y ago> geology nerd Shouldn't that be "paleontology nerd?"
- angiosperm 3y agoPaleontology used to be a subspecialty of geology, for a long time after they proved fossils had once been animals. Which the geologists had to do.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- skavi 3y agoSee footnote 1
- HankB99 3y agoWhere is footnote 1? I just looked up the authors of the article from their links at https://www.researchgate.net/publication/363885520_Seals_whales_and_the_Cenozoic_decline_of_nautiloid_cephalopods https://www.researchgate.net/publication/363885520_Seals_wha... and none mentions geology, though they did mention paleobiology, paleontology and fossils. What did I miss?
- nearbuy 3y agoThe footnotes for the article are in the first comment. The author put a humorous footnote about being pedantic.
- jjtheblunt 3y agoAnd, in doing so, was pedantic!
- ahazred8ta 3y agohttps://www.google.com/search?q=pedants+revolt https://www.google.com/search?q=pedants+revolt "I'd expected there to be less of you." "FEWER!!"
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- mannykannot 3y ago"Pinnipeds evolved about thirty million years ago. They showed up first in the colder parts of the northern hemisphere, then in the Antarctic, then in temperate zones." That's an interesting sequence, given that the continents then were about where they are now.
- aendruk 3y agoThat’s the sequence of notable populations; individuals did who knows what.
- ricardobeat 3y agoMaybe they evolved in both places independently, or maybe it took a couple million years for a pod of seals to make the journey from north to south, and then start dominating the local ecosystem.
- ivanbakel 3y agoWikipedia says pinnipeds are monophyletic, so there's only a single evolutionary branch they originated from. The travel question is much more interesting. Napkin math puts the distance between the polar circles at 12500 miles, the max swim speed of a seal at 25mph, giving a travel time of ~3 weeks of nonstop swimming as the crow flies. How does that happen? What would a pod of Arctic seals have eaten along the way, and what would have compelled them to make the trip out of familiar territory? How and why did they cross the temperate equatorial seas with a load of blubber?
- ekanes 3y agoAgree, this stuff is fun to imagine. Check out the many species that landed (and then kept evolving in isolation) in Hawaii. Seals, many birds, etc.
- DabbyDabberson 3y agoLook up monkey raft theory. How did monkeys from Africa get to South America? Also roughly 30 MYA.
- pfdietz 3y ago"So, you’re saying the nautiloids did okay until the pinnipeds sealed their fate?"
- Terr_ 3y agoI'm nautiloid to say more about their spiral into the depths.
- jagged-chisel 3y agoಠ_ಠ
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- klipt 3y agoNever trust a pinnipedophile.
- B1FF_PSUVM 3y agoAlso: https://crookedtimber.org/2024/02/19/death-lonely-death/#comment-830213 https://crookedtimber.org/2024/02/19/death-lonely-death/#com... about Voyager 1, recently in the news