General Discussion

My bachelor's is in neuroscience, so obviously, I find the human brain fascinating. But after the brain, I think I find the liver to be the coolest organ. It has so many different functions! And for whatever reason, until graduate level, the only thing you ever hear about the liver is bile synthesis. It does far cooler things!

I'm just glad someone started a bio science thread! I love talking about science.

Wait until you find out that trees aren't real.

a lot of flowers aren't strictly flowers but are, in fact, composed of dozens-hundreds of [i]smaller, specialized flowers[/i] working together to make a pseudanthium, literally a "false head". Think dandelions, sunflowers, daisies, that sort of design. ALSO the definition of "venomous" for snakes is wildly undefined once you get down into the depths of it. there's snakes we agree are venomous (rattlesnakes, cobras, etc) and that we agree aren't (pythons, boas, etc) and then there's a lil gray area where there's snakes which aren't [i]dangerous[/i], but which COULD be labelled as venomous, depending on whose paper you last read and what phase the moon happens to be in. used to be bonkers obsessed with this a few years back and it still makes for a good rant if i ever need to ramble about a topic for ten minutes straight [emoji=mirror happy size=1]

Not really that knowledgeable myself, but still a fact I found interesting that I learnt at a random point a couple months ago: Insects can go into a coma, not like us humans do, but because of the cold, apparently.

all tetrapods are fish, the statement birds are reptiles and birds are fish are both true. more importantly that makes us humans all fish too. this is purely in a taxonomic sense im sorry if im confusing anyone! [quote name="FivePebbles" date="2023-02-24 17:15:13" ] Wait until you find out that trees aren't real. [/quote] things like bamboo and palm trees are just really weird grasses, botanically a tree has to have a woody trunk that grows thicker every year. sea grass is also a grass and not algae, just like cetaceans it decided to go back into the water. the sahara desert is why we have the amazon rainforest, wind currents blow the sand which is composed of diatoms (algae with silicon shells) and it fertilizes the land in south america. one of the major areas they come from used to be covered in freshwater lakes. carnivory in plants has developed 12 separate times, this is because the plants are found in nutrient poor soil so they need to find other ways to feed themselves. what's known as the mistletoe cactus is the only cactus that grows outside of the americas, its found naturally in sri lanka and tropics in africa. everyone jokes that tomatoes are a fruit so ketchup must be a smoothie, cucumbers are also fruits as well as coconuts. bananas are berries and strawberries are not, rhubarb is a vegetable and not a fruit. i've tried to read over the wikipedia page on [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citrus_taxonomy]citrus taxonomy[/url] but its a mess (i appreciate that the pomelo is really just called citrus maxima). [quote name="interestingword" date="2023-02-24 17:35:15" ] a lot of flowers aren't strictly flowers but are, in fact, composed of dozens-hundreds of [i]smaller, specialized flowers[/i] working together to make a pseudanthium, literally a "false head". Think dandelions, sunflowers, daisies, that sort of design. [/quote] if im remembering right flowers can only have a maximum of [s]5[/s] ok maybe its 6 petals so yeah, when you see a sunflower its multiple flowers chained together with each of the outer flowers having one petal each. the part of america i live in used to be covered by the ocean during the cretaceous, we have a lot of shells and ammonites and such that can be found and taken home legally.

[quote name="Nyardyn" date="2023-02-24 16:28:39" ] Still the absolutely most mindboggling thing to think a about is butterflies. Inside the cocoon the animal will dissolve entirely into goo. it literally dissolves. the brain is gone, there ain't one any longer. the organs melt into disgusting slime. there are neither legs nor eyes nor anything else, just a cheese looking thick mucus. the animal is entirely restructured from scratch to be born as a new one. If that doesn't bother you then idk what will. [/quote] [url=https://old.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/7f4htq/ive_read_that_when_caterpillars_are_in_their/dq9of27/]afaik the brain remains and some other things but it still modifies during that phase of development[/url]. it is absolutely incredible that it turns into goop though [quote name="bulrush" date="2023-02-24 18:44:05" ] all tetrapods are fish, the statement birds are reptiles and birds are fish are both true. more importantly that makes us humans all fish too. [/quote] yeah and afaik all of that is also a worm. intestines are just comressed worm guts [quote name="bulrush" date="2023-02-24 18:44:05" ] everyone jokes that tomatoes are a fruit so ketchup must be a smoothie, cucumbers are also fruits as well as coconuts. bananas are berries and strawberries are not, rhubarb is a vegetable and not a fruit. i've tried to read over the wikipedia page on [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citrus_taxonomy]citrus taxonomy[/url] but its a mess (i appreciate that the pomelo is really just called citrus maxima). [/quote] i also want to add here that strawberries are accessory fruit. which means the red part isnt a fruit its some other plant part and the actual fruit on it are the little seed things, each of them is an individual fruit, sometimes some strawberries just decide to grow leaves instead of fruit there

all birds are lizard-hipped and not bird-hipped
or how the way we named stuff for dinos has screwed up a lot of terms thanks to continued scientific discoveries

My specil interest is also evolutionary bio and systematics. I love collecting facts like a dragon on a hoard.

Arborization is just carcinization for plants (but also for the arrangement of neurons in people with higher intelligence. Very cool)
The scale spacing on bird feet is actually pretty important for their perching behavior. I’d find a better study but I am bad at googling.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/jmor.21284
The elephant mormyrid communicates via electric signals sent from the ELL which is on their peduncle. It’s usually used for prey location because they live in dark waters and eat sediment-living invertebrates. Scientists have observed that their “speech” patterns are much like ours, with more dominant mormyrids “vocalizing” more and attenuating their signals as if for emphasis. They also offset their own electric signals when sensing for invertebrates, which has served as a model for deep learning AI.

[quote name="PixelSpiral" date="2023-02-24 23:01:53" ] [quote name="Nyardyn" date="2023-02-24 16:28:39" ] Still the absolutely most mindboggling thing to think a about is butterflies. Inside the cocoon the animal will dissolve entirely into goo. it literally dissolves. the brain is gone, there ain't one any longer. the organs melt into disgusting slime. there are neither legs nor eyes nor anything else, just a cheese looking thick mucus. the animal is entirely restructured from scratch to be born as a new one. If that doesn't bother you then idk what will. [/quote] [url=https://old.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/7f4htq/ive_read_that_when_caterpillars_are_in_their/dq9of27/]afaik the brain remains and some other things but it still modifies during that phase of development[/url]. it is absolutely incredible that it turns into goop though [/quote] Yep. Lepidopterans have been shown to remember what they learned as caterpillars. Still really cool that you can goop them almost entirely and still have the same brain, though. [quote name="bulrush" date="2023-02-24 18:44:05" ] all tetrapods are fish, the statement birds are reptiles and birds are fish are both true. more importantly that makes us humans all fish too. [/quote] Fish is not a cladistic term!!!! It’s a general body plan if anything. Same thing with very ancient/viable body plans like trees.

@Coincidence sorry i should've specified this is because of taxonomy, its the same reason for why there's a genuine push to classify the domains of life into only bacteria and archea so all humans will technically be archea too...