MLP Forum Archive

#5376 deathpigeon Tue, 13th Sep '11 10:20:04 PM

Because he's a baby.

"Dear lord, you make Karl Marx, Emma Goldman, [Noam] Chomsky, Lenin, and Howard Zinn seem conservative."
-Deviant Braeburn

#5377 Kuro Fox Tue, 13th Sep '11 11:32:56 PM from under a rock

But what kind of biology gives a creature arms and hands in infancy and then deforms them into forelegs as they mature?

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#5378 Smilingcloud Tue, 13th Sep '11 11:36:00 PM

SO, what's new?

#5379 deathpigeon Tue, 13th Sep '11 11:36:28 PM

A dragon.

edited 13th Sep '11 11:48:35 PM by deathpigeon

"Dear lord, you make Karl Marx, Emma Goldman, [Noam] Chomsky, Lenin, and Howard Zinn seem conservative."
-Deviant Braeburn

#5380 Hsere Tue, 13th Sep '11 11:49:44 PM

We also don't know that adult dragons lose the dexterity in their forelimbs/arms as they grow older. Adult dragons may be similar to chimps, in possessing forelimbs that are serviceable as both legs and dextrous arms/hands. This would be especially feasible if adult dragons primarily use flight as a means of long-range transport, rather than walking.

edited 13th Sep '11 11:50:22 PM by Hsere

"Someone who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person." —Dave Barry

#5381 Kerrah Tue, 13th Sep '11 11:52:15 PM from Helsinki, Finland

Or maybe wild dragons walk on all-fours throughout their lives, and thus their hands lose dexterity and become legs. Only if a dragon is taught how to use their hands, they get to keep them.

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#5382 deathpigeon Tue, 13th Sep '11 11:55:36 PM

Heck, we don't see much of older dragons, its possible that they go on both all fours, and on only two, and younger dragons merely lack something that makes so they can't go on all fours, and move around easily.

"Dear lord, you make Karl Marx, Emma Goldman, [Noam] Chomsky, Lenin, and Howard Zinn seem conservative."
-Deviant Braeburn

#5383 Kyler Thatch Wed, 14th Sep '11 12:17:38 AM from Gravity Falls

Bipedal locomotion is overrated, anyway. Quadrupeds have more stability (4 points of contact vs. 2), and... I'm not actually sure what else.

I took a guess and cut a portion out of my heart.

He said, "That's nowhere close enough, but it's a damn good start."

#5384 deathpigeon Wed, 14th Sep '11 12:18:38 AM

Both have their benefits.

"Dear lord, you make Karl Marx, Emma Goldman, [Noam] Chomsky, Lenin, and Howard Zinn seem conservative."
-Deviant Braeburn

#5385 Kyler Thatch Wed, 14th Sep '11 12:28:22 AM from Gravity Falls

True, there has to be, or we'd all be quadrupeds by evolution or something.

What do we bipeds get out of the deal, though? I forget.

edited 14th Sep '11 12:28:37 AM by KylerThatch

I took a guess and cut a portion out of my heart.

He said, "That's nowhere close enough, but it's a damn good start."

#5386 deathpigeon Wed, 14th Sep '11 12:30:05 AM

Limited and exclusive bipedalism can offer a species several advantages. Bipedalism raises the head; this allows a greater field of vision with improved detection of distant dangers or resources, access to deeper water for wading animals and allows the animals to reach higher food sources with their mouths. While upright, non-locomotory limbs become free for other uses, including manipulation (in primates and rodents), flight (in birds), digging (in giant pangolin), combat (in bears and the large monitor lizard) or camouflage (in certain species of octopus). Running speeds can be increased when an animal lacks a flexible backbone, though the maximum bipedal speed appears less fast than the maximum speed of quadrapedal movement with a flexible backbone - the ostrich reaches speeds of 65 km/h (40 mph) and the red kangaroo 70 km/h (43 mph), while the cheetah can exceed 100 km/h (62 mph).[17] [18] Bipedality in kangaroo rats has been hypothesized to improve locomotor performance, which could aid in escaping from predators.[19][20]

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edited 14th Sep '11 12:30:47 AM by deathpigeon

"Dear lord, you make Karl Marx, Emma Goldman, [Noam] Chomsky, Lenin, and Howard Zinn seem conservative."
-Deviant Braeburn

#5387 Hsere Wed, 14th Sep '11 12:32:49 AM

From what I recall, the current understanding is that bipedalism allows our hands to be more dextrous, since they don't have to have the stability to function as legs, so it's been instrumental in our development of things like tools. These developments, in turn, have allowed larger brains and greater intelligence to be selected for, since they provide an enormous benefit when one has the ability to finely manipulate one's surroundings, but less of one (though still one) when such manipulation isn't possible.

So we may have gotten sentience out of the deal.

edited 14th Sep '11 12:38:27 AM by Hsere

"Someone who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person." —Dave Barry

#5388 deathpigeon Wed, 14th Sep '11 1:23:50 AM

Night, everyone!

"Dear lord, you make Karl Marx, Emma Goldman, [Noam] Chomsky, Lenin, and Howard Zinn seem conservative."
-Deviant Braeburn

#5389 kegisak Wed, 14th Sep '11 1:46:20 AM

This is sort of forgetting the fact that we've seen adult dragons using their forelimbs dexterously. Does noone remember the dragon from dragon doing such things as wiggling his fingers, brushing his scales and making a fist?

#5390 Hsere Wed, 14th Sep '11 1:58:37 AM

Oh, yeah, I forgot about that — so see? More support for my hypothesis.

"Someone who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person." —Dave Barry

#5391 Kyler Thatch Wed, 14th Sep '11 3:48:05 AM from Gravity Falls

How does this guy manage to keep making Scratch so damn attractive?