Posts tagged evolution
Why would an non-Eusocial animal have a caste of sterile individuals? Formicidae and Apoidea have sterile workers,but those outnumber the fertile drones and princesses or queens. In another anima...
Could there ever be an incentive for a fish or other aquatic being to use simple tools, like early humans did? Would it be possible for any structure of a current water-dwelling being (for exampl...
I'm designing a creature that has found a new way to evolve directly during its life time. This method is different from having to bear incredible environmental stress or being a victim to violent ...
The fantasy creature I am imagining (planning a short story or two around) satisfies the following analogy: Human is to Chimpanzee as "This Thing" is to Badger. That is, the creature has a cl...
Real parasitic plants target only plant hosts and in certain species fungal hosts. How plausible are parasitic plants (or algae, lichen, or other photosynthetic organisms) that targets animal hosts...
On Earth, the vast majority of the biosphere is ultimately dependent on a large number of autotrophic organisms that produce usable energy in the form of glucose by using photosynthesis. However, o...
After reading a couple dozen entries about rogue planets and their implications (for those unaware, a rogue planet is a planetary mass that has been separated from the star by gravitational instabi...
The planet is a Super-Earth with 1.839 Earth masses and an average surface temperature of 180.7 degrees farrenheight, the atmospheric pressure is 50 times more dense than Earth's and there's large ...
What animals and in what conditions would evolve into something resembling a bearfolk like this one A ''bear'' humanoid of 600"“800 pounds standing in two legs, divided in many sub-species with ...
First question What event would cause hydrogen to slowly replace oxygen in the athmosphere? it can be something natural or artifial. it doesn't have to cause too much mass extinctions. Some sa...
Humans (and most animals) sleep. The reasons aren't really clear but most people believe: We have to sleep because it is essential to maintaining normal levels of cognitive skills such as spe...
Hunting is dangerous; even for the predator, hunting can result in death. There have been countless example where a predator was killed by what was supposed to be prey. Animals have evolved many wa...
How would an organism evolve to ''see''or sense things with high precision way before light hits its eyes or sound reaches their ears, or at least giving the illusion of doing so?
Having read this excellent question and its answers, I've tried to come up with an evolutionary history for a sapient, avian race that populates part of a world I'm building. I'd like feedback as t...
Is it possible that a large, multicellular, naturally evolved organism with an advanced intellect on the order of a human's could have evolved to pass on its knowledge and memories in a fashion tha...
And I'm not talking about insects. In what kind of environment could a large number of different species all develop six legs/limbs/appendages the same way most vertebrate species on Earth have fou...
Enter the Argonian: a (really) ugly sentient human-like lizard. Although almost no one plays as this race on their Skyrim playthroughs, they have some pretty astounding capabilities; they are maste...
Behold the Khajiit; Born from the insanely popular game series, Elder Scrolls, the Khajiit are a race of cat people who live in hot jungles. From the moment I saw this race, I fell in love with ...
Sleipnir is Odin's steed - an eight-legged horse in Norse mythology. How and where to place its legs to make it faster than four-legged horses? What other benefits or drawbacks may arise from the a...
Basically I want to create a world in which some of the humans have developed a higher body temperature in order to survive cold, harsh climates, such as the poles or even tall mountains. The reaso...
I'm retouching the idea discussed in detail here Evolution of species with seperate sapient and non-sapient forms?. I like the discussion had there, but want to focus in on one specific question, ...
Within software environments there is a variety of malware such as viruses, trojans, bots and so forth. This malware is created by human programmers to accomplish specific purposes (e.g. steal pers...
If we assume their homeworld is similar to Titan, but instead orbiting a Neptune sized gas giant and a bit bigger and receiving the same amount of Solar energy as Titan, The star is a main sequence...
I know the idea seems a bit far fetched but it's something I believe is common is science fiction and fantasy stories. I remember the talking trees of Zelda: Ocarina of time and of course, Tolkien'...
In Pokemon, each individual Pokemon "evolves" into a new stage of its evolution. A lot people claim that this can be explained using mere metamorphosis, but there are no mammals that go through suc...
You are a planetary engineer from a lonely species fairly high on the Kardashev scale. Although your species has wandered throughout the galaxy seeking out new life and civilizations for thousands...
What if our planet was always lit so that there would be no nighttime? Assume that the scenario is like this, where A is the planet and B and ABb are the stars. And they are all aligned so that it ...
In this alternate scenario, five million years ago, a mass extinction hit Earth. Not a massive volcanic eruption or a devastating bolide impact, but a sudden cold snap, a transition from Miocene h...
Why aren't animals photosynthetic on earth? And what would make it plausible for them to evolve to be?
Small vs. Large! If you had nearly the same creature, and the only difference was size, what advantages and disadvantages would large size vs. small size have--beyond the usual--reaching leaves mor...
On Earth, life took on a quadruped body plan which has lead to many different sub body plans; 4 legged, 2 legs-2 wings, 2 legs-2 arms, etc. This has made me wonder what possible sub body plans can ...
The primary purpose of the human nose is to detect scents. This is an obvious statement, as is that the primary function of the mouth is to eat. The secondary purpose of both of these features is t...
We all like hexapods, from the Centaur to the Griffin. A large problem with the realism of the hexapodal body plan is that there are not many reasons for a creature to have them and is still worth ...
Let's say I have a species similar to human, as sort of New Humanity. The only thing that separates them from humanity is their subspecies: the Sublorans. They have multiple animalistic features th...
In my world, daytime lasts for 9 years. I am trying to make this as realistic as possible. How would life live on this planet? How would they sleep etc.? My own theories are that they would mig...
In Halo series there is an intelligent race called Unggoy that evolved on a planet caled Balaho orbiting a blue supergiant called Tala, I would like to know if it would be possible for an intellige...
In Tarzan the Terrible Edgar Rice Burroughs introduces the Gryf which is a Triceratops that survived extinction and has since evolved to become carnivorous. It may be possible that ERB believed th...
what are the rules I need to follow to name different races of a specie and different species that have one ancestor in common ? Additionally how do i know when a race becomes a species ? Is an ...
I have a rocky world where land-based vegetation like grass or trees are either very rare and restricted to small and rare areas or non-existent. Rather, vegetation has stayed in the oceans and dev...
Could a creature evolve to have multiple consciousness ? Let me add more details : -They all live in the same body -They communicate with each other silently -They cycle phases of work whe...
Note: This question is a follow up to this question, and hence forms part of a bigger complex of questions about geology and biology in this certain scenario. Meta: The planet consists of two en...
Would it be possible for plants to evolve a co-dependency on a community of bioluminescent bacteria in order to survive in a low or zero light environment? Such as the plant gathering nutrients an...
The pangolin is a fascinating creature. Belonging to the only group of mammals with scales, they are arboreal and are not hindered by them in any way. However, these animals have a very complex evo...
I'm writing a story where Kradjin carnivorous flightless birds have been used as mounts by a nomadic steppe living people for millennia and I'm curious how this might have altered their morphology....
A hypothetical mammal has developed an unusual reproductive cycle. The females normally ovulate upon experiencing orgasm, whereas the males only display sperm production and heightened sex drive du...
Apparently life on Earth has no meaning, the closest thing to a reason to exist is creating as much biodiversity as possible, through reproduction forced as the only achievement every creature can ...
What sort of circumstances would allow for a parasitic relationship between two dominant species of an Earth-like planet? The criteria for an answer is as follows: The relationship must involve n...
I am designing a world where humans have somehow developed or have been put onto a planet in a primitive state. This world has only been habitable for about ten thousand years and therefore only ha...
Lets say that, for some reason, humans decide to breed true sapience into one of the great apes (chimps or bonobos). They start to use active selective breeding to encourage increased intellect an...
This questions came to me after some discussion on my previous one about a civilization living under Antarctica. I somehow have the feeling this is a dumb question - sorry if it is -, however I ca...
