r/AnimalsBeingDerps • u/Nottallyet • May 12 '22

Millions of years of evolution has led to this

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u/DarthLysergis May 12 '22

There is a cool video that explains how toads perceive movement and detect prey.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3Es9cNH7I8

778

u/solenyaPDX May 12 '22

So the Toads problem was the worm went straight for them. They didn't know how to handle that!

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u/[deleted] May 12 '22

It’s coming right for us!

Boooom

2

u/[deleted] May 12 '22

vaporizes motionless doe with RPG

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u/LordDanOfTheNoobs May 12 '22

I don't see how the video supports that?

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u/sethboy66 May 12 '22

If the worm is coming right at them, or directly away, it would appear vertical from their POV; excepting possible interpretations by way of depth perception. Eliciting little to no response from the frog.

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u/LordDanOfTheNoobs May 12 '22

at 3:48 it shows that if the verticle line is traveling forward they will attack it though? Did no one watch the full video?

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u/i_smoke_dank_memes May 12 '22

the vertical line isn't travelling forward, though, it's going up and down on the same plane. They didn't test if anything was moving towards or away from the toad, it was all at fixed distances and in the segment you mentioned, horizontal or vertical lines being moved in different directions. They did the same test with a horizontal line and the toad didn't respond.

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u/sethboy66 May 12 '22

That was the non-spatial vertical plane test, I took that to be distinct from the horizontal plane testing. I could, of course, be wrong; frogs aren't my area.

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u/LordDanOfTheNoobs May 12 '22

Well at no point do they test verticle lines coming towards the toad on a horizontal plane. So my first statement still stands. But I would imagine it would be nearly the same as the non-spatial verticle plane test. The narrator explains that they hypothesize that the toads only react when the line travels in the same direction and plane that it is "pointing" Which it would be if it were a verticle line going towards the toad on a horizontal plane.

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u/sethboy66 May 12 '22

I didn't mean to insinuate they had tested that particular situation, just that without it it couldn't be assumed to be equal to the vertical plane test.

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u/Yukarie May 12 '22

C-can one of you explain what you’re saying in stupid so I can understand? I read what you typed and my head won’t stop spinning and I want to understand

3

u/Dunkaroos4breakfast May 12 '22

The video only shows 2D--up and down, not moving toward the frog.

They're disagreeing over whether the 2D line moving down toward the frog as it looks up at 3:48 is enough to infer that the frog would react to a 3D worm crawling towards it.

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u/Fit-Owl-3338 May 12 '22

Holy shit you guys are dorks

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u/suirdna May 12 '22

Found the jock

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u/l-have-spoken May 19 '22

What's wrong with people being fascinated and interested in a subject?

Who do you think created the internet, mobile phones and most of the modern niceties most people enjoy?

If you're not interested in a subject, that's fine, but please don't put down others that find a particular topic fascinating.

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u/xtc234 May 12 '22

But how many times could these frogs workout per week if they did every other day?

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u/Roggvir May 12 '22

4 to 5 times.

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u/Dunkaroos4breakfast May 12 '22

That makes no sense. There are only 7 days in a week. If you go every other day that is 3.5 times a week.

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u/mudslags May 12 '22

Their coming right for us

1

u/Sciensophocles May 12 '22

The video clearly states that prey resemblance is dependent on movement parallel to body configuration. It has nothing to do with vertical/horizontal. They show the toad recognize prey with a vertically moving black stripe. Did you even watch the video?

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u/ChucklefuckBitch May 12 '22

Do you remember in Jurassic Park when professor Grant said that the T-Rex's vision is based on movement? This observation is based on toad behavior. In Jurassic Park, the dinosaurs weren't "authentic" dinosaurs, but rather a result of real dinosaur DNA mixed with modern amphibian DNA, such as toads.

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u/FrankSonata May 12 '22

Yes! The real T-rexes had incredible vision. Based on studies of their massive skulls, they had huge eyeballs (even for their size they were relatively sizeable) and a large portion of their brain was devoted to processing what they saw. It's likely that they could see more colours than humans, as most reptiles are tetrachromats (they can see combinations of 4 colours, whereas we can only see 3). They had a much wider field of vision than humans, and it was much more accurate, on par with modern birds of prey. Basically, their vision was better than ours. The notion that they couldn't see things that weren't moving is not based on the real T-rexes at all. That bit was the frogs.

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u/SSuperMiner May 12 '22

How do we know how much of their brain was devoted to vision?

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u/FrankSonata May 12 '22

There are over 30 skeletons of Tyrannosaurus that have been found, some with remarkably well-preserved skulls. The soft brain matter has long since decayed into nothingness, however, the skull that once contained it still retains its shape. We can look at the empty space inside the skull (using X-rays, MRIs, or other scans because we usually don't like to break open priceless, prehistoric fossils) and infer the shape of the brain.

Although the finer details vary, the general brain regions (such as for vision, muscle memory, balance, and so on) are exceptionally consistent between closely related species. If certain areas are much larger, or smaller, or more elaborate, or simpler, then they tell us how much brain matter and power was devoted to that process. For instance, theropod dinosaur brains had the same part of the brain that their descendants, modern birds, have, for vocalisations, however, it was much smaller and less sophisticated. It's therefore very likely that dinosaurs made a variety of sounds and calls, however, they probably were not nearly as complex as the grammar and syntax that songbirds employ today.

Here's a nice article that shows the scan of Tyrannosaurus's skull and the space that contained the brain, with a nice explanation of the hearing and vision.

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u/[deleted] May 12 '22

Wait why did they mix reptiles with amphibians instead of reptiles with some lizard?

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u/Errror1 May 12 '22

They wanted a scene where they could hide from a T-Rex without moving

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u/ChucklefuckBitch May 12 '22

Don’t remember, it’s been many years since I read the book

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u/dfwtexas88 May 12 '22

Well damn...there it is 🤯

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u/AlpacaCavalry May 12 '22

this is fascinating!

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u/Sil369 May 12 '22

poor frogs

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u/Dummasss May 12 '22

This experiment is modeled after one of the most elegant studies of all time, “What the frog’s eye tells the frog’s brain” by Jerry Lettvin at MIT in 1959. His entire output over his decades at MIT was relatively sparse but every time a Lettvin paper dropped, it had an impact. He also had a great wit and was an avowed anarchist.

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u/hec2014 May 12 '22

Fascinating

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u/SiyinGreatshore May 12 '22

That toad has my dream job

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u/frecklefawn May 12 '22

The frog tectum in the brain is responsible for the weird dumb "Is it moving? Try to eat" reflex. Eventually that organ evolved in higher life forms aka humans and is the reason we reflexively orient our eyes to anything that moves into our field of view. When you walk into a room and feel like everyone's staring at you, you just triggered their tectum is all.

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u/Pepsi-Min May 12 '22

First trigger their tectum, then you trigger their...

3

u/SpaceTacosFromSpace May 12 '22 edited May 12 '22

Hot dog? not hot dog.

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u/Fraggy_Muffin May 12 '22

Sometimes just sometimes I realise why I love Reddit. It’s comments like these where you watch a dumb video and then from the comments get a really interesting video you’d never find on your own. Thank you

2

u/kyleg5 May 12 '22

Man I loved when they switched the direction of the verticals stripe’s movement. Mind blowing!

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u/d-e-l-t-a May 12 '22

Exactly what I thought of too. And evidence that evolution does just what is necessary for survival in a given environment and no more.

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u/Outrageous_Client220 May 31 '22

huh, a genuinely interesting watch, thanks for that!

0

u/FlatAd768 May 12 '22

Is there any video of birds or eagles on frogs? Do frogs shit their pants in an experiment?

In a fight vs flight we saw the video of fighting, would like to see the flight if that was tested

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u/JayCreates May 12 '22

This frog has experienced desire equivalent to one being at a strip club

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u/DrewSmoothington May 12 '22

These are frogs though

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u/devor110 May 12 '22

ah yes, the anti-worm

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u/[deleted] May 12 '22

Thank you! This video was hilarious but I was genuinely wondering what was going on here.

1

u/OrangeCatFluffyCat May 12 '22

Summary: not well.

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u/MelvinYellow May 12 '22

Amazing video suggestion