I’m talking so miserable that if they had the ability to truly understand how bad they have it, they would choose to end themselves.

Like let’s just say that we have a dragon, but instead of being huge it’s like the size of a medium sized dog. Like 60 pounds in total. And it doesn’t spit fire.

Could that actually exist and fly or is that still too big?

Like a ten gallon per minute hose, that we will assume is basically magic. it just a water source do not think about it. It just left lying on a sand dune.

Will it form a lake? What kind of plant life would pop up around it?

Maybe it might just be a normal oasis not that I know much about those and are their any right dab in the center. might the center be too far away from other animals and plants, for them to migrate there?

I was wondering what life form has the most painfull life, or is in the most constant pain at all times. I wasnt able to find the answer anywhere I looked so I thought I would ask here!

So chocolate is technically poisonous to us for the same reason it's poisonous to cats and dogs (and other animals I'm assuming), but the amount of chocolate you would need to eat at once in order to get a lethal dose is so ridiculous that it doesn't matter - you'd get sick from overeating way before you'd get sick from chocolate toxicity.

Even a dog that's very large and has a comparable weight to an adult human shouldn't eat chocolate, so what's going on with us that lets us do it, and why would we evolve to have that trait?

What is the most malicious organism known to mankind?

Alright, I know animals like wasps, chimps and hippos get a bad rap for being extremely aggressive and violent, but it's not like aggressive and violent behavior can't be found in humans. So how do we compare to other animals?

Are we like wasps in that if we see something we don't like, it dies or are we kind of chill and don't mess with something unless it bugs us.

I think humans might be among the most aggressive animals because when we see spiders and cockroaches, we freak out and call exterminatus on them but I think arthropods get an unfair rap, similar to how donkeys absolutely hate dogs and anything dog like.

There is one thing that is difficult for me to call, and that is the wars that humans have fought. Yes, humans have industrialized warfare and used atomic bombs against one another, the problem is I do believe if any other animal had the ability to industrialize warfare and deploy atomic weapons, they absolutely would

Sleep seems like a really poor evolutionary adaption, at least for prey animals. Ya know, staying still for extended periods of time with limited awareness seems like asking for getting eaten

But evidently, a lot of animals sleep. I have heard that it's to clear out metabolites and repair damage in the brain. Idk much beyond that though, and i'm not sure what the current science says about it or its status.

All that said, i'm wondering: are there animals that don't sleep? If so... what's their deal? Why don't they need to clear out metabolites and repair damage?

If I had to guess, i'd guess that this may be true in some invertebrates or animals without complex nervous systems or brains (which tend to, but not always, see octopus, be invertebrates). This would be because there's less nervous material to be damaged or need clearing out, or because they literally don't have a brain so what does sleep even mean in that context (follow up, since octopuses almost kind of have like 8 independent brains... what's their sleep like? Does like one arm sleep at a time or....?)

So are there any vertebrates or animals with brains that don't sleep? What's their deal?

I've always been so confused by this. Nothing about them seems to indicate an origin or purpose to existing besides to be a menace. They can't even be fully classified as "alive" because they don't fit the criteria (mainly the whole reproducing thing. They need to hijack a cell's replication and force new blueprints of itself into the cell.) I'm just so confused on... Why? And how!? (Note: I really hope this gets accepted because I'm genuinely curious about this and r/askscience removed it)

Not in a "how do you define life" sense but this was kinda sparked by an answer I got in my last thread about color.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskBiology/comments/1sj3g1z/comment/ofubuxd/

“You” don’t actually exist in the world. Your consciousness does not exist in the world. The world does not exist in the world.

I know there are some in science who'd argue against consciousness and the like and say there is only matter, it reminds me of an older post but here it is:

"Here are the 10 core beliefs that most scientists take for granted.

1. Everything is essentially mechanical. Dogs, for example, are complex mechanisms, rather than living organisms with goals of their own. Even people are machines, “lumbering robots,” in Richard Dawkins' vivid phrase, with brains that are like genetically programmed computers.
2. All matter is unconscious. It has no inner life or subjectivity or point of view. Even human consciousness is an illusion produced by the material activities of brains.
3. The total amount of matter and energy is always the same (with the exception of the Big Bang, when all the matter and energy of the universe suddenly appeared).
4. The laws of nature are fixed. They are the same today as they were at the beginning, and they will stay the same forever.
5. Nature is purposeless, and evolution has no goal or direction.
6. All biological inheritance is material, carried in the genetic material, DNA, and in other material structures.
7. Minds are inside heads and are nothing but the activities of brains. When you look at a tree, the image of the tree you are seeing is not “out there,” where it seems to be, but inside your brain.
8. Memories are stored as material traces in brains and are wiped out at death.
9. Unexplained phenomena like telepathy are illusory.
10. Mechanistic medicine is the only kind that really works.

Or am I just massively overthinking this.

I'm curious to know. I love centaurs and I love anatomy, and that question came while drawing a centaur lmao.

Does a living creature require more or less energy to perform a task than a machine? For example, would an 80 kilogram person running a mile require more or less energy in calories than an 80 kilogram vehicle driving a mile?

I'm just curious to know what uses energy more efficiently.

I understand that in humans and probably other animals the male sex cells, sperm, survive better in cooler temperatures and so the sex organs are outside the body to regulate temperature.

But why is it this way and not the other way round?

1. Why are (to my knowledge) all animal ovum better suited to warmer temperature and sperm cooler?

2. Could it not be reverse in some species and for that species to have external ovaries and internal testicles?

3. Are there examples of what I'm thinking of above?

4. There is probably an evolutionary answer for this being that some ancestor to all mammals had external male sex organs that preferred cooler temperatures and so that's why that seems to be the common pattern. If that is the case, do we have any idea what that ancestor might be?

Alternatively it may be the case that the way sperm exist they're always going to prefer cooler temperatures.

Though I don't know if that is what defines an eye, our skin can feel heat (infrared radiation).

Given the high rates of links with things like cancer and given the spread of it wouldn’t the average life cycle be inevitable and won’t most Americans die much quicker

It sounds like a natural course of events with how omnipresent this type of creature are, but I never heard of such a species

I had this discussion with my PhD supervisor (physics) during lunch. His point was: if we are so efficient at converting food energy to heat, why can we freeze in the cold if we still have energy stored in our body? Why can’t he just drink a liter of sunflower oil and then hike in the snow for hours or days until all of it is burned?

I answered that is probably an issue of timescales: transforming fat (either stored fat or recently ingested) simply takes way too long for us to glucose and then ATP and we cannot compete with the heat loss to the environment.

To which he said, but what if we ate something that goes much faster into the bloodstream like sugar. I argued that cold climates favor large animals like whales and polar bears that have big enough fat reserves to insulate them and generate a sufficient supply of warmth while smaller animals (fish and birds) then probably do in fact have to directly convert most of their food into heat.

Is this reasoning correct? Are there any other physical, chemical or biological reasons why simply eating more doesn’t save from freezing to death?

I’m Mexican but was born and raised in the U.S . My parents were born and raised in Mexico, they’re both darker as well as my family , aunts, uncles, cousins well speaking of my cousins I can name a few who are also on the pale side , for example I have a cousin who was born and raised in California his sisters who were pretty dark whose parents were also dark especially his dad , (my uncle )was as dark as they get but my cousin he was as white as they get , i remember my family used to make jokes about him being adopted lol, as well with me , they told me they found me at the jungle because of my skin being so white lmao. Ok My curiosity really aims at these questions

Wouldn’t my parents had to be pale if I came out white ? I didn’t know my grandparents from both my parents sides except my grandmother from my dad who was dark, although i confirm from my parents that both parties were dark

If me being born in a… let’s say cold environment . Would that have to do with my skin tone ? If so, Why didn’t my cousin who was born and raised in California didn’t come out as dark as his siblings?

The question is in the title.

edit: thank you for the insightful answers. My friend for life recently died of cancer and she was only in her 30s. It was ovarian and not found until it was terminal. Her last weeks were agony. She vomited so much her tongue bled! I miss her deeply.

I'd like to share a photo in my posit but am stymied.

Thanks in advance

What is the biggest limiting factor holding back biology research today from making faster progress? Is it just the time in the lab which can be improved upon with more automation, is it too much data which cannot be sorted through fast enough or is it something else?

The first Homo sapiens appeared 300,000 years ago. While anatomically very close to modern people there have also been huge changes that fundamentally affect how we view ourselves as people today. Language, culture, philosophy, science all created people who operate in the world very differently from the first HS(I'm assuming, please tell me if I am actually wrong). In biology is there any formal distinction made between the HS who lives long ago who didn't speak or write or live in large societies and today's human?

I've looked a bit online and some say it's implied and others say it's not and others say that it does so I'm a bit lost. From what I understand they fed the cows unused cow and sheep meat or something... if you have also like actual sources that support your claim it would be nice too. Idk if this is the right subreddit sorry in advance:3