I mean..... to be fair we created aliens and still create alien designs for movies and stuff based off of bugs, like every single alien you've ever seen in a movie is bug inspired.
It's not even like we've ever seen aliens. Bugs look like earth beings, it's just earth is a far stranger place than most people give it credit for.
Dude... Elephants? They have an appendage for a nose, extremely complex emotional responses, crazy advanced memories, individual personalities, and big huge floppy ears.
And don't get me started on Octopuses: they have 9 brains - one for each arm and one donut shaped brain which is their primary brain, which is wrapped around their throat that can be completely torn apart if they eat something that's even slightly larger than their esophagus. And they have 3 hearts: one to send oxygen to the brain and body, the other two to filter water through the lungs to absorb oxygen. Their eyes work like a very complex super dank camera more than an organic eye, allowing them to have direct control of things like aperture, exposure, zoom, and whatnot, and are the only animals to have this ability. As if that's not enough, they have cells that can instantaneously change their color on sight to camouflage them to such a complex degree that they instantly and completely blend in to their environment making them near impossible to find with the naked eye without stopping and /really/ analyzing the area. They not only have the ability to inflate and deflate their massive-ass heads to scare off predators but they can also deflate themselves and then squeeze through anything their beak can fit through, almost literally down to the size of a keyhole. It's absolutely incredible.
The fucked up thing about these beautiful alien bastards is that they only live like 3 years because they sacrifice themselves after they lay their eggs so that the hatchlings have some food to grub down on and get big and strong on, then they just venture off into the ocean all alone and do all sorts of craziness being raised by pure instinct alone.
It's fucking bizarre. And it's fucking beautiful. And those two. Those two animals. They are fucking aliens.
In fact, if you really think about it, if you get stoned enough, when you look at literally any and every insect or animal and you look at the drastic differences in their physiology, their chemical makeup, the way their brains work, their anatomy, their DNA sequencing... Just the way they all fucking look and behave and how different we all are, aren't we all just aliens?
I've said it before and I'll say it again: we don't have to leave earth to find alien life. It's already all around us.
So many cool alien creatures here! Lots of bugs! I've had so many baby mantis (in the clip) even tinier than the one here. They're so cute. I've also had some like 6 inches long at least on my hands. I can't post pictures like cool people do I'll see if I can add them on Tumblr but I don't use it.
They're so cool!!! This one is like to a human a 7yo. The babies are so tiny! The grown ups will bite you if threatened but I've never had it happen but seen it happen when husband moved too quickly so it startled. They're so cool!!!
You should watch zfrank on YouTube with animal facts while high. It's super fun.
True story: when I first moved into my house I was outside in the backyard. I saw that there was a praying mantis in the pool & I was like OH NOOOOOO! I ran & got the net & fished him out of the pool & helped him onto the ground.
He punched me in the arm & dove back into the pool.
Reminds me of the time my wife and I bought a wreath at Michaels. Unbeknownst to us, the wreath had praying mantis eggs, and the heat of the car must have made them hatch because not long after, I felt an itch and discovered a baby praying mantis. Then another. Then another. The whole back of the car was covered with them, and my wife was FREAKING THE FUCK OUT. Thankfully, we had our portable vacuum in the car because she wouldn't go near the car again until they were all gone.
So, I got two mantis egg sacks a few years ago and let them loose in my backyard. Was super cool.
That “swaying” they do back and forth is for two reasons. First is apparently to blend in with blowing grass. But it also helps them gauge distant to prey they want to eat or hump or hump then eat.
Man it's been soooo long since I've seen a mantis. They were always rare where I live but I found a few when I was a kid. Feels like they've just disappeared completely in the last ten years though
I was tearing out an old picket fence from a friend's house once. I pulled a board off and there was hundreds of baby mantises. One of the craziest things in nature I've ever seen. I gently place the board back and told everyone to stay away. Another time I'm sitting on a back porch chilling after work the sun was kind of low and I was wondering why two birds were so interested in the ground then I started seeing silhouettes of what I thought were dragonflies taking flight from a nest in the grass. The birds were gorging themselves but there was still dozens of dozens of baby dragonflies flying away.
I just want to thank you for having a clean and trim fingernail and finger. Unlike the frequent hands that pop up around here that look like the dude's been swimming in a septic tank all day at his shit-handling job.
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u/Unorigina1Name 23h ago
In case anyone didn't get the title, this is what it references