enaronia:

deflare:

raphaeliscoolbutrude:

writing-prompt-s:

“In a game with no consequences, why are you still playing the ‘Good’ side?”

Because being mean makes me feel bad.

Because my no-consequences power fantasy is being able to help everyone.

Good is better. That’s why they call it “good”. It’s right in the name.

mostlysignssomeportents:

A group of elite Google Cloud engineers simply refused to put any work into an airgap system designed to let the company bid on sensitive military contracts, which undermined the company’s ability to seek military work.

This happened “earlier this year” according to a Bloomberg report, and was the inspiration for the  googlers’ successful uprising over sale of AI tools to the Pentagon’s drone program.

The engineers who participated in the boycott are known internally as the “Group of Nine” and were lionized by their colleagues for their ethical refusal to work on a project that would see the company’s engineering might turned to military applications.

https://boingboing.net/2018/06/23/gone-gone-pentagon.html

annevbonny:

anyway i love that thor ragnarok parades around as this cute fun happy go lucky inoffensive film even though at its core it’s just a big resounding FUCK YOU against imperialism and colonialism. thor stands by and watches his ancestral home be completely destroyed because he figures out that asgard was built on the backs of invaded and enslaved people. the second his father’s crimes are exposed he does the right fucking thing and lets it all burn instead of excusing his own ignorance. that scene of the tapestry coming down is so goddamned fucking iconic i could cry oh man  

(Source: jamesvflint)

rattlesnek asked: What quadrupedal carnivorous dinosaurs do we know of? It seems like we’re saturated with theropods

palaeofail-explained:

palaeofail-explained:

None! All known quadrupedal dinosaurs were obligatory or facultative herbivores.

Spinosaurids have, at various times, been suggested to have been quadrupedal; I don’t find this likely, however, as their hands don’t show any weight-bearing adaptations and I can see no reason why they would need to be.

The ankylosaur Liaoningosaurus has been suggested to have been piscivorous due to apparent preserved fish in the gut and supposed aquatic adaptations. I have my doubt about this; I don’t see why the fish bones in the body couldn’t have been from either scavenging fish or that they were simply washed in. Some of the supposed swimming adaptions have either been shown to be inaccurate (the “belly armour” was probably preserved skin) or may not be piscivorous adaptions (lack of fusion, odd proportions may be due to juvenile specimens).

#this is so whack#i wonder why that is

The ancestor of all dinosaurs was a biped. So, why did quadrupedal dinosaur evolve quadrupedality?

For sauropods, the answer is guts. Plants are way harder to digest and are less nutritious than meat, so herbivores need to be able to have massive guts in order to hold large amounts of plants and break them down over long periods of time. (This may also be the case in silesaurids, a group closely related to dinosaurs)

Ornithischians got around this by changing their hip configuration so that their guts could go back further, and indeed many ornithischians were bipedal. So why did some become quadrupedal? In thyreophorans, they evolved heavy bony armour, likely to prevent predation from theropods. In ceratopsians, their heads became very large, in part due to increased space for anchoring jaw muscles (for chewing plants) and and defence against predators. Ornithopods always retained some bipedal capabilities, and only started walking quadrupedally when they got really big, and the weight of their guts couldn’t all be compensated for by moving it backwards.

If we look at it this way, it seems that dinosaurs only evolved quadrupedality when they had to due to the effects of being an herbivore.

This is probably due in large part to the evolutionary history of dinosaur ancestors. The earliest tetrapods were superficially lizardlike animals; they walked with a sprawled posture.

(A typical sprawled-stance tetrapod. Image by Deror Avi)

This is a very energetically efficient posture, as the animal doesn’t have to waste energy holding itself up. There is a big downside though - animals with this posture waggle their bodies back and forth when they run, meaning that their lungs collapse and they can’t breathe while running. The ancestors of dinosaurs solved this problem by adopting an erect stance, which allowed them to breathe while they ran.

(Coelophysis, an early dinosaur. Image in public domain)

The transition from sprawled posture to erect (yes, yes, you’re very mature), however, had the side effect of effectively locking the hands in a position where the palms face each other. This was really always the case - in sprawled-stance animals, the palms are in this position as well. The arms were just swung out to the side so that the palms were flat down.

Humans have the luxury of being able to rotate our forearm bones past each other, so we tend to assume this is the case for everything. It’s not. We can only rotate our wrists because of a special cylindrical joint between the two bones in our forearm that lets one turn while the other stays still. Dinosaurs didn’t have this.

(Human radius/ulna from Pearson (source); Deinocheirus by Ryan DeLuca on Flickr)

In dinosaur lineages that took to all fours, they couldn’t simply turn their wrists and go; they were locked in position. Some groups (namely sauropods and thyreophorans) evolved twisted forearms that were locked with palms facing backwards (or “down”); others (namely ceratopsians and ornithopods) kept the palms facing inwards and just walked with their hands turned like that. (We don’t really know much about the hands of silesaurids, but i suspect they did something similar to this as well)

(Iguanodon, an ornithopod. By Scott Hartman @skeletaldrawing (source))

So, why didn’t theropods ever evolve quadrupedality? Because of their evolutionary history, dinosaurs were kind of up a blind alley when it came to re-evolving quadrupedality. The lineages that did take to four legs likely did so as side-effects of their herbivory, and there wasn’t really any factor that was strong enough to push (known) theropods into quadrupedality.

probablyrockinrpgideas:

jurvektheblogsmer:

perkwunos:

demi-steph:

grettir-dun:

anchovy-official:

bonehandledknife:

spirit-of-science:

perkwunos:

Dwarves shit huge and pee little… elves pee large and shit barely at all

Dwarves work in mines, their kidneys are in overdrive clearing all of the toxins and heavy metals they come into contact with. Their diet is mostly high efficiency foods, such as meat and fat and mushrooms. They probably don’t get a lot of plant matter in their diets.

Meanwhile elves’ diet is almost 100% plant matter (and all of the fiber that comes along with that) and their lifestyle is obsessed with fresh air, clean water, and a pure environment.

Face the facts: dwarves pee huge and shit little, and elves shit large and pee barely at all

However: 

Dwarves find belching polite and good fun, a compliment to the drink and cook. Farting, however, is crass– after all, farting in a mine shaft? Just think about it. It’s like blasting your buddies in the car and locking the windows, but in this case there are no windows to lock. You’re just sealed up in the darkness, inhaling Dvalin’s particular brand of beer-cheese-eggs-and-mushroom while your beard hairs curl and your eyes water. 

Conversely, Elves rip ass all the time because they subsist on fart fuel. Because they eat plant matter, they aren’t too ripe but they are loud enough to rattle the surrounding forestry, which the Elves delight in. Proper Elvish farts are released right next to an innocent victim in a stealth maneuver, as quietly as possible. The aggressor stands innocently nearby, until the victim begins to protest and complain and accuse, at which time a good laugh is had by all (except the unfortunate victim). The other beloved Elvish tradition is to loudly rip one in a quiet room, then firmly and solemnly chasten the nearest Elf for it– this one is favored by elder, Elves with the most dignified personalities. 

Who the fuck decided we needed this?

God did when she moved my fingers to type the original post. 

It’s been nothing but hardship and regret from there on, but I still trust that it’s part of a greater plan.

Jggfjkjffb

Fyi

kateordie:

lastoneout:

ishipmyotp:

What if Scrooge McDuck talked like how Scottish people on twitter talk?

Sorry this was too good a concept

This is a work of genius

archer-bro:

celticpyro:

helly-watermelonsmellinfellon:

sicut-anima:

haiku-robot:

dorito-and-pinetree:

galahadwilder:

A sudden, terrifying thought

When you see an animal with its eyes set to the front, like wolves, or humans, that’s usually a predator animal.

If you see an animal with its eyes set farther back, though—to the side—that animal is prey.

Now look at this dragon.

See those eyes?

They’re to the SIDE.

This raises an interesting—and terrifying—question.

What in the name of Lovecraft led evolution to consider DRAGONS…

As PREY?

I know this isn’t part of my blogs theme but like this is interesting

i know this isn’t part
of my blogs theme but like this
is interesting

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^Haiku^{^bot^8. I detect haikus with 5-7-5 format. Sometimes I make mistakes.} | @image-transcribing-bot @portmanteau-bot | Contact | HAIKU BOT NO | Good bot! | Beep-boop!

What species hunts dragons for sport?

What species glorifies the slaughter of dragons as the sport of kings?

What species are you?

Holy shit.

Harold, they’re reptiles.

This has been another exciting episode of “Tumblr Fails Biology.”

bigfatscience:

bigfatscience:

bigfatscience:

There are some very angry people in my notes and inbox this week. Apparently,  I am “toxic” and “evil” because I reported the results of 50 years of weight-loss research. They are mad because the research definitively and conclusively demonstrates that long-term maintenance of weight loss is virtually impossible. They also think I am “delusional” because I criticize the medical establishment for keeping this fact a secret from the general public.

The truth is that the ineffectiveness and harmful nature of intentional weight-loss is well known within the scientific and medical communities. If pressed, most doctors will affirm that their clinical experience conforms to the scientific results: Basically everyone who loses weight will go on to regain that weight within 3-5 years. In 75% of cases, they will regain more weight than they lost. 

This knowledge is why doctors became so desperate that they resorted to amputating parts of the digestive tract in the hopes that it might finally result in long-term weight-loss. Except oops, that doesn’t work either. Oh, and it causes death,  addiction, malnutrition, and suicide. Whoopsie daisy.

Diet culture is fucking toxic. And people deserve to know the truth.

You are wrong!!! All you have to do is try xyz and you can lose weight!!

I will believe claims like this when you show me a meta analysis of at least 10 random and controlled experiments, published in a high caliber empirical journal. That is the burden of proof. I provided such proof of my claims (indeed, the first two links I provided reference multiple meta-analyses supporting my claims). Now it’s your turn.

Apparently my first link does not work. Here is another. And another. And the citation, it is readily available from google sources.

Mann, T., Tomiyama, A. J., Lew, A. M., Westling, E., Chatman, J., & Samuels, B. (2007). Medicare’s search for effective obesity treatments: Diets are not the answer. American Psychologist, 62, 220-233. PMID: 17469900