bombus

LOL! Read these lyrics: SYSTEMATIC DEATH system, system, system - death in life system, system, system - the surgeons knife system, system, system - hacking at the cord system, system, system - a child is born poor little ****er, poor little kid never asked for life, no she never did poor little baby, poor little mite crying out for food as her parents fight crying out for food as her parents fight! system, system, system - send him to school system, system, system - force him to crawl system, system, system - teach him how to cheat system, system, system - kick him off his feet poor little schoolboy, poor little lad they'll pat him if he's good, beat him if he's bad poor little kiddy, poor little chap they'll force feed his mind with their useless crap force feed his mind with their useless crap! system, system, system - they'll teach her how to cook system, system, system - they'll teach her how to look system, system, system - they'll teach her all the tricks system, system, system - create another victim for their greasy pricks poor little girly, poor little wench another little object to prod and pinch poor little sweety, poor little filly they'll **** her mind so they can **** her silly **** her mind so they can **** her silly! system, system, system - he's grown to be a man system, system, system - he's been taught to fit the plan system, system, system - forty years of jobs system, system, system - pushing little buttons, pulling little knobs poor ****ing worker, poor little serf working like a mule for half of what he's worth poor ****ing grafter, poor little gent working for the cash that he's already spent working for the cash that he's already spent! he's selling his life, she's his loyal wife timid as a mouse, she's got her little house he's got his little car and they share the cocktail bar she likes to cook his meals, you know, something that appeals sometimes he works til late so his supper has to wait but she doesn't really mind cos he's getting overtime he likes to put a bit away just for that rainy day cos every little counts when the cost of living mounts they do the pools each week hoping for that lucky break then they'd take a trip abroad, do all the things they can't afford she'd really like to have a fur, he'd like a bigger car they could buy a bungalow, with a georgian door for show he might think of leaving work, but no, he wouldn't like to shirk he'd much prefer to stay and get his honest days pay he's got a life of work ahead, there's no rest for the dead she's tried to make it nice, he's said thankyou once or twice system, system, system - deprived of any hope system, system, system - taught they couldn't cope system, system, system - slaves right from the start system, system, system - til death do them part poor little ****ers, what a sorry pair had their lives stolen, but they didn't really care poor little darlings, just your ordinary folks victims of the system and its cruel jokes victims of the system and its cruel jokes! the couple views the wreckage and dreams of home sweet home they'd almost paid their mortgage when the system dropped its bomb. Indeed, and who creates that neurosis? The USA (in fact the West) fights itself - all over the world. Life isn't fair, but maybe we should be trying to make it as fair as we can?

A really heavy dose of influenza gives pretty good hallucinations too. I'd still say that in general hallucinogenic drugs are the safest method, particularly LSD which is very clean compared to mushrooms and 'natural' hallucinogens. I must say that I really wouldn't recommend them though. They're best left well alone! P.S. one other method is to sit in a totally dark room for 48 hours.

The plank constant is the size of pixels in the simulation that we inhabit!

No, I didn't miss the point. Its just that the 'ability' of sterile workers is based upon the genes of the queen. They cannot themselves influence evolution, as any ability they have to influence the gene pool was already 'coded' before they were born - in the queens genes. I'm not sure, and will find out, but I think the evolving bit only involved the fertile queens 'inventing' the idea of 'sister' sterile workers. Oh, and in answer to THEDARKSHADE the point of the thread wasn't really about aliens per se. It was about evolution (via natural selection), and what is possible and what is not. Yes, but that makes sense and I can't see how it has anything to do with bees! If you were immune to AIDS but sterile, you wouldn't pass any genes on, no matter how immune you were!

The sterile workers didn't evolve at all. It is only the queens/drones that evolved to produce sterile workers.

Well, the queen bee (or wasp, ant, termite) and drones pass on the genes. All the workers are offspring, but never pass on their genes. But their effectiveness depends on the queen's 'fitness' and the 'fitness' of the drone that she mated with. 'Successful' (fit) queens produce effective workers, who ensure that her fertile offspring (young queens and young drones) leave the nest at the right time and spread her genes (well, 50% of them). The sterile offspring are really no more than 'arms and legs' of the queen (and drone). The better your arms and legs, the better chance of passing your genes on.

Lucaspa, You present that theory as if it is the accepted one. The 'running raptor' theory is only one possible explanation. This has not been proven - although highly possible, as is the 'tree down' theory.

I'd have to disagree with you. Who is actually winning? Who gets the nice life? Who gets the money, power, privilage? Who does the system ultimately benefit? Who does most of the dying to maintain this system?

Ho ho ho, how blindly jingoistic you US citizens can be! Do you honestly think I'd be upset if you said UK elections were rigged? Anyway, I nonetheless agree that rigged is a bit strong, but it was a judicial coup, made possible by denying the vote to black and other likely democrat voters. Basically, all I was trying to say is that it's a bit rich for the US to say that the Russian election was dodgy! Let he who has not sinned cast the first stone etc.. Also, as I have often said, I am not anti-American. I am anti-capitalist, and anti Bush, and anti right-wing, but not anti-American. There are many good checks and balances in the US that protect citizens freedoms and rights in principle. However, in general the US system favours the companies, the establishment, the rich, and allows the poor and middle classes to be ripped off and the environment damaged. The checks and balances that are in place end up being ineffective but pacify the people allowing the rip-off to continue. I think we've gone a bit off-topic here:-)

The thing is, at what point does it become a disadvantage to the individual to be a late developer. Probably never! Thusly the species would 'evolve' into exinction (if it lived on such a violent world). An evolutionary bottleneck, such as cheetahs are probably in: cheetahs sacrifice power for speed. At some point in the future they will not be able to catch AND kill their prey (which can keep getting lighter and faster - unlike the cheetah). The extra effort to defend their families would complicate matters though.

Yes, I can see what you are saying, and it sounds believable. Basically, those individuals that can protect their offspring better than others are more likely to pass on their genes to the next generation because their offspring don't die before they breed. This could presumably work at the group level (not just at the family level). However, according to accepted science, evolution only works at the level of individuals passing on more of their genes. On that note, surely it would be an advantage for an individual in a colony to be a late developer so delaying the onset of a post-reproductive phase and carry on mating, while others (who have become warriors) defend his genes. Thus in the next generation there would be more late developers than there would otherwise be, ad infinitum???

Well, these were ideas in sci-fi books (Ian M Banks novels) and it didn't explain. It just happens after a certain point in the life of Idirans, which are 9 ft tall three legged aliens: Physique Full-grown Idirans stand about three meters tall on a tripod of legs and have two arms. There is some hint of fully trilateral symmetry in their ancestry, as a third, vestigial, arm has evolved into a chest-flap which the Idirans use to create loud, booming warning signals. They have a saddle-shaped head with two eyes at each end of the saddle. Idirans are biologically immortal and are very resilient to physical damage as they are protected by a natural keratinous body-armour and can withstand catastrophic damage and even remain conscious, though they do not naturally regenerate. They are dual hermaphrodites, each half of a couple impregnating the other. After one or two pregnancies Idirans lose their fertility and develop into the warrior stage, reaching greater size and weight, the armour hardening fully. Idiran warriors are capable of taking enormous amounts of damage and can survive massive trauma that would kill a human being instantly-for example, losing a large fraction of their head. The biological immortality was a result of their evolution as the 'top monster on a planet full of monsters', where strong natural selection pressure and a strong background radiation (causing mutations) prevented the biological immortality from stifling the evolution of the species

Good answer. Yes, maybe even in four limbed creatures a third leg could start off as a tail and become progressively more limb like? I like the idea of the Integral trees. Three limbs could be very useful in that sort of '3D' environment. Orangutans have in effect four arms, rather than two arms and two legs, so presumably three arms in a 3 D environment may be better than two, but then maybe four is even better - how about five!. Reptiles, birds and mammals have a pentadactyl limbs, and two arms, two legs and a head = five, so there are probably very old genetic codes for five 'things' within Earth creatures... nyuk nyuk:-)

Sexual reproduction passes on 50% of the genes from each sex (50% from the father, 50% from the mother). This is true in hermaphrodites as well. Three sexes would cut this down to 33.3% each, four sexes 25% each etc... I think the issue is that they all ultimately have to follow the laws of Physics, which biology is based on. But in moulds only two sexes are actually involved in any single reproductive act. Mmm. I think the fact that Alzheimers still exists as a disease may be because it cannot be 'weeded out' by evolutionary processes as it in general occurs after the reproductive phase. =========================== Again, probably due to the laws of physics, and the fact that nature likes simple solutions - even if they create complex systems when they interact together.

Lucaspa, you have misunderstood so many of my arguments that i shall just restate it from the start and very clearly for you, else we'll end up going all over the place. I maintain that our current multitude of types of Homo sapiens are developed from a basic stock of humans comprising three (or four) sub-species. These sub-species were/are: 1. Caucoisoid (an inaccurate term including modern Europeans, Mediterraneans, Persians, Afghans, Northern Indians, Western Russians etc) 2. Negroid (Sub-saharan Africans) 3. Mongaloid: (Chinese, Japanese, Inuit, ongls, North American and South American 'Indians' etc) 4. Australoid (Veddans, Australian aborigines, Ainu, Uralics) Some class this as a sub-group of 1. There has been much mixing of these basic 'sub-species' producing a multitude of groups that show a range of morphological features. However, the basic sub-species are still around and are readily distinguishable by geographical location. Just so you are absolutely clear, I DO KNOW that humans are not divided in scientific textbooks into sub-species, that's not the point. The point is whether we could (and be scientifically correct) if we chose to do so. One other thing, regarding Apes and Humans, I said Genus but should have said Family. The point was to illustrate that taxonomy is often arbitrary - as is the 'decision' NOT to sub-divide humans into sub-species. Also, Melanesians are not related to Negroid people. They have developed their characteristics independently. I am correct!

Thanks for the messages above. My own thoughts are... 1. Three-legged locomotion although possible (as is tri-radial symmetry etc) is probably not as efficient as having two, four, six, eight, etc legs. i.e., it is likely that there must be some selection factor that favours an even number of legs. However, as mentioned above, it could have been pure chance, and if starfish had colonized land first maybe we'd have something different. Despite this, I can't imagine how three legs could be an advantage over two... 2. I was indeed referring to three sexes being involved in reproduction. I would guess that the advantages of mixing up genes (improved chances of resistance to pathogens etc) is fine with two sexes as each individual still passes on 50% of its genes to the next generation. If one moves to three sexes, any individual only passes on 33.3% of genes. The advantage of resistance is probably outweighed by the disadvantage of passing less genes on, so two sexes is the best. Thus, I guess that three sexes (or more) involved in reproduction is probably unecessary anywhere in the universe. Nature doesn't like waste afterall ! Here's another one for you (still keep commenting on the first two though!) An individual of an alien race, once 50 years old, loses its ability to reproduce and becomes a pure warrior to defend the colony (it develops a hardened carapace, huge size, immense strength etc). I don't think this can evolve if it occurs in the post reproductive phase. Am I correct?

Are there any scenarios that would favour the evolution of three legged aliens? Are there any scenarios that could favour three (or more) sexes involved in reproduction? These are two things that I have read in sci-fi that I don't think are likely...

I agree, it's a dictatorship by 'The Companies' - so really an Oligarchy. The checks and balances don't really help much though do they? They pacify the population by making them believe the system must therefore be fair. They don't really work on the BIG issues. The checks and balances, and the supposed 'democracy' ensure that the status quo always remains, with very very little change!

My point is that 'it' started when Zionist Jews siezed by force land that was previously occupied by a peaceful Palestinian people who were willing to let displaced Jews settle in their country. It's like allowing someone in need to live in your house only to find them taking ownership and forcing you to live in the garage! I'm sure you'd be mad about it. Can I have your house and land then please, if you find it so arbitrary:-)

According to the above, I'd say they do - or at least, the 'races' we have today developed from three (four?) sub-species. Agreed. Agreed, but that doesn't mean a thing. E.g., Humans belong the Genus Homo, but Apes are classed as Pongo, for no specific reason apart from the fact that they are not human! Agreed, but not really on topic. The question was whether different races could develop into different species if isolated. It only takes some members each race (however one defines them) to be isolated for new species to emerge. Agreed. " Agreed. Not according to the Radio 4 program I recently listened to with the guy who mapped the human genome. Anyway, genetic difference is not necessarily relevant. Yes, but that doesn't affect the argument. The quoted source was Wiki, but I was taught it in University. Basically, although human races are not divided into subspecies, if the 'rules' were applied to humans one could quite correctly divide us up into three or four subspecies. Maybe, but again, doesn't really affect my argument. No idea what your on about there?? Are you on drugs? And? Well, now we are in the 21st Century obviously not! But humans are probably starting to merge as a single 'race'/sub-species, from three/four 'historical' ones. Sub-species can freely breed with each other and produce fertile offspring.

Indeed! The natural world is totally amazing. Just a shame we're killing it all off! http://www.well.com/user/davidu/extinction.html

Not all Israelis are Zionist Jews. Not all Israelis are Jews. Not all Jews are Zionist. Not all Jews in Israel are Zionist. Anyway. My point was only to highlight the underlying issue to the current 'problem'. Good post Lockheed! The bacteria were there before the Dinos!

Maybe I misunderstood you. However, I maintain that human races as described above can be considered sub-species, although I accept that it may depend on exactly what definition is used. As there is no universally accepted definition of species (see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species_concept#Definitions_of_species) there can't really be one for sub-species...

Much of the Himalayan area is well below this - hence Yaks and other wildlife surviving there. I just think that the area is so vast and unpopulated there is more of a chance that a Yeti could be there but undetected. I don't think the same is true for Bigfoot. From what I've read, there's convincing arguments on both sides. I remain undecided.

I agree. He has stopped his people being fleeced by the multinationals, oligarchs and gangsters. He doesn't crumble as soon as the companies raise their eyebrows like western leaders. Al Gore should have run for President. He'd have won hands down this time. The USA is a dictatorship. You are just made to think you have a say! All you get to vote on is colour of the ship, not the direction it's going. The West exports capitalism, not democracy. And the USA should know all about rigged elections. You had one in 2000 remember!