tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post6072190643886302683..comments2024-03-25T09:31:36.926+01:00Comments on Furahan Biology and Allied Matters: How well can connected boxes learn to swim? The ecosystem game Sigmund Nastrazzurrohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16449461215427527447noreply@blogger.comBlogger54125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-91245456457207630012020-03-15T19:58:25.900+01:002020-03-15T19:58:25.900+01:00Um, Afish...
Bear a few things in mind:
1. human...Um, Afish...<br /><br />Bear a few things in mind:<br />1. humans and all other tetrapods can basically be described as "worms with bits thrown on".<br />2. if the simulated organisms all looked like familiar things, there would be cries of "utterly no imagination!" and such.<br />3. this is a demo, and thus will be rougher than the game itself.<br />4. this is an early demo, and thus will be rougher than later demos.<br /><br />-Anthony<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-29763570009516769392020-03-13T11:36:34.743+01:002020-03-13T11:36:34.743+01:00So I checked out this evolution simulator game cal...So I checked out this evolution simulator game called "Species: Artifical Life, Real Evolution":<br /><br />https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vYxpY5gJgrg<br /><br />And for the most part, I kinda like it. The portrayal of concepts such as speciation, random mutations (which can be enhanced by radiation) and the ability to evolve into a wide variety of niches is fairly realistic, and for the most part the player manipulates the environment and watches the creatures evolve.<br /><br />What I DON'T like, however, are the specific creature designs, which are far uglier than what Spore has to offer and often make no anatomical sense, looking like bizarre nondescript blobs... the narrator's descriptions of the creatures say it all:<br /><br />"it's like a praying mantis but really fat and on drugs"<br /><br />"just a furry sweet potato"<br /><br />"the dinosaur of the scrotum world"<br /><br />"what happens if Oscar the Grouch mated with a manatee"<br /><br />Look, I want to praise "Species: ALRE" for its accuracy and portrayal of evolutionary processes in a realistic way, while still allowing enough player input for it to be engaging and not just a simulation that you just watch. And I get that it's probably due to memory limitations of the game...but still, it's kind of hard to take an evolutionary simulator seriously when some floating multicolored tuber with an assortment of nonsensical appendages is somehow the apex predator of this ecosystem. Maybe if they could make them look like actual creatures at least?AFishWithHandsnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-59679175268110830972020-03-10T13:05:29.402+01:002020-03-10T13:05:29.402+01:00...said by I, Anthony. knew I forgot something.
...said by I, Anthony. knew I forgot something.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-11595553394123696302020-03-10T13:05:04.660+01:002020-03-10T13:05:04.660+01:00There are inexpensive websites available at https:...There are inexpensive websites available at https://conlang.org/become-a-member/ (Furaha involves both a mixing of Swahili and Dutch/Africaans if I recall)...and even if you decide against them, the folks at Conlang could probably point you to a good site.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-45088029131586727942020-03-09T12:10:09.158+01:002020-03-09T12:10:09.158+01:00maybe you could make a deviantart or tumblr accoun...maybe you could make a deviantart or tumblr account for furaha?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-91757470392042388002020-03-09T11:03:31.715+01:002020-03-09T11:03:31.715+01:00Dear all,
These threads are becoming hard to mana...Dear all,<br /><br />These threads are becoming hard to manage, with all these different subjects. I could reopen a forum, as at one time I had one on the Furaha site, but there already is a forum on speculative biology: https://specevo.jcink.net/<br /><br />I will still welcome comments on Furaha and allied matters, but for general comments that have little or nothing to do with a specific post, it is better to post these in that forum. he section 'Genral Spec' is suitable for such questions.<br /><br />By the way, I was informed that my provider will stop hosting websites, so I will have to find a new home for planetfuraha.org before 1 April (no joke here). That will probably take time and attention too. Sigmund Nastrazzurrohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16449461215427527447noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-44282037851304499992020-03-05T12:58:06.606+01:002020-03-05T12:58:06.606+01:00//specevo.jcink.net is the forum...if that doesn’t...//specevo.jcink.net is the forum...if that doesn’t help (I’m logged in, so there may be variation)...google “speculative evolution forum” and its not the reddit or taptalk ones.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-39814408849678901172020-03-05T08:48:49.896+01:002020-03-05T08:48:49.896+01:00Oh, i meant that they didn't have hi tech stuf...Oh, i meant that they didn't have hi tech stuff and industrial cities, they only reached hunter-gatherer and primitve agriculture before they began regressing.<br /><br />also where is the spec evo forum?ratbatcatnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-81211603886375045502020-03-05T01:39:41.218+01:002020-03-05T01:39:41.218+01:00Finally found it: Sat. 30 Jan. 2010 Greenworld I
...Finally found it: Sat. 30 Jan. 2010 Greenworld I<br /><br />-Anthony<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-24726390070446999852020-03-05T00:59:15.844+01:002020-03-05T00:59:15.844+01:00I, Anthony, do say
Nastrazzurro,
Apologies; I cou...I, Anthony, do say<br /><br />Nastrazzurro,<br />Apologies; I couldn’t find the relevant post, so I used exoskeleton wrongly, unable to recall the proper term/description.<br /><br />Hmm...so the bipterates (seasoar & flag, yes?) hail from a different Fishes group than marshmallow & kin?<br /><br />Ratbatcat ,<br />If it has language, culture, and art, it has civilization.<br /><br />I think one of Baxter’s novel series has a species who lost their minds in such a way...can’t lose a war if they can’t be combatants. Gabbleduck.<br /><br />Anon,<br />I could see such snake-eel-thing holding it’s dominance even if legged things emerge from the sea later on. As for fast savanna hunter sans legs. - cobras and pythons do fine in that role. As for a plains grazer...it’s already at eye level with its food - so no problems.<br /><br />Can we have these spec evo discussions in the spec evo forum?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-3775470237633771412020-03-04T12:13:46.260+01:002020-03-04T12:13:46.260+01:00Everyone's been dicussing tripods and tetrapod...Everyone's been dicussing tripods and tetrapods and hexapods as dominant vertebrate analogues but what if early on in a planet's history an eel-like "fish" with a long serpentine body and no appendages of any kind was the first creature to conquer land and its descendants became snake-like creatures? How would they occupy niches like "chasing predator" or "plains grazer" or "treetop browser"? Could limbless flight even be achieved in any way or will there simply be no bird-analogues?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-28179975877400640602020-03-04T11:47:22.718+01:002020-03-04T11:47:22.718+01:00Hmm...the idea about intelligence being a disadvan...Hmm...the idea about intelligence being a disadvantage reminded me of a concept i wrote a long time ago about evolution on an alien planet, where one species becomes intelligent and self-aware (but hasn't built a civilization), developing a true language, cultural traditions, limited fire use and a sense of aesthetic art.<br /><br />However, the climate gradually cools over the next few thousand years, food becomes scarce and populations become fragmented. with less food to fuel a big and energy hungry brain, and an increasingly more solitary lifestyle making a big brain less useful (after all intelligence is always a trait of social creatures), each succeeding generation becomes less and less intelligent, and 5 million years later their brains have atrophied to an almost reptile-level of intellect as they become dim-witted plains grazers who still look a lot like their formerly sapient ancestors.<br /><br />I wonder if this scenario is actually plausible? It even gets me thinking if such a process could occur to humans in a post apocalyptic event, with the survivors' children increasingly becoming less educated and undernourished generation after generation until humanity is reduced to just being yet another animal...ratbatcatnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-16604200745276815942020-03-04T09:48:08.961+01:002020-03-04T09:48:08.961+01:00Anonymous (28 feb, on mini whales): there already ...Anonymous (28 feb, on mini whales): there already are fairly small whales such as the harbour porpoise, but that is not a ballen whale. There could be two problems: as size decreases, it becomes relatively more difficult to insulate a warm body, and the second is whether filter feeding with baleen works for small volumes. Well otters are warm-blooded, small and aquatic, so that's one answer, and many fish of herring size are filter feeders, so that's the second one. All in all, yes, that should be possible. <br /><br />Intelligent snail (2 March, on evolution favouring less intelligence): I can think of scenarios where less intellogent animals outcompete mere intelligent ones. For example, in some Norwegian flords fish were all caught (stupid humans!) and jellyfish, more tolerant of pollution and with an incredibel procreation ability, now fill the ecosystem, which seems to be stable. how about bright-eyed amphibian evolving to become eyeless worm-like creatures? But you asked whther intelligence itself could be disadvantageous. I cannot think of a direct mechanism, only indirect ones: intelligence means many neurons, and that means time to grow and train those neurons as well as a great amount of energy. Take those away, as in the jellyfish scenario, and the stupid shall inherit the Earth. <br /><br />Sheatherius (3 March): I will send you an email<br /><br />Anthony (4 March): Sharp observation (as usual). In my slow rebuilding of Furaha, I left the terrestrial hexpods for last. I have a better idea of where they came from now, and that is from endoskeletal 'Fish' with dermal plates that at times have a structural, load-bearing role. There is no true exoskeleton. The capacity for armour is in principle present in all hexapod lineages, apparently except for bipterates and the two independent lineages of tetrapterates. (To avoid confusion: tetrapters are unrelated to hexapods and are exoskeletal.)Sigmund Nastrazzurrohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16449461215427527447noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-26051250486808521892020-03-04T00:30:39.562+01:002020-03-04T00:30:39.562+01:00A little(ish) Furaha question: it has been mentio...A little(ish) Furaha question: it has been mentioned in the past, that terrestrial hexapods have an easier time evolving armor {than, say, their Earthly analogues} because they have a leathery-exoskeletony skin in their distant ancestry that they can modify. (has this detail been cancelled?)<br /><br />Thus, I was wondering if aquatic members of the hexapod clade (either returned-to-the-sea or the branch(es) that never went on land) have this armor as well, or if its largely dormant in them.<br /><br />Thank you.<br /><br />-Anthony Docimo<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-27933412173274716552020-03-03T08:00:00.401+01:002020-03-03T08:00:00.401+01:00Nice! Glad to see the actual author of Serina acti...Nice! Glad to see the actual author of Serina active on this blog!<br /><br />(On a side note, do you happen to have a drawing of tribbethere internal anatomy? I wonder how their "stomach-derived lungs" or their caudal vertebrae modified into a leg are supposed to work?)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-55944876661797609712020-03-03T07:12:48.280+01:002020-03-03T07:12:48.280+01:00Hello, responding to above, I author Serina. The p...Hello, responding to above, I author Serina. The project is, slowly, ongoing with the last updates early this year, in the table of contents at the bottom of the Ultimocene page. You can contact me at Sheatherius@gmail.com if you have any reason to. <br /><br />Dylan Bajda Sheatheriushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09371082419893582767noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-77317460081926723392020-03-02T08:01:18.638+01:002020-03-02T08:01:18.638+01:00Is it possible for evolution to select for smaller...Is it possible for evolution to select for smaller brains and less intelligence? Like, not even a disease or cataclysm that wipes out all the intelligent species, but like the simpler-minded ones straight-up outcompete the clever individuals in a generally favorable envirnonment for...some reason?<br /><br />Like, evolution isn't actually selecting for bigger brains actively, obviously, and even highly advanced intelligent life can become extinct if they can't easily adapt to a changing environment, like the fork-tailed babbling jay from the Serina project. But is there a situation where being intelligent or even quasi-sapient is actually a disadvantage to survival and the more instinct-driven members of the species have the upper hand?<br /><br />(Excluding of course a scenario where the sapient individuals develop politics and religion and go to war over it, killing themselves off while their chimp-intelligence peers go about their monkey business...)intelligent snailnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-74825533232036572232020-02-28T09:31:06.998+01:002020-02-28T09:31:06.998+01:00Would a tiny whale make sense anatomically? I was ...Would a tiny whale make sense anatomically? I was doodling some spec evo animals set 100 million years in the future and one species I thought of was a freshwater baleen whale about the size of a platypus and lived a similar lifestyle, using whisker-like bristles to root out small invertebrates in the bottom substrate. Given though that baleen whales now are super big, are there constraints preventing mini-cetaceans?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-78587467450088599402020-02-26T17:30:27.836+01:002020-02-26T17:30:27.836+01:00Jonathan: you can learn more about these animals b...Jonathan: you can learn more about these animals by reading this: https://planetfuraha.blogspot.com/2012/04/four-years-on-and-back-again.html<br /><br />You can also look for 'centaurism' in the blog; you will find several posts on the subject.<br />Sigmund Nastrazzurrohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16449461215427527447noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-32419878650131926762020-02-26T11:50:19.417+01:002020-02-26T11:50:19.417+01:00what are those creatures on your profile pic? the ...what are those creatures on your profile pic? the yellow bird-like centaur thing chasing the one that looks like a blue hexapod moose?Jonathannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-25118918463264564902020-02-25T17:44:54.836+01:002020-02-25T17:44:54.836+01:00oh it can't link to tumblr, its a bit wonky.
...oh it can't link to tumblr, its a bit wonky.<br /><br />but i've seen that post before and it's a neat little touch on "odd walkers", where dolphins become ambush predators hunting land prey, using their foreflippers and tail flukes in a sea lion like gait, and eventually they develop hooves on their flippers and tail and become akin to a three-legged entelodont.<br /><br />strangely they also re-evolve hair. is it possible to regain such long lost traits? like say a blind cave fish is the only survivor of a mass extinction and returns to the surface, could it re evolve eyes?flishnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-11648301319827321212020-02-25T17:30:22.095+01:002020-02-25T17:30:22.095+01:00Tribbetherium (sopcial shrimp): very nice indeed!
...Tribbetherium (sopcial shrimp): very nice indeed!<br /><br />Giorno Giovanna on edibility: I guess the word implies that eating the 'edible' something is not fatal. Somewher else, you may reads that Furaha Sawjaws cannot digest humans, but onfortunately for them only find that out after having eaten a human. But more seriously, I think that science fiction treats alien bacteria and biochemistry as invisible subjects to be ignored at will. Suppose humans could really walk around on an alien planet with its own life and biochenistry. Would our bacteria have an impact on the plabet? How about the reverse? So far, I have treated that the same way everyone else does: ignore it... (perhaps I will write a post on the subject).<br /><br />Baboing on multiple species: I agree with Anthony: there is no reason it cannot happen. <br /><br />Sonic: couldn't see the site, sorry (they have no 'reject all privacy invasions' button). <br /><br />And I also agree with Anthony in that many of these questions might be better placed on the speculative biology forum: you will find more people there to provide answers. I look in occasionally. <br /> Roelienhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02033683308678776480noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-63577941442523440522020-02-25T10:46:46.755+01:002020-02-25T10:46:46.755+01:00thoughts about the idea of "land ceteceans&qu...thoughts about the idea of "land ceteceans"? found this interesting discussion about the concept on tumblr: <br /><br />https://alphynix.tumblr.com/post/175439816884/so-in-the-light-of-the-ridiculous-titan-dolphinsonic the hedgehog's inflamed and swollen pancreasnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-10146283984312856902020-02-25T05:44:46.351+01:002020-02-25T05:44:46.351+01:00Giorno - flygs are edible...you're asking abou...Giorno - flygs are edible...you're asking about nutriciousness, a different matter. :)<br /><br />they can, Baboing, quite easily; its another question whether they would overlap in time. but I don't see any reason why they couldn't get along to one degree or another - some say (as one random-ish example) elephants are too smart to be domesticated, others say its their lifespans interfering.<br /><br />there's an excellent forum for spec discussions and questions like this: https://specevo.jcink.net/index.php?act=idx<br /><br />-anthony.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5821098719340852065.post-49688840770287495862020-02-24T18:00:39.777+01:002020-02-24T18:00:39.777+01:00can more than one sapient species evolve on the sa...can more than one sapient species evolve on the same planet or will they inevitably wipe each other out like homo sapiens did with all the other hominids at the dawn of civilizationbaboingnoreply@blogger.com