When humanity found out how long horseshoes crabs had been around, unchanging and perfect, they decided to name their divine human leaders after them.
That is why royalty are called 'blue-bloods'.
52I was taught it was because nobility were the only pale Spaniards in the middle ages, so they were the only people whose skin showed through the blue color of the veins. So they claimed their blue blood showed their divine right to royalty.
17Sacre-bleu!
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You • may • not • like • it • but • this • is • what • peak • performance • looks • like 🦀
46So like I know horseshoe crabs have been around nearly unchanged and all. And good for them!
But are you (general you, not op specifically) really trying to tell me that not once in their entire historical span of time on earth.. not one single time did anything evolve from a horseshoe crab?
Clearly I’m not saying the whole species changed, but that is separate from an offshoot population evolving into something different. Which surely must have happened, no?
30one single time did anything evolve from a horseshoe crab?
We don't talk about those cowards.
45Weirdly enough, evolution isn't random - it follows rules. We're still figuring out what those rules are, but it does in fact reach a certain point, then lock down the genes.
Horseshoe crabs are chemically incredible, they're extremely resilient and physically pretty good for their niche
Maybe they are a genetic endpoint
3Do you have any citations for that?
I’m not saying you are wrong, because I’m open to new information, but that’s not ever been my understanding of how evolution works, and I’ve read a ton on the topic.
Evolution continues even if a species doesn’t obviously change over time. Unless it’s an asexual reproducing species, gene recombination ensures some level of diversity, and more opportunity for novel traits. But even a clonally reproducing species have a chance for mutations, they are just significantly more likely to be detrimental than useful.
12Wait, so it's stops before 'the heat death of the universe'? That's bizarre!
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No reason to evolve if you're already a crab.
19Not even a crab, the Horseshoe is way more primitive
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Two things: first, horseshoe crabs almost certainly have changed/evolved considerably over four hundred million years, just in aspects of their physiology that aren't fossilized. Second, horseshoe crabs have like nine different types of eyes; even that tail is essentially one big eye, covered in photoreceptive cells. We humans consider ourselves the "dominant" species, but I don't think we could handle crawling around in slime and mud for four hundred million years quite as well as they have.
14Nah we drain the mud and build a road on it to run over our children. Much better.
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Even the speech bubbles look like them
13Why aren't these things considered Trilobites exactly? They look like Trilobites and I'm pretty sure they fill some of the same general niches? Is it just a taxonomical thing? Are they just not in the right clade?
12Not in the right clade, basically.
They look similar, but aren't directly related. It's similar to why legless lizards aren't snakes, and bats aren't birds.
3But snakes are legless lizards. Link to youtube
Edit: Wrong link, I'll leave the previous one anyways because it's also fun https://youtu.be/_5jNZyoSszE
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Obligatory individuals don't evolve, populations do.
I know it's just a silly meme but misconceptions about evolution unfortunately seem to be pretty widespread.
10if individuals don't evolve then explain why I have a Charizard.
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Aren't these the guys who drink blueberry smoothies?
9Yeah then they go down the waterslide
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5Who knew horseshoe crabs were the Pikachu's of the sea?
5Perfection is the end of evolution, it's a far predecessor of spiders and scorpions
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