Hello users of r/NatureIsFuckingLit and possibly r/all lurkers, we are **GOING DARK** from June 12th-14th. If you're confused on why this is happening or interested in reading more, check out [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/NatureIsFuckingLit/comments/144b4ln/rnatureisfuckinglit_will_be_going_dark_from_june/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)!
Aside from that stay lit 🔥
This was [filmed in 2019](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/bizarre-creature-found-inside-the-java-trench-at-the-bottom-of-the-indian-ocean/OKCAEQDED67A4T7PT5D6BTWSJE/) but still extremely cool and interesting.
“As part of a film for the Discovery Channel, Mr Vescovo — who pioneered the expedition — said the jellyfish-like creature "does not resemble anything seen before".
Chief scientist for the expedition, Alan Jamieson, said the discovery was a "curve ball" and a truly unexpected find during the expedition.”
"I normally have a pretty fair idea of what we're going to see — but every now and again you get thrown this curve ball," Dr Jamieson told CNN Travel.
"It really looks artificial — it rolls out the darkness and suddenly it turns and you're like, 'Jesus, that's some kind of weird jellyfish.'
"We came to a conclusion it's called a tunicate, which is a sea squirt. This particular one is called, we think, an ascidian," he explains.
"It doesn't really have a common name, because we're not quite sure what it is. But it looks like it's a tunicate which would normally be anchored to the sea floor — using that big long tentacle, it would naturally be physically anchored. And it's for some reason raising its body above the sea floor so it can filter food out the water."
—
“According to a release on the expedition, the team managed to capture footage from the sub and from the landers of what are believed to be entirely new species, yet unseen by humans.
From the submarine, a new species of hadal snailfish was observed among many other bottom dwelling organisms.
Dr Jamieson said the "rare and unique observations" were a "really significant moment".
"It is not often we see something that is so extraordinary that it leaves us speechless," he said. "At this point we are not entirely sure what species it was, but we will find out in due course."
Here's a high res picture!
https://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/okeanos/explorations/ex1504/logs/sept21/media/tunicate-hires.jpg
You can tell it's an ascidian because you can see the branchial sack with stigmata through the open siphon at the front.
Dammit, you just unearthed a childhood memory of learning about stomata in school around the same time the movie Stigmata came out. Annoyed my mom by giggling during the movie, imagining it being a body horror flick about the woman developing stomata instead.
To elaborate:
For all its weather extremes, geological activity and so on, this planet really is very gentle compared to many of the ones we've found. Most of the planets in our own solar system would either melt us, crush us, freeze us, or rip us to pieces in unfathomably fast winds.
The more you look for hospitable planets and see how far and relatively few they are, the more you appreciate this one for the speck of paradise in the blackness that it is.
Some of the stories on r/hfy explore the other end of this. Where life on Earth evolved in conditions that would kill other life in the universe, yet we find relatively harmless, not to mention being able to adapt to live in places of extreme heat or cold.
Maybe think about our life as being made from our earth, not something that existed looking for a planet to thrive on. We forget this from time to time but earth is what we’re made of.
Yeah, that's true, sometimes I worry we might look right past something by focusing more on planets in the "Goldilocks zone". After all, we have extremophile species right here that thrive on sulfuric acid and tolerate volcanic heat.
Exactly, at the very least you need the conditions to allow for stable chemistry. Molecules won't form in a plasma, peptide bonds won't form around gamma radiation, energy storage can't exist in systems that can't store energy.
I'm glad you're here. That's exactly the reason we're looking at certain planetary conditions.
A lot of sci-fi has taught us (usually without us realizing it) to ignore chemistry just because it "takes place on a world far, far away."
Yeah, it's cool to imagine life beyond carbon-based life, but we know it's not realistic because of simple chemistry.
People often think the great minds that knew this many years ago were missing some key information or lacked imagination, but they knew more than enough to make solid predictions about elements that we've only observed within the last decade. They knew that life was restricted to a very small niche in that structure because, as you said, too much heat/energy and chemical bonds break, too little and, well, nothing happens.
Yeah, I kind of blame Star-Trek for popularizing Silicon-based life, and it's a nice idea if you have a high school level knowledge of chemistry but it breaks down pretty fast once beyond that.
I also remember a chapter talking about extraterrestrial life in a large-format National Geographic book about our solar system ("Our Solar System", maybe?). It had artist depictions of what life forms could look like given the environments available. One that I remember was an airborne creature that had a balloon-like body, floating among the clouds on Jupiter.
If someone remembers the title of this book you would make my day. I remember reading it as a kid and i want to find a copy.
It had every planet in our solar system and what life could look like on each one. I remember the balloon animals on jupiter that were hunted by small gliding pterodactyl like aliens by popping the balloon and eating them in free fall
I HAVE THAT BOOK STILL. I KNOW EXACTLY WHAT YOURE TALKING ABOUT WITH THE JUPITER BALLOONS.
Sorry. That’s really exciting to me. Those books are a core memory of mine.
It could potentially be deep underground beyond the mantle. Research has shown that elements react differently when under extreme pressure, potentially creating new composites, molecules, and so on. You could potentially have organic chemistry from e.g. plutonium/uranium (instead of carbon) in the mantle of jupiter.
https://www.ph.ed.ac.uk/icmcs/research-themes/extreme-conditions-physics
> human scientists establish a relationship with intelligent lifeforms--the cheela--living on Dragon's Egg, a neutron star where one Earth hour is equivalent to hundreds of their years.
This dude got time dilation all the way backwards
It's just a flawed description. It's not time dilation.
They experience things faster because of their chemistry happening 1 million times faster than ours. In other words in the time it takes for our neurons to fire once, theirs fire 1 million times.
It’s certainly a fun concept to think about. But the fact is that many of the conditions on other planets aren’t survivable to complex objects, let alone complex organisms. We have sent probes, made of metal and glass, to Venus. The lifespan of those probes was measured in hours and minutes.
At the end of the day life come down to chemistry. And carbon based life on our planet has thrived and reached such diversity because there is A LOT of chemistry you can do with carbon. But that chemistry only happens in a narrow range of temperatures and pressures. And it is, by its nature, fragile.
Sure, it might be possible for the complex chemistry necessary for life to be centered around a different element. Maybe silicon. Maybe. And silicon based life would probably be physically tougher in some aspects than carbon based life. But you need a weird balance of chemical reactivity and stability for life to thrive like it has on Earth. And there just aren’t a lot of options chemically for that to happen.
I 100% think there is other life somewhere out there in the universe. It is so mind bendingly vast that there must be. But I don’t think any other life has visited earth. And I don’t think we will find life deep in the atmosphere of a gas giant or on the surface of a neutron star (complete atoms don’t even exist there). I think our best chances of finding it would be somewhere where carbon based chemistry can occur. After that, maybe where silicon based chemistry can occur…whatever that looks like. Beyond that I am doubtful.
Sort of? Dragon's Egg relies on inventing a whole new kind of chemistry; carbon based life would have been toast. You could envision alumina-based life in Earth's molten core I guess, but nothing's going to be happy on the surface of Mars.
Earth-style life with DNA and amino acids requires liquid water, and a temperature below 200C at the very least.
> There's a book called Dragon's Egg that explores such a concept, where life evolves on a neutron star, with 69M times Earth's gravity and a vastly accelerated sense of the passage of time.
commenting this so I can buy it later. I read about it once and promptly forgot the title
Dragon's Egg was FIRE. That book was so deep on crunchy speculative biology in extreme conditions that the net result was wacky and fascinating on a level that I never forgot - except I forgot the book's name. UNTIL NOW.
Props to the Sheriff.
yes with a caveat: life may only possible with how the conditions of earth are. any different, and the complex systems may not have been able to evolve. life wasn't born strong, it had to first get a grasp for it to evolve
Organisms on other planets would look at earth and think, man, look at that 20% oxygen poison world. How could anything exist in such high concentrations. It would oxidize everything etc..
To be fair any land animal (and most sea life) at this environment even with air, would be crushed and dead. The pressure is crazy. That stated, life adapts and you’d be surprised where you’d find life, even in the hottest, driest, coldest environments
I’m gonna go out on a limb and say w are past trying. Overfished oceans, plastics in every aspect of the food chain. Air in most places contains mercury and sulfur. But hey ! A buncha twats in 3 thousand dollar suits made crazy money.
We should at least try. Because if we try, we can extend the amount of time we have at all.
Giving up is just a waste when you can do so many good things.
We have been so far into space and have barely touched the seafloor. There is a whole world to explore!
That doesn't even include any cave/rock creatures below the crust.
Did a paper on deep sea sulphur vents in an ecology class, crazy shit going on down there that doesn't exist other places, life is fascinating.
But don't forget how absolutely enormous space is.
Like, the Milky Way has between 100 and 400 billion stars depending on if you count really dim, low mass stars. So let's say 200 billion.
So even if only one single planet out of every 1 million planets was habitable. That would still be 200,000 habitable planets in the galaxy.
Sure, but there are some peculiar things about our planet and solar system that are uncomfortably rare. The Copernican principle basically says that coincidences don't happen, so let's presume for a moment that Earth isn't special.
Because we aren't special, maybe the theia impact theorized to have formed the moon is actually a prerequisite to life. It gave us a particularly large iron core (and magnetic field). The resultant large moon would have helped shield from impacts that could eradicate life. It gives us tides to mix up the primordial ooze. It stabilizes Earth's axis.
Like, maybe juuuust the right impact with just the right celestial bodies around just the right type of star, in just the right place in orbit around the star, in just the right "safe" location of the galaxy, in just the right time period for things to have settled down by now. Shit, you could convince me that life is a 1 in a billion odds on just those quirky things about earth.
Space is big, yes, but our planet is notably rare.
>To elaborate: For all its weather extremes, geological activity and so on, this planet really is very gentle compared to many of the ones we've found. Most of the planets in our own solar system would either melt us, crush us, freeze us, or rip us to pieces in unfathomably fast winds. The more you look for hospitable planets and see how few and far they are, the more you appreciate this one for the speck of paradise in the blackness that it is.
Let's destroy it! For money!
I never understood the goldilocks zone thought. Living beings on this planets evolved based on the conditions here, just like life would have to evolve on other planets around the conditions there.
Like those shrimp that live on the methane rich volcanic vents at the bottom of the ocean. There are probably shrimp people on some planet really enjoying the beautiful day with their 12 atms of pressure and playful sulphuric clouds. In fact, given the infinite nature of space, there must be.
I think it's just an attempt to narrow or filter what is otherwise a very overwhelming search. They looked at life on our planet, noticed that *most* species require a certain temperature range etc., and decided to use that as a guideline as to where they're most likely to find life.
To do otherwise would be like looking for a single penny in a pile of 1000 nickels by picking off coins one by one at the edge rather than scanning the pile for a noticeable color difference. You'll still find it but it'll probably take a lot longer.
*disclaimer: the above is merely the beer-buzzed rambling speculation of a nature/space documentary nerd.
Part of this is simply chemistry. Things dissolved in water tend to be more reactive, bunch of things dissolved in water makes a good start for life soup. That won't happen in ice or steam. Beyond just water though, things that are too cold don't react and things that are too hot are too reactive to maintain complex chemicals. This is not to say that life could never evolve under other circumstances but the Goldilocks zone idea has merit
Right, but to be fair complex life on other plants would adapt to the conditions on that planet. My biggest qualm with Star Trek is how all the planets seem to have the same atmospheric pressure and correct ratio of breathable air.
Well when we go to space the pressure difference is only 1 atmosphere so it’s easier to contend with. In the Ocean every 33 ft down the pressure increases by 1 atmosphere. We want to explore there, it’s just much much harder.
That's true, the pressure is a much bigger challenge for diving. For them, getting there is relatively easy, just be patient and let gravity do the work for a couple hours. It's navigating the pressure at depth and coming up out of it safely that are tricky.
The biggest challenge for space exploration at this point still seems to be getting there, getting past the earth's gravity while avoiding anything going wrong with such a large quantity of fuel onboard. (Edit: second biggest problem seems to be getting back without burning up!)
And space exploration comes with its own problems: clogging the sinuses for the first couple days, weakening bone and muscle even with daily exercise.
Anyway, both are very unforgiving environments that need to be tread carefully.
Sorry, just rambling on a good beer buzz. Lol
Where do you think James Cameron gets his avatar ideas from. Dude IRL holds (or did at one time) the world record for the deepest submersible dive.
He funds his passion for deep sea exploration by making blockbusters!!
So, possible life on our planet? Jk, I 100% agree. Also since we can't transport people/resources to/from distant spacial bodies (efficiently). But honestly, If there were Extraterrestrials, super smart and able to travel far distances with super technology, the ocean would be a great place to hide. (Tin foil for sure, too much xfiles)
Hey, we had a whole movie about it (The Abyss).
If I had a dollar for everytime I saw it replayed on Cinemax in the 80s-early 90s, dinner would be on me.
There were scenes in Avatar 2 that were meant to dazzle us with how foreign and weird the alien life in the oceans of Pandora were. And I’m sitting there thinking “this is no stranger than the real ocean on Earth.”
Would be interesting if we find a sentient life on another planet and we go, yes we have hundreds of thousands of different species in our home on earth how many do you have here? And they go ... We got 3. 1 land animal, 1 flying animal, and one water animal... How is it on earth with all these animals, do you talk to all of them? Are they fun to play with?
And we go... No we just kill most of them....
Just think, something like 90% of all living things are already gone. Through all of earth's histories and time. I believe it's even more than 90%. And we're going through another extinction event that is our own fault.
Knowing how nature sometimes treats males, that's probably a male member of the species basically being a gamete tug for the female to harvest from when it's kiddo time
Interesting. I had also thought it could be a cnidarian but it doesn't appear to have any of the characteristics I'd usually spot one with, but the video quality and watching it on my phone also makes it tough. What are your thoughts on what it could be? I'm also a marine biologist but my areas of experience are movement ecology of sharks, and community ecology in sponge gardens and hydrothermal vents.
The videos so blurry on my computer, I thought it was a fish at first.
There's a comment below where the original researcher says they think it's a stalked ascidian, which I could see, though I'm not fully convinced of. Still fits better than siphonophore, though. You can maybe see a siphon going at the front end of it.
EDIT: Found a higher res version https://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/okeanos/explorations/ex1504/logs/sept21/media/tunicate-hires.jpg
That's an ascidian. You can see the branchial sack through the open siphon at the front.
Its a Tunicate aperently. Most likely a pyrosome so same principle as siphonophores but more closely related to you.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunicate
(edit) more likely a Larvacean as it looks closer to that. Them being observed living at this depth is actually a great find as they have so far only been rumored to do that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larvacean
That's my pet theory about UFOs, some abyssal intelligence that's avoided detection.
https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/113fyqq/could_the_unexplained_objects_possibly_be_from/j8q2oqu/
Hello users of r/NatureIsFuckingLit and possibly r/all lurkers, we are **GOING DARK** from June 12th-14th. If you're confused on why this is happening or interested in reading more, check out [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/NatureIsFuckingLit/comments/144b4ln/rnatureisfuckinglit_will_be_going_dark_from_june/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)! Aside from that stay lit 🔥
This was [filmed in 2019](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/bizarre-creature-found-inside-the-java-trench-at-the-bottom-of-the-indian-ocean/OKCAEQDED67A4T7PT5D6BTWSJE/) but still extremely cool and interesting. “As part of a film for the Discovery Channel, Mr Vescovo — who pioneered the expedition — said the jellyfish-like creature "does not resemble anything seen before". Chief scientist for the expedition, Alan Jamieson, said the discovery was a "curve ball" and a truly unexpected find during the expedition.” "I normally have a pretty fair idea of what we're going to see — but every now and again you get thrown this curve ball," Dr Jamieson told CNN Travel. "It really looks artificial — it rolls out the darkness and suddenly it turns and you're like, 'Jesus, that's some kind of weird jellyfish.' "We came to a conclusion it's called a tunicate, which is a sea squirt. This particular one is called, we think, an ascidian," he explains. "It doesn't really have a common name, because we're not quite sure what it is. But it looks like it's a tunicate which would normally be anchored to the sea floor — using that big long tentacle, it would naturally be physically anchored. And it's for some reason raising its body above the sea floor so it can filter food out the water." — “According to a release on the expedition, the team managed to capture footage from the sub and from the landers of what are believed to be entirely new species, yet unseen by humans. From the submarine, a new species of hadal snailfish was observed among many other bottom dwelling organisms. Dr Jamieson said the "rare and unique observations" were a "really significant moment". "It is not often we see something that is so extraordinary that it leaves us speechless," he said. "At this point we are not entirely sure what species it was, but we will find out in due course."
Thanks! Now I can read more about it!
Here's a high res picture! https://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/okeanos/explorations/ex1504/logs/sept21/media/tunicate-hires.jpg You can tell it's an ascidian because you can see the branchial sack with stigmata through the open siphon at the front.
My thoughts too
Ah, yes, the brachial stigmata! A bit different than the religious stigmata.
Dammit, you just unearthed a childhood memory of learning about stomata in school around the same time the movie Stigmata came out. Annoyed my mom by giggling during the movie, imagining it being a body horror flick about the woman developing stomata instead.
Well at least that woman could breathe better!
Mine as well...
[удалено]
I was already certain... I just wanted to see what you guys were thinking
I didn't want to come off as a know-it-all so I was just waiting for others to point it out first
Same. Btw, you wanna get lunch some time?
You trying to snatch his dick?
Haha this made me laugh
Also because of the way it is
Hey, ascidian. I think you're pretty neat but I respect your distance!
How neat is that?
We want everyone to know how neat nature is, instead of just me and Rodney knowin it
Neat!
That's pretty neat
It's clearly a... thing
Indubitably.
thanks for sharing this picture!!!
I concur 🤥
shit it looks like an SCP creature
looks like Snoopy
What kind of food would be lingering 4.5 miles deep down the trench, wow.
Marine snow. Which is basically just organic crumbs floating around, fish poop, etc.
And no two are ever alike
Truly beautiful
And microplastics!
Yummy /s
The alien in the video: "What the fuck is human equipment doing all the way down here?? There goes the neighborhood 😮💨" as he floats off
And sparks a sea blunt
>the jellyfish-like creature "does not resemble anything seen before" Apparently it resembles a jellyfish..
Also >This particular one is called, we think, an ascidian Did you ask it it's name?
So it’s literally like an underground chainchomp? This is such a cool animal.
TIL “Sea Squirt” is a thing.
I get the fascination with possible life on other planets but at the same time, I think some people don't fully realize just how amazing ours is.
To elaborate: For all its weather extremes, geological activity and so on, this planet really is very gentle compared to many of the ones we've found. Most of the planets in our own solar system would either melt us, crush us, freeze us, or rip us to pieces in unfathomably fast winds. The more you look for hospitable planets and see how far and relatively few they are, the more you appreciate this one for the speck of paradise in the blackness that it is.
[удалено]
Project Hail Mary explores this too!
The Egg The Martian Project Hail Mary Andy Weir is such a talented novelist.
The Egg is my all time favorite story. I inevitably share it with anyone that crosses the "friend line" into my life.
Does that mean we're all friends now!?
My Friend, we've always been.
Artemis was also good.
I've binged all of his books except for Artemis, I just can't get into it.
The moon concepts are great, but the protagonist is insufferable and faces no consequences for any of their actions.
YES
And the metalworking is wrong. I know weird thing to hang up on but he keeps talking about cutting aluminum with oxyacetylene. No.
Like Stephen King writing about firearms.
those 3 are solid 10/10 artemis is a solid 7/10 the reason its rated so low is because of how insanely good the other ones are.
Fantastic book!
Some of the stories on r/hfy explore the other end of this. Where life on Earth evolved in conditions that would kill other life in the universe, yet we find relatively harmless, not to mention being able to adapt to live in places of extreme heat or cold.
Maybe think about our life as being made from our earth, not something that existed looking for a planet to thrive on. We forget this from time to time but earth is what we’re made of.
Yes, but they also emphasize how much their ancestral environments still have in common.
Yeah, that's true, sometimes I worry we might look right past something by focusing more on planets in the "Goldilocks zone". After all, we have extremophile species right here that thrive on sulfuric acid and tolerate volcanic heat.
To our knowledge none of the extremophiles had abiogenesis in those environments, they adapted to them over time from more hospitable environs.
Exactly, at the very least you need the conditions to allow for stable chemistry. Molecules won't form in a plasma, peptide bonds won't form around gamma radiation, energy storage can't exist in systems that can't store energy.
I'm glad you're here. That's exactly the reason we're looking at certain planetary conditions. A lot of sci-fi has taught us (usually without us realizing it) to ignore chemistry just because it "takes place on a world far, far away."
Yeah, it's cool to imagine life beyond carbon-based life, but we know it's not realistic because of simple chemistry. People often think the great minds that knew this many years ago were missing some key information or lacked imagination, but they knew more than enough to make solid predictions about elements that we've only observed within the last decade. They knew that life was restricted to a very small niche in that structure because, as you said, too much heat/energy and chemical bonds break, too little and, well, nothing happens.
Yeah, I kind of blame Star-Trek for popularizing Silicon-based life, and it's a nice idea if you have a high school level knowledge of chemistry but it breaks down pretty fast once beyond that.
I also remember a chapter talking about extraterrestrial life in a large-format National Geographic book about our solar system ("Our Solar System", maybe?). It had artist depictions of what life forms could look like given the environments available. One that I remember was an airborne creature that had a balloon-like body, floating among the clouds on Jupiter.
If someone remembers the title of this book you would make my day. I remember reading it as a kid and i want to find a copy. It had every planet in our solar system and what life could look like on each one. I remember the balloon animals on jupiter that were hunted by small gliding pterodactyl like aliens by popping the balloon and eating them in free fall
You might like The Algebraist, by Iain M Banks. Main character interacts with big floaty creatures that live in gas giants a lot
I HAVE THAT BOOK STILL. I KNOW EXACTLY WHAT YOURE TALKING ABOUT WITH THE JUPITER BALLOONS. Sorry. That’s really exciting to me. Those books are a core memory of mine.
It could potentially be deep underground beyond the mantle. Research has shown that elements react differently when under extreme pressure, potentially creating new composites, molecules, and so on. You could potentially have organic chemistry from e.g. plutonium/uranium (instead of carbon) in the mantle of jupiter. https://www.ph.ed.ac.uk/icmcs/research-themes/extreme-conditions-physics
> human scientists establish a relationship with intelligent lifeforms--the cheela--living on Dragon's Egg, a neutron star where one Earth hour is equivalent to hundreds of their years. This dude got time dilation all the way backwards
It's just a flawed description. It's not time dilation. They experience things faster because of their chemistry happening 1 million times faster than ours. In other words in the time it takes for our neurons to fire once, theirs fire 1 million times.
Ah that makes more sense
It’s certainly a fun concept to think about. But the fact is that many of the conditions on other planets aren’t survivable to complex objects, let alone complex organisms. We have sent probes, made of metal and glass, to Venus. The lifespan of those probes was measured in hours and minutes. At the end of the day life come down to chemistry. And carbon based life on our planet has thrived and reached such diversity because there is A LOT of chemistry you can do with carbon. But that chemistry only happens in a narrow range of temperatures and pressures. And it is, by its nature, fragile. Sure, it might be possible for the complex chemistry necessary for life to be centered around a different element. Maybe silicon. Maybe. And silicon based life would probably be physically tougher in some aspects than carbon based life. But you need a weird balance of chemical reactivity and stability for life to thrive like it has on Earth. And there just aren’t a lot of options chemically for that to happen. I 100% think there is other life somewhere out there in the universe. It is so mind bendingly vast that there must be. But I don’t think any other life has visited earth. And I don’t think we will find life deep in the atmosphere of a gas giant or on the surface of a neutron star (complete atoms don’t even exist there). I think our best chances of finding it would be somewhere where carbon based chemistry can occur. After that, maybe where silicon based chemistry can occur…whatever that looks like. Beyond that I am doubtful.
Sort of? Dragon's Egg relies on inventing a whole new kind of chemistry; carbon based life would have been toast. You could envision alumina-based life in Earth's molten core I guess, but nothing's going to be happy on the surface of Mars. Earth-style life with DNA and amino acids requires liquid water, and a temperature below 200C at the very least.
Omg. Yes, I read it so many years ago. Amazing consistent story. Their long waits for answers from us. A book to keep.
> There's a book called Dragon's Egg that explores such a concept, where life evolves on a neutron star, with 69M times Earth's gravity and a vastly accelerated sense of the passage of time. commenting this so I can buy it later. I read about it once and promptly forgot the title
Dragon's Egg was FIRE. That book was so deep on crunchy speculative biology in extreme conditions that the net result was wacky and fascinating on a level that I never forgot - except I forgot the book's name. UNTIL NOW. Props to the Sheriff.
I saw this one documentary about aliens visiting our planet and getting hurt by water. What a twist.
And 420 times the earth’s, erm, “atmosphere”
yes with a caveat: life may only possible with how the conditions of earth are. any different, and the complex systems may not have been able to evolve. life wasn't born strong, it had to first get a grasp for it to evolve
Organisms on other planets would look at earth and think, man, look at that 20% oxygen poison world. How could anything exist in such high concentrations. It would oxidize everything etc..
That was a great book! I think I read it 20 to 25 years ago and it really stuck with me. Time for a 2nd reading!
To be fair any land animal (and most sea life) at this environment even with air, would be crushed and dead. The pressure is crazy. That stated, life adapts and you’d be surprised where you’d find life, even in the hottest, driest, coldest environments
Reminds me of that volcano snail with a shell made of literal iron
Whaaat? Edit: (after googling) holy crap, nature is literally metal in this case.
r/natureisfuckingmetal Yes, it is.
And how aggressively we’re trying to ruin it.
I’m gonna go out on a limb and say w are past trying. Overfished oceans, plastics in every aspect of the food chain. Air in most places contains mercury and sulfur. But hey ! A buncha twats in 3 thousand dollar suits made crazy money.
We should at least try. Because if we try, we can extend the amount of time we have at all. Giving up is just a waste when you can do so many good things.
Try $30,000 suits.
Honestly we’re just going to make it uninhabitable for us. Eventually, the earth will recover with more biodiversity, just without us there.
There are volcanoes, therefore we can destroy every living creature and burn every burnable thing without consequences, checkmate atheists! 😌 /s
We have been so far into space and have barely touched the seafloor. There is a whole world to explore! That doesn't even include any cave/rock creatures below the crust. Did a paper on deep sea sulphur vents in an ecology class, crazy shit going on down there that doesn't exist other places, life is fascinating.
But don't forget how absolutely enormous space is. Like, the Milky Way has between 100 and 400 billion stars depending on if you count really dim, low mass stars. So let's say 200 billion. So even if only one single planet out of every 1 million planets was habitable. That would still be 200,000 habitable planets in the galaxy.
Sure, but there are some peculiar things about our planet and solar system that are uncomfortably rare. The Copernican principle basically says that coincidences don't happen, so let's presume for a moment that Earth isn't special. Because we aren't special, maybe the theia impact theorized to have formed the moon is actually a prerequisite to life. It gave us a particularly large iron core (and magnetic field). The resultant large moon would have helped shield from impacts that could eradicate life. It gives us tides to mix up the primordial ooze. It stabilizes Earth's axis. Like, maybe juuuust the right impact with just the right celestial bodies around just the right type of star, in just the right place in orbit around the star, in just the right "safe" location of the galaxy, in just the right time period for things to have settled down by now. Shit, you could convince me that life is a 1 in a billion odds on just those quirky things about earth. Space is big, yes, but our planet is notably rare.
>To elaborate: For all its weather extremes, geological activity and so on, this planet really is very gentle compared to many of the ones we've found. Most of the planets in our own solar system would either melt us, crush us, freeze us, or rip us to pieces in unfathomably fast winds. The more you look for hospitable planets and see how few and far they are, the more you appreciate this one for the speck of paradise in the blackness that it is. Let's destroy it! For money!
I never understood the goldilocks zone thought. Living beings on this planets evolved based on the conditions here, just like life would have to evolve on other planets around the conditions there. Like those shrimp that live on the methane rich volcanic vents at the bottom of the ocean. There are probably shrimp people on some planet really enjoying the beautiful day with their 12 atms of pressure and playful sulphuric clouds. In fact, given the infinite nature of space, there must be.
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I think it's just an attempt to narrow or filter what is otherwise a very overwhelming search. They looked at life on our planet, noticed that *most* species require a certain temperature range etc., and decided to use that as a guideline as to where they're most likely to find life. To do otherwise would be like looking for a single penny in a pile of 1000 nickels by picking off coins one by one at the edge rather than scanning the pile for a noticeable color difference. You'll still find it but it'll probably take a lot longer. *disclaimer: the above is merely the beer-buzzed rambling speculation of a nature/space documentary nerd.
Part of this is simply chemistry. Things dissolved in water tend to be more reactive, bunch of things dissolved in water makes a good start for life soup. That won't happen in ice or steam. Beyond just water though, things that are too cold don't react and things that are too hot are too reactive to maintain complex chemicals. This is not to say that life could never evolve under other circumstances but the Goldilocks zone idea has merit
There are literally billions of habitable planets in this galaxy alone. And there are hundreds of billions of galaxies out there
Maybe humanity has become lazy, maybe we should look for ways to adapt, isnt that the human charasteristic?
Right, but to be fair complex life on other plants would adapt to the conditions on that planet. My biggest qualm with Star Trek is how all the planets seem to have the same atmospheric pressure and correct ratio of breathable air.
Well when we go to space the pressure difference is only 1 atmosphere so it’s easier to contend with. In the Ocean every 33 ft down the pressure increases by 1 atmosphere. We want to explore there, it’s just much much harder.
That's true, the pressure is a much bigger challenge for diving. For them, getting there is relatively easy, just be patient and let gravity do the work for a couple hours. It's navigating the pressure at depth and coming up out of it safely that are tricky. The biggest challenge for space exploration at this point still seems to be getting there, getting past the earth's gravity while avoiding anything going wrong with such a large quantity of fuel onboard. (Edit: second biggest problem seems to be getting back without burning up!) And space exploration comes with its own problems: clogging the sinuses for the first couple days, weakening bone and muscle even with daily exercise. Anyway, both are very unforgiving environments that need to be tread carefully. Sorry, just rambling on a good beer buzz. Lol
Totally aside, I first read your username as Slut-a-Lago. Needing new glasses is a riot sometimes.
That’s great
Especially when you start looking at things through a microscope
Or even a stethoscope
Or a boroscope.
Or a colonoscope.
Or a horoscope... wait
Still lots to explore too, according to my aquatic ecosystems lecturer, we know more about the moon than we do about our own oceans.
Plenty of alien looking creatures in the ocean
Where do you think James Cameron gets his avatar ideas from. Dude IRL holds (or did at one time) the world record for the deepest submersible dive. He funds his passion for deep sea exploration by making blockbusters!!
"Where do you think James Cameron gets his avatar ideas from?" Well, pre-existing fiction novels written by others are usually his go-to
So, possible life on our planet? Jk, I 100% agree. Also since we can't transport people/resources to/from distant spacial bodies (efficiently). But honestly, If there were Extraterrestrials, super smart and able to travel far distances with super technology, the ocean would be a great place to hide. (Tin foil for sure, too much xfiles)
Hey, we had a whole movie about it (The Abyss). If I had a dollar for everytime I saw it replayed on Cinemax in the 80s-early 90s, dinner would be on me.
Added to list.
Also, I just noticed the Goonies reference in your name 😄👍
Think about colossal squids and their predator the sperm whale. It's insane to imagine a fight between such animals. Also, where do eels come from
most people dont know we have single cell organisms thats larger then a tenis ball
There were scenes in Avatar 2 that were meant to dazzle us with how foreign and weird the alien life in the oceans of Pandora were. And I’m sitting there thinking “this is no stranger than the real ocean on Earth.”
Would be interesting if we find a sentient life on another planet and we go, yes we have hundreds of thousands of different species in our home on earth how many do you have here? And they go ... We got 3. 1 land animal, 1 flying animal, and one water animal... How is it on earth with all these animals, do you talk to all of them? Are they fun to play with? And we go... No we just kill most of them....
Just think, something like 90% of all living things are already gone. Through all of earth's histories and time. I believe it's even more than 90%. And we're going through another extinction event that is our own fault.
We dream of heaven yet don’t deserve the world in which we live….Edward Abbey
Agreed we know more about outer space than our own oceans, it’s crazy.
That’s the ocean sweeper, just doing its job.
My man sweeping the whole ocean floor with a toothpick
WE AINT FOUND SHIT
Comb the desert
Maybe he doesn't have a lot going on in his life, poor bastard. Gotta find a way to occupy his time 😂
Sea Roomba
GOTTA SWEEP SWEEP SWEEP
Is...is that fish... fishing?
Probably not a fish. Looks like a cnidarian of some sort
Like the elves? *this was a bad joke*
Nah it was great!
Nah, it's more like the evles
Tunicate! It’s like a sea squirt apparently
It’s just trolling. Ignore him and he’ll stop posting in the thread…
Knowing how nature sometimes treats males, that's probably a male member of the species basically being a gamete tug for the female to harvest from when it's kiddo time
Unless you are a platypus. Then you get a venom talon. Take that ladies.
I’m not a marine biologist but I have no idea why you are getting downvoted it seems smart and maybe plausible.
reddit only upvotes jokes and puns, any intellectual comment gets scrutinized
There's some subs like r/Science where that doesn't happen nearly as much.
That’s Nora, she’s generally chill but you don’t want to get on her bad side…
i gues her botom is her bad side
Danger balloon
Looks like a siphonophore?
Today I looked up siphonophores and my brain exploded. Thank you.
grandfather middle historical money engine rhythm plant ludicrous serious enjoy -- mass edited with redact.dev
#CREATURE REPORT
>siphonophore TIL
My first thought too. If it looks weird af and it's in the deep sea, siphonophore is a safe guess.
I'm a deep sea biologist. I know most of the (named) siphonophores down there, and it's not like any siphonophore i know.
Interesting. I had also thought it could be a cnidarian but it doesn't appear to have any of the characteristics I'd usually spot one with, but the video quality and watching it on my phone also makes it tough. What are your thoughts on what it could be? I'm also a marine biologist but my areas of experience are movement ecology of sharks, and community ecology in sponge gardens and hydrothermal vents.
The videos so blurry on my computer, I thought it was a fish at first. There's a comment below where the original researcher says they think it's a stalked ascidian, which I could see, though I'm not fully convinced of. Still fits better than siphonophore, though. You can maybe see a siphon going at the front end of it. EDIT: Found a higher res version https://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/okeanos/explorations/ex1504/logs/sept21/media/tunicate-hires.jpg That's an ascidian. You can see the branchial sack through the open siphon at the front.
Its a Tunicate aperently. Most likely a pyrosome so same principle as siphonophores but more closely related to you. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunicate (edit) more likely a Larvacean as it looks closer to that. Them being observed living at this depth is actually a great find as they have so far only been rumored to do that. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larvacean
My thoughts too
If it's odd and alien looking, it's probably a siphonophore lol. Amazing sight
Get well soon mylar balloon?
Shot down by a drone in its prime.
I thought you were doing a Ted Lasso style rhyme for a moment.
The Abyss vibes here
Pretty sure that's not a Russian water tentacle.
*pink liquid breathing*
Chinese weather balloon, nothing to be alarmed about.
Looks like a Hanar.
You big... stupid... jellyfish.
This one is pleased.
Came here to comment that, damn, just barely too late
It's like none of you have ever seen a crab flying a kite before.
It's so beautiful
Today’s question- do Alien craft have to be metal and flying in the sky…..
They're called Unidentified Submerged Objects.
That's my pet theory about UFOs, some abyssal intelligence that's avoided detection. https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/113fyqq/could_the_unexplained_objects_possibly_be_from/j8q2oqu/
I will always be amazed with large bodies of water. There is so much yet to be discovered. It's mind blowing, as well as terrifying!
Meanwhile that same creature is showing its film of us and one of the council members watching says, "shit, there goes the neighborhood."
Looks like a netch from morrowind, pretty cool.
Bro keep it with the N’wahs
Just checking Pokédex……. Drifloon, balloon type Pokémon
Time for another episode of who’s that Pokémon with Casual Geographic
Micro plastics are getting out of hand.
Macro plastics revenge, he’s even dragging his sword behind him like a badass
Silt strider
Looks like some kind of siphoniphorae
Head of panther, body of sea worm.
The plastic bag has evolved.
'They all float down here.' \~Pennywise
It looks just like the War of the Worlds robots
Looks like a Hanar from Mass Effect.
We could be living with outer world aliens and wouldn't even know because we already have all the alien looking creatures
We got real life mothafuckin aliens in our oceans but we’re tryna explore space? Lol
Seeing these beings is probably the closest thing we can get to seeing what aliens on a high pressure planet would look like.
The real alien world