First Gear Mechanism Discovered In Nature 136
GameboyRMH writes "A gear mechanism has been discovered [paywalled original paper here, for those with access] for the first time in nature in the nymph of the Issus, a small plant-hopping insect common in Europe. It uses the gears to synchronize the movement and power of its hind legs, forcing the legs to propel it in a straight line when jumping, which would otherwise be impossible for the insect if it had to control the timing and force of its leg muscles independently."
man is still superor... (Score:5, Funny)
Our contraptions have 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th and sometimes higher.
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Yeah, but they all look the same, just different sizes.
Insect Ex Machina (Score:2)
Re:Insect Ex Machina (Score:5, Interesting)
Which brings us to this
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/mantis_shrimp [theoatmeal.com]
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Our contraptions have 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th and sometimes higher.
In fact, man is so superior, we even have contraptions with infinite gears! [wikipedia.org]
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Often I've wondered whether there was an actual evolved free wheel anywhere at all in nature. I guess that marginally meets the criteria. Neat.
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Thanks again. Actually used for propulsion, interesting. I was expecting more of an internal use like a pulse-less pressure turbine for stealth circulation, since obviously legs work better on the macroscopic level for travel over arbitrary terrain..
Re: man is still superor... (Score:1)
Guess you Americans still can't get the grasp of irony.
Yeah, some men are so superior they can't even spell superior.
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Guess you Americans still can't get the grasp of irony.
Yeah, some men are so superior they can't even spell superior.
There is nothing ironic about this. The word superior does not imply perfection. In this example, man only needs to be better at spelling the word superior than nature is
In a contest between man and nature, man will always win any spelling bee, even if nature was represented by an actual bee.
Evolution is gearing up for a jump! (Score:4, Funny)
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Nah, that's why we have people above 7 feet tall. Jumping is for suckers, just stand up and reach it.
Re:B effing S (Score:5, Informative)
I don't think you are jumping the sort of distances (relative to your size) that this insect is. The power of the jump compared to its mass is quite impressive, and apparently has special requirements. From the linked article:
" The gear teeth on the opposing hind-legs lock together like those in a car gear-box, ensuring almost complete synchronicity in leg movement - the legs always move within 30 'microseconds' of each other, with one microsecond equal to a millionth of a second.
This is critical for the powerful jumps that are this insect's primary mode of transport, as even minuscule discrepancies in synchronization between the velocities of its legs at the point of propulsion would result in "yaw rotation" - causing the Issus to spin hopelessly out of control."
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You're joking right? I could see quite easily how a gear mechanism could have evolved from a simple pair of spurs.
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but it's impossible for you to actually show it happening
That's because it takes orders of magnitude than a human being lives, dumbass! Would you deny continental drift because you can't see it happening? Grass grows too slowly to be seen by the naked eye, so while we're at it you can deny that grass grows, too.
Re:B effing S (Score:5, Insightful)
To me, this level of detail in nature is strong evidence for creation rather than evolution.
I suspect that Creationists would say the same thing about any complex biological structure. Interlocking gears are interesting because human beings manufacture similar structures, but there's nothing about them that's more miraculous than, say, a retina.
And if biologists can find fossils with more-primitive gear structures as we go back in time -- fewer teeth, less-effective interlocking, etc. -- that would actually support evolution even more, by demonstrating that it is able to produce interesting machines by gradual (and occasionally stark) mutation.
Of course, I doubt that most Creationists can ever be swayed from their opinions, no matter what scientific evidence is presented, because evidence for evolution in the fossil record is already overwhelming and yet there are still Creationists. That's the power of religion.
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If you found a car on another planet, where humans had never been, would you assume it evolved there?
If the materials were unrelated to any other naturally occurring material, as is a regular car (steel is not naturally occurring, nor is plastic or paint), then it would seem to be manufactured, not evolved. If you see a burn mark in a piece of toast that looks like Jesus, do you assume God put it there, or that in millions of pieces of toast cooked per day, some burns will bear some resemblance to other objects?
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In the interest of pedantic drivel, please define "naturally occurring".
Steel, paint, and plastic are all natural if you consider humans to be an agent for natural processes. As much as protein synthesis is a natural process governed my organelles, why not the synthesis of polymers governed by animals? Is there some moment where humans are just barely smart enough that the results of their chemical processes are unnatural?
As for the original scenario, if we were to find a car on another planet, a thorough a
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Steel, paint, and plastic are all natural if you consider humans to be an agent for natural processes
With that definition, there can exist nothing not-natural. As the word has a definition other than "everything" then manufacture by humans is not natural. Most would take "natural" and "manufactured" to be antonyms, but even if you don't, I can't see any reasonable argument for them being synonyms.
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With that definition, there can exist nothing not-natural.
You don't have to go quite that far to render the term "natural" completely meaningless. You can just look at many of the objects connotated as "natural" and find that among them are often found poisons, carcinogens, disruptive species, and diseases,
Which is pretty much why "natural" is a useless word these days, and becoming moreso annually. Terms such as "bio-friendly" with attached meanings of actual consequence are starting to gain traction. "Natural" will eventually become a word used solely by peop
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With that definition, there can exist nothing not-natural.
Well, yes. There can of course be supernatural things, but I haven't seen any of those those myself...
It is important to denote the universe of discourse. In the case of finding a car on a planet, literally the entire physical universe could hold a "natural" reason for the car's presence. On the other hand, if we consider only the planet itself to be the realm of possibility, finding an "unnatural" object means it is obviously supernatural.
From the perspective of a hypothetical Martian having Neanderthal-le
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To me, this level of detail in nature is strong evidence for creation rather than evolution.
To me, this level of idiotic thinking is strong evidence of mental incompetence.
Can't explain something in under ten seconds? Well then, God must have done it.
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Or is it like the Babel fish in HHG? Proof of the opposite?
Quote:
The argument goes something like this: "I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."
"But," says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and therefore, by your own arguments,
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You are making the assertion that these gear-like structures are proof of a creator, so how do you differentiate between living structures that are created and living structures that evolved? These particular structures are proof? How so? How do you define complexity and what order of complexity is the threshold for what could have evolved and what you assert must have been created?
In order for this to be accepted as proof by anyone other than yourself and your cult, you need to provide detail and method
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To me, this level of detail in nature is strong evidence for creation rather than evolution.
That's because it's easy to imagine a Creator just appearing magically all at once but having life evolve itself over billions of years is just too weird.
I'm serious. That's really the belief.
A creator can self-evolve or self-appear, but nothing less is allowed to in their limited little pantheon of belief.
Of course, they also have to ignore the creation of death, disease, famine and Republicans.
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I'm confused, Are you suggesting that gods create cars, or that aliens create insects?
Or were you just stretching for a car analogy?
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So you're saying the Flying Spaghetti Monster created this highly complex system to move this critter rather than using the much simpler method of grasshoppers and crickets.
I guess that makes sense when you consider it had to impregnate someone else's wife (breaking one of its own commandments) to have its child which it then let be executed to fix the mistakes it made when it created man.
Yeah, I can see how
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Then take the creature as a whole. Even such a tiny insect is absolutely as complex as a car! For that matter, every *cell* in that insect is as complex as a car - at least the mechanical components (excepting for the point of this discussion the onboard electronics / computer systems).
Oh, and at least I have the decency to avoid name calling and use of expletives... and in fact, to use my real name on comments which may be unpopular. I'm not afraid of what I believe, and I know that it is extremely unpopul
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Then take the creature as a whole. Even such a tiny insect is absolutely as complex as a car! For that matter, every *cell* in that insect is as complex as a car - at least the mechanical components (excepting for the point of this discussion the onboard electronics / computer systems).
Oh, and at least I have the decency to avoid name calling and use of expletives... and in fact, to use my real name on comments which may be unpopular. I'm not afraid of what I believe, and I know that it is extremely unpopular on sites like this - but the truth will win out in the end (even if it is long after we are both dead).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nwew5gHoh3E
If we are of divinely micromanaged origin, the divine is a slacker who takes horrible shortcuts. What are tonsils for? The Appendix? The tail we have in the womb? These are rhetorical questions. Real scientists, who rely on empirical evidence to support theory, vs. theoretical evidence to support faith, understand that following:
1) The world is flat is a false statement.
2) The world is a sphere flat is a false statement.
But the people who don't understand that #2 is
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Let's take your car analogy and run with it. If I found a car on a planet full of self-replicating creatures that shared many features of the car, and even found very simple car components all over the place, as well as a underground record showing many iterations of creatures that eventually led to the car... then yeah, I would assume it evolved there.
Re: B effing S (Score:5, Funny)
it's the bombardier beetle all over again (Score:3, Interesting)
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/bombardier.html [talkorigins.org]
"how can it evolve? it will blow up if it doesn't get it just right!"
we should all realize that, unfortunately, creationists will immediately alight upon these gears as "intelligent design" and disproof of evolution
"how can it evolve? if the gears don't mesh, it doesn't move!"
you can't argue with the dull and intellectually dishonest
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Even taking the creature as a whole, the nature of God, that His existence can't be proven and requires faith, requires that all of creation be ordered in such a way that it could have evolved without an active Creator --- If you can prove that something could only be made through ``intelligent design'' then there's no room for faith.
Let's leave religion in church and Sunday School where it belongs, okay?
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You can't possibly be unaware of the response to such "spontaneous arrangement of molecules is too unlikely" statements.
But just in case:
The complexity did not arise spontaneously. Non creationists suggest that complexity that improved inclusive fitness was retained and thus preferentially found in the pool of offspring. So are all other characteristics that improve survival .
Re:B effing S (Score:4, Insightful)
Some open minds that folks have here...
Not open enough for our brains to fall out.
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Moderators, please mod GP up (Score:2)
William George's post should not have been modded "Troll". I also disagree with his point (and I said as much in my own reply), but it's a plausible position to take if you're a Creationist. Posting unpopular or even unscientific opinions is not necessarily trolling.
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William George's post should not have been modded "Troll". I also disagree with his point (and I said as much in my own reply), but it's a plausible position to take if you're a Creationist. Posting unpopular or even unscientific opinions is not necessarily trolling.
No, you are wrong on all counts. His position is not plausible. "plausible" has a meaning, and it doesn't mean "sounds reasonable to me regardless of reality." Our objection to his post is not that it's unpopular -- heck, it's wildly popular south of the Mason-Dixon line -- but that it's horseshit. People who post horseshit in a science/technology website are either completely clueless or deliberately trolling.
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What you are proposing is inherintly anti science. Instead of trying to figurout why things the way they are, you would have us just accept that they are. Not only is it creationism bad science, but also lazy theology.
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On the contrary! I greatly applaud scientific efforts to understand how things work. It helps us advance our knowledge of God's creation, and aids us in all manner of activities in life: health care, transportation, food production, etc. I also find it fascinating when discoveries are made that change the way we understand the world, and I am constantly amazed at the complexity of things we take for granted in day to day life because we cannot see them in detail easily (DNA replication, atomic interactions,
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"I can see those same findings and interpret them in a way that meshes science with the activity of God"
What do you think about Mr Occam?
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"In other words, scientific reasoning will never tell you anything about God or spiritual matters."
Which is estrictly true and proves you no less a troll than the person I answered to.
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"I find that a lot of things in life make a lot more sense with that approach."
That might make for a good philosopher but has little to do with science.
Are your conjetures testable?
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The difference between my approach and that of the naturalistic scientific community is that my worldview does not require our universe to be a closed system.
Science doesn't require anything of anything. It certainly doesn't require the universe to be a closed system. There's plenty of active scientific research and theory going on around the subject. Is our universe just an inflated patch of another universe? Are we living on the three dimensional surface of a four dimensional brane? And so on.
and I find that a lot of things in life make a lot more sense with that approach.
A lot of things make a lot more sense for people when they can just throw up their arms and say "God did it!" It doesn't actually get you anywhere, though. A lot of scien
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It's interesting that everyone is looking at the same evidence in nature but coming to different conclusions. Sometimes you need to ask yourself what evidence would you need for the existence of a Creator? Is there any possible evidence that could provide for the existence of a Creator?
What if a theoretical Creator wrote a letter to you saying what his name was (Psalms 83:18) and told you he was responsible for creating everything (Genesis 1:1). How about if he gave an explanation for things like why we su
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Sometimes you need to ask yourself what evidence would you need for the existence of a Creator? Is there any possible evidence that could provide for the existence of a Creator?
Try r/Creator/Santa Claus/, does it still make sense?
I would need pretty convincing evidence. Something I can touch or observe, something that EXISTS. And before you claim that Creator is a creature in a higher state of being and cannot be observed... so is Santa!
What if a theoretical Creator wrote a letter to you saying what his name was
1. Look for potential prankster
2. If prankster not found, just assume he exists (the prankster, that is)
(Psalms 83:18) (Genesis 3:6), (Mathew 24:14), (Revelation 21:3-4) (2 Timothy 3:16) (Daniel 2:44)
I assume they are source links to works written by prophets. Prophets are people who
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Or maybe there's something special about this insect that gives it an extra need for stability. (Hint, there is, read the article. What, didn't your private school teach you to read?)
Re:B effing S (Score:5, Funny)
Wow, congratulations, you proved all etymologists wrong with three seconds of thought.
Etymologists? [xkcd.com]
Re:B effing S (Score:5, Informative)
Have you never seen a cricket or grasshopper?
Yes. They have stabilizers. This little bug doesn't, thus needs more accurate jumping.
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"a millisecond off one way or the other means the difference between landing on target, and landing several inches or feet off target."
Do you really think they aim for a target when they jump?
Funny.
Transformers (Score:5, Interesting)
One of the original origin stories for the Transformers was that they evolved from naturally occurring pulleys and gears. IIRC it was used in the comics, until they retconned it.
picture (Score:5, Informative)
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Indeed. 10 to 12 gears, with a 1:1 gear ratio.
The cool part?
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Science rules! ... or not? (Score:5, Funny)
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Full text as PDF (Score:5, Informative)
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Thanks pdfbuddy!
Gears? (Score:2)
Gears?
Looking at the photo of an Issus on the Phys.org link, I'm more interested in the jet propulsion the little bugger appears to be using.
photoshop plz (Score:4, Funny)
Boring... (Score:1)
That's not impressive. Call me when you find an insect that has evolved a clutch.
System only works for juveniles. (Score:1)
Issus wives can really grind your gears.
Painful (Score:2)
Microseconds has to be in single quotes, and defined in the same sentence it is used. That's ignoring that fact that it is also, apparently, a tag. *sigh*
If we keep looking... (Score:3, Funny)
Next up: a bug that has Linux. (Not just Linux that has bugs)
I hope that bug has a good lawyer (Score:1, Troll)
What? (Score:2)
Nature is the best innovator over time, bar none. (Score:5, Informative)
There exists a Weevil with a screw as a leg joint.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trigonopterus_oblongus [wikipedia.org]
Nature is absolutely awesome.
what I want to know is how do paramecium (Score:3)
synchronize their cilia? I have watched them under stroboscopic illumination and there are wave-like patterns in the motion, similar to what you see when a centipede runs across the floor. Paramecia are single celled and have no nerves, no muscles. How do they synchronize the motion of those hundreds (or thousands) of cilia? Is it simply cascading chemical reactions?
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Is it simply cascading chemical reactions?
In a first approximation, all of biology is a series of cascading chemical reactions. Why should cilia be any different?
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I thought about quoting the relevant part of TFA on this in the summary, but didn't....what a mistake.
Anyway you can read it to find out why you're wrong in the case of this insect.
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The advantage of gears over nerve signals is that neural-toxins from poison enemies wouldn't be able to mess up the leg timing.
Re:Bullshit! (Score:4, Informative)
Some of these research articles of late seem to have no respect for the basics of nature that the layman seems to have been taking for granted since the beginning.
If you're going to whine about an article, at least read it. The gears help it react faster than any sort of nerve impulse could.
And they also suggest at the end that the reason larva have gears but not adults is because larva molt.
They theorize that adults do not have gears because any sort of fracture is permanent and fractures seem likely over a period of sustained use.