Humans are part of nature.
I agree. The boundary can easily become diffuse or even silly.
However, there’s a reason I asked what I asked. My ultimate purpose is to show that existence is not perfectly designed, that sometimes it is brutal and grotesque. Unfortunately, people often retort saying nature is brutal and grotesque because of humans. So, by focusing on non-human nature, I’m sidestepping the retort.
I always though the distinction between natural/unnatural is completely meaningless. We do not consider animal intelligence and its products “unnatural” but we somehow do this for humans.
I don’t know, plastic feels fairly unnatural
It’s just long dead bio matter with few extra steps.
Here’s some I know:
- Dolphins rape other dolphins https://theconversation.com/dolphin-sexual-politics-gets-the-tabloid-treatment-6063
- Praying mantis females often eat the head of males they have sex with. Some spiders do that too, like the appropriately named black widow spider. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_cannibalism
- Mass extinctions have occurred in the past, way before humans existed https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_extinction_events
- Genetic mutations often lead to inviable offspring or awful conditions (I don’t know specific examples off the top of my head)
- Parasites can take control of insects and lead them to drown (also don’t know examples off the top of my head)
Some examples in no particular order:
-
Cowbirds lay eggs in other birds’ nests, and if the other bird kicks their eggs out, the cowbird will come back and destroy the nest.
-
You’ve probably heard of female black widows eating the male after mating, but did you know that this is so common among spiders that the males of some species are literally hardwired to automatically die during or after mating? Makes the whole process easier and prevents the male from getting away.
-
Toxoplasmosis mind controls mice and makes them seek out cats so they get eaten and the parasite can move on to the cat.
-
The hyena birth canal. If you think human childbirth is excruciating… you’d be right actually, we’re pretty high up there on the list of animals with the worst birthing experiences, but hyenas have it even worse.
-
There’s a parasite that goes into a fish’s mouth, eats its tongue, and attaches itself to where the tongue used to be and essentially becomes the fish’s tongue.
-
Hamsters eat some of their own offspring if they have too many to ensure they have enough resources to properly care for the rest.
-
Baby sharks try to kill and eat each other in the mother’s uterus.
Til fish have tongues
-
Pigs. Pigs take one generation to revert to feral state and are naturally pack hunting, intelligent, omnivores. Right now Texas and Florida is dealing with cases of hogs pulling apart horses to eat. There are cases where the hogs followed hunters home and trashed the place in retaliation.
It’s a testament to our hubris that we’ve kept pigs and dogs for so long. Dogs won’t recover, but pigs only need a year to come back for blood.
Predators eating prey alive, like lions eating bison from their bellies first.
Ouch. Looked it up. Its brutal. https://enviroliteracy.org/do-lions-eat-their-prey-alive/
TIL lions eat some prey alive because it saves the lions energy. They avoid spending too much energy killing a prey that is difficult to kill. Instead, they incapacitate (but not kill) a prey and start eating right away.
Malaria. Cholera. The black death. Syphilis. I could go on but you probably get the point…
Cordyceps fungus. Prion diseases like Chronic Wasting Disease.
Both are horrible
Cordyceps fungus
Holy crap. This gave me the creeps. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps_unilateralis This opened the door to the broader category of parasitoids https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasitoid
Prion diseases
Truly scary stuff. I vaguely knew that genetic problems are a thing, but I didn’t know the specifics. Thanks for sharing this https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prion
There’s currently a case being studied in the US south that looks like CWD jumped to humans.
With RFK jr in charge of HHS we are probably doomed
Any documentary that talks about the life of insects and smaller animals is a horror film.
otters. baby otters. otters offering baby otters to be eaten first by predators.
Don’t forget that adult otters are known to maul and rape baby otters for fun.
Jeeze, I’m an outlier - my first thought was the beautiful spiral of a pine cone. Anything that has the Fibonacci spiral, but picking up a pine cone from a quiet, rain-soaked forest path where every footstep is cushioned by fallen needles and leaves. There are many types of cones, but the hard ones that have spread all their seeds form the most beautiful and uniform spirals. To a non-believer, it feels like one of the greatest arguments for the existence of an intelligent higher power
Pinecones are indeed beautiful. However, they are decidedly not one of the greatest arguments for the existence of an intelligent higher power. In fact, the whole claim about pinecones having the Fibonacci sequence is false https://youtu.be/1Jj-sJ78O6M
Additionally, I wouldn’t think that cones having nice shapes are an example of nature being brutal and grotesque. But I suppose you wanted to make the opposite argument: that nature is perfect and beautiful.
Tell them to look up how ducks, mate.
Ouch. Rape. Sometimes gang rape. Bloodied female. Sometimes drowned female. https://misfitanimals.com/ducks/how-do-ducks-mate/
Awful.