/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.10158105]

What mammal clade went through the most drastic evolutionary changes for the past 50 million years and why is it the Cetacea?

[Anonymous No.10158492]

>>10158105
Jelousy of sharks.

[Anonymous No.10158573]

That's cool! So this dude went from land to water? They kinda selectively bred themselves against the will of nature.

[Anonymous No.10158582]

>>10158105
>tfw no more gigantic monster whales that can devour humans in one bite

[Anonymous No.10158611]

>>10158105
>>10158573
The law of nature can be bent, as we humans show
the cetacea did change the most (though arguably the primates are more so) since they went from being land dwellers to completely water ones and changed nearly their whole anatomy for it

[Anonymous No.10158617]

>>10158611
You bring up a good point. Humans! I know we're still bipedal and all, but we got pretty damn smart over the last couple hundred or so thousand years. I give credit to fire and, yes, bending nature's rules.

[Anonymous No.10158673]

>>10158573
>against the will of nature.
Not really. Think of something like a big otter, or a seal transitioning to a manatee that transitions to a dolphin that gets THICC and turns into a blue whale.
There's a lot of food just off the coast and they slowly adapted to go farther and farther out.
A lot of the large marine predators had died off, so there was a niche waiting to be filled.

[Anonymous No.10158714]

>>10158105
First of all mammal groupings are awful. Second horses because of the mess of their lineage.

[Anonymous No.10158945]

>>10158617
Yea, soley because of the genus Homo the primate lineage is arguably the most drastically changed since the primates began.
I mean we haven't radically changed like the Whale lineage but our brain power makes up for it in sooo many ways.
Go back like 50 mya, some shrew creature. 10 mya later, some lemurs and monkeys, then about 30 or 20 mya apes appear, and they branch off into pongoids and hominids. 3 mya Australiopiths walk earth and make simple rock tools, then half a mya Homo Neanderthalensis/Sapiens begins to radically change the world, which we have especially done in the past century.

[Anonymous No.10158956]

>>10158714
i dont see Quaggas, i thought they lived till historic times

[Anonymous No.10159050]

I understand cows and other domestic animals have changed greatly. With all due respect to the Cetacea

[Anonymous No.10159056]

>>10158105
Whales are related to hippos. I think.

[Anonymous No.10159163]

>>10158573
Yup. The ancestor were some sort of wolf-sized creature

[Anonymous No.10159175]

>>10159163
These massive faggots used to the size of rodents

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indohyus

[Anonymous No.10159231]

>>10159175
Oh! That's funny. You call animals faggots. Thank you!

[Anonymous No.10159349]

>>10158105
>drastic evolutionary change
In terms of habitat change? In terms of number of DNA base difference? In terms of physical appearance? In terms of physical appearance per DNA base difference (i.e. "effectiveness" or "drasticness" of the genetic difference)? In terms of how fast they couldn't interbreed with their closest relative population anymore?

Define your shit!

[Blank No.10159373]

>>10159231
Got em, bazinga

[Anonymous No.10159982]

>>10159349
>autism
What do you think. Turning from a tiny rodent into a fish-like massive animal that is the largest on the planet, or from a crocodile to a crocodile?

[Anonymous No.10160587]

>>10158714
>Today horses descend from small horses
Woah, evolution is amazing.

[Anonymous No.10160760]

>>10158582
We have shark whales :^)

[Anonymous No.10160761]

>>10158582
We have shark whales :^)

[Anonymous No.10161516]

>>10158582
We have whale sharks

[Anonymous No.10161589]

>>10161516
If you get eaten by a whale shark and you're not plankton then you've officially become the biggest loser in the history of evolution.
That's mauled-by-dachshund tier.

[Anonymous No.10161607]

Ok so I say that the primate clade has changed the most. Why? Intelligence alone.

[Anonymous No.10161848]

>>10161607
yah but whales and dolphins are pretty intelligent too. Infact, it's theorized they can actually communicate with a very complex context

[Anonymous No.10162369]

>>10158956
Generally considered just a subspecies of zebras now, last time I looked.

[Anonymous No.10162375]

>>10161589
>mauled-by-dachshund tier.
I like you.

[Anonymous No.10163430]

>>10158105
I'd say proto-humans developing into niggers or alternative into modern humans.

[Anonymous No.10163934]

>>10159373
GTFO

[Anonymous No.10164678]

>>10163430
Based and redpilled

[Anonymous No.10165027]

>>10158611
>why the most drastic evolutionary changes
>most drastic

You gave a non valid answer. You basically said the species are really different because they went from land to sea, which happen to be really different, therefore they needed to be really different and that causes the change to be most drastic (implicitly by saying "did change the most").

Here's an analogy. Lets say it snows tonight and it normally takes 3 hours for anyone to successfully put chains on their tires. My neighbor and I can both go to work the next day traveling on the main road or the icy side road which needs chains to get to work on time. We naturally should choose the path of least difficulty as there is no reason not to. We both go to sleep with no chains on our tires. The next morning we both get up at the same time and leave 45 min later and I see my neighbor driving along the icy side road with chains while I'm on the main road with no chains because it was the least difficulty. He must have put the chains on drastically faster than expected.

His tires (species) are really different because they went to a really different environment and needed to be really different to fit and "survive" that environment. But that is not at all a reason to make the change "most drastic" and circumvent the normal 3 hours it takes to add chains. And "showing up to work on time" is irrelevant because the neighbor could have simply skipped the whole thing and taken the main road.

That is the problem with your reply. Just because the environments are drastically different it does not provide a driving force behind the drastic/rapid change. You could say the change was necessary, sure, but the drastic/rapid aspect has no explanation based on what you said. We should have seen the process take the path of least resistance and been on pace with other alleged transitions.

[Anonymous No.10165652]

>>10158492
t. Shark

[Anonymous No.10165680]

>>10163430
based and redipilled

[Anonymous No.10165689]

>>10158105
>actually believing in this bullshit

[Anonymous No.10166561]

>>10165689
t. Actual brainlet

[Anonymous No.10166590]

>>10159163
cute doggo :O :3

[Anonymous No.10166612]

>>10165689
Not an argument.

[Anonymous No.10166613]

>>10159349
Whales are fish cladis

[Anonymous No.10166751]

>>10158673
>A lot of the large marine predators had died off, so there was a niche waiting to be filled.
That's not how a marine ecosystem works (or any ecosystem really). When an apex predator dies the secondary predator now has free reign and will overpopulate, decimating the lower food supply. Because of the natural order of things, ie predator vs prey, there really is no situation where a long term "niche" is suddenly created and there's an abundance of prey waiting to be eaten. Everything is either in balance or going through a very short period of chaotic ecosystem restructuring.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trophic_cascade

This explains its. Even though as the cascade effect trickles down some species can overpopulate (because their predator is now gone) this new "safe" species' respective food source will naturally decrease due to overpopulation. Bing bang boom it all will very quickly and chaotically restructure.

If you assume whales evolved from land mammals this is not a valid driving force to get them into the ocean.

[Anonymous No.10166757]

>>10159231
You missed the point of both parts of that post to get upset about a word that has none of the connotations it used to have while being a snob about the low brow humor from a middlebrow position.

[Anonymous No.10166766]

>>10166757
No. I totally understood. You mistook my appreciation for sarcasm. That may be my fault if I did not correctly convey.

[Anonymous No.10166767]

>>10166751
Evolution kek

[Anonymous No.10166772]

>>10166757
>>10166766
I have broken my own rules and started a sentence with "no." I could have said the same and omitted it. Still getting the hang communication. I retract my "no."

[Anonymous No.10166774]

>>10166766
Ah I see, isn’t life remarkable, its many transformations, regressions and revanchisms? What a delight, this twilit garden of inexplicable beasts; we, all that we’ve been, or could ever become, fading off soon in a haze of our excesses.

[Anonymous No.10166852]

>>10166774
Indubitably

[Anonymous No.10168426]

>>10158714
where does my little pony fit in?

[Anonymous No.10168478]

>>10168426
Uranus