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Author Topic:   Found: The First Mechanical Gear in a Living Creature
caffeine
Member (Idle past 1024 days)
Posts: 1800
From: Prague, Czech Republic
Joined: 10-22-2008


Message 16 of 24 (706646)
09-16-2013 5:17 AM
Reply to: Message 15 by Jon
09-15-2013 11:22 PM


Re: The designer is pretty piss poor
We eat through the same hole we speak out of. Without changing that, there isn't any way to get the lungs to supply the speaking apparatuses with air unless we cross tubes somewhere.
I think you've missed CS's point rather dramatically. His whole suggestion was to change that - we can have one hole for eating, and another for breathing and speaking.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 15 by Jon, posted 09-15-2013 11:22 PM Jon has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 17 by Jon, posted 09-16-2013 8:20 AM caffeine has replied

  
Jon
Inactive Member


Message 17 of 24 (706657)
09-16-2013 8:20 AM
Reply to: Message 16 by caffeine
09-16-2013 5:17 AM


Re: The designer is pretty piss poor
His whole suggestion was to change that - we can have one hole for eating, and another for breathing and speaking.
So... two oral cavities? Two tongues? Four sets of teeth?
Is that really CS's point? If so, it's more ridiculous than the point I thought he was making.

Love your enemies!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 16 by caffeine, posted 09-16-2013 5:17 AM caffeine has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 18 by onifre, posted 09-16-2013 11:59 AM Jon has not replied
 Message 19 by caffeine, posted 09-16-2013 12:02 PM Jon has replied
 Message 20 by ringo, posted 09-16-2013 1:35 PM Jon has not replied

  
onifre
Member (Idle past 2951 days)
Posts: 4854
From: Dark Side of the Moon
Joined: 02-20-2008


Message 18 of 24 (706675)
09-16-2013 11:59 AM
Reply to: Message 17 by Jon
09-16-2013 8:20 AM


Re: The designer is pretty piss poor
So... two oral cavities? Two tongues? Four sets of teeth?
No, just one hole for eating and a whole-nutha-other one for breathing and speaking.
But if we're making requests, I'll take two tongues.
- Oni

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caffeine
Member (Idle past 1024 days)
Posts: 1800
From: Prague, Czech Republic
Joined: 10-22-2008


Message 19 of 24 (706677)
09-16-2013 12:02 PM
Reply to: Message 17 by Jon
09-16-2013 8:20 AM


Re: The designer is pretty piss poor
So... two oral cavities? Two tongues? Four sets of teeth?
Why would the air-hole need teeth? Or a tongue, for that matter. It'd need some way of fiddling around with the air flow to make different sounds, but there's all manner of ways of accomplishing that.
I'm not sure what's so stupid about the whole idea.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 17 by Jon, posted 09-16-2013 8:20 AM Jon has replied

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ringo
Member (Idle past 412 days)
Posts: 20940
From: frozen wasteland
Joined: 03-23-2005


Message 20 of 24 (706685)
09-16-2013 1:35 PM
Reply to: Message 17 by Jon
09-16-2013 8:20 AM


Re: The designer is pretty piss poor
Jon writes:
So... two oral cavities? Two tongues? Four sets of teeth?
We could speak out of any convenient orifice. [Insert joke here.]
If the lips, teeth and tongue were significantly different from the ones we use for eating, our languages would have evolved in different ways (or would have been designed in different ways). All we really need for speech is an air supply and some sort of modulation apparatus.
And we could talk with one mouth full without being rude.

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Jon
Inactive Member


Message 21 of 24 (706700)
09-16-2013 5:03 PM
Reply to: Message 19 by caffeine
09-16-2013 12:02 PM


Re: The designer is pretty piss poor
It'd need some way of fiddling around with the air flow to make different sounds, but there's all manner of ways of accomplishing that.
Correct. My point was that the teeth, the tongue, the lips, etc. are all perfectly fine articulators. Two separate systems would require two separate articulatorshowever different they may look, with one set of articulators being used only for eating.
I'm not sure what's so stupid about the whole idea.
It asks for a lot of extra hardware. What's the real need for it, though?
How many people die from choking to death? Is it really that many?

Love your enemies!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 19 by caffeine, posted 09-16-2013 12:02 PM caffeine has not replied

Replies to this message:
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onifre
Member (Idle past 2951 days)
Posts: 4854
From: Dark Side of the Moon
Joined: 02-20-2008


Message 22 of 24 (706703)
09-16-2013 5:15 PM
Reply to: Message 21 by Jon
09-16-2013 5:03 PM


Re: The designer is pretty piss poor
How many people die from choking to death? Is it really that many?
Sounds like the excuse god gave his boss.
- Oni

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 Message 21 by Jon, posted 09-16-2013 5:03 PM Jon has not replied

  
New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


Message 23 of 24 (706711)
09-16-2013 6:18 PM
Reply to: Message 15 by Jon
09-15-2013 11:22 PM


Re: The designer is pretty piss poor
We eat through the same hole we speak out of. Without changing that, there isn't any way to get the lungs to supply the speaking apparatuses with air unless we cross tubes somewhere.
Dolphins!. They talk out of their noses. And fairly well. Throw some kind of tongue-thingy in there and viola.
Here's a fairly interesting article that says:
quote:
its pitch is not defined by the size of its nasal air cavities, and hence that it is not whistling," Madsen said. "Rather, it makes sound by making connective tissue in the nose vibrate at the frequency it wishes to produce by adjusting the muscular tension and air flow over the tissue."
"That is the same way that we humans make sound with our vocal cords to speak," he added.
It was just a general point that it is rather common for creatures to have separate breathing and eating tubes.
Are you talking about mammals? Because its totally irrelevant that frogs breath through their skin, or bugs through their legs, or whatever the hell it is you're talking about.
The only mammals that I can think of right now that have that is the cetacae. And they all can talk pretty good from an animal perspective. The dolphins are just the poster child for cetacae and that's why they were used. If your response is that other createures, that aren't even mammals, can breath through a non-eating tube, then you've horribly missed the point, which is what I suspect is the case given you're avoidance of clarifying.
It seems that to 'wind up' the system would take as much energy as the system would give off (probably more).
You could incorporate some leverage to help for heavier functions.
I think the advantages really come from the gear's ability to store a large amount of energy and release it rapidly in a higher concentration.
I still think it could help with some, albeit slow, heavy lifting.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 15 by Jon, posted 09-15-2013 11:22 PM Jon has not replied

  
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 24 of 24 (706759)
09-17-2013 9:01 AM
Reply to: Message 10 by New Cat's Eye
09-13-2013 9:50 AM


Re: The designer is pretty piss poor
ut I think we could consider other animal's somatic auditory communications as "talking" in the sense that they're communicating information to one another with noises from their mouths.
I've got no problem with your position. But if Jon is going to claim that dolphins don't talk, I'm willing to let him have some rope.
This entire line of argument is silly anyway.
Edited by NoNukes, : Remove h from John

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy.
Richard P. Feynman
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. Frederick Douglass

This message is a reply to:
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