For this week, I read the “Mantis Shrimp” by Matthew Inman, on the Oatmeal, which is a humor website. Frankly speaking, I am a big fan of the Oatmeal, and before reading the post, I was preparing myself for an entertaining and funny read. However, I didn’t expect it to be so much informative and didactic. According to Inman, the mantis shrimp is a marine crustacean, 15 to 30 cm long, which lives in warm shallow water. It is unique on many levels. First, it has 16 color-receptive cones which allow it to see a high range of colors. Second, it is a violent animal.
It is worth noting, according to Inman, that human beings have only three color-receptive cones, dogs have only 2, and butterflies which are near the top of the food chain have five color-receptive cones. Mantis Shrimps have even a better vision than butterflies with
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their 16 color-receptive cones, and therefore they see a “thermonuclear bomb of light and beauty” (Inman, 2016). The strips that Inman drew to introduce the mantis shrimp were followed by two real photos of mantis shrimps.
I didn’t need much more to fall in love with its colors. The mantis shrimp is just spectacular with its colors, forms, eyes, and legs. Having read the previous strips, however, I wasn’t sure that the mantis shrimp was real, those two photos presented the needed evidence that mantis shrimps do exist. Trying to contain my amazement, I scrolled down, and I continued reading. Inman went on to show the mantis shrimp not as a peaceful being but as the most violent sea creature because it has “two raptorial appendages on the front of its body” which make it very sturdy (Inman, 2016). It engages in supercavitation which is a process that boils water around the mantis shrimp’s limbs and creates an undersea shockwave that kills its preys (Inman, 2016). The mantis shrimp mainly dismembers its preys and eats them. While it isn’t advisable to put a mantis shrimp in an aquarium because it can kill all living creatures in it and can even break the aquarium glass, the mantis shrimp according to Inman is his new favorite animal for several
reasons. In conclusion, Inman’s descriptions of the mantis shrimp were simple, vivid, and real, that it became evident to me why it was his new favorite animal. I simply loved the way he depicted this animal and the simplicity he used to explain his thoughts. I was expecting a good laugh, but I got a fascinating, informative read instead. Reference: Inman, M. (2016). Why the mantis shrimp is my new favorite animal. The Oatmeal. Retrieved from http://theoatmeal.com/comics/mantis_shrimp
Because of its size and abundance, T. californicus is commonly regarded as the insect of the sea. This creature is generally very small, from 1-3 mm in size as adults. They are cylindrically shaped, and have a segmented body (head, thorax, abdomen) though no noticeable division between body regions (Powlik 1966). Each segment of the body has a pair of legs. They use their 'legs' to propel themselves through the water in short rapid jerks. They have 2 pairs of long feathered antennae, a chitin us exoskeleton and a single eye in the middle of their head, this simple eye can only differentiate between light and dark.
“Taxonomically speaking, a lobster is a marine crustacean of the family Homaridae, characterized by five pairs of jointed legs, the first pair terminating in large pincerish claws used for subduing prey…. Moreover, a crustacean is an aquatic arthropod of the class Crustacea, which comprises of crabs, shrimp, barnacles, lobsters, and freshwater crayfish” (Wallace, 55). This is an example of Logos since the author uses scientific facts to convey the message he wants to communicate in an objective way. Wallace also uses logos as a persuasive device by presenting facts on the science of the lobster’s neurological system and its ability to feel pain. The Maine Lobster Promotion Council states “The nervous system of a lobster is very simple, and is in fact most similar to the nervous system of a grasshopper. It is decentralized with no brain. There is no cerebral cortex, which in humans is the area of the brain that gives the experience of pain”. Wallace counter-argues this statement by mentioning the fact that since lobsters have a simpler nervous system compared to humans, they are unable to produce their own natural opiates. “One can conclude that lobsters are maybe even more vulnerable to pain, since they lack mammalian nervous systems’ built-in analgesia, or, instead, that the absence of natural opioids implies an absence of the really intense
During this experiment Brine Shrimp were placed in four bowls. These four bowls contained 2 cups of either water, vinegar or a water and vinegar solution with 50 shrimp in each. Over a course of 3 hours all of the shrimp in the vinegar mixtures died. Beginning this experiment, the control group, placed in two cups of water moved around the bowl actively. This differentiated from the groups placed in vinegar solutions. These shrimp were placed in one of three bowls. In group 2 the tank consisted of one and a half cups water and a half cup vinegar. The third bowl contained one cup water and one cup vinegar. Lastly, the fourth bowl included two cups of vinegar. The shrimp in the control group were the most active. The shrimp in these bowls moved
The North American brine shrimp goes through several stages in development before reaching adulthood. The brine shrimp is first encased in a protective capsule within a female brine shrimp’s brood sac (Drewes, C, 2006). Here, egg development rapidly...
The body of the shrimp is two parts the thorax which is the body and the head , the body pieces are connected by the cephalorax and a narrow abdomen. The mouth if the shrimp works with the gills so they can be used. Shrimp have a hard shell that keeps everything together and protects them, its legs, eyes, and rostrum grow out of the hard shell. The use their nose or a sharp peak which there there basically the sing thing to protect their self from all the bigger and other animals it come in contact with and it sticks them with and it has a length that the shrimp lets out to be able to reach where the shrimp wants to get the other animals. Shrimp have some similarities to fish like when they travel, breed, and eat its usually done in schools (schools area group of the species). A (shrimp) single female is capable of producing a large number of offspring, one shrimp can lay up to one million eggs in a single session, take two weeks to hatch it takes two weeks to
Vision plays a huge role in the lives of non-human primates. Non-human primates have exceptional binocular vision, due to forward-facing eyes with overlapping visual fields (Prescott). This binocular stereoscopic color vision allows primates to see the world in terms of height, width, and depth, also known as three-dimensional vision (Haviland et al. 2010). Highly developed vision allows the later arboreal primates to judge depth, distance, and location when moving at speed from branch to branch (Haviland et al. 2010). This bino...
The experiment measured the survival rate, the growth rate, and the size of the brine shrimp at the time harvested in various environments. To obtain these measurements, three environments were created: sea water, brackish water, and freshwater. For this experiment the scientists used 5 liter plastic buckets. Every two days, half of the water from each bucket was discarded and new water, of each respective salinity, was added into each bucket...
Flatworms belong to the phylum Platyhelminthes. They have the simplest body plan of all bilaterally symmetrical animals. They are called flatworms because their bodies are compressed. The mouth is the only opening into the digestive cavity the flatworms have. Food is taken in through this hole and wastes are discharged also through this hole. Flatworms have a well-defined nervous, muscular, excretory, and reproductive system. The flatworm distributes the food it digests through a digestive tube that branches throughout all of its body parts. The fact that the worm’s body is flat serves many purposes. It allows the worm to hid in small spaces, to fit into the opening of other animals if the worm is parasitic, and it means that all the cells are close enough to the surface for exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide with the environment (Meinkoth 399).
Cones (only five million or so exist) are mostly found on the center of the visual field, a place called the fovea. The words you are reading now are being processed by cones in the fovea. They operate in brighter light than rods and detect color (there are three types, each responding to a particular range of wavelengths). Cones do not pool their output and exist for resolution, not mere detection. The only drawback with the cone system is the amount of light saturation necessary to stimulate them and send their signal to the brain.
Dog’s vision and their eyes structure are enormous difference than human beings. Although, dogs could only acquaint limited colors, majority of their vision abilities did not be affected. In Miller and Murphy’s study (2002), they mentioned that dogs only have two types of cones which performed a color identification as a primary task. One of the cone cells could receive light wave
Color Vision Development in Infants: The Responsibility of Cone Types and Wavelength in Order of Color Development
However, categorical perception and its effects are not limited to auditory stimuli. As mentioned earlier, a categorical perception effect can also be seen in different kinds of visual stimuli.The perception of colors in a rainbow may be the most obvious example of CP. Even though a rainbow consists of many different wavelengths of visible light, observers only perceive distinct colors and not the full continuum of existing visible light (Goldstone, 2009). In addition to applying to relatively simple stimuli such as colors, categorical perception can also partially explain expertise in certain subject areas. Radiologists, for instance, are particularly skilled at spotting differences between X-Ray images. These experts have developed an ability to spot meaningful (cross-category)differences while minimizing irrelevant (within-category) ones (Goldstone, 1994). Categorical perception has also been demonstrated in facial expressions and basic shapes (Beale and Keil,
The giant oceanic manta ray (Manta birostris) is one of two species of gigantic cartilaginous fish from the genus Manta in the family Mobulidae. Manta birostris was first described by Dondorff in 1798; not much research had taken place during this time, which led to misconceptions about the fish (Passarelli and Piercy). Due to their alarming size and bat-like shape, these mantas were often seen as menacing monsters and received the name devilfish. Since the 1990s, there has been an increase in research on the biology, behavior, distribution, and life cycle of M. birostris which has led to large pushes of conservation measures for these massive fish.
we can’t see in the UV spectrum, and there are other animals such as butterflies which have 4 or 5 different photoreceptor types and can see more colors than us
Many people Zoological scientists have insisted animals change its color to blend itself with its surroundings and therefore escape the attention of predators or preys. For example, the white fur of polar bears helps them in becoming less visible on the snow when they go in search of ringed seals used by them as their food. Toad is another example. Most toads have dull coloration - browns, greens, grays - to help camouflage them in their environment. However, those statements can be denied due to physical difficulty.A major factor that confute the theory of protective coloring is that most animals do not have proficient ability to distinguish colors as human beings do. Animals and humans have rods and...