Some bad ways to go

[Sean Elifritz]

Yet a few more reminders that monsters do exist...we call them insects (Well, and worms I suppose). Thank God they don't get big.

Roaches Lose Free Will Due to Wasp Venom

Suicide Grasshoppers Brainwashed by Parasite Worms

 

[Elendil]

I've seen the video with the grasshopper and the worm before. Whatever created this reality, it's got a sick mind...

 

[trainedobserver]

Whatever created this reality, it's got a sick mind...

Well, there are those who would argue there was no mind involved at all.

Looking at how other species exploit each other in such horrible ways makes you wonder where certain folks get off preaching that humanity is somehow a horrible unnatural monster that the Earth has to be saved from through some magical assention or messianic intervention by gods or aliens. Such a stance, for all its high-mined false nobility, is rooted in a shameful ignorance of the natural world and a overinflated and unrealistic view of humans as a species.

 

[Elendil]

Well, there are those who would argue there was no mind involved at all.

Ok, allow me to rephrase: whatever this reality is, it's sick all right...

 

[trainedobserver]

Ok, allow me to rephrase: whatever this reality is, it's sick all right...

Depends where you look and for how long I guess. The human perspective is just one of many that the universe facilitates, each has its own take on the matter I'm sure. Life is struggle. Civilization shields us from that in a large part I think. We think life is less terrifying than it is because we have those who face the terror for us. The slaughter house worker, the solider on the field, the doctor in the surgery, editors, all perform functions that shield the majority of us from the basic horrors of human existence. But yeah, it can get pretty disgusting.

 

[Xylo]

I don't see any of it as "sick" or horrible. It's nature. Adaptations for survival are necessary in all species. I would argue that the adaptations in the two cases above represent a great deal of sophistication, especially the worm that leads the grasshoppers to kill themselves in water...allowing the progeny to swim off to the next phase of their life cycle. Very clever if engineered, very serindipitous if not.

 

[Elendil]

Yeah but...well, I never thought I'd feel so much pity for a poor grasshoper.

Truly a bad way to go...