Comment on Bees don't have lungs.

Gullible@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

• tahoe@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  No because you’re likely too big (no offense) :(

  I think insects have little holes all over their bodies, in which air gets inside by itself through some physics shenanigans. It doesn’t need to be actively sucked in like with lungs, it just happens because they’re so small.

  This method doesn’t scale up though since if you’re bigger, you need more air, and having little holes all over your body won’t cut it. Thats when you know you need lungs, and that’s why you don’t see insects the size of a dog these days (thankfully).

  There used to be times in the Earth’s history (Carboniferous) where the air’s composition was different though, and since it had more oxygen in it, insects could grow a lot larger.

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  • Metz@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    Fun fact: Cutaneous respiration (aka “Skin breathing”) is something we humans do too. But it accounts only for 1% to 2% of our oxygen input.

    However, the cornea of ​​our eyes doesn’t have its own blood vessels to supply it. Therefore, it relies on direct gas exchange with the environment—in other words, skin respiration.

    Our eyes breath like bees.

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    • dave@feddit.uk ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      Is that why bees can’t wear contact lenses?

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      • Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

        No, it’s because they have compound eyes. Even if they could afford all the different lenses they need, they’d never have enough time to put them in and take them out, while still working a full day.

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    • hperrin@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      So what you’re saying is I have two eyes in my beeholes?

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    • milicent_bystandr@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      1-2% is more than I’d have imagined!

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    • Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      I like this fact. That’s why it’s so important to take out certain kinds of contacts at night.

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  • Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    Adding to this, the holes (spiracles) connect to the tracheae, which connect to air sacs. While respiration is almost entirely passive in smaller species, larger species actually force air through the system to aid the otherwise passive process.

    …m.wikipedia.org/…/Respiratory_system_of_insects

    Side note: Spiders have book lungs. They’re not insects, but like insects, they are arthropods.

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  • wisely@feddit.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    So theoretically if we terraformed the Earth we would be free to genetically engineer humans to survive without lungs?

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    • Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      They wouldn’t be human. So much of us is built around our lungs, including our ability to speak that anything adapted to survive without them would be as different from a human as a human is from other lung-less animals. Even if they were more intelligent, they would not look or act remotely like a human.

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      • XTL@sopuli.xyz ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

        Keyword suggestion: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism

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  • joelfromaus@aussie.zone ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    It’s been a long time since I’ve seen it but the movie Mimic had bugs that had grown to the size of a human and taken on a vaguely human form in order to hunt us.

    The movie used the reasoning that the bugs had developed basic lungs which enabled them to grow past the limits of their usual breathing apparatus.

    No point to make here, I just remember it being cool that they put a small amount of thought into why the bugs could grow to human proportions.

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• Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  Yeah, and if you pluck a chicken, it will be a human, because it’s featherless and stands on two legs.

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  • hperrin@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    But what came first, the human or the egg?

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    • Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      I don’t have a clever response, so I’ll just point out that eggs predate vertebrates by millions of years.

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  • milicent_bystandr@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    Nah-ah, that makes it a dinosaur!

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    • Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      Image

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      • Akasazh@feddit.nl ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

        Wait till you hear about Eric the half a bee

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  • GreatRam@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    Diogenes my goat

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    • Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      Glad you brought this up. I’m doing some work in this rich guy’s house and I can’t find a single spittoon.

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• trxxruraxvr@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  That is almost how it works, but to really become a bee you’ll have to turn the lungs into wings. Good luck. I’m looking forward to seeing the result.

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  • Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    [Lung flapping sounds]

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    • Angelusz@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      Mm moist.

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      • Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

        It would definitely change the nature of romance and sex.

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• BigDanishGuy@sh.itjust.works ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  left wiggle, right wiggle, left wiggle, buzz

  WHAT! MY MOTHER WAS A SAINT!

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• FauxLiving@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  My aunt Bee had lung cancer

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