Comment on tall tails

• bjoern_tantau@swg-empire.de ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Your bones aren’t just swimming around in a sea of muscles. They are attached to the muscles and sinews. So those places where they are attached are formed in specific ways depending on what is attached.

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  • LillyPip@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Also, as you move throughout your life, those attachments can cause stress in places that build up, and your bones will show all of that. For instance, even though all humans have the same soft tissue connection points, we can tell by a skeleton whether a person had a life of hard labour vs relative luxury, whether they were an archer with stronger and more stressed arm muscles, etc.

    If tail vertebrae, for instance, have spent their life supporting and moving a heavy amount of soft tissue, those connection points will look much different than a similar tail of skin and bone with far less weight to bear.

    So now, we have a pretty good idea not only where soft tissues attached, but their relative size, strength, and use.

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