Ray, when someone asks if you're a crab, you say YES!!!
this post was submitted on 15 Jun 2025
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The octopi that take over after us will love to hear from our tasty new neighbors.
“They're made out of meat“
I think the meme is funny too, but it seems like it's becoming so divorced from its original context that some people actually believe that carcinisation is some kind of ideal endpoint of evolution. Just to clarify: this isn't true given how few, localized actual examples there are and the tradeoffs involved.
I unironically love Latinisation (and Greekification).
“Crabification” would have worked just fine to express this idea, but “carcinisation” sounds so scientific and erudite.
People dog on English, but I think it’s really cool how we have other ancient source languages to pull from to coin “smart” words when needed. And when you dig into the etymology of the “fancy” word, it adds texture, layers, history, and extra context to the whole thing.
Ok, that was a tangent. Carry on.
A few additional fun points about this:
- "Crab" is Germanic.
- "-ification" itself has its roots in Latin, so even your proposal would be "Latinised".
- "carcino- comes from Ancient Greek.
- True crabs' scientific name, "Brachyura", is Neo-Latin derived from Ancient Greek.
I mean most of the European languages do the same with mostly ancient Greek and Latin.
"Ideal endpoint of evolution" is itself a funny joke to those who participate in knowing things...
Well, evolution simply means adaptation, right? If there's nothing new to which you need to adapt, ever again, you will have reached the end of your branch. 🤷♂️
The ideal endpoint of evolution will have regrowing limbs and organs, acid abs poison breath, laser eyes, hard, chitinous exoskeletons, little monkey servants who bring you cheese look what about this isn't crab
😂 love you 🦀
Sure, but that doesn't actually happen in reality, that things just stop changing. Occasionally, you get rather isolated ecosystems where the changes go back and forth in a mostly self-contained manner and then adaptation might plateau for a bit, but at some point, a lightning or an earthquake or something will strike and then it's back to adaptation.
Well, and those species which were the most adapted to this isolated ecosystem are also likely to die out then, rendering this temporary endpoint not exactly "ideal" either.
But it's also not one singular endpoint either. Diversity is itself a strength, which helps species survive. This is particularly important where there is change, because external influences will affect different members of this species more or less strongly.
But even without change, splitting the work is beneficial. This can be as mundane as not everyone carrying around the equipment for bringing out the babies. But in particular with societal structures, it can also mean that the big muscle folks might do the muscly tasks and the big brain folks do the brainy tasks and those with claws for hands open up all the tin cans.
Evolution will not push past that to arrive at some hypothetical "ideal endpoint", because that society with work splitting is fitter for survival than a monoculture would be.
It doesn't happen in reality, of course. It's just a hypothetical.
But there are obviously cases in nature where species have not changed (much/noticeably) for millions of years. I would call that pretty much end game, given the set of animal and plant (and other) life forms present up to that point. But sure, apocalyptic changes will turn that upside down. You could argue that those are also part of nature and that adaptation to those scenarios are also a part of evolution.
I tend to both agree and disagree. 😅
We may not actually be crabs, but we sure do act like a bunch of them in a bucket.
This is sort of the plot of Children of Time
Heavy emphasis on "sort of"
All the crabs on Earth: “Wait, we’re here!”
Meanwhile, the dolphins decided to sneak out the back.
... At least they thanked us for the fish.
Fooking Proons!
We always tend to portray aliens in science fiction as humanoids. It's time to change that
Isaac Asimov, “Hostess” (1951):
There were four fingers but no thumb. Each finger had five independent ball-and-socket joints. In this way, the flexibility lost with the absence of the thumb was made up for by the almost tentacular properties of the fingers. What was even more interesting to her biologist’s eyes was the fact that each Hawkinsite finger ended in a vestigial hoof, very small and, to the layman, unidentifiable as such, but clearly adapted at one time to running, just as man’s had been to climbing.
[…]
“[…] Look, there are five intelligent races in the Galaxy. These have all developed independently, yet have managed to converge in remarkable fashion. It is as though, in the long run, intelligence requires a certain physical makeup to flourish. […]”
[…]
“Now when the differences among the intelligences are closely investigated, it is found over and over again that it is you Earthmen, more than any of the others, who are unique. For instance, it is only on Earth that life depends upon metal enzymes for respiration. Your people are the only ones which find hydrogen cyanide poisonous. Yours is the only form of intelligent life which is carnivorous. Yours is the only form of life which has not developed from a grazing animal. And, most interesting of all, yours is the only form of intelligent life known which stops growing upon reaching maturity.”
Adrian Tchaikovsky would like a word.
Can you recommend some of his work to start?
The main reason I mentioned him is the Children of Time series, it revolves around non-humanoid “aliens” a lot. Fantastic series, but I love almost any of his SciFi stories.
Cool, thank you, friend!
Children of Time
Almost “Username checks out” :)
Rocky from Hail Mary is sort of crab-like, and I think they're making a film adaptation...
Yep. Very non-human or earth like at all in anatomy.
"That would be expensive! Just slap a crab necklace on some guy and call it a day."
-the producers
Coming out in March
Very excited
Yeah, I hate that so much. Often times, it's clearly just easier/cheaper to put makeup on a human actor, or at least for the aliens to be able to use the same equipment. But it's so boring. If I want to see a humanoid with different skin color, I'll visit my neighbor.
Aaaaand there is the Mass Effect reason
Prador Moon literally has giant space crabs as the antagonists.
iirc, in Star Trek the Klingons descend from a crab-like ancestor. I mean, yes, I understand what you’re getting at but I still think it’s kinda cool that Klingons are sort of humanoid crabs
Which canon? In TNG, they establish that humans/klingons/romulans/cardasians/etc all share the same progenitor race that seeded the stars based on their DNA.
I think I read it somewhere in a trivia thing on Memory Alpha, but I honestly donʻt remember. But the Progenitors seeded common ancestors with their DNA. Which means that species like the Xindi wouldʻve had Progenitor DNA even though they have a multi-facted evolution with reptillian, primate, and arboreal humanoids…
You're forgetting the three other Xindi species, that are much less humanoid. The Avians, who look much like a pterodactyl. The Insectoids, who look like praying mantis. And the coolest of them, the Aquatics, who have amazing spaceships full of water rather than air, which made for some awesome scenes!
Thanks for making me laugh!
We will never crab fast enough. We are doomed.
I’ve been walking sideways instead of forwards for weeks now. My eyes feel stalkier and my pincers are the envy of all.
Take the crab pill and crabmaxx like me.
Badminton players are way ahead of you all.
Badminton players are crablike?
Nah but we crab walk/run/bounce to reach the ball faster when it is dropped near the net by the opponent. It's faster than alternatingly putting one foot in front of the other.
🦀💨
HA!!! Great one!