Comments

  4. octopode.myopenid.com says

    @Moggie #2

    I see no evidence for bukkits in the fossil record, therefore evolution is wrong.

    Commencing sticking-fingers-in-ears in 3… 2… 1…

  8. Louis says

    That’s ridiculous PZ! You’re not that fat!

    …{sound of penny dropping}…

    Oh it’s the beard.

    My coat. I gets it.

    Louis

  9. Carlie says

    Manatee! That’s always been my favorite animal.

    They like to play with the molluscs, not eat them.

  10. Carlie says

    No wait, walrus! All those animals look alike to me. It could be a giraffe for all I can tell.

  11. JerryM says

    An Atlantic walrus plods toward shore after gorging on clams in the shallows. Such a big bull may stir up, shell, and suck down thousands of clams a day in summer, relying on his muzzle full of sensitive whiskers, called vibrissae, to help locate prey.

    that’s the problem with molluscs, such a large phylum, before you know it you’re eating a relative…

  15. AdamK says

    O oysters, come and walk with us
    The walrus did beseech,
    A pleasant talk, a pleasant walk along the briny beach…

  17. https://me.yahoo.com/a/crVQ.C5.m9671qMu9Mq9ZX59qLM-#e95e7 says

    “You are transparent. I see many things. I see plans within plans.”

  18. Rachel Bronwyn says

    My first thought was “What a sorry looking manatee.” Then I took note of the incredible facial hair and realised it was a walrus doing it’s best manatee impression. Quite convincing.

  20. Antiochus Epiphanes says

    #14

    AE: troll

    If I’m not mistaken, a troll is also a metazoan, however fictitious.

    To which I declare, “meh”.

    Two measly genomic compartments, and not a fucking cell wall to be found. And don’t get me started on developmental constraints…

  21. Brownian, OM says

    “You are transparent. I see many things. I see plans within plans.”

    So this is one of the scenes David Lynch cut in which Guild Navigators searched every square centimetre of Caladan’s seafloor for the Kwisatz Haderach.

  23. vanharris says

    Walrus? Manatee? Nahhhh.

    It’s a transitional form. Note the flippers, transitional between legs & fins. It’s some kind of tetrapod.

  24. AZ Writer (Kim Hosey) says

    “I did not say this. I am not here.”

    Walruses do have the same creepy-eye thing going on as navigators. Their mouths are less disturbing though.

    AdamK (#15): You beat me to it!

  25. the_fishiologist says

    the forehead wrinkles must mean he’s concerned about Republicans too (and so he should be, with the the GW denying going on down there).

  27. Joffan says

    If you look at it just right, it’s Homer Simpson.

    I don’t see that, but upside down I could almost get Bart…

  30. blf says

    Actually, it’s a bunch of oysters pretending they are an aquatic Nac Mac Feegle and dressed up in a walrus costume. This explains why it seems to be trying to stand on its head. The oysters in the neck are having an argument with the oysters in the stomach, and so aren’t paying attention, allowing the head to drop. The oysters in the brain are fighting everybody, and at least one of the flippers is about to walk off in disgust.

    I think the intention is to give a certain carpenter a nasty surprise / lesson.

  33. Sanity Jane says

    “Tell me, schatze, is it twue what they say about the way you walwusses are…gifted? Oh, it’s twue. It’s twue. It’s twue, it’s twue!”
    /Lili Von Shtüpp

  34. TWood says

    Nun: Let me get this straight: you don’t believe in God because of “Alice in Wonderland”?

    Loki: No, “Through the Looking Glass”. That poem, “The Walrus and the Carpenter,” that’s an indictment of organized religion. The walrus, with his girth and his good nature, he obviously represents either Buddha, or, or with his tusks, the Hindu elephant god, Lord Ganesha. That takes care of your Eastern religions. Now the carpenter, which is an obvious reference to Jesus Christ, who was raised a carpenter’s son, he represents the Western religions. Now in the poem, what do they do? What do they do? They, they dupe all these oysters into following them and then proceed to shuck and devour the helpless creatures en masse. I don’t know what that says to you, but to me it says that following these faiths based on mythological figures ensures the destruction of one’s inner being. Organized religion destroys who we are by inhibiting our actions, by inhibiting our decisions out of, out of fear of some, some intangible parent figure who, who shakes a finger at us from thousands of years ago and says, and says, “Do it… do it and I’ll fuckin’ spank you.”

    From the movie ‘Dogma’ – 1999

  35. Stanton says

    I read in a book, Astonishing Animals, that walruses have been observed to suck out the brains of young seals through the nostrils.