The most interesting creatures on Earth...

Chuck Stone

If aliens came to Earth from far far away to investigate the three most interesting creatures which three do you think they would pick?

Let's say humans are a given to be chosen because we can do sums, build stuff, and bake cakes.

What about the other two creatures though? What would the aliens choose and why?

WindSock

Octopussles

They have 6 muscley arms and 3 hearts and are VERY clever.

MickySticks

Eamon Dunphy. Some creature that lad.

The King of Moo

Elephants: "What's with the noses?"

Cats: "They're clearly the power behind the throne, but how exactly are they manipulating the humans to serve them?"

Dogs: "Maybe we can warn them somehow that the cats are clearly planning to use them as their slave race once they've got rid of the humans. Also, they're great fun!"

TeddyTedson

Dolphins and Decepticons and lions and tigers and bears oh my....
(Kind of ruins your point for humans though Chuck Stone!)

TeddyTedson

WindSock wrote: »

Octopussles

They have 6 muscley arms and 3 hearts and are VERY clever.

Are surprisingly they taste good!

MickySticks

WindSock wrote: »

Octopussles

They have 6 muscley arms and 3 hearts and are VERY clever.

Don't they have 8 arms?

44leto

Bat are amazing but the octopus and squids are the true brains of the oceans, we got the land give evolution more time and they may end up with the ocean.

FatherLen

duck billed platypus! (that thing is nuts)
sloths (my favourite animal)
humans (we're alright i suppose)

Chuck Stone

I would have thought bees would have been one because of all the work they do pollinating plants and their organised societies.

Then probably Lol cats because... you know.. Lol.

4zn76tysfajdxp

The platypus. Mouth like a duck. Tail like a beaver. Only mammal to lay eggs. Was thought a hoax by the spectacled boffins who discovered it. Truly the 8th wonder of the animal world. That or ducklings.

earpiece

If I was an Alien, I'd just keep on flyin' towards the bright light...... Nothin' to see here folks.

woodoo

Gail Platt

tayto lover

The dog. What a faithful companion they are. They love, protect and remain faithful to you for life. No other animal comes close for love, companionship and intelligence.

Hande hoche!

Ladyboys. Fascinating creatures, though

Fromthetrees

http://www.liverpool-rumours.co.uk/images/Hildegarde.jpg

Guill

Birds of Paradise - cause they're cool
Cats - Cause they trick humans into doing all the work

cursai

Fully loaded shark!!!!!
http://static.fjcdn.com/pictures/We_8084fa_2091579.jpg

squod

Aliens

Shryke

Well obviously people. We make music, art, books, architecture, TV, film, plays, advanced technology, 100's of languages, plenty of odd things about us too from habits and conditions to wierd sex fetishes and messed up eating habits (you disgust me China!).
I'd go on but really I think people are a lot more observable than most every other living creature on the planet that has eating, ****ting and sleeping as the most interesting parts of its day.

WindSock

Alden Tender Student wrote: »

The platypus. Mouth like a duck. Tail like a beaver. Only mammal to lay eggs. Was thought a hoax by the spectacled boffins who discovered it. Truly the 8th wonder of the animal world. That or ducklings.

And have a poisonous projectilr spike. The Echidna also lays eggs, both are the only monotremes, that is a single canal for poop pee and eggs.

EGAR

Alden Tender Student wrote: »

The platypus. Mouth like a duck. Tail like a beaver. Only mammal to lay eggs. Was thought a hoax by the spectacled boffins who discovered it. Truly the 8th wonder of the animal world. That or ducklings.

Not true, 4 species of Echidnas are also Monotremes.

LordSutch

Meerkats

http://www.standrewsaquarium.co.uk/images/content/Meerkats.jpg

4zn76tysfajdxp

WindSock wrote: »

And have a poisonous projectilr spike. The Echidna also lays eggs, both are the only monotremes, that is a single canal for poop pee and eggs.

EGAR wrote: »

Not true, 4 species of Echidnas are also Monotremes.

My god. We truly live in a wondrous age. Monotremes. Poisonous spikes. Eggs. What next?

Silverfish

Alden Tender Student wrote: »

My god. We truly live in a wondrous age. Monotremes. Poisonous spikes. Eggs. What next?

Mimics.

WindSock

Alden Tender Student wrote: »

My god. We truly live in a wondrous age. Monotremes. Poisonous spikes. Eggs. What next?

Hefty langers?

4zn76tysfajdxp

WindSock wrote: »

Hefty langers?

Donkeys are so biblical.

WindSock

How come EGAR gets more thanks than me and I posted the same before him.
Perhaps because it lacks a pun.
Echidna not.

Hande hoche!

WindSock wrote: »

How come EGAR gets more thanks than me and I posted the same before him.
Perhaps because it lacks a pun.
Echidna not.

They can see your cock.

Professey Chin

Silverfish wrote: »

Mimics.

Thats it. We're boned...

johnr1

Hande hoche! wrote: »

They can see your cock.

They must have damm good poor eyesight so.

Archeron

Chameleons. If the aliens could find them.

EGAR

I've got many many favourites in the animal kingdom. The ones that fascinates me the most at present is the Goblin Shark.

hidinginthebush

Ah its gotta be blue whales, the biggest mo fo's to EVER inhabit the planet, I'm constantly amazed they they live right now and are still more massive than even the biggest dinosaurs!

I unfairly want to suggest all the big animals, but some of the small fellas are pretty epic too, ants, termites, those glow in the dark fish. There really are too many to choose when you get into it.

Teyla Emmagan

Colossal squid. Or the coelacanth. Or the thylacine, just because it interests me.

Or a bright orange 16 year old Irish young wan staggering over O'Connell Bridge half naked on a freezing Saturday night with that funny bendy knee walk that comes from not being able to walk in your heels. Truly evolution is a marvellous thing.

EGAR

Teyla Emmagan wrote: »

Or a bright orange 16 year old Irish young wan staggering over O'Connell Bridge half naked on a freezing Saturday night with that funny bendy knee walk that comes from not being able to walk in your heels. Truly evolution is a marvellous thing.

I think I spent too much time on FB tonight, I was actually looking for the *like* button... :eek:

I am still wiping coffee off my screen after that comment by Teyla, love it!

Br4tPr1nc3

honeybadger.

the most boss of all animals!

Irish Guitarist

The button beetle (so called because they have been known to live in buttons), also known as the date stone beetle. The female gives birth to a son, then has sex with him and eats him. Here's the Wikipedia page. One thing the article left out though is that the males are often born without eyes because they don't live long enough to need to see anything.

Axolotyls can regrow their limbs. I'm sure aliens would be fascinated by that.

The bonobo is a fascinating animal. They love sex about as much as humans do. They have sex just to say hello to each other and the males even engage in a bit of penis fencing.

chocksaway

Parasitic helmints! Their lifecycle depends on the host dying and being eaten so that they can occupy another host. They can cause increases in risk taking behaviour in mice ultimately leading to the mice dying and getting eaten!

Capt'n Midnight

It all depends on what ET is used to.

water bears are pretty tough


things that fly

perhaps coral and other organisms whose calcium carbonate shells when suubducted in ocean trenches power volcanos and perhaps plate techtonics


in some cases you'd have to take a full ecosystem, pollenators + flowers

flowers / grass would be interesting if they didn't have them back home , both relatively new tricks

Plyatapus would probably not be that interesting to them , insects and plants are hairy too.

Perhaps some of the cyanobacteria here could solve their environmental problems ? Nitrogen fixers, oxygen production, autotrophs etc.

RichieC

Ravens and Crows, scary intelligent, tool users in many cases, devilish problem solvers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtmLVP0HvDg

smash

Chameleons or Octopuses.

summerskin

tayto lover wrote: »

The dog. What a faithful companion they are. They love, protect and remain faithful to you for life. No other animal comes close for love, companionship and intelligence.

They lick their own shit and then lick you.

Not sure who's less intelligent, dogs or their owners that believe the dogs love them for any reason other than that you feed them.

Chuck Stone

RichieC wrote: »

Ravens and Crows, scary intelligent, tool users in many cases, devilish problem solvers.

Never trusted the bastards after Damien Omen used them to do his diabolical deeds.

Ghandee

The Slow Lori.

One of the most interesting animals on earth imo.


Sadly, because of their 'cuteness' widespread abduction from their natural homes, and cruelty (to the tourist trade) is rife in Thailand.

Wibbs

summerskin wrote: »

They lick their own shit and then lick you.

Well cats hock up pn their own paws(that they've just buried their doings with) and then "clean" themselves in their own spit and cat owners are convinced they're hyper clean so the madness kinda goes both ways.

Not sure who's less intelligent, dogs or their owners that believe the dogs love them for any reason other than that you feed them.

They would have love/loyalty/emotional attachment to the "pack" which means the owner and/or the family. As for intelligence dogs are like people, some are clever, some are as dumb as rocks. The clever ones can be remarkably clever. There's one in Germany IIRC that understands complex object relational concepts that test 4 year old kids.


I'd go with the octopus too. Their brains actually extend into their legs. Pity they're not long lived. Squid are even shorter lived. Giant squid only take a couple of years to attain their huge size. As for how many arms they have? Technically they have two "legs" and 6 "arms".

Plus one to what Capt'n Midnight wrote. It would depend on what the aliens were used to. That said I suspect any alien intelligences out there that re still organic in nature would have similar enough creatures on their world. Certain environmental niches favour certain body shapes and have done for millions of years. So Sharks, bony fish, dolphins and ichthyosaurs all have very similar overall designs in response to the environment. So under alien waves you shouldn't be surprised to find fishlike creatures. Under alien skys, bird like creatures should also be expected. If their atmosphere was particularly dense creatures may swim through it more than fly, but similar adaptations would be more likely than not I reckon.

Full.Duck

Whales!

They have the most sophisticated form of communication on this planet.

If aliens came down the first thing to do would be to find the easiest way to communicate with a species. That would be the whales.

Duggy747

How about this insanely cute kitten?

Or the Star-nosed Mole, which looks like a Face-Hugger?

Or a shaved bear?

Chuck Stone

Full.Duck wrote: »

Whales! They have the most sophisticated form of communication on this planet

After humans, surely?

Duggy747 wrote: »

kitten?

Star-nosed Mole

shaved bear?

Ugly bastards. The Aliens would probably go straight back home.

Chuck Stone

Wibbs wrote: »

Well cats hock up pn their own paws(that they've just buried their doings with) and then "clean" themselves in their own spit and cat owners are convinced they're hyper clean so the madness kinda goes both ways.

That's true but cats don't usually try to lick the faces and mouths of humans unlike dogs.

smash

Full.Duck wrote: »

Whales!

They have the most sophisticated form of communication on this planet.

I thought Dolphins did? I know they're smarter than whales too.