Two questions about Myrmecophaga tridactyla

[james_davis_nicoll]

First





Just how bright are they? That head sure looks small.

Second, wouldn't they be even cooler and more able to resist predators if they weighed a ton or so? I'm looking at you, genetic engineers with no particular system of ethics.

(blame the dragon's tales, although it doesn't take much to make me muse about replacing lost megafauna like terror birds or velociraptors in F16s pachyderms, with new and improved versions)

Comments

[caprinus.livejournal.com]

I dunno if "it's been done" in books, but I certainly role-played in a North American setting with domesticated giant ant-eaters.

[roseembolism.livejournal.com]

One of the nice things about creating a setting which has a past civilization concentrating on genegineering, is the opportunity to populate the world with revived megafauna, for no other reason than someone in the past saying "That looks neat! I think I'll revive the species!"

I mean hell, it's what I would do if I could build species to order.

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

These

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyptodon

would be somewhere near the top of my list of things to recreate.

[catsidhe.livejournal.com]

First: they don't need to be very intelligent. Ants don't take a lot of outwitting.

Second: they would need several metric buttloads of ants, each and every day to sustain that mass. Besides, their defences are that they (i) store formic acid in their body, making their meat bad tasting and slightly poisonous, and (ii) massive claws which can rip a hole in stone-hard clay.

I don't know that any lion would try to eat an anteater twice.

[anansi133.livejournal.com]

they would need several metric buttloads of ants, each and every day to sustain that mass.

What if instead of ants, they ate naked mole rats, or prairie dogs, or meerkats, or rabbits?

Hmmm, rabbits... they might try such an experiment in Australia for that reason alone.

[hattifattener]

They could engineer them to eat rabbits and cane toads. What could go wrong?

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

I'm seeing VERY large sticky tongues crashing through windows in skyscrapers, groping around for the tasty morsels.

[panzerwalt.livejournal.com]

6 to 8 feet long, half of which is tail.

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

there used to be a huge anteater in the days of the mega-fauna.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I seem to recall an SF novel (or possibly story) in which the hero had a pet anteater, but can't recall details beyond that.

[drelmo.livejournal.com]

Tamanduas, which are basically smaller, cuddlier versions of giant anteaters, are moderately common as exotic pets.

[le-trombone.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it was in Analog. I think it was a Campbell-era story, but it could have been Bova.

[thinks a bit]

[uses google]

Well, that was easy. "The Man with the Anteater", Analog, July 1971. F. Paul Wilson.

[martin-wisse.livejournal.com]

According to one of the tidbits in the Richard Dawkins book I'm reading, most of that skull is taken up by tongue as well...

[carloshasanax.livejournal.com]

An eighty gram brain in a thirty kilo body, right on the encephalization quotient line, almost exactly comparable to a hyena or a capybara.

There's a lot more known about hyenas and capybaras. But all else being equal, I think the extraordinary claim would be anteaters as much dumber. (Or much smarter.)

Cite?

[(Anonymous)]

Just wondering where one finds that sort of information.

Also, what are they using the brainpower for? Hyenas and capybaras, in their different ways, lead lives filled with activity and challenge. Anteaters... hum. Few predators, and life seems to consist of a series of pleasant ambles from one food source to another.

On the other hand, one could say much the same of orangutans.


Doug M.

Re: Cite?

[galbinus-caeli.livejournal.com]

Few predators, and life seems to consist of a series of pleasant ambles from one food source to another.

Sounds like the lifestyle of a certain non-avian biped I could name.

Re: Cite?

[carloshasanax.livejournal.com]

Dude. McNab and Eisenberg, "Brain Size and Its Relation to the Rate of Metabolism in Mammals", American Naturalist, February 1989, 157-167.

Re: Cite?

[(Anonymous)]

life seems to consist of a series of pleasant ambles from one food source to another

Thinking along those lines, I had thought if my karma dictates that I come back as a quadrupedal mammal, being a hedgehog would be quite nice. But, now that you mention it, a giant anteater might be better. Nice climate and less trouble with cars.

[pperiwinkle.livejournal.com]

They are, however, much cuter.

[luna-the-cat.livejournal.com]

I'm very surprised that hyenas and capybaras would be anywhere near each other. Hyenas are (a)social, and (b)predators, both of which add to the demand for brainpower; capybaras, on the other hand...well, let's just say that in encounters with them (and I bet a poll of zookeepers would back me up on this), they have all the intelligence of mud bricks.

...I'm going to have to go look up brain stats now.

[luna-the-cat.livejournal.com]

Hm, using your very own reference, hyenas DO have significantly more brain-power-per-kilo than Hydrochoerus, and especially so accounting for the capybara's apparent higher metabolism; it's the "small relative brain size coupled with high relative basal rate for grazers over 100g" thing, I think. But this is addressed: p.166, "...(2)physical factors may underlie an increase in the rate of metabolism without any appreciable increase in brain size; and (3) relative brain size tends to reflect food habits and behavior independently of variation in basal rate. We suggest that species using abundant foods or living in structurally or competitively simple environments do not attain maximal brain size."

Yep, that was more what I was expecting.

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

Just to show my age, I can't help but remember a Jackie Mason impression whenever seeing one of those critters.

-- Steve always liked the look of anteaters.

obSF: one of those, standing bipedally and with shortened muzzle and tail, was my mental construct of what Brian Daley's Srillans (from the Floyt/Fitzhugh series) looked like.

[martinl-00.livejournal.com]

If you're going go igantify an anteater, why not go with a pangolin? Things like a mini ant-chomping T-Rex already..

[luna-the-cat.livejournal.com]

And besides, pangolin are not only WAY TOTALLY COOL, they're also sacred!

[luna-the-cat.livejournal.com]

Just a thought, but are you SURE you would want one of these?

Apparently they catch the flu.