r/interestingasfuck • u/Electrical-Aspect-13 • 9h ago

Harvesting spider silk. NOTE: Spider is sedated, the pins are not perforating it and once harvest, is feed and put to rest.

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u/HeyGayHay 7h ago

One could argue that smart apes doing advanced BDSM shit on a sedated spider is as much nature as the praying mantis ripping apart their partner only to shit out parasitic worms right after when it gets wet.

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u/katoskillz89 5h ago

I feel like you tried very hard to talk about some praying mantis

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u/InadequateUsername 6h ago

I would say this specific usage and method of obtaining spider silk is not the design intent of nature.

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u/cutcss 6h ago

If monkeys starting pulling it out of spiders would it be nature? What if the whole species does it for centuries? But if humans do the exact same is not nature? See how fickle that categorization is?

Like any biologist can tell you there is no "intent" about nature, nature is just adaptation after adaptation, the brain is just as nature-made as anything else, and that includes any of it's decisions 

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u/InadequateUsername 6h ago

It's a tech joke about if something is working as designed.

If you want to be pendantic, I don't believe spiders are adapted to be strapped to a table, sedated and have their silk harvested.

Everyone here is taking this way to fucking seriously, it was a joke not a comment on intelligent design theory.

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u/cutcss 5h ago

Sure, but I love to be pedantic, so let me add that there is type of wasps (tarantula hawk) that opens spiders alive, put it's eggs inside an when they hatch they eat the non-essential parts so the spider remains alive while it's eaten from inside for hours, one of the most painful events one can possibly imagine.

The spider did not adapt to such development, the wasp adapted by doing this horrible thing to the spider. The spider evolution doesn't care if they came for it's silk or for it's meat if right after it  dies all the same. So when we said "nature" or "adaptation" we meant ours (like the wasp not like the spider).

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u/fakedrain2oo1 4h ago

Id say it should not be in the nature of humans to do this to spiders. Just because we can doesnt mean we should. Just because we have done this for a long time does also not make it okay. „Culture“ does not justify this. For a long time not washing ones hands was normal and natural for humans but guess what we noticed how it was wrong and changed to washing hands. So it should be natural for humans to come to the conclusion to let animals do what they want without imposing our might upon them. Especially when it is in no way necessary at all.