Recent comments in /f/askscience

sea_of_joy__ t1_jcwh0ik wrote

Reply to How different were the first horses domesticated by humans compared to modern horses? by clacker96

Also, one group of early proto-Indo-Europeans whom we call the Yamnaya were attributed to either their domestication or utilizing their full potential for animal husbandry, transportation, and warfare.

However, we know that this isn't the case. The Yamnya's horses were too small still to support the weight of a person, and also, the Yamnaya had disc-shaped wheels which had too much inertia to be able to go fast as a chariot or wagon.

So about 1,000 years after the Yamnaya started their journey, one of their offshoots became the Sintashta of East of the Urals just north of Kazakhstan. These Sintashta spoke a language that descended from the Yamnaya's language, but it skewed more like Proto-Indo-Iranian.

Anyways, these Sintashta people selectively bred horses until they were big, and also, they innovated the spoked wheel, which made them unstoppable in war. The Sintashta lived from 2100 BC - 1800 BC.

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aldinski t1_jcvh06a wrote

Reply to comment by Necessary-Lack-4600 in How different were the first horses domesticated by humans compared to modern horses? by clacker96

Yeah, maybe. But catching animals is always part of the herding, usually not daily business, but in many situations, least not of all catching for the kill. Horses are constant grazers and not as feed efficient as cows (or goats and sheep) this also means that they cover a lot of ground a day and they are skittish flight animals. So you can not compare them to cow/sheet/goat. Also horses haven been domesticated quite late in history, compared to the other animals. Botai horses clearly were ridden, so riding horses was part of the horse herding business and was developed in parallel.

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Ok-Championship-2036 t1_jcvghcm wrote

Reply to Do any animals apart from humans have an evolving den/nest aesthetic? by Toorelad

To some extent, each den is unique and crafted to suit the needs of the individual animal. So each one could be called unique, potentially. We have also seen evidence of "locality" among certain species, where beavers pick up different techniques from their parents or neighbors when building and re-building dams. Or where bears teach each other tricks to get around human habitation.

But I don't know if I would go so far as to call it a style... I think "style" implies an ideal of fashion or values. There would have to be a clear idea of good or bad examples in order to decorate properly. It feels a bit too far outside of function to have a strong presence in non-domesticated animals. Even animals like rats (which are fastidious about their homes and re-arrange daily or weekly), the arranging part is still largely functional, changing pathways, access points, cleanliness, or textures.

So, to answer your question, I think "style" is a purely human concept. However, plenty of individuals animals DO have a preferred form of building and maintaining dens, and that is something we see across many species. Each animal is going to have its own unique method of going about things and its own way of meeting needs. The way they change and decorate the den is probably going to be a reflection of that rather than a particular "look".

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Necessary-Lack-4600 t1_jcvasqd wrote

Reply to comment by aldinski in How different were the first horses domesticated by humans compared to modern horses? by clacker96

>To me the idea of herding an animal good in running like horses as a walking human seems ridiculous.

Why? Herding is not running behind fleeing animals. Herding is making them accustomed to you with lots of patience, not scaring them by trying run after them. Quite a lot domesticated animals run faster than humans. No-one can outrun a cow. Even sheep are way faster than most humans. But we did domesticate and herd them.

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Butterbrotbox t1_jcv9zpw wrote

Reply to comment by [deleted] in What is the ultimate fate of rocky bodies? by spiteful_rr_dm_TA

>In 500 million years the sun will be too luminous for Earth ro be Habitable

Where do you get this number from? It contradicts this:

>At the end of the next 4.8 billion years, the Sun will be about 67% brighter than it is now. In the 1.6 billion years following that, the Sun's luminosity will rise to a lethal 2.2 Lo. (Lo = present Sun.)

https://faculty.wcas.northwestern.edu/infocom/The%20Website/evolution.html

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