First Mechanical Gear Found in a Living Creature

Re:First Mechanical Gear Found in a Living Creature by vdaniuk on Thursday September 12, 2013 @05:08PM (#6376955)

Statistically, it is very likely that at any given point in time there will be only one species with the trait that humans consider significant.

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Re:First Mechanical Gear Found in a Living Creature by boldfield on Thursday September 12, 2013 @05:24PM (#6377056)

I'm about to commit an HN faux pax here, but, citation? Off the top of my head I can think of traits which do not fit your assertion: vision in the 390-700nm wavelengths, hair/fur, eye placement (think predator v. prey), etc, etc.

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Re:First Mechanical Gear Found in a Living Creature by dragonwriter on Thursday September 12, 2013 @06:34PM (#6377447)

I think GP used significant in a sense more like "newsworthy", in that, ceteris paribus, the perceived significance of a trait is inversely related to the frequency with which it has been seen in the past.

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Re:First Mechanical Gear Found in a Living Creature by vdaniuk on Friday September 13, 2013 @11:04AM (#6380914)

Yes, thanks, that's exactly what I meant.

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