What human power-ups/power-downs would you choose? Why?
Just got an audience with the creator, gave you an opportunity to choose one organ to enhance/reduce its functionality; Cause apparently the creator can "grant your wish"
Option 1) An on/off switch for my uterus without medical intervention. Periods are bullshit.
Option 2) Night vision for my eyeballs so I can dodge dog toys during midnight bathroom ventures.
Periods are bullshit.
Yeah... they are...
been wondering; why does it happen to humans only? I mean, I've never seen a cow or any mammal going through any of this...
Well now you made me go and google it. Some snippets from the top results:
Evolution. Most female mammals have an estrous cycle, yet only ten primate species, four bat species, the elephant shrew, and one known species of spiny mouse have a menstrual cycle. As these groups are not closely related, it is likely that four distinct evolutionary events have caused menstruation to arise.
Also:
To understand why menstruation evolved, we have to think of it as a by-product of spontaneous decidualisation. In most mammals, decidualisation – the thickening of the uterine wall – is controlled by the embryo: it occurs in response to fertilisation rather than in preparation for it. In menstruating species like humans, spontaneous decidualisation is one way the parent tries to wrest back dominance of their uterus from an increasingly invasive embryo. The uterine lining now responds only to the parent’s hormones rather than the embryo’s, and the parent controls whether or not they get pregnant. They put their defences up preemptively, by sealing off the main blood supply from the endometrium before the embryo implants there. Not content with this, the embryo evolved to burrow through the endometrium until it reaches the arteries, where it tears through the wall and rewires the blood vessels so that it can bathe directly in the parent’s blood. The (arguably) ungrateful parasite pumps out hormones to make the arteries expand around it, and paralyses them to prevent the parent from cutting off its supply. It produces more hormones, which act directly on the parent to maintain pregnancy and increase the availability of nutrients. The parent defends themselves as best they can: their endometrium fights against the embryo’s invasive proteins, their immune system attacks the invading cells, and their own hormones try to counteract those of the embryo. The tug-of-war rages on.
Well that’s just metal af.
There’s a nice SciShow vid on that
Without a doubt, the larynx/esophagus connection. It’s one of the biggest design flaws in the human body. Beyond the discomfort and coughing that occurs when food or drink “goes down the wrong pipe,” there’s the possibility of sudden, agonizing death at random when you’re just taking in sustenance. Eating and breathing through the same tube is for chumps.
I have allergies and usually have sinus infections at least once or twice a year. Every time this is brought up, I wonder how many people would suffocate by not being able to breathe through their mouth. It has its drawbacks but only two small openings that are prone to extended blockages for breathing does too.
I guess if you were fixing this situation as OP wanted and made an additional "pipe" you'd inevitably just have to add an additional opening somewhere. Maybe we could have blowholes.
But evolution ended up giving us two external tubes to breathe. My conclusion is that its better to have redundancy in external tubes openings for air.
So, to avoid the efficiency of a branch that lets us eat and breathe from our mouths would you make it so we can't breathe from our mouths and we still have 2 tubes to breathe as redundancy? If so, where would you place the extra tube opening? Head or further away? Toe or back would help act as a snorkel, I'd think.
Good question, I hadn't really thought about it much. I'm just jealous of dogs, who can eat and breathe simultaneously. Evolution dropped our larynx down low so that we can talk, but evolution only does the best it can with what it has to work with, and a magical redesign could theoretically do better. I wouldn't mind a blowhole, as it would make snorkeling a lot easier!
Gimme dat blowhole mod
It would be nice if my pancreas actually worked all the way.
Other than that, i'd like to be able to fill my balls with helium so I could float around.
to fill my balls with helium so I could float around.
LMAO
I hope you realize that floating objects generally orient themselves in such a way that the most buoyant parts are at the top. So while you could float around, you would be hanging by your balls the entire time...
You have to balance on top.
My brain. Just let me fucking fall asleep.
Probably my brain. If I could far surpass the most intelligent people in the world then I'm sure I could capitalize on that in tons of ways, probably even in financial ways by charging for shows of my intellect
Or use the brain power to conjure up a prank of the century
Practical answer - My brain. Just make me ridiculously smart. I could figure out how to power up the rest of my organs on my own after that.
Fun answer - My stomach. Just let me eat anything and everything and as much as I want.
Spinal column. Hands down. Fix things so there's no more disk problems, no more pain. Make spinal nervers regenerate. It is part of the very core of our being and when it doesn't work correctly it ruins everything else.
Never rotting teeth would be great.
My back. Getting old sucks.
I look at the kids, wish i was that flexible 🤣
Upgrade cells. So they don’t degenerate with time.
This precisely. Maybe "us vs them" was useful when we lived in caves and resources were limited, but now, we should theoretically have enough food and housing that everyone could be comfortable.
But, Eisenhower's "military industrial complex" has bogarted all the resources, and emphasized tribalism by saying it's really "their" fault, where "they" are anyone not like "us". When we're all struggling together.
Added intelligence upgrade for all the ideas I just can't handle on my own. I feel like I'm floating around in an overpopulated world which makes methods to achieve anything a PhD level discussion.
I want the power up to prevent this same question that's been posted 10,000 different times in 500 different ways to ever be posted again.
Definitely my brain. I think I'm experiencing trauma-related deterioration. I used to have a pretty high IQ, but I can feel the functionality fading. I wish my brain could handle the stress better.
I would choose my brain. I would add the ability for it to balance my moods and accept that I will never have an SO again—without having to be medicated in perpetuity.
Pain... Pain keeps you alive.
People who lack pain receptors don't last very long in this world.
If something is broken and giving chronic pain, yeah, fix that with the creator. But honest, healthy pain is vital.
Just contract leprosy.
Eyesight. Because the glory.
Torn between going straight up Von-Neumann-brain, or functional immortality (e.g. Bullets are still a problem, but aging won't be.)
Skin: Make it so I can endure the harshest of elements. Or be impenetrable.
As for the brain and being really smart. I think people are underestimating the power of stupid people to randomly mess up your plans.
Skin: Make it so I can endure the harshest of elements. Or be impenetrable.
Good look getting a vaccine
Bahahahah
Brain - I want to be able to perform real multitasking.