What if we had front rodent teeth?

[AccuTron]

Yes, seems way out, but let me explain:

 

I was just about to respond to another forum topic -- haven't done so yet -- where the topic touches on the corruption of science, and I am bared fangs when it comes to AGW fraud, so I thought to myself, I should add parenthetically something like "excuse me for a moment while I chew on my screen bezel."  You may yet see this.

 

With respect to all my fully undamaged furniture, would it be helpful as stress release to constantly be required to gnaw on something?  Right now, we have beer nuts and pizza, bless 'em, and chewing on pencils, not so blessed.  What we have now makes us fat and does bad stuff to our teeth.  And may not be that effective anyway.

 

What if bar or restaurant tables had a bowl of free range fully organic wood blocks, perhaps creatively cut?  ("Are you going to eat your knots?")  Pocket Kevlar chew bars that never wear out?  There's a whole serio-comic range of thought there.  ("Dahling, where did you get your chip bib?")  

 

But I'm curious about the stress relief part.  Could that actually be a sort of strain relief, species wide?  If human genetic engineering chose a goal, how about teeth that keep growing, a select few up front?  Rodents already do it, which would be a head start on the genetics.

 

 

(That's what coffee and little food looks like to me.)

 

"Dentum Über Alles!"

[Torero]

I guess in that case the excellent r/K-theory series would have been presented reversed.

[AccuTron]

I had to look that up, haven't followed it closely.  I gather that if we think of rats, it's r, but what about beavers, they seem K?  Anyway, it's about teeth and stress relief, whatever the breeding style.  Is K more attentively stressful?  Are r's unstressed about care for young, but stressed that there are so dang many of them?  I guess there will always be research questions. 

[Torero]

I had to look that up, haven't followed it closely.  I gather that if we think of rats, it's r, but what about beavers, they seem K?  Anyway, it's about teeth and stress relief, whatever the breeding style.  Is K more attentively stressful?  Are r's unstressed about care for young, but stressed that there are so dang many of them?  I guess there will always be research questions. 

 

Stefan uses the rabbit example for the r's, yet rabbit are not rodents. Beavers are. Just wanted to make the remark.

 

It's a good point you make; how is stress related to r vs K? Rodents as preyed animals should have quite some stress, you'd say. But looking at the largest one, I don't know, looks pretty relaxed...

 

[AccuTron]

I envy that animal's career path....Hmm, I have the back yard finally growing grass, and these critters don't look like fence jumpers...I think one or two out back might be nice.  On the other hand, the wild rabbits might object.

[Danske]

 

With respect to all my fully undamaged furniture, would it be helpful as stress release to constantly be required to gnaw on something?  Right now, we have beer nuts and pizza, bless 'em, and chewing on pencils, not so blessed.  What we have now makes us fat and does bad stuff to our teeth.  And may not be that effective anyway.

 

What do you mean by 'be required' (underlined)? Do you want to make some kind of gnaw law?

[AccuTron]

What do you mean by 'be required' (underlined)? Do you want to make some kind of gnaw law?

Rodents, and I guess similar animals, are required to gnaw or those front teeth will keep growing without stopping.  I've seen a, I think it's called a marmoset, a cat sized animal, in a public park, that had been fed only by tourists and stopped it's natural behavior, and the two lower front teeth were at least two inches long, curving way up past the top of it's head, and the other two curving downward way past it's head.   

[Danske]

Rodents, and I guess similar animals, are required to gnaw or those front teeth will keep growing without stopping.  I've seen a, I think it's called a marmoset, a cat sized animal, in a public park, that had been fed only by tourists and stopped it's natural behavior, and the two lower front teeth were at least two inches long, curving way up past the top of it's head, and the other two curving downward way past it's head.   

 

Lol. So what? Is this what passes for philosophical discussion around here? Even as a thought experiment you could at least inject some philosophical concepts. What do you mean by 'be required', is this some fantasy of yours? To become president and impose laws about chewing wood?