26
votes
Knocking Out Zombies
they are walking human corpses reanimated by slime molds growing around their bones
If the hits cause enough damage to disconnect the bones, they zombie has little to no capability of moving.
...
- 262k
20
votes
Knocking Out Zombies
Humans have a dedicated set of sensors to detect the environment, the balance of its body and the position of its body. Your slime molds need a similar replacement for all these tasks to operate the ...
- 43.1k
19
votes
How effective would this spider's technique be in getting it food/shelter(for its young)/transportation/protection?
The spider wouldn't thrive
The spider has two weaknesses. First is the fruit. If the fruit supply is halted, the species is in grave danger. The second is angering humans. As so many species have ...
- 31.3k
8
votes
Knocking Out Zombies
Slime moulds have something, even if we would not recognise it as a nervous system. If they are going to make a blob that moves like a slug, then need some sort of internal communication so they don't ...
- 1,530
7
votes
How effective would this spider's technique be in getting it food/shelter(for its young)/transportation/protection?
Same likelihood as all other animals larger than the head of a pin that specialize in killing humans. Zero.
Humans are not safe targets in the best of circumstances. All the animals that specialize in ...
- 766
7
votes
How effective would this spider's technique be in getting it food/shelter(for its young)/transportation/protection?
True jumping spiders are araneomorph spiders, which has certain consequences for their biology.
Araneomorph spiders' fangs point toward each-other, allowing a powerful but shallow bite, that on larger ...
- 48k
7
votes
What kind of world could have humanoid size spiders
An earthlike world
They don't actually have to be true arachnids, do they?
If they're hairy with eight legs and big eyes, who's going to dispute the 'spider' tag? The square cube law can take a flying ...
- 9,677
6
votes
Knocking Out Zombies
How does the slime mold find their next victim?
they are walking human corpses reanimated by slime molds growing around their bones!
Based on this sentence the slime molds are hidden under tissue ...
- 169
5
votes
Could a desert animal recycle ammonia into protein to avoid urinating?
Half a frame challenge:
Use uric acid.
Forming uric acid (birds, reptiles) rather then urea(mammals) is a viable option to reduce water output upon excretion. Uric acid is more expensive metabolically ...
- 4,381
5
votes
Accepted
Could a desert animal recycle ammonia into protein to avoid urinating?
The first and obvious problem is that urination removes many toxic chemicals from the body, only two of which are ammonia or urea. At best, this plan can reduce the rate of urination by reducing how ...
- 1,570
5
votes
What kind of world could have humanoid size spiders
You've got what you need here, now (with a tweak).
Spiders are a bit different from insects in that they're respiration isn't limited to spiracles - they have lungs. In principle they could be as big ...
- 23.7k
4
votes
Knocking Out Zombies
My immediate thought was fainting goats. They don't faint because they got hit in the head. It's just a hereditary condition triggered by over-excitement or being startled. (If you read through the ...
- 6,144
3
votes
How effective would this spider's technique be in getting it food/shelter(for its young)/transportation/protection?
Why have a antagonistic relationship?
Two book series come to mind - the children of time, with genetically/nanotech modified (I forget) spiders which form complex societies and eventually ally with a ...
- 7,529
2
votes
Knocking Out Zombies
Punctured Membrane.
A slime mold is like a wet garbage bag. Give it a poke and it starts leaking nasty bin juice all over your clean carpet.
The bin juice (cytoplasm) is full of free-floating ...
- 60.3k
2
votes
Knocking Out Zombies
If the mould is distributed through the entire body, not localised in the head, and you want it to be knocked out by a blow, then the blow needs to ripple through the entire body like the time Wilder ...
- 3,798
2
votes
Knocking Out Zombies
It's a biological fact that each slime mould is a single cell.
As long as the nucleus of the cell is in the head, you can easily knock it out by smashing the head.
Even if your zombies are infested ...
2
votes
Accepted
What kind of world could have humanoid size spiders
Part One: A Naturally Habitable Low Gravity Planet.
The kind of world you need is one with rather low surface gravity to help the giant spiders avoid collapsing under their weight, and high enough ...
- 27.7k
2
votes
Knocking Out Zombies
Slime mold cell structure
The slime mold is made by a lot of multinucleate amoeba-like cells. They are multinucleate in order to get better surviving chances if a cell is chopped in two halves. But ...
2
votes
Knocking Out Zombies
I think that you sort of answer your own question.
The question you have answered already (albeit implicitly) is "how do single slime molds, which are brainless, turn into a volitional organism?&...
- 2,748
1
vote
Knocking Out Zombies
What if the mechanics were changed from the slime mold itself moving the bones to the slime mold coopting the nervous system? In that case a taser may disrupt their ability to integrate with the ...
- 111
1
vote
What kind of world could have humanoid size spiders
Smaller people
We all know about cube-square law and its effects on animals. This is all about scaling. Mammals have a hard time below the size of a mouse, and bugs can't survive much any larger than ...
- 9,881
1
vote
What's the most efficient way for a living creature to tunnel through wood?
Chemical Boring.
I presume the animal eats the wood as it goes. In that case the most energy efficient way to dig the tunnel is to digest the wood and suck it up like a milkshake.
The animal smears ...
- 60.3k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible