Some of the “souvenirs” of the Ring War have become embarrassments to the families of the veterans. It was a different time.
I can’t do it on purpose, but I do sometimes feel them move if I am surprised by a noise behind me.
Most people have never noticed, in the Donald Duck conic strips, illustrated characters who are not members of the Duck family are dogs if male and cats if female. The dog-males have round black noses and pendant floppy ears, and females have pointy cat ears, and still look humanoid enough that the reader does not notice the consistency of the characteristics.
I never saw them as cats and dogs, just dogs with ears that hang low vs hang high. Though my exposure is mostly in cartoon form from Ducktales and such.
“Yo auntie wears Orcish combat boots!”
Insufficient number of mechanical rice picker accidents.
Several, but none inherited the pointy ear.
I have pointed ears, buy they don’t look like elf or Vulcan ears.
Unless you’re Henry Rollins…
I do not see (or it has not been shown) why directional acoustic collectors should be pointy.
Given the 3-D scoop, which is the way to go (yay Nature!) perhaps “optimal” stiffness to strain considerations of cartilage come into play.
Most of the time, evolution tries to balance survival by using the minimum amount of equipment required.
Sorry, but this is utter nonsense. Evolution doesn’t have an agenda and isn’t trying to do anything. Random mutations simply happen. Some get passed along and some don’t. Some have survival advantages and some don’t. There’s no “balance” that is some sort of goal. Evolution simply happens, there’s no destination.
No, it’s not entirely nonsense. Random mutations tend to behave like a form of entropy: They tend to de-evolve from more elaborate structures toward more simple structures, UNLESS there is some adaptive preference toward the more elaborate structure.
For example: Certain species of mammals live in places where there is little or no light, and in these species, their eyes have tended to de-evolve and become vestigial. Bats, living in caves and coming out only at night, are famously blind. There are some species of dolphins that live in muddy river waters, and some of these species are nearly blind. Whales and dolphins, at some point in their history, had legs, but these have de-evolved. Some cetaceans have a vestigial pelvis and vestigial leg bones.
Yes, it’s all in random mutations. But random mutations are as likely to add or subtract some structure. Absent some evolutionary pressure favoring the more elaborate structure, you tend to get regression.
No bats are actually blind. All have at least small, perfectly functional eyes. Many species are active in daylight and have good vision.
There’s been no evidence presented here to show that humans never had pointy ears.
There is some small amount of evidence [sup]*[/sup] that guys with pointy ears are considered hot by some members of the opposite sex. YMMV
- Really sorry, you will need something very strong and alcoholic to wipe the memory of this seared into your brain.
Ayup… in fact, it was this character who inspired me to ask this question.
City on the Edge of Forever, just so you know the reference wasn’t lost.
Then, why do plastic surgeons do so many nose-jobs and no pointy-ear-jobs?
The shape of the ear allows it to filter certain frequencies which help us figure out where a sound comes from. Computer headsets take advantage of this to trick your brain into thinking a sound is coming from front or behind depending on which frequencies are filtered out. Pointy ears might not be as good as this type of filtering and may be at a disadvantage at locating a sound (just guessing).
I would also guess that pointy ears might get a lot colder than rounded ears. Round ears can get pretty painful in cold weather. That pointy part that sticks out would be even harder to keep warm. That might also be a disadvantage.