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What if humans were marsupials?


Alan Degas

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One thing I was thinking is that abortion wouldn't even need to be a topic. Don't want to carry to term? No problem. Just take out joey (who is basically just a fetus at time of birth anyway) and attach to other nipple (either fake or real) and be on your merry way. 

 

With our technology we would probably quickly abolish any need to carry our young in pouches anyway and pregnancy and birth would be fairly minor inconveniences. So it would hopefully create more equality between the sexes when it comes to jobs etc. Though, knowing humans I am sure that we would sexualize pouches beyond what is reasonable, so women would probably feel forced to wear clothing covering their stomach area at all times while men would be free to show midriff willy nilly. 

I could probably become very unfair for women who want to choose to have babies the natural way though. We would mayhe make it law for work places to accommodate a mother with a growing joey... but let's be honest, they would easily weasel their way out of that one and women would feel pressured to grow their joeys outside of their own pouch, as to not interfere with their work performance and risk getting fired. 

 

 

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This could be an entire sci-fi novel.

 

Here's another thought- would it be considered gross to carry around items in one's pouch like it was a purse?

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Supermarket security would demand to inspect every pouch. 

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If I remember correctly, the Narns from Babylon 5 are sort of... humanoid reptile marsupials.  That show is strange on so many levels.

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Marsupials are pregnant for a brief period of time before the embryo goes in the pouch, so I imagine early term abortion would still be a thing. If anything abortion would probably be easier once it's in the pouch because if someone was really bent on not bringing it into the world all they'd have to do is take it out and and flush it, throw it in the trash, bury it, whatever and nobody would ever know. I wonder if some people would advocate for all trash getting thoroughly inspected to prevent that from happening.

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Anthracite_Impreza

Just the idea grosses me out :wacko: Then again, so does eutherian reproduction.

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2 hours ago, Anthracite_Impreza said:

Just the idea grosses me out :wacko: Then again, so does eutherian reproduction.

Most biology is weird if you think about it too closely.  Especially anything to do with cephalopods.

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Anthracite_Impreza
19 minutes ago, Ardoise said:

Most biology is weird if you think about it too closely.  Especially anything to do with cephalopods.

Gastropods are best 🐌

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1 minute ago, Anthracite_Impreza said:

Gastropods are best 🐌

Little bi-sexed house-carriers.  10/10

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I had some pet aquatic snails, but they died when my room got too cold during one of the snowstorms last winter.  I think I'll get new ones, though.

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Tails could be a problem 

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Anthracite_Impreza
47 minutes ago, Skycaptain said:

Tails could be a problem 

Koalas and wombats don't have tails and they're marsupials ;)

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4 hours ago, Skycaptain said:

Tails could be a problem 

I wouldn't mind having one, honestly. Animals with long tails have better balance.  I spend a lot of time hiking, and greater agility on unstable surfaces would be fantastic.

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2 hours ago, Ardoise said:

I wouldn't mind having one, honestly. Animals with long tails have better balance.  I spend a lot of time hiking, and greater agility on unstable surfaces would be fantastic.

If you're on a cycle, signalling a turn is easy, driving a car less so 

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43 minutes ago, Skycaptain said:

If you're on a cycle, signalling a turn is easy, driving a car less so 

We would have to design things like cars and furniture differently.

On a related note, I would love to see what alien furniture would look like.

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Siimo van der fietspad

If humans were marsupials...we'd probably look a lot like other marsupials.  That is, furry, a relatively small skull, and forelimbs that are not well adapted for much besides grasping as an infant. The main downside is that with a combination of early birth and subsequent development in the pouch, developing our large brain becomes very difficult. It also prevents several unique features of human physiology, such as forward-facing eyes, being able to run rather than hop or climb, and having opposable thumbs. It's not completely impossible to evolve a species of highly intelligent kangaroos, but humans have sidestepped the need for a pouch as our flexible arms and ingenuity with materials have made carrying a baby fairly simple. 

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It's not marsupials, it's when cats evolve opposable thumbs we need to worry:P:P

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If octopuses got opposable thumbs we’d be doomed.

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21 hours ago, Gloomy said:

If octopuses got opposable thumbs we’d be doomed.

Their tentacles are actually more dextrous than human hands.

They can open jars from the inside.

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Ace of Mind
On 4/22/2019 at 3:35 PM, Gloomy said:

If octopuses got opposable thumbs we’d be doomed.

Seriously, octopus potential is massively underrated. It's almost creepy. 
It's a real shame they tend to synchronize generational dying-out during reproduction, leaving the next generation to re-learn everything again through experience, and preventing the formation of social structures. Like, seriously, given that they've been around a lot longer than we have, if they had ever evolved a way around this and went social, we would probably be living in a simulation run by octopuses by now 😅
🐙

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Everyone is giving such insightful answers, and here I am, thinking about how many snacks I would be able to fit in my pouch. 😂

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On 4/21/2019 at 9:37 PM, Ardoise said:

If I remember correctly, the Narns from Babylon 5 are sort of... humanoid reptile marsupials.  That show is strange on so many levels.

I didn't remember that they were marsupials (has been a long while since I watched Bab5)... but Google says you're right. :)

 

After being born by their mother, Narn babies spend the first three months in an abdominal pouch in their father's abdomen... leading to them using the term "pouchling" as an insult akin to "grow up already".

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13 hours ago, Mysticus Insanus said:

I didn't remember that they were marsupials (has been a long while since I watched Bab5)... but Google says you're right. :)

 

After being born by their mother, Narn babies spend the first three months in an abdominal pouch in their father's abdomen... leading to them using the term "pouchling" as an insult akin to "grow up already".

Reminds me of seahorses.  We'd have a good deal more gender equality if we had a similar setup.

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Being a marsupial would be cool. I would just use my pouch to store random stuff like candy, because I probably wouldn't want kids even if I was a kangaroo, a wombat, a koala, etc.

 

(Yes I'm Aussie and as you probably know, we have lots of crazy animals in our country!)

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I wonder if the TSA would check people's pouches.

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