Biology questions for fiction writing

[hopewrites]

I have some questions that I'm not sure where to look for the answers to.

Figured I'd start a thread and anyone else with a quick bio-question could pop in as well. Since I've noticed we have some biology enthusiasts with extensive knowledge, I'm hoping they'll pop by and help us out.

 

[hopewrites]

OK, so my question.
I've got a story I'm struggling with and am hoping this new character I thought up will help get the story rolling. But I need to know more about basking and how/why it works.

My understanding is that basking aids thermoregluation. So if you have a humanoid who ether naps in puddles of sunlight or takes scalding hot showers in aid of thermoregulation, and later finds out they are part alien, what differences to their biology would prompt such a need?

I mean. I know thermo regulation is a big deal for most life (maybe all, but I don't want to throw everyone in the same bucket, so I'm playing it safe and saying most.) Like, the reason spiders migrate into my house once it gets cold is that being warm enough to hunt when everything else is too cold to move gives them an edge. I mean, I head the reason bees are so successful is that they can disengage their wing joints and warm their flight muscles up before heading out, which gives them an evolutionary edge over pollinators who have to wait for external temperatures to warm them enough for flight...
I'd heard that the argument for "cold blooded" vs "warm blooded" is that by allowing external forces do one's thermoregulation allows for longer stretches of famine than self-regulating systems that have higher caloric needs for base functions.


Or am I confusing too many disseperate nature documentaries?

 

[tinkerdan]

If you haven't already seen this you might take a look.

REPTILES, THERMOREGULATION AND THE ENVIRONMENT | British Chelonia Group

The article itself does not address your issues directly but it does cite a large number of references at the bottom that could be helpful.

 

[Ihe]

Let me start off by saying I'm not a biology expert, but the idea is thought-provoking, so here it goes.

Depending on external conditions for your thermoregulation is indeed more energy-efficient, as you've mentioned. The body doesn't bother with that mechanism and saves on calories. This would free up a good percentage of caloric resources in the alien's body that he could in turn use for other more pressing bodily functions (maybe something awesome only these aliens can do, and now your MC can do as well...). It makes the organism very dependent on external factors though, which is a huge disadvantage to their adaptability, so I don't know if this alien race would be too advanced. Yes, the motivation to control these external factors could be a push towards technical advancement, but they would've still been too constricted by this very limiting cold blood, relegating them to very specific time frames and parts of their world, as well as forcing them to extended periods of basking in preparation for any action worth the energy. Their world would need to be very hot all around, night and day (if you want these aliens to be advanced). Cold-blooded to warm-blooded is a very important hurdle to overcome if any species wants to make it in the universe as highly advanced, IMHO, at least from the viewpoint of Earth biology. Keep in mind basking takes up copious amounts of time from an organism's daily routine, leaving very little time for progress once the other more pressing bodily needs are met.

Also, I would think the bigger the animal, the longer the basking (although I could be wrong on this). But if I'm right, the aliens would be small, or have a way of expanding their receptive surface to heat/infrared light for more energy efficiency. Maybe that could be an interesting bodily transformation for the MC?

What would be interesting is if the MC could learn to switch between mammal warm-blood mechanisms and a alien cold-blood mechanisms (at precise times of the day--maybe controlled by infrared light intensity?--or at will). If these aliens have a special biologic function that needs a cold-blooded system to work, the MC could choose to drop his temperature to "save up energy" and set the body up for this action. This would open some interesting narrative about the gradual transition in his body as well.

I don't think I've even come close to answering your question, but I appreciate the distraction from my WiP, so excuse my disoriented ramblings .

 

[Theophania Elliott]

I'd say, first, decide what your story needs this character to do, and why.

• Are they basically self-thermoregulating, but not very efficiently?
• Are they self-thermoregulating, but native to a colder temperature than where they currently are? My thermoregulation is fine, but I still lean against radiators in winter, and my husband has remarked on the way I bask in the sun. I am also reminded of going to the south of Spain in February, and enjoying the lovely warm sunshine - and watching all the Spaniards wrapped up in coats and scarves!
• Or are they not self-thermoregulating at all?

And how much detail do you really need? Unless this thermoregulation thing is a major part of the plot, you may not need to know exactly how it works (or doesn't). It may be enough to work your way through the logic of why their species (ancestor-species) is the way it is, and the logical consequences.

Also, the biology of interspecies reproduction can be strange - think mules versus hinnies, ligers versus tigons, and so forth. Often the offspring is sterile, if cross-species reproduction is possible at all. From the purely biological angle, I would guess that the more different your two species are, the less likely they would produce viable offspring.

 

[tinkerdan]

I'm not sure I'd favor one over the other in terms of intellectual capacity.
Though and Endotherm has the advantage of self regulating through internal biology over the Ectotherms reliance on environment, I think that would impact more on a social level and variance in method of productivity. Where the Endotherm might have a advantage in most cases of more time to be productive physically over longer periods throughout the day. The Ectotherm would have to rely on specific times when they are at optimal temperature which means they would often be dormant through the night and possibly the warmest part of the day. So the Ectotherm would have smaller time envelopes and if they were to keep up with the productivity of the Endotherm then they would have periods of frenzied activity punctuated by periods of dormancy.

When you factor in intelligence and technological advancements then there would be more possibility for creating artificial environments that are optimal enough that the two could converge in the sense of productive active time. It would only be periods outside of that ecosphere that you might demonstrate the extreme differences in the two.

Your quandary here is interesting though if you don't emphasize it too much you might get by without a whole lot of explanation of the biology, however if you think it is greatly important to the plot then you might want to study the biology of the two.

 

[J Riff]

Scorpions, Water Bears, other ancient ones knew how to survive in a large temperature range. Bees rule, let's ask the ants. Maybe something to do with blood getting thinner/thicker as temp change?. Maybe the alien can't do that for some reason.

 

[Ihe]

I'm not sure I'd favor one over the other in terms of intellectual capacity.
Though and Endotherm has the advantage of self regulating through internal biology over the Ectotherms reliance on environment, I think that would impact more on a social level and variance in method of productivity. Where the Endotherm might have a advantage in most cases of more time to be productive physically over longer periods throughout the day. The Ectotherm would have to rely on specific times when they are at optimal temperature which means they would often be dormant through the night and possibly the warmest part of the day. So the Ectotherm would have smaller time envelopes and if they were to keep up with the productivity of the Endotherm then they would have periods of frenzied activity punctuated by periods of dormancy.

When you factor in intelligence and technological advancements then there would be more possibility for creating artificial environments that are optimal enough that the two could converge in the sense of productive active time. It would only be periods outside of that ecosphere that you might demonstrate the extreme differences in the two.

Your quandary here is interesting though if you don't emphasize it too much you might get by without a whole lot of explanation of the biology, however if you think it is greatly important to the plot then you might want to study the biology of the two.

I'm not saying cold-blooded creatures couldn't make it to our level. I'm just saying it would be MUCH harder for them to do so, and thus, less likely. At base-level survival, warm-bloods are already at an advantage. That difference in kind only grows more noticeable the further you go in our evolutionary tree. The ones least encumbered by external factors are the ones with most control over their progress. IMO, having to bask is not an advantage, ever, under almost any circumstance.

 

[Phyrebrat]

One of my favourite fishes - the opah - recently became listed as the first warm blooded fish. The method it uses may be of interest to you.

Meet the Comical Opah, the Only Truly Warm-Blooded Fish

 

[Ajid]

Ahh I see your problem. You think Biology is important when really geology is truly more significant.

 

[Phyrebrat]

Taxi for Sheldon!

 

[Ajid]

Sorry it's stuck in the strata

 

[RX-79G]

FYI, cats and other warm blooded animals bask to make up for metabolic losses when sleeping. In other words, they burn so much less energy when napping that they try to supplement by seeking heat.

A being that sought hot showers would run somewhat against that grain, since a shower is a pretty active (standing) activity. But relaxing in a hot bath, sun or under a duvet could be something that a person with a more dynamic metabolic variations might do.

A potential upside is either more direct metabolic control or the ability to raise it significantly above human levels to move faster, stay awake longer, etc. I don't think you'd necessarily have a structural change to be like that - it would be more cellular.

 

[Ajid]

Typical biologist!

 

[hopewrites]

Scorpions, Water Bears, other ancient ones knew how to survive in a large temperature range. Bees rule, let's ask the ants. Maybe something to do with blood getting thinner/thicker as temp change?. Maybe the alien can't do that for some reason.

!!

so if MC gets a bit dehydrated, blood thicker, they'll transition to other species type charicteristics in metabloic rates? That'd be cool.

if the aliens have to come from some place super hot that helps my story line more than hinders, so concider me running with that trian of thought.


as for how/when the interbreading took place, frequancy or anything like that, I havent looked into this MCs geneology at all. Not even their parents. Probably work better for my plot sketch if they dont know, make it a nice "who am i" story. I find I have a tendancy to write more of those.

Thanks for the links and thoughts!! I knew this place was awesome! Keep 'em comming