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I mean why 5, why 5 on each limb, why not 4 or 6. Why do our feet also have 5. Whats with our body being so symmetrical.

People who know anything about evolution, now is your time to shine.

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[-] Atrabiliousaurus@lemmy.world 41 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The wikipedia article Polydactyly in stem-tetrapods has some explanations on how we ended up with 5 fingers and toes.

The gist of it is that tetrapods (four-limbed vertebrate animals) evolved from a fish similar to a lobe-finned fish that had 5 sets of bones in each of its fins that evolved into fingers and toes. Some tetrapods have subsequently lost digits but the basal state was five.

There's a book, Your Inner Fish by Neil Shubin that's full of this kind of stuff. Highly recommend.

[-] scarabic@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago

I love it. So many things in the world don’t really have an “explanation,” they have a “story.”

The reason they are as they are is just because of prior conditions.

[-] OutlierBlue@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago

Amazing book. I recommend reading it if you're interested in evolution.

this post was submitted on 15 Sep 2023
135 points (86.9% liked)

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