Why is the butterfly the most perverted and cruel creature in the world? Learn about its metamorphosis

When it comes to the most perverted and cruel creatures in the world, what comes to mind first? Snakes? Centipedes? Or parasites? Actually, none of them.

The real answer is butterfly! What's going on? Let's take a look.

A veritable pervert

The entire development process of a butterfly is called metamorphosis.

Simply put, metamorphosis means that during the growth process of animals, their morphological structure and living habits undergo qualitative changes.

For example, the mosquitoes that everyone hates the most, their larvae live in water and rely on nutrients in the water for survival. They can only emerge as mosquitoes after four metamorphosis.

The metamorphosis process is divided into complete metamorphosis and incomplete metamorphosis.

Mosquitoes and butterflies belong to the latter. As we all know, when a butterfly is a young animal, it is a "big green caterpillar" and some of them have patterns on their bodies, which are completely different from the dancing butterflies and make people feel extremely curious at first sight.

The growth process of a butterfly is divided into four stages: egg, larva, pupa and adult.

People often say that the transformation from pupae to butterfly is the third step in the growth of a butterfly. However, few people know that the growth process of a butterfly is actually quite cruel and abnormal.

The growth of a butterfly

After mating, the female butterfly will attach itself to the stems and leaves of the plant to lay eggs, in order to provide a comfortable environment for the offspring to grow.

The number of eggs laid is generally between 50 and 200, depending on the mother's nutritional level, but the hatching rate of the eggs is not high.

Unlike the eggs of other insects, butterfly larvae must break open the eggs themselves. Although the eggs are very fragile, it is a challenge for new life.

If they cannot be completed, their fate is doomed to die in the womb.

The larvae that break out of the eggs are now exhausted and have no strength to gnaw on the roots and stems of the plant to replenish their nutrients. At this time, they will eat the eggs that gave birth to them.

These eggs are rich in protein, enough to sustain them through their first metamorphosis.

But this process seems rather bizarre. If it happened to humans, it would be like a baby eating the placenta that wraps itself around itself bite by bite after it is born.

After completing the first metamorphosis, the larvae have a complete body structure and are able to digest the roots and stems of plants, extract nutrients from them to sustain life, and complete several subsequent metamorphosis.

The larvae must undergo four metamorphosis before they can become butterflies. With each metamorphosis, the larvae will grow in size. The larvae of some species of butterflies will also change their appearance to prepare for pupation.

The pupation stage is the most cruel part of a butterfly's life. Its cruelty and perversion far exceed that when it breaks out of the shell.

From cocoon to butterfly

Friends who have seen Stephen Chow’s movie “Kung Fu” know that at the end of the movie, the protagonist was beaten to a bloody mess and his bones were broken by the bad guys, but in the end he emerged as a master.

In fact, the process of butterfly metamorphosis is even more complicated than this.

When the pupa is formed, the larva's body will slowly be disassembled. Except for some organs that are necessary to maintain life, all cells will turn into a messy "blood" and then reassemble bit by bit.

It's like keeping a person's brain and heart, and then mashing up all the body parts.

Of course, the reorganization process is not messy. On the contrary, it will precisely reshape the butterfly's body structure.

If the pupa breaks during the process, or is destroyed by external factors, the only thing that awaits the larvae is death.

Because once the pupa breaks open, the larvae lose the warm environment in which to transform into butterflies.

Moreover, the breaking of the pupa may lead to the loss of certain tissue structures, resulting in serious consequences.

At this point, you may be wondering how the larvae can accurately organize these cells into the body structure of a butterfly?

This makes us marvel at the magic of life. Just like humans, it can develop from a simple fertilized egg into an advanced intelligent creature.

It is hard for people to imagine that the human brain, which is more powerful than a supercomputer, actually develops from a fertilized egg.

The process of a larva turning into a butterfly is just as magical.

Scientists speculate that the ability of butterflies to reconstruct a new body so delicately may be due to the "muscle memory" of certain specific genes inherited from the mother.

Scientists compare the larvae's pupae to a coffin containing a "live" corpse. It is difficult to say whether the larvae in the metamorphosis process can be considered living things.

Moreover, no one knows how painful this transformation process is. It can be described as truly cruel and perverted.

The entire emergence process takes about 15 days, but it is worth noting that the time spent reorganizing the body structure in the pupa is even less.

It is usually around 12 days, because many larvae need to differentiate their tissue structures in the first and second days, and then adapt to their new bodies in the last two days.

The time spent on these two stages varies depending on the development of the larvae.

After everything is done, the butterfly relies on its powerful wings to break open the cocoon and becomes a free butterfly in the sky.

Some people say that after such a cruel metamorphosis process, are the butterfly and the original larva really the same living organism?

This is hard to explain. After all, butterflies have no moral concepts, and it is difficult to use a standard to measure independent living beings.

Previously, a controversial "memory replacement" surgery was reported on the Internet.

Theoretically, it is possible to use scientific means to erase a person's memory and replace it with someone else's memory.

If a wealthy person is very old and needs a young body to continue his life, then if the memory of this wealthy person is implanted into a young body, who exactly is this young body?

From an ethical perspective, this body belongs to a wealthy person, but from a biological perspective, the body still belongs to the original owner.

This question has never been answered. After all, human memory itself is a wonderful thing, and very little research has been done on it.

Let’s get back to the topic of butterflies. As a representative of completely perverted and cruel creatures in the biological world, besides butterflies, what other creatures are equally “cruel and ruthless” or slightly “perverted”?

Cruel and perverted creatures

The first is the dolphin, which is considered a “good animal” by everyone.

Don't be fooled by their harmless appearance at ordinary times. They are very abnormal when mating.

When the mating season comes, dolphins who are rejected by females or cannot find a mate will gather together and look for lone female dolphins to engage in coercive behavior.

In addition, dolphins often engage in same-sex mating behavior.

If the former is for the purpose of reproduction, the latter is simply a habit of dolphins.

What is even more unacceptable is that dolphins can mate with other species. There are many such cases, which has greatly refreshed people's understanding of dolphins.

Second, chimpanzees, humans’ closest relatives.

When chimpanzees fight, the victorious side will brutally kill the other side's leader and his male cubs in public. Some chimpanzees will even drink blood and eat meat to declare their sovereignty.

Of course, the losing female chimpanzees will be taken over by the winning side, just like in primitive tribal wars of humans.

The cruelty of nature is beyond everyone's imagination, but fortunately we live in human society. What do you think about this? Welcome to leave a message in the comment area. Follow CHN Jiuxiang Technology, and through popular science, you will find that there are too many wonderful things in this world.