Episode 241 - Digestion
4/12/20262 hr 20 min
The world is full of food, but in order to make the most of it, living organisms need to be able to break it down and extract the useful nutrients. This episode, we explore the fundamental process of digestion and the many, many ways that life has adapted this process to various diets. And we’ll take a look at what the fossil record has to tell us about ancient diets and the evolutionary history of digestive systems.
In the news: predator bites, coelacanth lungs, Cambrian claws, and squid evolution.
Time markers: Intro & Announcements: 00:00:00 News: 00:05:55 Main discussion, Part 1: 00:38:10 Main discussion, Part 2: 01:23:30 Patron question: 02:06:50
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The Intro and Outro music is “On the Origin of Species” by Protodome. More music like this at http://ocremix.org
Musical Interludes are "Professor Umlaut" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0
Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsDavid· Host0:00
You're listening to the Common Descent Podcast.
Will· Host0:03
[upbeat music] Hello, David.
David· Host0:20
Hello, Will.
Will· Host0:21
And hello, listeners. Welcome to episode 241 of the Common Descent Podcast, where we like to discuss all sorts of cool, natural science and paleontological topics. Today, we're discussing a very relatable one, digestion.
David· Host0:40
I do it all the time. I'm doing it right now.
Will· Host0:42
Yep. In this topic, we will be discussing what digestion is, the different steps, the different organs that are involved, some of the diversity, some, some of the diversity- [laughs] ... as well as how we're able to study it in the fossil record. Digestion is a very cool concept that we will get a glimpse into the many, many ways organisms get nutrients.
David· Host1:08
Yeah, this is one of those topics that is fun 'cause you start out with a very personal understanding- Mm-hmm ... a very relatable understanding. Yes, this is how my body does it, and then you can spiral off into all of the fun directions of, well, here's how everybody else does it. Here's a bunch of ways it can vary. Here are the details you might not be familiar with. Here are the definitions.