Haha, I didn't mean it quite so literaly. But generally when I hear/read people giving generalised examples of evolutionary history, it often involves the fish leaving the sea at some point.

Thinking about it though, it depends if fish existed before mammals or not, as they definitely have a common ancestor.

/me goes check

Yeh, so the current understanding is that we have a common ancestor with fish, being a chordate, which can be both vertebrate and invertebrate. But that's a rather subjective take on when evolution left the sea.

It's not easy to find a phylogenic tree with a marker saying which species left water first.

/more checking

So what I meant by "fish jumping out of the sea and sprouting legs" were the tetrapods, which evolved from chordates leading to out of water compatible lungs; then fins to limbs etc.

However, they weren't the first creatures out of the sea. There were arthropods for starters (invertebrates, which also became insects).

My point was really that I can see this type of creature (an echinoid) evolving to be amphibious before either the arthropods or tetrapods; mostly because they would have a simpler path of evolution to be able to do so.

>> ^BoneRemake:

>> ^L0cky:
People talk about fish jumping out of the sea and sprouting legs as part of evolution. I think it'd make more sense to be something like this.

Where the F have you heard of people believing fish sprouted legs and thrust themselves out of the water ? Pro Tip: do not hang around those people.

Same logic: What are we then?

I was gonna say that Crocs haven't really changed much since the Cretaceous, but that would actually be a little bit of a lie. They are quite complex really, its just that their outward appearence is much the same, well, because water hasn't changed much. They adapted to be an amphibious ambush predator, the design worked 80ish million years ago, it still works.

This is the Canadian Army attempting to make an amphibious assault on a beach. All island nations can take a sigh of relief knowing Canada doesn't have the capability to wage warfare on them.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'ice, manitoba, selkirk, winnipeg, canada, flood, floating backhoe' to 'ice, manitoba, selkirk, winnipeg, canada, flood, floating backhoe, amphibious' - edited by calvados

The legs are more like very simple hydraulic muscle than legs. This same type of thing is what will eventually power human augmentation exosuits. Rather than big pistons they will use woven micropiping that flexes and counterflexes just like human physiology.

As for 24 legs, many many legs is how you get a very stable moving platform. Applications besides the obvious like moving space shuttles and delicate buildings around would be mobile buildings, mobile cities, amphibious aicraft carriers, etc.

So cute! Will pay for a 1/10th scale domesticated clone of the worlds largest land (Amphibious?) predator.

An elephant would be gross, and I already have minitigers!

Amphibious? Aren't those supposed to float? I'm pretty sure that thing was UNDER water when it got close to the far bank. Maybe it was being pulled by a cable and was unpowered.

Wiki "amphibious vehicles". Your WTF? has been canceled.

>> ^Dignant_Pink:
um, sharks are fish, not amphibians. sorry to be that guy, but come on, that one's easy.


Yes, you are correct. Sharks are not amphibious and have never been, but in the make-believe world I created before I wrote that sentence they were quite clearly mastering land and air.

Also to PuffyJacket45 concerning;
"* The shark was swimming directly upward, not toward any surfer. Probably chasing some smaller prey"

It's a Spinner shark
"It is capable of vertical spinning leaps out of the water as a feeding technique in which the shark spins through a school of small fish with an open mouth and then breaks the surface"

Wow, I want one. I wonder if they'll have a 2 seater (or does it fit 2)?

*edit*

From www.airventure.org:
The two-seat amphibious sport plane is made of carbon fiber and is powered by a 100-hp Rotax 912 ULS engine. Its retractable landing gear allows for land and water operations. Other features include a sports car-like cockpit, MP3 port, and patent-pending Seawing platform for easy access and docking on water.

Estimated price for the standard model is $139,000, and the company is accepting refundable deposits on orders through its website, www.iconaircraft.com. The company initial deliveries to begin in late 2010.

>> ^waxxx:
Inflation in Germany was one of the prime factors of the fall of the national socialism party. Hitler had many pipe dreams, spoke a lot empty phrases and often held gatherings that were tailored to be energized by packing small venues. I often wonder why he didn't attack other English countries such as Britain?


Um, dude, you wanna, I dunno, study history a bit?

If not for British kickass fighting in the air, a full sea/land invasion would've occured.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Britain
"Had it been successful, the planned amphibious and airborne landings in Britain of Operation Sealion would have followed. The Battle of Britain was the first major campaign to be fought entirely by air forces. It was the largest and most sustained bombing campaign attempted up until that date. The failure of Nazi Germany to destroy Britain's air defence or to break British morale is considered its first major defeat.[7]

Neither Hitler nor the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) believed it possible to carry out a successful amphibious assault on the British Isles until the RAF had been neutralised. Secondary objectives were to destroy aircraft production and ground infrastructure, to attack areas of political significance, and to terrorise the British people into seeking an armistice or surrender. Some historians, such as Derek Robinson, have argued an invasion could not have succeeded; the massive superiority of the Royal Navy over the Kriegsmarine would have made Sealion a disaster and the Luftwaffe would have been unable to prevent decisive intervention by British cruisers and destroyers, even with air superiority"

Post World War 2 the Japanese were forced to undergo a massive force reduction under Article 9, to be reconstituted as the JSDF. From Wiki:

Japan's Basic Policy for National Defense stipulates the following policies:

1. Maintaining an exclusive defense oriented policy.
2. To avoid becoming a major military power that might pose a threat to the world.
3. Refraining from the development of nuclear weapons, and to refuse to allow nuclear weapons inside Japanese territory.
4. Ensuring civilian control of the military.
5. Maintaining security arrangements with the United States.
6. Building up defensive capabilities within moderate limits.

Japan's USD $44.3 billion/year budget makes it the fifth largest military spender in the world, after the United States, Germany, United Kingdom and France. About 50% of that is spent on the personnel and the rest is split on supplies, new weapons, upgrades, etc. [7] Reflecting a tension concerning the Forces' legal status, the Japanese term 軍 (pronunciation: gun), referring to a military or armed force, and the English terms "military", "army", "navy", and "air force" are never used in official references to the JSDF.

Article 9

In theory, Japan's rearmament is thoroughly prohibited by Article 9 of the Japanese constitution which not only states, "The Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes", but also declares, "land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained." In practice, however, the Diet (or Parliament) which Article 41 of the Constitution defines as "the highest organ of the state power", established the Self-Defense Forces in 1954. Due to such a constitutional tension concerning the Forces' status, any attempt at enhancing the Forces' capabilities and budget tends to be politically controversial. Thus the JSDF has very limited capabilities to operate overseas, lacks long range offensive capabilities such as long-range surface-to-surface missiles, air-refueling (as of 2004), marines, amphibious units, or large caches of ammunitions. The Rules of Engagement are strictly defined by the Self-Defence Forces Act 1954.

VTOL is not only fuel ineffcient, it also limits your take off load. So if the plane is full combat equipped it will not take off vertically. Instead it will use STOL since Harrier is a V/STOL fighter. It's taken off of a LHD (USMC amphibious assault ship).

"that is the plane is amphibious, not the pilot"
lol liked that

I recall seeing this before somewhere and the comments suggested that he was having engine trouble which is what kept dropping him in the drink (certainly the first time he goes in, it really looks like the helo is falling rather than being flown down). The pilot's trying to power out of there towards the end, trying to use forward momentum as well as lift, when the rotor hits and goodnight Irene.

The helo's also supposed to be amphibious, so they say (it's an Mi-14), but I still can't imagine that it's made to bob around on the ocean for very long.