Disposable Aliens

An analysis of claims by a supposed molecular biologist on Reddit

Please note, I’ve clarified a few points based on Reddit feedback.

For those who don’t know me, I’m a biological anthropologist (PhD) with expertise in functional and evolutionary anatomy, and human evolution. I got my anatomy training in medical school level gross anatomy. I’m sharing some thoughts and analysis of the recent claims made on Reddit by an anonymous poster claiming to be a molecular biologist.

The larger argument is that the alien beings discussed (maybe the “greys”) are artificial and disposable. Here are some of the features claimed indicative of being artificial:

• Minimalist and condensed genome, no genetic “junk.”
• Fewer proteins coded, more efficient
• Elegant artificial DNA, unique chromosome structure

Points used to argue it’s disposable:

• No teeth, simple digestive system only for a liquid diet
• “Vestigial” mandible ( and other structures)
• Lacking bone cells that would allow repair and maintenance of bone
• Lacking many platelets, suggesting the being can’t clot and/or stop bleeding very efficiently

In the following sections I make commentary on the anatomical and physiological claims.

GROSS ANATOMY

Head

“There is a mandible, but the musculature is vestigial.”

An ongoing theme throughout these claims are that certain features of these creatures are vestigial. This would seem to contradict their discussion about genetics when the author says, “the result is a minimalist highly condensed genome.” The beings are highly refined yet retain “vestigial” structures.

Neck

The trachea and esophagus are claimed to be completely separate structures. The implication is that the beings would be able to swallow and breathe at the same time. Human adults are incapable of this, but our infants are. Most mammals can drink or swallow and breathe at the same time, although there trachea and esophagus does meet.

There are no vocal cords. Presumably this calls back to the idea that these creatures are telepathic, though telepathy isn’t mentioned in the claims. Instead there are “sacs” that allegedly make noise.

Eyes

“The size of their eyes suggests they have excellent night vision.”

It’s true that animals adapted to night vision often have large eyes. It’s unclear in this description how large the pupils are and other structures, but if those other structures are simply in proportion to the size of the eyes it may not make a lot of sense that this is night adapted. This description also strikes me as suspicious because it’s very similar to the “Alien Autopsy” video hoax.

But more importantly, if the bodies have been analyzed by experts one would think they’d know if they have excellent night vision. The author details structures of the eye (number of cones), so should also have been able to say something about the rods, which are involved in night vision.

Hands and Feet

“Their hands have four digits, including an opposable thumb on the medial side.”

In humans our thumb is on the lateral side (consider anatomical position). This statement would indicate the aliens’ thumbs are where our pinky finger is located (5th digit). Maybe the author means what they say, but this comment makes me think this person doesn’t have a good grasp of anatomical terminology. Medial thumbs would likely have other consequences to arm structure that aren’t described.

“Fingers are proportionally much longer than in humans. Unlike humans, finger musculature is entirely intrinsic to the hand. In other words, the muscles used to move the fingers are not in the forearms but entirely located in the hands.”

If flexion and extension muscles of the hand or phalanges are on the hand instead of the forearms, strength of grip would be weak. Strength and stability of the wrists would be compromised. It would be difficult to make room in the hand for these muscles (it’s actually rather preposterous) and still have a hand that functions like a hand. It wouldn’t have the full range of motion as human hands, and having long fingers would only exacerbate the weakness of the grasp.

“At first glance, the feet consist of just two digits, but a necropsy soon determined that each toe was made of two fused digits. The medial toe is marginally longer than the distal toe. The feet are relatively longer and narrower than in a human. Their musculature, however, is vestigial.”

The description of the medial toe doesn’t make sense in terms of anatomical terminology. If the medial toe (the big toe) is longest, then it is also the distal toe. I’m not sure what it means to say the musculature of the foot is vestigial. It doesn’t use its feet? This is nonsense. If the muscles are vestigial their feet would be non-functional. If their calf muscles are also located in the feet (similar to the hands) they wouldn’t be able to walk at all. They’d have to hop on their heels rather haphazardly (or whatever behaviorally to accommodate).

The consequence of vestigial/atrophied intrinsic muscles of the foot is that the arch would collapse. The foot wouldn’t be able to function as a relatively rigid structure to support the foot as weight first occurs with heel strike, then travels across the arch on the lateral side before shifting weight medially across the metatarsal heads, finally with toe-off at the medial (“big”) toe.

If this organism were designed efficiently why would so-called “vestigial” traits be added into its structure? If this thing is designed from the ground up, why would you add evolutionarily inefficient structures. And at that, in an area that needs those muscles crucially to get around.

In fact, by definition if this thing is designed it shouldn’t have vestigial traits at all.

Skeleton

“A transverse section of the bone reveals osteon and osteocytes. There appear to be few osteoblasts and no osteoclasts. This indicates that the bones are no longer growing and cannot absorb the minerals present or adapt mechanically to changes in posture.”

Without these bone cells it’s not clear how the bone is able to grow in the first place. This bone would be incapable of adapting to different stresses; any small crack or fracture would never be able to heal (or heal at a glacial pace). If this is supposed to be a feature to simplify the beings, to me it doesn’t make a lot of sense. One might think that at least having the ability to heal somewhat would be more efficient. Otherwise, it seems like they would have to be destroyed for relatively minor injuries.

The author notes that few bone cells indicate the bone isn’t growing, but any adult bone isn’t growing. That is assessed by relative fusion of the primary and secondary growth centers. To me it seems like pointing out this detail in the context to bone cells is also evidence of a hoax.

Further, the skeleton serves in humans and animals as mineral storage, among other things. But if bone cells aren’t doing their jobs, then calcium regulation would be upset. Animals normally have dynamic skeletons, adding and removing bone due to mechanical stress, saving or losing calcium for physiological processes, etc.

Biological System

“Blood flowing to the pulmonary capillaries via the pulmonary artery is pumped against the flow of air, maximizing gas exchange efficiency. The blood gas barrier is relatively narrow in these capillaries, at least compared to a human.”

These are nonsensical statements. Saying that the blood is pumped against the flow of air makes no sense (do they mean countercurrent, as pointed out by someone on Reddit? The language is too imprecise to know). Air isn’t flowing directly into capillaries (which isn’t how countercurrent works of course, but in human lungs countercurrent has low importance, relative pressures in the thorax and lungs are most relevant). In terms of the blood gas barrier, in humans this is already a single cell thick. How much thinner do you get?

“Platelets are present, but in smaller proportions than in humans.”

This would mean the beings have a weaker ability to stop bleeding (depending on how much lower, also there are other immune system responses to injury that are strangely not mentioned despite the relevance here). This doesn’t seem like an engineered trait that would be beneficial. A small injury might cause one of these things to bleed out. It would be like having an army of hemophiliacs.

The system described for getting rid of waste also doesn’t seem advantageous. The beings would produce no solid waste, only urine-like waste that for some reason the designers thought would be a good idea to flush out to the surface of the skin. Just in terms of hygiene and maintaining a clean environment this seems strange. Especially when presumably another system that produced highly concentrated urine might be cleaner and more efficient.

The significance of saying the beings have more type I muscle fibers is that these muscle fibers are slow twitch. Slower reaction time but greater endurance. Having fewer fast twitch muscles would mean they aren’t so great at bursts of activity.

LAST THOUGHTS

Perhaps compared to some of the other areas in these claims (that I haven’t commented on here as they are outside my expertise), the anatomy and physiology seems particularly incoherent and functionally impossible. These beings have a host of traits argued to be either minimalist, vestigial, or both. Vestigial structures aren’t consistent with a being that has been highly efficiently designed. Vestigial structures are present in creatures that have evolved. To the extent creatures have vestigial structures at all, which does have some controversy. Presumably if their DNA was designed, you wouldn’t have issues separating linked traits or those that had undesirable interactions. This would argue against “vestigial” traits hitching along.

The description of anatomy seems to be fabricated from somebody who doesn’t understand basic anatomy. The changes in muscle location in the hand would severely hamper the entire function of the arm and strength of the hand and wrist. Having vestigial muscles in the feet would make the feet completely useless. Although not mentioned, if the flexors and extensors of the toes are also located on the foot, this would cause similar problems to those in the hand. Gait would be awkward, probably hopping from heel to heel, and with poor balance (or some other behavioral compensation for a weak non-functional foot).

For all of the reasons presented in this discussion I think the claims are a hoax.