Nails are just vestigial claws.
Nails are just vestigial claws.
23 comments
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Vestigial may not be the correct word. We do use our nails quite a lot for finer manipulation of tools
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It also serves to enable very precise grip in a way that a blunt fingertip couldn't (pinching something very tiny), to enable us to scrape things, and to protect the fingertip from injury. It definitely isn't vestigial.
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I mean... nails on our hands definitely have a function, yes. But they only serve those functions because they're not proper claws. If we actually had claws, we wouldn't manage such fine manipulation.
I think that's more like a happy accident though. I was more thinking about toenails. My late father's (RIP stubborn bastard) nails definitely were closer to claws than nails.
And that made me think of elephant toes. Did you know elephants are basically tiptoeing all the time, btw? It just very much doesn't look like it.
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And teeth may have* developed from scales (no joke!) ;)
Edit: added * as a result of the information below (thank you, again!)
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As are hooves.
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True enough.
Ever thought about how those work in the womb? They're not hard to begin with and covered with a "capsule" (which is the same thing biologically we have at the base of the nail; the eponychium is the thickened layer of skin at the base of the fingernails and toenails. It can also be called the medial or proximal nail fold.
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23 comments