why are bugs and worms so horrifying to us?

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this question has kinda interested me for a while - nearly everyone i know has a pretty visceral reaction to these things: even if they're not actively scared of them, they wouldn't want to spend an hour or two flipping through a book with huge pictures of them. but WHY do most of us feel that way? is there some scientific or psychological explanation?

i think it's got something to do with the way bugs and worms seem to lead such pointless, small, repetitive lives - we tend to humanize cats and dogs (they're cute and furry), and even lizards and fish (they're cute and scaly), but bugs just seem so remote from everything we imagine "life" to be that we find it kind of disturbing that they're alive at all. in fact, the bigger/more detailed-looking they are (centipedes, tarantulas), the scarier they are! as a kid, i remember being petrified of leeches, despite the fact that i've never actually seen a leech. just the idea of this creature that existed solely to suck blood and nothing else was unimaginably horrifying.

with worms, well, it could be the fact that they don't have legs, but since i've never found snakes scary or creepy, i'm thinking it's more the fact that they don't have EYES. brrrrrr.

the only bugs i can think of that don't seem that creepy are butterflies/moths and ants. the former because, yknow, they're kind of pretty (tho they're still yucky-looking close-up) and the latter because they seem intelligent and neat.

― J.D. (Justyn Dillingham), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 08:42 (twenty years ago)

haha is this cuz of ade's noizeboard thread?

― j blount (papa la bas), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 08:48 (twenty years ago)

ugh yeah i made the mistake of trying to watch that centipede-eats-mouse shit.

― J.D. (Justyn Dillingham), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 08:50 (twenty years ago)

T/S: Too many legs vs. Not enough legs

― Dadaismus sinks his soul in Mother Nature's bower (Dada), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 10:00 (twenty years ago)

http://us.movies1.yimg.com/movies.yahoo.com/images/hv/photo/movie_pix/walt_disney/a_bug_s_life/bugs.jpg

― David Orton (scarlet), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 10:04 (twenty years ago)

Not afraid of worms:
http://www.scifimoviepage.com/images/tremors.jpg

― Hello Sunshine (Hello Sunshine), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 11:54 (twenty years ago)

Because they eat our bodies when we are dead.

― phil d. (Phil D.), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 11:55 (twenty years ago)

"evolutionary psychology thing: bugs can be deadly or carry diseases, so it's natural for us to avoid them."

― rory@, Tuesday, 28 March 2006 12:01 (twenty years ago)

bugs don't die, they multiply

― send your men of science quick (Jody Beth Rosen), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 12:04 (twenty years ago)

I wish I had a copy of Ivor Cutler's "I Believe In Bugs" to hand:

Lying in the silken ground one day,
I shall sense the buggies wriggle as they eat me away
Singing "I believe in bugs,
I truly believe in bugs,
I truly believe in bugs"

― Dadaismus sinks his soul in Mother Nature's bower (Dada), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 12:07 (twenty years ago)

repeating something doesn't make it true JD!!

http://www.queenhomeschool.com/productpages/images/maneatingbugs.jpeg
("bugs" includes worms in this book)

― mark s (mark s), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 18:47 (twenty years ago)

I would never fuck that woman.

― the bug-eating bitch, Tuesday, 28 March 2006 19:02 (twenty years ago)

Insect posse will be crushed

― Washable School Paste (sexyDancer), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 19:09 (twenty years ago)

"evolutionary psychology thing: bugs can be deadly or carry diseases, so it's natural for us to avoid them."

otm

― gypsy mothra (gypsy mothra), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 19:43 (twenty years ago)

that is a fascinating article.

― s1ocki (slutsky), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 20:03 (twenty years ago)

that article is awesome XPOST

― Houdini Gordonii (ex machina), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 20:04 (twenty years ago)

Because they eat our bodies when we are dead.

Yeah, that's pretty much it. Worms = decay. It's a learned thing, too -- an infant won't know to avoid maggot-covered meat.

― Gilbert O'Sullivan (kenan), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 20:07 (twenty years ago)

you know that from experience?

― s1ocki (slutsky), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 20:09 (twenty years ago)

I read things.

― Gilbert O'Sullivan (kenan), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 20:09 (twenty years ago)

I don't truck with no infants.

― Gilbert O'Sullivan (kenan), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 20:09 (twenty years ago)

but you party with maggot-covered meat?

― s1ocki (slutsky), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 20:11 (twenty years ago)

seems to me the main reasons are a lack of identifiable features to empathize with - they're completely different biologically than we are. No facial features, segmented bodies, multiple limbs, no lungs, that kind of thing. Really the only readily identifiable thing we have in common with them is our social structures and behavior...

(I can't say I'm particularly repulsed by close-ups of bugs - I find lots of that stuff fascinating)

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 20:28 (twenty years ago)

those ain't bugs

― s1ocki (slutsky), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 20:32 (twenty years ago)

click here for fun

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CL2hetqpfg&eurl=

― -rainbow bum- (-rainbow bum-), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 21:11 (twenty years ago)

has anyone ever read "The conquerer worm" by Stephen R Donaldson?

― AaronK (AaronK), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 21:49 (twenty years ago)

they are the only creatures who won't die after atomic bomb/when the ice eon will arrive (bugs)

― human flyy, Tuesday, 28 March 2006 22:08 (twenty years ago)

That giant centipede is FUCKING HORRIBLE.

― chap who would dare to be a stone cold thug (chap), Tuesday, 28 March 2006 22:11 (twenty years ago)

three years pass...

These fucking earthworms keep crawling under the door and into my damn apartment every time it rains. I hate them.

You are assholes, worms

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Friday, 31 July 2009 05:26 (sixteen years ago)

They're stupid as shit. They crawl like two feet and realize theres no moisture in my house and then dry up and die like stupid assholes.

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Friday, 31 July 2009 05:27 (sixteen years ago)

And then leave their shitty worm corpes for me to scrape of the floor. I fucking hate you, worms.

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Friday, 31 July 2009 05:27 (sixteen years ago)

this apartmint is fucked up and its like whiney is a crul ringmaster

― estela, Friday, 31 July 2009 05:37 (sixteen years ago)

What I hate most about worms is that they don't know how to use apostrophes. Fucking worms.

― never name anything coolpix (kenan), Friday, 31 July 2009 05:40 (sixteen years ago)

Also, Whiney: consider weatherstripping.

― never name anything coolpix (kenan), Friday, 31 July 2009 05:40 (sixteen years ago)

"the only bugs i can think of that don't seem that creepy are butterflies/moths and ants. "

ladybugs are pretty awesome.

― Matt Armstrong, Friday, 31 July 2009 09:21 (sixteen years ago)

And ants are creepy on a number of levels.

― never name anything coolpix (kenan), Friday, 31 July 2009 09:25 (sixteen years ago)

a woman i like was telling me she saw, truly properly saw, a cockroach's dear little kind face when she was tripping and she realised she had always been very wrong about them.

― estela, Friday, 31 July 2009 09:33 (sixteen years ago)

While tripping? Wow. I can't imagine doing that. I might possibly see a cockroach for what it truly IS, and deeply appreciate and admire it, the way the robot in Alien admires the alien, but dear and kind? Cockroaches are not kind. They have too few intentions at all to be kind.

― never name anything coolpix (kenan), Friday, 31 July 2009 09:37 (sixteen years ago)

They can, however, eat just about anything but metal. That's a helluva adaptation.

― never name anything coolpix (kenan), Friday, 31 July 2009 09:38 (sixteen years ago)

i wasn't converted by her story.

― estela, Friday, 31 July 2009 09:40 (sixteen years ago)

I don't think she really took acid. "Groovy roaches" sounds more like mushrooms.

― never name anything coolpix (kenan), Friday, 31 July 2009 09:47 (sixteen years ago)

Did anyone else have the Butterfly Ball book when they were kids? So weird to me when I was six.

http://static.guim.co.uk/Guardian/books/gallery/2008/oct/08/booksforchildrenandteenagers/page53-5504.jpg http://static.guim.co.uk/Guardian/books/gallery/2008/oct/08/booksforchildrenandteenagers/page59-5947.jpg

― Joerg Hi Dere (NickB), Friday, 31 July 2009 09:48 (sixteen years ago)

i think it was mushrooms xp

― estela, Friday, 31 July 2009 09:54 (sixteen years ago)

I dunno - different hallucinogens do different things for different people.

― free jazz and mumia (sarahel), Friday, 31 July 2009 10:02 (sixteen years ago)

But acid is always more hard-edged and analytical. That's one of the things that can easily become unpleasant about it.

― never name anything coolpix (kenan), Friday, 31 July 2009 10:16 (sixteen years ago)

Did anyone else have the Butterfly Ball book when they were kids?

Wow, it's been so long since I thought about that book. My brother and I had it as kids and I remember staring at the illustrations for hours, they were so lush and peculiar. A Google image search reveals that the illustrator Alan Aldridge was, amazingly, also responsible for the picture of Penelope Tree that Felt used as the cover for The Splendour of Fear.

Looks like the book got a fairly recent reprint, may have to pick one up for nostalgia's sake.

― Bill A, Friday, 31 July 2009 12:28 (sixteen years ago)

Just has a GIS myself, hadn't twigged that he was the same guy who did record covers for the Who, Elton John etc. Some great book covers too!

― Joerg Hi Dere (NickB), Friday, 31 July 2009 12:55 (sixteen years ago)

nine years pass...

https://www.rt.com/news/434375-frozen-worms-alive-siberia-permafrost/

Two worms that have been frozen in permafrost for up to 42,000 years have come back to life, and are now considered the oldest living animals on the planet, in what is being described as a major scientific breakthrough.
The ancient nematodes (aka roundworms) are “moving and eating” again for the first time since the Pleistocene age, after coming back to life in Petri dishes, according to a new study by a team of Russian scientists in collaboration with Princeton University.
“We have obtained the first data demonstrating the capability of multicellular organisms for longterm cryobiosis in permafrost deposits of the Arctic,” wrote the study’s authors.

― j., Saturday, 8 December 2018 18:21 (seven years ago)

Russian scientists are already working on a plan to insert them in the brain of the next asshole elected as President of the USA.

― Monica Kindle (Tom D.), Saturday, 8 December 2018 18:25 (seven years ago)

We've got them beaten.

― Sanpaku, Saturday, 8 December 2018 20:55 (seven years ago)

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