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clipka · Joined: 04 Nov 2008 Posts: 254

DrNo wrote:

The egg shells must be weak enough for the babies to be able
to break them up, but if the shells were too uniformly weak, there
would be too much of a chance for them to be broken up in the
uterus due to internal collisions.

Are you aware that eggs are much easier broken from the inside anyway?

Like concrete, chalk can sustain very much pressure, but is very poor at withstanding "pulling" forces.

clipka · Joined: 04 Nov 2008 Posts: 254

DrNo wrote:

clipka wrote:

However, the slightly conical shape has the benefit of a roling eggs moving in a circle instead of a line...

That looks more like a side effect, but still interesting.

That's far from being just a side effect. It's striking how many sea birds nesting in steep cliffs have eggs of such extremely conical shapes.

Nature has found perfection there, too.

DrNo · Joined: 03 Jan 2009 Posts: 395

clipka wrote:

Are you aware that eggs are much easier broken from the inside anyway?

Sure... but suppose we want the shell of a spherical egg to be
as strong as the ovoid version, then it would need a much more
rigid material, because a sphere cannot support as much pressure
due to its weak shape.

In this case, would the babies be able to break through
this sphere even from the inside?

_________________
DrNo

DrNo · Joined: 03 Jan 2009 Posts: 395

clipka wrote:

That's far from being just a side effect. It's striking how many sea birds nesting in steep cliffs have eggs of such extremely conical shapes.

Nature has found perfection there, too.

Fine, I give you that. This aspect is also very likely to be
part of the "algorithm" in the first place.

I'd say a very nice observation. We know a sphere is too
weak, but an elliptic shape would still have enough strength.

However, an egg is ovoid, so slightly conical.

_______

You know what? This is why I don't believe in natural
selection... it doesn't make any sense to me that nature
would "try" anything...

I can't imagine nature trying a few template shape
for eggs.

"The spherical ones were too weak and were always falling
down the cliffs, so such species didn't survive.

Only the ovoid-egg-based species have survived."

Yeah sure... that sounds like childish reasoning...

_________________
DrNo

clipka · Joined: 04 Nov 2008 Posts: 254

DrNo wrote:

Sure... but suppose we want the shell of a spherical egg to be
as strong as the ovoid version, then it would need a much more
rigid material, because a sphere cannot support as much pressure
due to its weak shape.

Actually the sphere is the most robust shape of all.