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Biology/Speculative biology of Lovecraft's "gugs," if they were real creatures

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Expert: - 3/11/2010


Question

Gug
Hello,

Maybe it has something to do with my unusual kind of high-functioning learning disability. I know that despite being very interested in speculative biology and enjoying works like "Barlowe's Guide to Extraterrestrials," "What Does a Martian Look like?" and "The Science of Extraterrestrials," I have to be careful of the risk of offending people by mentioning hypotheticals that might be thought pointless.

I am frightened that I will give some offense, but at least I noticed that you responded to somebody's speculative question by mentioning the idea of silicon-based organisms. And so, if you do not mind, here is my question:

For several years I have tried and tried to put aside this question of how the world might look to Lovecraft's "gug" beings if they were real. I would like to emphasize that this image was purchased fairly as part of the "Sci-Fi & Fantasy Clip Art" CD by the now-defunct company called simply CD Titles, and the license agreement says that it is legal to use or share anything on there however one wishes, as long as one does not claim to own the picture, and does not use it for profit. I say this so that I will not be wrongly found to have violated the policy on plagiarism. Gugs are described as having mouths that are oriented VERTICALLY instead of horizontally, and with large eyes optimized for light collection in dark caves. In the particular artist's conception by Marcus J. Ferrari, you will see that the gug's eyes are forward-oriented in the way that would be binocular for a human, are iridescent yellow as if with a tapetum, and are NOT slitted like those of a reptile, but have standard pupils in them. There a two eyes, on the left and on the right in a predator animal configuration like a human, but the heavily toothed VERTICAL MOUTH is the MIDDLE. The span of the mouth is all the way up the face, the size and proportions are not the same as a human.

This probably requires some suspension of disbelief, at least as this artist has chosen to depict it with what seem to a hybrid of mammal and reptile characteristics -- shaggy hair for insulation against cold, and yet scaly characteristics also. In this, it reminds me a little bit of a pangolin, but only a little bit.

In particular, I wonder about the gug's vision, and it's brain. As I understand it, the fixed distance between the eyes of a predator is one of the things that the brain takes into account in order to have steady depth perception, stereopsis, field of view that does not change all the time etc.

Thus, depending on when and how much the gug opened and closed its mouth, wouldn't the distance between the eyes change, causing the gug's depth perception to consequently have a huge change as well? Supposing that the gug can even DO binocular fusion -- I hypothesize that he probably can, for he is a dangerous predator -- do you think that a proportionally large part of the gug's brain would have to be devoted to this processing? Put another way, if there were a version of a Penfield homunculus that was for a gug, the relative size of the eyes on the Penfield homunculus would be huge, correct? If the gug wanted to see something farther or closer, he would have to "mouth squint," would he not? The depiction seems to show the gug's head and oral cavity with a slightly "beaky" curvature that projects forward-- and so, slightly similar to a toucan, but rotated 90° -- an oral cavity of almost a spherical shape, which means that in order to accommodate that cavity, the distance between the anterior and posterior regions of the skull must be quite large. I wonder wether the gug's large brain is in the rear, or as high as ours, or much lower, perhaps with only a small part in the cranium itself. I suppose that gugs were engineered as sentry creatures, and did not evolve naturally. I also suppose that they cannot see color. I would be fascinated to hear what you think about these things.

Thanks very much,

Julian

Answer
Hi Julian
I see you have been giving serious thought to this topic. And this Gug is new to me I was at one time a follower of Lovecraft. You are trying to apply the physiology of earth mammals to a mythical creature and your hypotheses are as good as any I could think of.. That is the beauty about fantasy.  Any conclusion you wish to make undoubtedly has merit.

Walter Hintz

Expertise

Science teacher for over 50 years. MSc. in biology. I can answer questions in general biology, zoology, botany, anatomy and physiology and biochemistry.

Experience

I have a MSc in biology and have been a science teacher for over 50 years. At present I am a faculty member at a college and a science consultant at seven catholic schools.

Publications
The Ohio journal of Science
Momentum-The Journal of the Catholic Education Association

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