evolution-3

An eight-panel comic. A large green alien explains evolution to a woman. The alien says all spacefaring species got their intelligence during a brief phase when larger, more powerful brains were selected for, and that this ecological configuration is so rare it seldom occurs more than once per planet. The woman asks, 'So, we're special?' The alien replies humans aren't just special, they're unique: bipedalism creates a trade-off between running ability and the size of a cranium that can fit through a female's hips at birth. It says nature gave humans the same sapience as all minds in the universe but then capped human mental expansion 'due to butt size constraints!' The alien continues that humanity's inability to deny its love of big butts is the voice of evolution begging for enough room to fulfill its greatest destiny, but the evolutionary window closed: butts held their ground and brains languished. In the final panel, shown as silhouettes, the alien says, 'And that is why there's never been an ape farther out from Earth than the Moon.' The woman replies, 'And here I thought it was budget stuff.' Votey: a hand-drawn off-panel speech bubble reads 'It was worth it!' while a woman's face stares back with a deeply disgusted, unimpressed expression.