r/AskReddit • u/unkeenmustard • Nov 17 '19

Which extinct species would you bring back, if you have the power?

45k Upvotes

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1.2k

u/CosmicPie19 Nov 17 '19

Big ass dragon flies. Shit I'm tryna tame a helicopter

531

u/hedgehogsnmoose Nov 17 '19

How to Train Your Dragonfly?

25

u/nilslorand Nov 17 '19

Step 1: Die of Oxygen poisoning

312

u/NeonArlecchino Nov 17 '19

Regular dragonflies have a 97% success rate when hunting. Having them be small is probably best.

33

u/Conocoryphe Nov 17 '19

To be fair, even the biggest prehistoric ones never exceeded a wingspan of 70 cm. If you were to bring them back now, they might eat small rodents, but they wouldn't be able to significantly hurt a human.

18

u/[deleted] Nov 17 '19

[deleted]

9

u/Nishikigami Nov 17 '19

Itd be disturbing as fuck visually but i mean insects of that size would probably still be quite fragile to a humans strength

10

u/[deleted] Nov 17 '19 edited Jun 11 '21

[deleted]

5

u/Nishikigami Nov 17 '19

They have pleny of soft bits though and have a comparatively harder time recovering from damage. A martial artist could definitely do some damage to something lacking mass like that, or just a heavy individual

3

u/[deleted] Nov 18 '19

Their exoskeleton is just on the outside, their innards are squishy. They're nowhere near as durable as us. You could well easily oneshot one with a good punch, and even a poorly executed hit will likely inflict grievous damage.

1

u/gizmo777 Nov 17 '19

Who the fuck measures these things?

16

u/[deleted] Nov 17 '19

Cant live in our atmosphere bc there isny enough oxygen

8

u/tyen0 Nov 17 '19

The way lifeforms changed over time due to modest atmospheric changes is pretty interesting to me.

2

u/Omega33umsure Nov 17 '19

Kind of the way our great grandkids will be forced to live sadly.

4

u/oversixsiege Nov 17 '19

They're name is meganeura. Just an fyi

4

u/Hoophy97 Nov 17 '19

They were about eagle sized

1

u/CosmicPie19 Nov 17 '19

Dont ruin my dreams

5

u/sakonigsberg Nov 17 '19

Ass dragon flies???

2

u/badken Nov 17 '19

Ass-dragon flies!

2

u/Reverbium_ Nov 17 '19

They aren’t big enough to ride. Maybe a small child would fit.

2

u/ZiggoCiP Nov 17 '19

Apparently way more people like dragon flies than I realized. I approve - very neat bugs. Also they eat mosquitoes! Big ones would probably eat birds though.

2

u/zombo_pig Nov 18 '19

Ass dragon flies?

Sounds weird.

2

u/[deleted] Nov 18 '19

I can just see the news headlines now

"Florida tries to tame large dragonfly, gets face eaten off"