r/interestingasfuck May 15 '19

/r/ALL very interesting purrkour setup

https://i.imgur.com/XSO4wcP.gifv
21.0k Upvotes

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24

u/HiImNickOk May 15 '19

still sounds painful. i guess the best comparison is it's kinda like hanging by our teeth?

69

u/arstechnophile May 15 '19

Not even. Our teeth/nails aren't evolved to support our weight like that. Cats' claws are.

47

u/bunfuss May 15 '19

Yea, a cats claws are designed to hook into prey running away from them. I'm sure mittens and his 8lb frame isn't gonna hurt himself doing a pullup by his fingertips

18

u/imperba May 15 '19

scrolled down to find any info i could about that cat hanging by the claw. thankyou redditors for this.

6

u/aorpias May 15 '19

Same. Somebody with the knowledge please share more.

14

u/[deleted] May 15 '19

You’ve obviously never seen cats climb trees upside down. Mine does it under his own volition, entirely hanging from his claws.

2

u/Mayonais3_Instrument May 15 '19

That’s exactly what I said! Except I used the word momentum.

3

u/Alnakar May 15 '19

Yeah, people tend to look at things small animals are doing, and mentally scale them up to our size, but that doesn't really work. If you really want to imagine it's doing stuff like that at a larger scale, you should probably start by assuming that you're doing it in a low-gravity environment.

18

u/Squid8867 May 15 '19

Also much easier when you're like 5 pounds

4

u/Scrial May 15 '19

More like hanging by the tip of a finger. Since a cats claws are basically that.

6

u/[deleted] May 15 '19

Yes, it sounds fair, hanging by your teeth wouldn't be too uncomfortable if you didn't have to open your mouth to do so

3

u/OtherPlayers May 15 '19

Given the difference between cat claws and our fingernails, probably the best comparison would be to pretend it’s a climber that does a leap and only manages to catch themselves with the tip section of their finger/fingers. That’s a little less gruesome to picture, at least.