if there were human/avian hybirds then...?

Question

where would the air sacs be?
below the lungs?
random question..

oooooooops! i mean hybrids!!
sorry!

yeah i know you cant mix them or anything..
im just wondering..

geez people:
Wings on the back so the torso is vertical..
and I thought this was a simple question!!!!!
can someone just answer it?!?!
Thank you.!

Answer 1

I'm sorry - it's not really a simple question.

You can't just take humans and birds and mate them and produce a hybrid (hybird *lol*) so there would have to be some other sort of way they were produced ... evolution or maybe an engineered design - taking a human and putting bird features in by adding the DNA to make certain cells like the growth of feathers on the skin instead of hair - or perhaps the other way around, taking a bird and putting human features in.

So lets have a bit of a thought play.

(1) take a human - manipulate the DNA so we have bird-like features - the question is how birdlike do you want? I guess with the air sacs and such you want flight (big ask).

We'd need:
o Hollow bones and a lighter skeleton
o Bigger arm muscles - smaller and lighter legs
o Feathers instead of hair - lots of arm feathers
o Could you get by with human lungs? We'd have problems at high altitude (but thinking about what we've got I don't think we're going to get to high altitude!). Wouldn't need air sacs if we were going to keep human lungs.
o Where would the air sacs be, I guess we could program them to grow just about anywhere. If we were going to have air sacs we'd need to change the lungs instead cos we'd want to lighten the load and not have 2 sets of respiratory apparatus - we'd need parabronchi instead of alveoli in our lungs and probably would put the air sacs under the wings to be powered by arm movement. We wouldn't need a diaphragm if we had air sacs.

Couldn't we just take the easy option and have a feathery human flightless bird that lays big eggs? :)

(2) If you took a bird and wanted to change that to be more human you'd probably keep the air sacs where they currently are and not develop lungs (for the same ideas discussed above).

Have a look at the wikipedia picture of a Harpy (old Greek Myths and Legends creature).

Answer 2

Doesn't this depend on what you think the basic design of the organism would be? Wings on the back so the torso is vertical, or attached at the side so torso is horizontal?

Answer 3

Nonsense. And it is spelled hybrid. Humans and birds can not breed.

Answer 4

Well of course, they'd all be bird brains.