S[ub]lime

May 12, 2023 7:03 AM

Culturally, an ambivalent relationship with the ambivalent slime persists. On the one hand, we view it as abject and rank—a sign of decay, death, rot, the feminine; indeed, Sartre famously despised it—but on the other, we find it exciting and amusing. from Creatures That Don’t Conform by Lucy Jones

Slime Moulds (Myxomycetes) photos by Barry Webb

posted by chavenet (20 comments total)

I don't want to disparage an earnest and thoughtful piece, but my god it also reads like a creeping horror short story, right down to the end. The slime mold is IN HER!
posted by praemunire at 7:10 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

In the photos, the first one has an oddly worshipful aspect to it.
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:26 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

Ever had a McNugget...
posted by sammyo at 7:31 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

Ok ok, they deny.

Semantics?

(ya, don't go looking at the picture in the news article, and DO NOT google pink slime ;-)
posted by sammyo at 7:36 AM on May 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

Slime mold solves maze puzzle
posted by y2karl at 7:41 AM on May 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

I have similar feelings about fungi. Amazing and under-appreciated.

Egon Spengler knows what’s up.
posted by leotrotsky at 7:45 AM on May 12, 2023 [7 favorites]

See also Clans of the Alphane Moon by Philip K. Dick featuring an intelligent Ganymedian slime mold named Lord Running Clam, subject of the rapidly oozing away Amazon best seller Ganymedian Slime Mold On Tour.
posted by y2karl at 8:04 AM on May 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

BTW, Barry Webb's photographs are things of beauty indeed. Now if only he had taken some of mouldy figs.
posted by y2karl at 8:25 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

<3
posted by Sublimity at 10:50 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

There's also a fairly gross scene in MeFi's Own jscalzi's Old Man's War involving some pretty aggressive slime molds.
posted by Halloween Jack at 10:51 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

Beautiful writing.

Big fan of these critters/critter adjacent lifeforms.
posted by Artw at 11:13 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

The Last of Us title sequence is actually all slime molds, ie NOT FUNGI.
posted by Artw at 11:15 AM on May 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

Now I really want to find a way to take macro / micro photos with my phone
posted by rebent at 11:29 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

There are add-on macro lenses for the iPhone that I hear are decent but have never used myself.
posted by praemunire at 12:05 PM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

So beautifully written! And I love how at times the prose breaks down into poetry, an echo of the way the slimes defy categorization. Also, those photos are so gorgeous and otherworldly
posted by treepour at 1:23 PM on May 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

Wow the photos, so beautiful! Experimental glass art, jewelry, candies, a few cookies--definitely cookies with a cocoa crackle--more glass art, mystical little domiciles. Yah I want a better camera/lens set up too!
posted by winesong at 2:00 PM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

Obligatory ZeFrank (a twofer!):
The Smartest Slime
The Self-Sacrificing Amoeba

I got macro add-ons for the wife's phone which were pleasing while not being too pricey. It was disappointing to find that they no longer fit when she upgraded the phone.
posted by polecat at 2:26 PM on May 12, 2023 [3 favorites]

I was irritated the article didnt have a link to this:

...showing that plasmodium can solve various complex problems, such as finding an optimal way home through mazes, or, famously, mapping the car and rail networks of Tokyo more efficiently than humans are able to.

So here you are: Slime Mold Grows Network Just Like Tokyo Rail System
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:22 AM on May 13, 2023 [1 favorite]

I'm not here to yuck your yay! about slimes, but I've always felt very uneasy at best about them since reading Silverberg's short story, "Symbiont" as an impressionable kid. Nope, nuh-uh, nada, no way.
posted by Fiberoptic Zebroid and The Hypnagogic Jerks at 7:44 AM on May 13, 2023 [1 favorite]

There's an amusingly quirky British documentary called The Creeping Garden about slime moulds.
posted by sneebler at 7:01 AM on May 14, 2023