History Main / WeWillNotHaveAppendixesInTheFuture

* This trope was facetiously employed in ''PhilOfTheFuture'' when Phil ran into a problem: he would have to be seen barefoot to stamp tomatoes in a farm on a class trip, but in his time, no one has pinky toes. To quote Phil's mother [[SciFiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale "They won't lose their pinky toes for another 70 years."]] Ironically, pinky toes are actually used for balance.
* In ''TheBigBangTheory'', Sheldon argues that his pinky toes and lateral incisors are smaller than average, indicating that he is a more advanced form of humanity, a "''homo novus''", and thus is too evolved to learn how to drive. Leonard would beg to differ, but doesn't bother.

[[ArtisticLicenseBiology Evolution is a result of natural selection]], and there isn't much evolutionary pressure against having an appendix. If something is truly vestigial, there is little advantage in getting rid of it so evolution will be ''particularly'' slow in getting rid of vestigial organs, if it gets rid of them at all. Whenever a feature becomes useless to an animal it does tend to slowly disappear since genetic mutations that lead to its degeneration are not weeded out by natural selection. There is also the issue of the resources, minor as they presumably are, that the animal uses to grow these useless features; there is therefore some benefit to losing these vestiges, but there's not much in it.

* Also parodied in ''TheSimpsons'', where a news report says that scientists predict people will evolve an additional finger in the future. Characters on the show have only three fingers and a thumb on each hand.

* Some people don't grow wisdom teeth.
** [[InvertedTrope On the opposite end,]] some people don't need to get them pulled.

* If presence of appendix among the human population decreased until only a testimonial number of people had it, it would become what in Biology is known as Atavism. Horses with lateral toes and whales with leg bones are among the best known examples.

* In MikhailAkhmanov and Christopher Gilmore's ''Literature/CaptainFrenchOrTheQuestForParadise'', the titular protagonist has 2000 years ([[TimeDilation subjective time]]) or 20,000 years (objective time) over his new wife, who is only in her 50s (but looks 20 thanks to the omnipresent cure for aging). The first thing he does after taking her onboard his ship is to have her examined by the ship's AutoDoc. The doc revealed something horrible to French - she still has an appendix. Angry at the carelessness of her home planet's religious fanatics, he has the AutoDoc remove the "offending organ" despite the fact that there was ''nothing wrong with it''.

A note on the appendix itself: The appendix has historically been thought a useless, vestigial or even [[RupturedAppendix dangerously]] [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appendicitis self-destructive]] organ, but ScienceMarchesOn - it's still considered vestigial, but not necessarily useless. In the last few years scientists have begun to suspect that it is actually important to the body, as a reservoir of the "good bacteria" species that populate the colon and are necessary for digestion. When the colon's population is thrown out of whack by infection, diarrhea, or the like, the bacteria "hiding" in the appendix can recolonize it and return the necessary balance. There are also suggestions that this reservoir is used in training the immune system of babies and young children. It's still a lot easier to live without one than it is to live without most of your other organs, but it does seem to serve a useful (if non-vital) purpose. This is what we would expected from evolution; if you have something useless hanging around, it can be repurposed. Moreover a smaller appendix might more easily become infected, putting up a barrier to its fading away and selecting for a larger appendix.

Incidentally, shouldn't the plural of appendix be appendices?

* In MikhailAkhmanov and Christopher Gilmore's ''Literature/CaptainFrenchOrTheQuestForParadise'', the titular protagonist has 2000 years ([[TimeDilation subjective time]]) or 20,000 years (objective time) over his new wife, who is only in her 50s (but looks 20 thanks to the omnipresent cure for aging). The first thing he does after taking her onboard his ship is to have her examined by the ship's AutoDoc. The doc revealed something horrible to French - she still has an appendix. Angry at the carelessness of her home planet's religious fanatics, he has the AutoDoc remove the "offending organ" despite the fact that it there was ''nothing wrong with it''.

* In MikhailAkhmanov and Christopher Gilmore's ''Captain French, or the Quest for Paradise'', the titular protagonist has 2000 years ([[TimeDilation subjective time]]) or 20,000 years (objective time) over his new wife, who is only in her 50s (but looks 20 thanks to the omnipresent cure for aging). The first thing he does after taking her onboard his ship is to have her examined by the ship's AutoDoc. The doc revealed something horrible to French - she still has an appendix. Angry at the carelessness of her home planet's religious fanatics, he has the AutoDoc remove the "offending organ" despite the fact that it there was ''nothing wrong with it''.

* [[StarTrek Vulcans]] as a species lack appendixes. No reason for it... they just... do...

A note on the appendix itself: The appendix has historically been thought a useless, vestigial or even [[RupturedAppendix dangerously]] [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appendicitis self-destructive]] organ, but ScienceMarchesOn - it's still considered vestigial, but not necessarily useless. In the last few years scientists have begun to suspect that it is actually important to the body, as a reservoir of the "good bacteria" species that populate the colon and are necessary for digestion. When the colon's population is thrown out of whack by infection, diarrhea, or the like, the bacteria "hiding" in the appendix can recolonize it and return the necessary balance. There are also suggestions that this reservoir is used in training the immune system of babies and young children. It's still a lot easier to live without one than it is to live without most of your other organs, but it does seem to serve at least a non-vital purpose. This is what we would expected from evolution; if you have something useless hanging around, it can be repurposed. Moreover a smaller appendix might more easily become infected, putting up a barrier to its fading away and selecting for a larger appendix.

A note on the appendix itself: The appendix has historically been thought a useless, vestigial or even [[RupturedAppendix dangerously]] [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appendicitis self-destructive]] organ, but ScienceMarchesOn - it's still considered vestigial, but not necessarily useless. In the last few years scientists have begun to suspect that it is actually important to the body, as a reservoir of the "good bacteria" species that populate the colon and are necessary for digestion. When the colon's population is thrown out of whack by infection, diarrhea, or the like, the bacteria "hiding" in the appendix can recolonize it and return the necessary balance. There are also suggestions that this reservoir is used in training the immune system of babies and young children. It's still a lot easier to live without one than it is to live without any of your other organs, but it does seem to serve at least a non-vital purpose. This is what we would expected from evolution; if you have something useless hanging around, it can be repurposed. Moreover a smaller appendix might more easily become infected, putting up a barrier to its fading away and selecting for a larger appendix.

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** While it is not employed in Part 3 of ''Literature/TheGodsThemselves'', the eugenics-conscious moon government ''wants'' to use genetic engineering to get rid of various organs they consider unnecessary, like molars (the artificial food of the Moon requires little chewing).

* Creator/IsaacAsimov employed this trope in ''A Pebble in the Sky'' where Imperial officials realize the main character is a time traveler by the fact he has wisdom teeth and an unusually large appendix. Justified by the fact [[spoiler:Earth was covered in radiation after a nuclear war]], which would increase mutation rates vastly. How much time passed between the "present" in ''A Pebble in the Sky'' (1950s) and the Empire is disputed in the Robots/Empire/Foundation fanbase.

** While it is not employed in Part 3 of ''TheGodsThemselves'', the eugenics-conscious moon government ''wants'' to use genetic engineering to get rid of various organs they consider unnecessary, like molars (the artificial food of the Moon requires little chewing).
** The interesting thing about this trope in Asimov's works is that he is a biochemist; where, exactly, this trope pops up is purely a property of ScienceMarchesOn.

** While it is not employed in Part 3 of ''The Gods Themselves'', the eugenics-conscious moon government ''wants'' to use genetic engineering to get rid of various organs they consider unnecessary, like molars (the artificial food of the Moon requires little chewing).

** In the episode "Lady Bouvier's Lover," Homer is worried that Abe marrying Marge's mother would make him and Marge brother and sister, and as a result turn the kids into "...horrible freaks with pink skin, no overbites, and five fingers on each hand!"
*** For those who never seen this episode, right after Homer says this, the camera points at the kids, who instead of being drawn in the Simpsons style, are drawn "horrifically" normal.