The theme of the upcoming 35th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize ceremony is DIGESTION. Some humans think of digestion mainly in terms of their own experience, either as eating food or as being food. To expand the mental and digestive horizons of one of those people, suggest to them that they read, or at least chew on this study:
“Always Chew Your Food: Freshwater Stingrays Use Mastication to Process Tough Insect Prey,” Matthew A. Kolmann, Kenneth C. Welch Jr, Adam P. Summers, and Nathan R. Lovejoy, Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, vol. 283, no. 1838, 2016, article 20161392.
“Complex prey-processing behaviours have been thought to be lacking in fishes and other vertebrates, despite the fact that many of these animals feed on tough prey, like insects or even grasses. We investigated prey capture and processing in the insect-feeding freshwater stingray Potamotrygon motoro using high-speed videography. We find that Potamotrygon motoro uses asymmetrical motion of the jaws, effectively chewing, to dismantle insect prey. However, CT scanning suggests that this species has simple teeth. These findings suggest that in contrast to mammalian chewing, asymmetrical jaw action is sufficient for mastication in other vertebrates. We also determined that prey capture in these rays occurs through rapid uplift of the pectoral fins, sucking prey beneath the ray’s body, thereby dissociating the jaws from a prey capture role.”
Here is further, visual, detail from that study:
