h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

In parts of the eastern U.S., a very large brood of cicadas (Brood X) is set to emerge in May and create quite a racket.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/what-is-brood-x-us-cicada-infestation-coming-in-2021/

Are they edible? My daughter made cookies out of crickets. This earned her a master’s degree in human nutrition

- With the highest grade possible, adds the proud father

" The 17-year periodical cicadas about to emerge are considered a delicacy. You can have your cake and eat cicadas, too"

http://patch.com/us/across-america/billions-17-year-cicadas-emerging-spring-are-edible

http://www.edibleinsects.com/product/chocolate-covered-scorpion/
http://www.amazon.co.uk/CHOCOLATE-DIPPED-INSECTS-Crickets-Worms/dp/B00BISCBXW

My sister and bro-in-law once got my nephew a box of coated various insects for xmas

But! Apparently ? crickets are a better source of protein than beef (I think ? I've heard that ?)

You are right, Prof.

People have digested crickets, locusts and certain larvae for millennia. Not in our knick of the woods, though.

Since we are not used to eating insects it is expected that we may rear insects as food for domestic animals rather than eating them ourselves

Tarantulas, lizards, and turtles will eat crickets.

Pigs will eat almost anything. It is estimated that at any given time there are four times as many pigs as people in my country. We could stop importing soy beans. Some at least. Many would benefit from that. The climate also.

Each world culture has throughout history, has eaten certain foods etc that are "inedible" to others, part of nature as such.

I in Yorkshire love the "sea foods" of cockles and muscles(and to some even whelks etc "yuck")
But! I couldn't see me eating "escargot/snails" YET it's more or less the sane thing ?

Peanuts were once thought of as food for pigs.

Pigs still consider peanuts fit to eat. Wild pigs have been making the news for raiding deep south peanut plantations.

I went to a convention in Atlanta about 17 years ago. I was warned by well-meaning friends/relatives to beware the wild boars there. I did not see as much as the hair on one's chinny chin chin.

Prof, you might be surprised to learn how closely shrimps are related to cockroaches!
And

Spiders are arachnids. Just like scorpions, mites, and ticks. Arachnids belong to the animal group arthropods which also include insects and crustaceans (lobster, crabs, shrimp, and barnacles)

Would I eat Nah, not unless I was starving and there wasn't anything else. But I have a picture of my daughter devouring a candied tarantula just for the h*ll of it

Furry insects: bumblebess
Furry arachnids: tarantulas

black and orange, a nice combo.

Cicadas often have some oranges and blacks too, but no fur.

PierreCheers mate Post 12 opens my eyes to even more than I know about DNA and the links within species etc

Going back in time I could be eating long lost cousins etc ? bloody hell! I'm a cannibal

You are not wrong, Prof. We may all descend from the same single-celled being if I have understood correctly

My cousins the cicadas will not be invited to my house for dinner, however.

A cannibal had a guest who asked if it was okay if he stayed for dinner.

- Of course, came the answer ...

Going back to how we all descend from one mother cell:
By a weird coincidence one of my newspapers has an article about just that today.
I'll give you the first few lines:

Human history began 1.5 billion years ago when a large bacterium swallowed a small bacterium.
So much had to play together that it seems unlikely that life ever arose. But it did. Somewhere on an inhospitable planet, the first infant emerged and then lay for billions of years, swimming around and reproducing. Until a bacterium's small, ingenious invention wiped out almost everything
The first infant life was a simple bacterial-like matter - a very basic single-celled organism that did little more than lie and swim around and eat from its surroundings and divide to become more. A simple life it may seem to big, multicellular and self-centered beings like us - but life has to start somewhere.
And in fact, the life that arose - the mere fact that it arose - is far more spectacular than most anything else that has happened in the history of the universe.

Yep! Pierre spot on mate.

The starter "culture" was the "primordial soup" which grew to the amoeba single cell life-form and then What can I achieve if I expand and divide ?

Sounds exhausting if you ask me. Why would I aspire to evolve more at my age?