Arthropods in culture Arthropods in culture Culture consists of the social behaviour and norms in human societies transmitted through social learning. Arthropods play many roles in human culture, including as food, in art, in stories, and in mythology and religion. Many of these concern insects, which are important both economically and symbolically, from the work of honeybees to the scarabs of Ancient Egypt. Other arthropods with cultural significance include crustaceans such as crabs, lobsters, and crayfish, which are popular subjects in art, especially still lifes, and arachnids such as spiders and scorpions, whose venom has medical applications. The crab and the scorpion are
History of Animals in specific characters (Book VIII). To illustrate the philosophical method, consider one grouping of many kinds of animal, 'birds': all members of this group possess the same distinguishing features—feathers, wings, beaks, and two bony legs. This is an instance of a universal: if something is a bird, it will have feathers and wings; if something has feathers and wings, that also implies it is a bird, so the reasoning here is bidirectional. On the other hand, some animals that have red blood have lungs; other red-blooded animals (such as fish) have gills. This implies, in Aristotle's reasoning, that if something