Tortoises Memes

The perfect bell curve of chelonian knowledge! The left side shows novices who can't tell a box turtle from a snapping turtle, happily pointing at tortoises and shouting "turtle!" The peak represents zoology professors who've spent decades studying taxonomic distinctions and will absolutely die on the hill of "ACTUALLY, tortoises are terrestrial testudines with elephantine feet while turtles have webbed appendages for aquatic locomotion!" And then... the enlightened right side of the curve—experts who've transcended pedantry and embraced the biological reality that tortoises are indeed just a specialized subset of turtles. The taxonomic equivalent of "well yes, but actually no." The circle of knowledge is complete when you realize we're all just arguing about shell-dwelling reptiles while they slowly outlive our entire species.