his (assuming he?) existence can be compared to that of Carcinisation. some species just always evolve into crabs, some always evolve into amorphous tar blobs that embody evil.

One head-type-thing and four limb-type-things, with only two being primarily locomotive, makes that more humanoid than not on an intergalactic body plan scale.

We are very bad at thinking up truly alien life.

and yaphit might have been a reason why orville ran out of budget and was not renewed 😆

But without hands, those shrimp people aren't going to be able to do much in the way of tool use, which limits their space-faring prospects. If you're not a warp-capable species, you're basically nobodyl. I feel like you at least need to kick off the tech-tree with fire and banging rocks together. Fire means air, which means terrestrial locomotion, and tetrapod seems like the most elegant form for that to take off (three legs on the ground while one moves). Banging rocks together means two hands, which assuming we're developing from a tetrapod, means bipedalism.

Sure there might be some tungsten-based shrimp people who achieve warp through telekinesis or something suitably Traveler-esque, but that kind of hyper intelligence doesn't exactly lead to involving oneself in the petty squabbles of lesser life forms. They might exist, but they wouldn't be characters Starfleet would interact with regularly.

Another instant upvote for Viagra Boys!

That is so good!

https://youtu.be/BCV6paTXyCU?list=RDBCV6paTXyCU

If you're gonna go back, go WAY back!

yeah, I guess that's also why the trill designs changed, the various Klingon forms, etc

TNG S6:E20 - The Chase

Picard's old archaeology professor is found murdered, the crew try to complete his research. Soon, the crew must compete with Romulans and Klingons and Cardassians to uncover the truth behind his discoveries.

The truth was an ancient species who planted seeds of DNA all over the galaxy, which is the reason they all kind of look alike.

Well...how about this:

the race of Beforeians seeded inhabited worlds. So the entire biosphere happened on its own from cyanobacteria up to wooly mammoths and shit, and then the beforeians seed the planet with hominids.

If life didn't evolve on Earth, the Beforeians wouldn't have seeded it. Just like they didn't seed Mars or Venus.